As seen in the past, most protection-seeking women are usually unemployed, with most of them being poor. Shelters that serve them fail to address not only the violence faced by the women from the barterer, but also the other habitual dominations that interfere with the lives of these African-American women. Therefore, this prevents them from coming up with substitutes of the abusive relationships that sheltered them initially (Crenshaw 1143). Limited access to resources among the black female immigrants in America facilitates their continued stay in battering relationship, since they are scared of being deported. In addition to this, cultural barriers deter them from reporting such cases.
The vulnerability of immigrant women is also intensified by the fact that they are fully dependent on their spouses in matters like their legal statuses, and it is worse to those who experience language barrier, that is, the women who are non-English speakers (Crenshaw 1251). According to reports from counselors, a greater percentage of resources endowed to African-American women must be utilized in solving other problems as opposed to the rape case itself (Richie 96).
This is due to shortage of funding. These problems are intensified by the fact that the centers of rape cases will consume the greater portions of the resources to accompany them to courts, despite the fact that the cases of the colored women in America have minimal chances of being pursued in their judicial systems. Their resources are always misdirected.
African-American women also face discrimination in prison. In the recent past, limitations of race and gender have eliminated the possibility of associating domestic torture with that of the public one. State violence against women has been a topic of debate in the recent past (Davis 335). Most women have come up with organization to fight gender-based violence against women through politics, religion and other social institutions. Many women have shared their experiences in order to enlighten other women on how to defend themselves against such cases like rape and domestic violence.
Embracing identity politics has been of great help to individuals of different color, lesbians, and gays within African-Americans; however, it does not bring out the differences but the opposite situation. What is more, it ignores the disparities among different groups and, as a result, race and class identity dimensions shape the violence experiences of these African-American women (Davis 350). Sexism as well as racism affects the life of individuals in their day-to-day lifestyles as they rarely affect practices of antiracism and feminism.
The intersectionality concept can be used to explain multiple means through which gender as well as race affects the black women’s experiences in employment in America. This aimed at illuminating that the experiences of the blacks are not cocooned in discrimination of gender and race. The boundaries between sexism and racism are well understood although they still affect black women at an epic proportion as they are victims of both sexual and racial discrimination. The existing ideas about a woman being excluded from the public punishment hindered reforms that protested against the torture and violence to women.
However, it is ironical how sexual as well as physical assaults against African-American women are termed as crimes, but still present in the society. The public women imprisonment continues to be a hidden affair (Davis 341). On the contrary, majority of women face public punishment, though it relates more to the colored women in America as much as they face violence every now and then in their families as well as intimate affairs. African-American women pose victims and perpetrators (Belknap 172).
They tend to experience more sufferings than the males during their imprisonment. Low-income women from African-American communities are assaulted sexually, and battered, and engage in activities that are illegal. This bears a great contradiction with popular impressions like poverty, addiction and the rapidly increasing rates of violence against women being a result of social, psychological or moral inadequacies. The perpetual private violence auctions against African-American women have reduced incidences of punishing women in public (Davis 351).
Punishment that is state sanctioned continues to be informed by ideologies as well as structures that are patriarchal, and tend to come up with female criminality historical assumptions linked to social norms violation ideas defining the place of an African-American woman (Richie 04). There has been a lot of information disclosed by feminists concerning corporal punishment that women are given when charged with adultery. Among the most serious violations of rights of the black women in prisons of the United States is sexual abuse.
In this society, African-American female prisoners are seen as invisible and much disenfranchised adults. It will be of great importance to mobilize individuals to fight against gender violence. Today, activists all over the world push for reforms that will be free from gender and racial biasness. It is the high time that women from diverse backgrounds residing in the United States receive equal treatment; however, this should be enhanced by fighting cultural barriers that violate women rights, giving men all the power.
Works Cited
Belknap, Joanne. The Invisible Woman: Gender, Crime, and Justice. Belmont, Ca: Wadsworth Pub. Co, 1995. Print.
Crenshaw, Kimberle. “Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics and violence against women of color”. Harvard Law Review, 43.1 (1993): 1241-1302. Print.
Davis, Angela. “Public imprisonment and private violence: Reflections on the hidden punishment of women”. Frontline feminisms: Women, war and resistance. New York: Routledge, 2004. Print.
Richie, Beth. Compelled to crime; the gender entrapment of battered black women. New York: Routledge. 1996. Print.