Complications with Respectability Politics

Dear goddaughter,

It is good to hear from you–especially since you went to college and don’t know how to call home. I miss your voice and our conversations.

I’d like to address your comments in your last letter about my “brand of feminism operating within the ‘politics of respectability.’” Also, when you said, “‘respectability politics’ never did us any good or got us anywhere.” First of all, whatever that white lady teach you in her feminism class ain’t gospel. I will only warn you once: do not address me out your neck through a letter– especially on account of what some white lady you just met told you.

I grew up in Greenville, Alabama on a little piece of land. It was my brothers, sometimes my daddy, and always my mama. I was good to my mama. I worked hard. I went to school. I went to church. I was taught modesty through scripture, redemption through song, and protection through the body of Christ. My mother and I held on to this because we knew there was a chance none of it mattered.

Because my father wasn’t around, men would always make advances at my mother–and sometimes me. Whenever one would get a little too close and you would see the aggression in their eyes...all you could do is pray to God they would remember you were a respectable lady. You would hope they would see you in your white and think you were an angel. That they would see your vessel as worthy of respect and sanctity.  

Some men think it their birthright to occupy our bodies and our homes. Not my body. Not my home. My respectability is all I had to resist certain intimate dangers. You are right. It did not work all the time. When you are a domestic working for white families, they laugh at the thought of a respectable, colored gal.

Nothing is perfect in this life. Only God’s love. I used respectability politics as a chance to determine how people would see me. And yes, that did me a whole lot of good. That feminism class can’t teach you that.

Second of all, be careful of forming judgements so early about the people who have loved you without inviting us into the conversation. When you are studying African American women in your classroom filled with white children, remember you are also talking about me. And my life. African American women are women of great complications and great dignity. Remember where you come from.  I love you.

Yours,

Rosa