Segregation is a failed strategy- only alliances can prompt change which necessitates looking outside one’s own identity

(Barbara, Interviewed by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor (AAS@Princeton, though none of her words are underlined, How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective)

Mm! So I wonder if you could say more about that. And let me—I’ll just add that I think that there’s certainly a right-wing kind of ridiculous caricature of identity politics. But I think that the concept is also sort of seen in a particular way by liberals or the left, in that for some the notion of identity politics seems to be that unless you suffer a particular kind of oppression, that you have no role in the struggle against it. And so there’s this real emphasis on experience as the main sort of—as the main kind of way that gives you the ability to fight a particular oppression. That if you don’t have that experience, then you really have no role. And so it’s almost as if by embracing one’s identity, that you give up on any sort of hope or notion that there is such a thing as solidarity. We never meant that. I mean, we actually worked in coalitions. I just described working in coalitions with socialist feminists. We worked in coalitions with other people, too. We certainly showed up for causes that might not be the expected ones for people who had the identities that we had. Demita [has] talked about standing up for union organizing, and for men of color who were being excluded from work sites and from construction jobs, because of racism. And I often cite that example, too, because I guess both of us will never forget the looks on the faces of the guys—who were primarily guys—who were demonstrating. And then we come, you know, and we demonstrate with them. You know, they didn’t expect that to be the case. So as I said, we absolutely believed in coalition building and solidarity. It’s a real misapprehension of what we meant by it. And I don’t know why people skip it. I mean, to me, all the explanation that’s needed is in the Combahee River Collective statement, about what it is we stand for, and who we think we should be working with. But as I have explained, the reason we used the term “identity politics” is that we were asserting at a time when Black women had no voice. At a time when Black women were being told to walk seven steps behind and have babies for the nation. At a time when Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture said—when asked what is the position of the Black woman in the Black struggle, and his response was that Black women’s position was to be prone. He actually meant supine. Now is a time when much solidarity is needed, because the nation-state is in freefall. It’s not like I’m a worshipper of the nation-state. That’s not what I’m saying at all. But it is a little bit unsettling when you see what was thought to be basic assumptions about how that nation-state functioned go completely out the window. [laugh] This is a time for solidarity. I mean it’s like just because I—and I’m doing a theoretical “I” here, or a figurative “I”—just because I have health coverage doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be standing in solidarity with those who stand to lose it under this regime. Just because I have a US passport and full legal status in the United States doesn’t mean I’m not supposed to be standing in solidarity with people who are undocumented. Who have every right to be here as well. So, as I said, it’s a misunderstanding and a distortion of what it was that we stood for. And I think that sometimes that notion that you just outlined as, “If I don’t have a particular identity, I’m not allowed to work on a particular issue”—that sounds to me like an excuse. That sounds to me like Okay, so that’s what somebody decides if they’re not really willing to go there, and go through the struggle of crossing boundaries and working across differences. The concept of This Bridge Called My Back is an incredibly powerful one, and that book was catalytic in the women’s movement, and in certain parts of the left. Bernice Johnson Reagon’s essay, which was not originally an essay, it was an article based upon a speech—that concludes Home Girls—I always tell people, the reason “Coalition Politics: Turning the Century” is the last piece in the book is because that’s what I wanted people to leave the book with: the idea of working together across differences. Coalitions. “This Bridge Called My Back” as a concept. Why are those so important? Because of the fact that that’s the only way we can win. The only way that we can win —and before winning, the only way we can survive is by working with each other, and not seeing each other as enemies. There’s far too much of the perspective of: “You’re not like me. I’m not like you. I’m not a transgender person. I don’t give a damn whether you can go to a bathroom or not. And the fact that you’re being murdered summarily, and that your income levels keep you in poverty far more likely than somebody who is cisgender—that’s not my problem!” Those are bad politics. Really, really bad politics. And the reason it’s important, as I said, is because that’s how we win, and that’s how we survive in the meantime. There are ethical principles of struggle that you can see in any significant political intervention in history. You will see—one of the things that you should see in positive movements forward toward justice—not toward power—because there are many interventions that were just about the accrual of power, where you didn’t really have that mentality and that principle of “We must all be in this together.” But if it’s a forward movement toward justice, you will see that people of different backgrounds and different places in a social structure actually at times come together. The abolitionist movement comes to mind. Because there were white people who actually stepped away from their white skin privilege at a critical time in US history, because they could see as plain as the nose on their face that enslaving other human beings was wrong. And they decided, like, “Okay, yeah, I guess I’m white, but I guess I love humanity more.” And of course, there were people who were abolitionists who were racists. Who really thought that Black people were inferior to white people. I’m not that big of a fool that I think [laugh] that everything was just . . . lovely, and everybody was just really conscious and open. No. I mean, there were abolitionists who actually thought Black people were inferior, and actually wished for them, once we were freed, to get on the first boat sailing. [laugh] “Go back somewhere else, not here!” But be that as it may, they still lost social standing, paid prices, speaking out for people whose situation they didn’t have to be concerned about—what difference did it make to them? You know, they were still white in the United States. Things could have been really nice, you know? That’s a great example of when people see an incredible wrong, an incredible injustice, and they decide that justice is more important than their status and their privilege. And those are models that we need to adhere to, I believe. I love when we see examples of people pushing themselves far beyond the status quo and far beyond the average, and speaking up and speaking out and acting for justice. I always say that the people I can work with are the people with whom I share political values and goals and priorities. So that means just about anybody as far as ethnicity, race, gender, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I don’t have a litmus test for, like, “I only work with certain kinds of people who share my specific identities.” I’m going to be a political idiot if I only work with Black lesbian feminists and refuse to work with anybody else. I mean, I wouldn’t know the things that I know about Black feminism and about organizing if the only people I had ever worked with were Black feminists who were lesbians. Don’t get me wrong. I have learned a tremendous amount from working with people whose specific identities I share, but I also would have lost a lot if I had never worked with people who are different from myself.(Kindle/no pages)

*The Combahee River Collective was a famous meeting of black feminsits credited with coining the term “identity politics”