INTROSECTIONS

“Once upon a time, maternity clothing was all bows, floral patterns, and muumuus. While it has evolved in the last few decades to include body-conscious styles that flaunt (rather than hide) “baby bumps,” it’s remained mostly conventionally feminine.

The founders of the new line Butchbaby want to change that. Vanessa Newman, a digital strategist, and Michelle Janayea, a design student at Columbia College in Chicago, are creating an alternative to hyperfeminine maternitywear aimed at LGBTQ folks who are starting their own families.”

SUPPORT FOG, A SHORT FILM ABOUT BEING BLACK AND MENTALLY ILL

Fog follows Valerie, a successful Black female attorney, who must navigate a major career move and the return of her college-aged daughter while hiding her deteriorating mental health. The film includes a 90s sitcom kinda like The Fresh Prince or The Cosby Show within it that reflects how people see Valerie and her personal expectations parallel to her turbulent interior life. It’s a project that I’m really passionate about and am so excited to shoot this summer as a part of the AFI Directing Workshop for Women.

At its heart, Fog is the story of millions of African-American women across the country. Mental illness is still something of a taboo in the African-American community. While over 17 million Americans suffer from some form of mental illness, only 12 percent of African-Americans living with a mental disease are diagnosed. As an African-American woman who has faced life with depression, I wanted to tell this story, a story that I have heard from countless other African-American women of different ages and walks of life, and give this issue the platform it desperately needs.

Andrea Smith, Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide (2005)

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In Conquest, Smith places Native American women at the center of her analysis of sexual violence, challenging both conventional definitions of the term and conventional responses to the problem.

Beginning with the impact of the abuses inflicted on Native American children at state-sanctioned boarding schools from the 1880s to the 1980s, Smith adroitly expands our conception of violence to include environmental racism, population control and the widespread appropriation of Indian cultural practices by whites and other non-natives. Smith deftly connects these and other examples of historical and contemporary colonialism to the high rates of violence against Native American women—the most likely women in the United States to die of poverty-related illnesses, be victims of rape and suffer partner abuse.

Hillary Clinton vows to end mass incarceration in the wake of Baltimore protests 

Underground Sketchbook Zine - Volume 1 - Black Women Matter

This zine is dedicated to black women. Read the stories of 11 black women who have been killed by law enforcement. Know their names. See their faces. Remember their stories.

Read online or donate to get a copy mailed to you! We recommend that $5 covers printing and shipping costs. By donating to our group you will help fund our future social justice art endeavors. Learn about what your donation will help support here.

This is indefensible.

Here are 13 figures that illustrate how bad health care access for women of color in our country really is.

136%. How much America’s maternal mortality rate has increased between 1990 and 2013.

Colorlines reports that the United States jumped from a rate of 12 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births to 28 per 100,000 — all in the span of 23 years. That’s twice the rate of Saudi Arabia, and three times that of the United Kingdom. The primary reason cited is a lack of access to quality insurance and adequate medical resources.

3-4. The number of times higher the national maternal mortality rate is for black women than white women. This figure has held relatively steady for the past 40 years, according to the CRR report.

94. The number of black maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in Fulton County, Ga., which includes the city of Atlanta. 

That’s more than three times the national average. The rate for white women in the same county is “essentially zero,” according to Colorlines, i.e., “too insignificant to report.”

77%. How much higher the maternal mortality rate is in states with higher populations of people living below the poverty line, when compared to states with smaller impoverished populations, according to Colorlines (citing a 2010 Amnesty International report). 

Low-income populations in the U.S. are disproportionately made up of black, Latina and Native American women. The report claims these disparities are especially apparent in Southern states with high black and Latino populations, namely parts of Georgia, Mississippi and Texas.

1. The number of clinics in the state of Mississippi that provide abortions. Mississippi’s population is 37.4% black and nearly 25% poor — significantly higher than the national average for both categories.

19. The number of states (including almost all in the South) that have opted out of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Needless to say, this is disturbing: Expanding Medicaid would allow for unprecedented access to affordable contraception for low-income women, and women of color in particular.

This is important for one key reason: Contraception is not only a vital component of effective family planning, but according to some, a proven means of combating poverty. 

72%. The percent decrease in women receiving health care services in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley over the past few years, Colorlines reports. The region has recently become “ground zero” for America’s ongoing debate around treatment of immigrants without documents for the U.S., originating primarily in Mexico and Central America.

70%. How much greater the likelihood thatan immigrant woman of reproductive age will lack health insurance, as compared to her U.S.-born peers. This figure has a clear racial bent: Most immigrants to the U.S. come from either Mexico or Asia.

5. The number of years immigrants must wait before they’re eligible for Medicaid under federal law. Texas, home to the nation’s second largest Latino population, makes them wait even longer, according to Colorlines.

1 in 3. How many Native American women will be sexually assaulted or raped in their lifetime, according to the Center for American Progress. That’s 3.5 times higher than any other racial group. An added problem hereis that federally funded health care facilities on reservations — where about 30% of Native Americans live — lack the capacity to treat and care for victims: CAP reports that women often must travel hundreds of miles just to receive a rape kit and STI screening. 

35.1. The number of new black female AIDS cases per 100,000 women age 13 and over in 2009, according to a 2011 National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report. Compare that to 7.9 casesfor Hispanic women and 1.5 for white women.

66%. The percentage of new female HIV cases nationwide which black women comprise. Forbes reports that HIV/AIDS is now the leading cause of death among black women age 25-34.

4.3. The cervical cancer death rate per 100,000 among black women nationwide — twice the rate for white women. The difference is so stark it has attracted the attention ofresearchers, who examined the disparity by focusing on the state of Maryland and published their findings in PLOS ONE health journal.

Among their troubling discoveries: Between 1999 and 2008, black women were far more likely to receive radiation or chemotherapy as their only form of treatment, regardless of their stage of cancer. White women, on the other hand, were significantly more likely to receive “multi-modality treatment,” incorporating surgery, chemo and radiation, andresulting in higher survival rates.

Researchers concluded the disparity is rooted in a few key factors. Oneis the lack of health care access for black women; the other is a deliberately discriminatory approach to treatment from medical practitioners.