fMarlena has 11 post(s)

I believe that Angela Davis is trying to tell us that the lives and struggles of the working class and slaves must be recognized in order for the women’s movement to have a significant impact. The Seneca Falls Convention heavily focused their discussion around white middle class women, even though white working class women and Black women were a huge part of the women’s rights movement. Working class white women had more severe struggles than middle class white women did, as they had to work long hours in tight, cramped spaces and were exposed to illnesses and disease. This mainly took place in the textile mills, which was largely composed of women. The fact that this is completely overlooked in the Seneca Falls Convention shows a huge struggle between the two classes that needs to be resolved for the women’s rights movement to flourish. It is unacceptable that there was not even a mention of Black women during the convention, especially since these white women were the ones who said that the women’s rights movement must be supportive of the abolitionist movement. Another significant fact is that women were not even allowed to speak at abolitionist meetings and conventions. These issues that the white middle class women’s rights movement have with the working class community and the Black community needs to be fixed for the movement to fully be effective and reach the full population.

Sojourner Truth was a key figure in merging the abolitionist movement and the women’s rights movement. She described the struggle between wanting to be free from sexism and racism, which was something that was not addressed at the Seneca Falls Convention. I think that Angela Davis implies that without the Seneca Falls Convention, these issues of the lack of representation of working women and Black women would not be brought up, and Sojourner Truth is an extremely powerful woman who greatly contributed to allowing Black women to join the movement. I think that Davis also implies that there are great weaknesses in both the women’s rights movement and the abolitionist movement, because Black women were not welcome in the women’s rights movement, and all women were not welcome in the abolitionist movement. These movements need to co-exist in order for there to be a great impact on society, and having these two movements unite is what will reach out to more and more people who can relate to the cause, and even those who can’t relate but are willing to listen.