User:Mixedgrrl



== www.askthisblackwoman.com AskThisBlackWoman ==

Black Woman (Kym Platt) is a loud mouth politico/writer hailing from Ohio and living in the Lower East Side of NYC.

All of her life she have been hyper-politicized, especially when it came to race and racial discrimination. Being biracial (white mom, black dad) gave her the ability to see how race was played out in America in a very intimate way. In her school library in the seventh grade and she was fascinated by a foreign-sounding word on the spine of a book. She stared at the book for several minutes, trying to pronounce the word; feeling drawn to the word's power. Finally she went to the book, took it down from the shelf, opened it and began to read about a governmental system of oppression by a minority of whites that enslaved blacks who were among the majority in this particular population. The word was "apartheid". This event and the first time she read Toni Morrison's Beloved as a teenager sealed her fate forever and thus began a life of racial obsession. Kym Platt went on to study African-American Studies and Zulu at The Ohio State University and traveled throughout the African continent. She moved from Ohio to New York City in August of 2000 with the desire to start her own publication for mixed-race people. Living in New York shifted her political and personal focus from mixed-race issues (although not entirely) to issues that pertain to African-American people. She began to see just how bleak the political and social situation was for black people living in this country, and felt she needed to do something about it. For a while, she believed that just "showing up" was good enough to make an impact when it came African-American issues in non-African-American environments. If she went to protest the war in Iraq, people would see that blacks were politically active in the anti-war movement…their voices would be heard. She thought being an African-American organizer would be enough in a labor movement that has abandoned African-American people. Her presence would represent a silenced black voice, but she quickly learned that if you speak up too often or too loudly about African-American issues, you will lose your job. Even as she participated in the local political groups in her neighborhood she began to realize that her very presence was enough for folks to justify not reaching out to other black people. She was the token African-American, and for "them" that was enough. Kym Platt felt very alone in her role as token black person, and I began to think of ways to get young African-Americans politically motivated and organized around issues that affect her community, like HIV and AIDS, poverty, over-sexualized images, violence, drugs, incarceration, etc. When socializing with her Filipino and Latino friends and seeing the amazing energy and passion with which they organized their folks, fighting tirelessly for justice and the end of racial discrimination, she felt inspired to organize within her community. Kym Platt looked around the African-American community and saw a whole lot of complacent people, no longer politically active, or believing all they need to do was vote, if they voted at all. She saw a community that valued the pretense of wealth and propagated sexual stereotypes of black men and woman that promoted promiscuity and hyper-sexualized behavior. She saw a people being devastated by poverty, obesity, and diseases that include AIDS, diabetes, and cancer. Only 50% of African-Americans receive a high school diploma. Joblessness rates in some cities reach 50% and about half of the nation’s 2.2 million prisoners being black. But she also saw a whole bunch of disgruntled folks like herself, educated, talented, compassionate, dedicated and completely voicelessly. Kym Platt believes that Black America as a whole doesn't have a political voice. Well, that's not entirely true. Black America has a mainstream political voice that is completely out of step with the needs of the African-American community. Folks like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have out lived their usefulness. They neither appeal to the larger black community, nor do they understand the more modern political complexities of Black America. Jesse and Al are our Civil Rights icons, and instead of desperately holding on to their current leadership roles, they should work to cultivate new progressive African-American leaders. There is no political voice for young people of African descent (those of us under 40) who think critically about issues of race and discrimination and yet want to participate in an energetic political movement that focuses on the political needs of the African-American community. A new generation of African-Americans who find the rigid conservatism of mainstream black politics to be limiting as well as silencing. There are plenty African-Americans, perhaps millions, that want to create a better world for black people, and we should be neither silenced, nor constrained, but encouraged and supported. New generations of African-American leaders need to rise up and begin to fight against the injustices that are inflicted upon our people. With Ask This Black Woman Kym Platt wants to provide political analysis and cultural criticism in an attempt to both educate and agitate African-Americans. She wants to amplify the voice of young disgruntled and disaffected African-Americans and create a space for allies to join us. With Ask This Black Woman she is seeking to create, not only a forum for political thought and criticism, but a place where folks can be outraged enough to begin to organize in the African-American community and along the way make connections with others who want make a political impact.