“Every indignity that comes from the denial of reproductive autonomy can be found in slave women’s lives – the harms of treating women’s wombs as procreative vessels, of policies that pit a mother’s welfare against that of her unborn child, and of government attempts to manipulate women’s child-bearing decisions through threats and bribes.” PoliticsGenderRacial JusticeReproductive Justice Book:Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty Source: Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty
“Benjamin Franklin, one of the most revered intellectuals of his day, was instrumental in importing Enlightenment thinking to the British colonies in North America. There, Enlightenment scientists' understanding of race served a critical political function: the view that nature had created racial distinctions resolved the contradiction between the Enlightenment ideals of liberty, equality, and tolerance and the enslavement of African people. The shift to secular thinking reinforced the view that Black people were innately and immutably inferior as a race and therefore were subject to permanent enslavement. After chattel slavery ended, the biological concept of race continued to shape the social and biological sciences, medical practice, and social policies, forming a scientific foundation for eugenics, Jim Crow, and post-civil rights color-blind ideology that ignores racism's persistent impact.” AmericaRaceRacismEnlightenmentSlaveryAfrican AmericansBlacksRace Theory Book:Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019 Source: Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019