Commentary

Commentary – Racial Injustice, Domestic Violence and the Shelter Movement

Published

4 years ago

September 24, 2020

Racial injustice negatively impacts the fight against domestic violence and intimate partner abuse so this is a good moment to examine policies, procedures and historical practices and the way in which they impact black families.

Even though Black women are more likely to suffer domestic violence than other groups, racism exists in the institutions designed to support them.

According to Linda Ammons, a longtime dean of the Widener School of Law, “A study of the shelter movement in America led a researcher to conclude that Black women are ignored in the policymaking, planning, and implementation of shelter service.”

My work with survivors started in the early 1980s at an Oakland shelter led by white women, housing predominately Black clients. In my early experiences working on the crisis hotline, I got calls from Black women complaining about being evicted or rejected from white-led shelters.

Many Black women have left shelters or have been excluded due to misunderstandings about cultural differences. “African American women hesitate to seek help from shelters,” continued Ammons, “because they believe that shelters are for white women. Because the shelters are associated with the women’s movement, and many Black women are estranged from women’s politics, they may feel that only white women’s interests are served in the shelters.”

Today, many of these shelters continue to reflect white norms, and few Black women are represented in national leadership.

The other aspect facing Black survivors is racism in the criminal justice system. Historically, even in situations where Black women are living in an unsafe home, they have refrained from calling the police. Black women feel they are doing ‘harm’ to Black men and the Black community by involving law enforcement.

The courts, by incarcerating a disproportionate number of Black men and women survivors of domestic violence, reinforce this level of distrust.

Feminista Jones in Time magazine wrote: “As Black people, we don’t always feel comfortable surrendering “our own” to the treatment of a racially biased police state and as women, we don’t always feel safe calling police officers who may harm us instead of helping us.”

It is difficult to combat domestic violence in Black communities where women and their children have been taught to keep silent.

Domestic violence programs, most serving vulnerable populations, are now dealing with both the impact of COVID-19 and the reality of centuries of systematic, institutional racial oppression.

But what we must do now is build practices that support Black survivors. We invite all to join in our fight to end this societal epidemic that ravages our Black families.

Our job at A Safe Place is to lift up the voices of our Black sisters and brothers as we combat domestic violence while creating a zero-tolerance of such behavior to make the world a better place for our most precious resource, our children.
Carolyn Russell, MA, MSW, is a 30-year veteran advocate and policymaker in the Battered Women‘s Movement. For 26 years she has served as the executive director of A Safe Place, the City of Oakland’s first battered women’s shelter and comprehensive domestic violence prevention and support services organization.

Michelle Snider

Associate Editor for The Post News Group. Writer, Photographer, Videographer, Copy Editor, and website editor documenting local events in the Oakland-Bay Area California area.

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Associate Editor for The Post News Group. Writer, Photographer, Videographer, Copy Editor, and website editor documenting local events in the Oakland-Bay Area California area.

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Commentary

Opinion: Lessons for Current Student Protesters From a San Francisco State Strike Veteran

How the nation’s first College of Ethnic studies came about, bringing together Latino, African American and Asian American disciplines may offer some clues as to how to ease the current turmoil on American college campuses over the Israel-Hamas war. After the deadline passed to end the Columbia University encampment by 2 p.m. Monday, student protesters blockaded and occupied Hamilton Hall in a symbolic move early Tuesday morning. Protesters did the same in 1968.

Published

6 hours ago

May 3, 2024

Oakland Post

iStock Photo

By Emil Guillermo

After the deadline passed to end the Columbia University encampment by 2 p.m. Monday, student protesters blockaded and occupied Hamilton Hall in a symbolic move early Tuesday morning.

Protesters did the same in 1968.

That made me think of San Francisco State University, 1968.

The news was filled with call backs to practically every student protest in the past six decades as arrests mounted into hundreds on nearly two dozen campuses around the country.

In 1970, the protests at Kent State were over the Vietnam War. Ohio National Guardsmen came in, opened fire, and killed four students.

Less than two weeks later that year, civil rights activists outside a dormitory at Jackson State were confronted by armed police. Two African American students were killed, twelve injured.

But again, I didn’t hear anyone mention San Francisco State University, 1968.

That protest addressed all the issues of the day and more. The student strike at SFSU was against the Vietnam war.

That final goal was eventually achieved, but there was violence, sparked mostly by “outside agitators,” who were confronted by police.

“People used the term ‘off the pigs’ but it was more rally rhetoric than a call to action (to actually kill police),” said Daniel Phil Gonzales, who was one of the strikers in 1968.

Gonzales, known as the go-to resource among Filipino American scholars for decades, went on to teach at what was the positive outcome of the strike, San Francisco State University’s College of Ethnic Studies. It’s believed to be the first of its kind in the nation. Gonzales recently retired after more than 50 years as professor.

As for today’s protests, Gonzales is dismayed that the students have constantly dealt with charges of antisemitism.

“It stymies conversation and encourages further polarization and the possibility of violent confrontation,” he said. “You’re going to be labeled pro-Hamas or pro-terrorist.”

That’s happening now. But we forget we are dealing not with Hamas proxies. We are dealing with students.

Gonzales said that was a key lesson at SF State’s strike. The main coalition driving the strike was aided by self-policing from inside of the movement. “That’s very difficult to maintain. Once you start this kind of activity, you don’t know who’s going to join,” he said.

Gonzales believes that in the current situation, there is a patch of humanity, common ground, where one can be both pro-Palestine and pro-Israel. He said it’s made difficult if you stand against the belligerent policies of Benjamin Netanyahu. In that case, you’re likely to be labeled antisemitic.

Despite that, Gonzales is in solidarity with the protesters and the people of Gaza, generally. Not Hamas. And he sees how most of the young people protesting are in shock at what he called the “duration of the absolute inhumane kind of persecution and prosecution of the Palestinians carried out by the Israeli government.”

As a survivor of campus protest decades ago, Gonzales offered some advice to the student protesters of 2024.

“You have to have a definable goal, but right now the path to that goal is unclear,” he said.

About the Author

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. A veteran newsman in TV and print, he is a former host of NPR’s “All Things Considered.”