Both sides are correct: Black women are right to want husbands and a traditional family; feminists are correct when they argue that making the US a more liberal welfare nation would pull many black women and their children up out of poverty—with or without said black women having a partner.

The point is that black women wanting husbands and feminists wanting a welfare state are really two separate issues—and the way that feminists often try to argue to black women that in lieu of seeking husbands black women should instead seek a welfare state is dismissive of the needs and desires of black women.

So once again, black women and feminists end up talking past each other.

Feminism is not opposed to women having heterosexual relationships with men: “Women with heterosexual preferences need to know that feminism is a political movement that does not negate their choices even as it offers a framework to challenge and oppose male sexual exploitation of women (Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center, bell hooks)”

History will always be written by those who bothered to show up. The agenda will always be set by those who attend the meeting. And by black women’s continual rejection of both their invitation to attend the feminist meeting, they are accepting the continued marginalization of black women’s needs and interests both within the feminist movement and within the world at large

And yet, feminism the movement and feminists the people are not perfect. There is room for tremendous growth within the feminist movement and the voices of black women with different viewpoints are appreciated and needed. If black women want to be understood then they must speak up.

“Women must begin the work of feminist reorganization with the understanding that we have all (irrespective of our race, sex, or class) acted in complicity with the existing oppressive system. We all need to make a conscious break with the system. Some of us make this break sooner than others. The compassion we extend to ourselves, the recognition that our change in consciousness and action has been a process, must characterize our approach to those individuals who are politically unconscious. We cannot motivate them to join feminist struggle by asserting a political superiority that makes the movement just another oppressive hierarchy. (Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center, bell hooks)”