Race, Gender And Homosexuality

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“Ours is a time of uneasiness and indifference” (Mills: 7). With the #BlackLivesMatter movement, the Supreme Court’s decision on marriage equality, and a the fact that a woman could be the next president of the United States (following an African American man), society today is one where the ideas of race, gender, and sexuality are constantly being tested and more people are joining into the conversation through social media and other outlets. Through this influx of social involvement, it is important to have a clear understanding of these three categories: race, gender, and sexuality. You could open up Wikipedia and get a textbook definition, but it is important to understand where these definitions came from and how society, overtime, has…show more content…
Heterosexuality is the norm in our culture and, through different social practices, is formally and informally reinforced. The idea of “homosexuality” is a newer, Western concept and has come to the forefront in today’s world. “Sexuality… has become an increasingly important social and political as well as moral issue” (Weeks 1986:32). Religion has entered into the realm of sexuality due to homosexuality and common idea of sexuality being on a spectrum. With people like Ruby Rose and marriage equality being legalized, the norms of heterosexuality are being…show more content…
One of them being that we get a glimpse at the different social positions these intersections have, giving us access to knowledge that we would neglect if we viewed race, gender, and sexuality exclusively. From “A Black Feminist Statement”, we see that if we just look as gender as “female” v. “male”, we neglect the unique struggles of a Black woman or a gay man. Black feminists can connect to White women in the sense that they share similar anatomy, but they have a different race and often a different class. Black woman can then connect with Black men at the levels of race and class, but their gender separates them. By looking at the intersection of being Black and being a woman, we can go “beyond white women’s revelations because we are dealing with the implications of race and class as well as sex” (Moraga- Anzaldua: 213). Doing this, allows us a more complex understanding of what it means to be a woman, what it means to be Black, and, ultimately, what it means to be a Black woman in today’s
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