The video, Paris Is Burning tells us about during the ball tells us that many people really seem to fit in together either you’re a girl or a boy. How they accept everyone can do anything and do anything. How many of them enjoyed being watched by people also cheering for them. Plus that is the way they fit in without being judged since everyone has certain problems. They also talked about the roles that changed in the ’70s. Looking like a gorgeous movie star to a model. It is for everyone now for more people to be involved in. I feel like it isn’t really a bad thing because they somehow lost and thought of finding something more enjoyable and mostly having fun. Mostly because of the social standard of living in real life the gay men can’t get a job as executives unless having an educational background and the opportunity. But the thing about the ballroom is they can do anything they want to feel confident about themselves for once. By showing the straight world I can be an executive if there were an opportunity to be one. I really like the video because I feel like they can have somewhere to go in life. In the video they also talked about many of the parents also don’t seem like they accept their child as gay. And even though it is like that their lives still ended up great. You just have to accept who you are basically and know that you can change your own lives.

I really like Karinys Carrillo SnapShot because of how it represents Paris Is Burning. Showing us different outfits that each one wears to the ball and how fashion represents them and show people that men can wear, and express themselves. Also when they talked about spoil rich white girls getting what they want don’t really have to struggle and have good finance and nice clothes and having no problem. Well, I felt like it isn’t fair for other races like-colored women. For example, Junie Vallon Snapshot shows how another Black Woman was killed wants to know that they should do something about it. Mostly Black women suffered a lot more than white Women. The opportunity is the skin color white women had. They still go through certain things but not as bad as Black women do.

The Combahee River, Collective Statement tells us that Black Women face difficulty in political work their not really trying to actually fight for oppression but address oppression since they don’t even have the class privilege to rely on or access to resources. And the quote I found that make more sense ”We exist as women who are Black who are feminists, each stranded for the moment, working independently because there is not yet an environment in this society remotely congenial to our struggles because being on the bottom, we would have to do what no one else has done: we would have to fight for the world.” No one had really experienced the way they have to deal with it alone frustrated and how they had to struggle all alone.

Black feminism is a concept centered on the belief that Black women are naturally valued, and that a Black woman’s independence is necessary not as an auxiliary to someone else’s, but because of our desire for individuality as human beings. 

Black feminism is important because it focuses on Black women’s experiences, comprehending their situation in connection to race, sexism, and class discrimination, as well as other social and political characteristics. 

In 1977, THE COMBAHEE RIVER COLLECTIVE STATEMENT by Combahee River Collective quite states, “During our years together as a Black feminist collective we have experienced success and defeat, joy and pain, victory and failure. We have found that it is very difficult to organize around Black feminist issues, difficult even to announce in certain contexts that we are Black feminists.” 

This is important for years, black women have been barred from mainstream feminism because of their ethnicity, while black liberation organizations have rejected them because of their gender. Black feminism emphasizes and engages with the numerous facets of identity that women have, which was essential since it allowed them to discuss being black with gender inequity. Despite prejudice and discrimination, Black women have been and continue to be vital to black emancipation and gender equality.

Ida B. Wells, for example, was a well-known journalist, activist, and researcher. She had to deal with sexism, racism, and cruelty throughout her life. Wells-Barnett was a gifted writer who also used her journalistic skills to draw attention to the plight of African Americans across the South. 

Wells built the first black kindergarten, organized black women, and helped elect the city’s first black councilman, to mention a few of her many accomplishments. I believe she felt compelled to advocate for black women and other people of color since no one else would. 

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Allison’s photo snapshot is one that stood out to me. In 1969, a group of black protestors captured in this photograph was marching for the freedom of women’s rights. They also supported black liberation in order to reclaim justice and freedom.

This is due to fact that black women have attempted to confront oppression on several occasions. 

In addition, black women also lack the racial, sexual, heterosexual, or economic privileges that other groups have, as well as the rudimentary access to resources and power that these groups enjoy.

Being a black woman has an emotional cost, as well as hurdles in terms of political knowledge and action.

While many of the African American men and women, as well as people of color and the lgbtq+, are all fighting for the same equality there are times when the voice overlapped each other or worse they focused on just cis men instead of the LGBT and women of the same groups. That is why the groups had to separate and create their own groups so they can be heard as well. Examples of this are shown in the pictures uploaded by Nancy Susano and Jaisely Dominguez. Nancy uploaded a picture of what seems like a march and someone holding up a sign saying “Black Woman Matter” while of course all of the black lives matter sometimes we focus so much on the big picture instead of thinking about how much further African American women need to push up further as well. The same is to be said about the picture posted by Jaisely, there is a person depicted holding a “Dykes against racism everywhere” Many of the LGBT persons are also a part of the fight for equality but they are also a group that has to be pushed up further.

The Combahee River Collective Statement by Combahee River Collective stated “We also often find it difficult to separate race from class from sex oppression because in our lives they are most often experienced simultaneously. We know that there is such a thing as racial-sexual oppression which is neither solely racial nor solely sexual” This proves that my previous statement that separate movements have to be had for different groups of people. While many people often experience the same kind of oppression or inequality doesn’t mean we are all fighting for the same fight and ALL are going to be heard as sad as that is.

In the video, Paris Is Burning showed many of the categories that were part of the ball, things as, School, military, businessmen. Ordinary queer people in stereotyped ‘straight’ activities and careers. It was said in the video “In a ball room you can be anything you want. you’re not really an executive but you look like one and there for you are showing the straight world I can be an executive, if I had the opportunity I could be one” This shows just how much society caters to cis white men, black and people of color have to work harder and be smarter for the same job position as a white man but they are often overpassed for the said white man. Even if the person of color is more qualified for the job.

When we hear the word feminist, we automatically think about women who are going against the unjust and cruel treatment by the dominance of men. Yet feminism supports equality of all the sexes through social, political, economic, and personal movements. According to the text, “If Black women were free, it would mean that everyone else would have to be free since our freedom would necessitate the destruction of all the systems of oppression.” Black feminism really centers around valuing black women and their need for liberation and liberating and assisting the struggle against other major oppressed systems.

I think an important concept attached to this text is combining all voices and systems of oppression because not just one can be liberated. One cannot have the right, and the other one may not. It is simply hard to break down every race from its class or race from sexuality and give them all their own movement and voice because they are combined through their oppression that happens simultaneously. According to The Combahee River Collective Statement, “racial, sexual, heterosexual, and class oppression, and see as our particular task the development of integrated analysis and practice based upon the fact that the major systems of oppression are interlocking.” Many black activists such as Harriet Tubman and Ida B. Wells Barnett have always brought awareness to their sexual identity, then combined it with their political, racial, and personal views to their movement.

A snapshot that I wanted to respond to and took my interest the most was Karinys Carrillo’s snapshot of a dark skin individual putting makeup on in a bra and jeans with a short and maybe masculine haircut. I think this image relates to the idea of breaking down and analyzing the layers of black language and black feminism and where critical thinking started to go against oppression. According to the text, “We discovered that all of us because we were “smart” had also been considered “ugly,” i.e., “smart-ugly.” “Smart-ugly” crystallized how most of us had been forced to develop our intellects at great cost to our “social” lives.” We reject as a community a lot of stances and different layers to a human being because it doesn’t strategize with what we idealize or what we are trying to do. Because we don’t include them in our strategize in politics and movements, we exclude a large part of a black community and black feminism. We exclude a lot of black men, black women, black teens, and black children. This happens because we reference biological features, whether someone is feminine or masculine, and devalue proposals from others who may not support exactly what someone is trying to do. Even the idea of black feminism has a negative context because they feel the need to only value themselves and not organize around every black person.

To reference what I said at the beginning of my explanation about when we hear feminism, we think about women trying to dominate and go against men is in some ways true. Women threaten a traditional system because whether you are a male or female is where you stand in power relationships. One is not greater than the other. It always seems to be a competition to who is better at what. When in reality, they both complement and value each other and the community in different ways.

Feminists group has been a group that has always wanted to have equal rights between both genders, men and female. Inequality has affected us female in many ways. Black feminists is not just trying to fight oppression but actually address the issues that is going on. According to the article (1997) The Combahee River Collective Statement states “There is a very low valued placed upon Black women’s psyches in this society, which is both racist and sexist”. One part that caught my attention while reading the article (1997) The Combahee River Collective Statement, when it state’s “If Black women were free, it would mean that every one else would have been free since our freedom would necessitate the destruction of all the systems of oppression.” It caught my attention because we a women that have to deal with many issues and fight to get what we want. As I kept reading it mention about the roles in female and male in the 1970’s and that it has been a traditional thing meaning that men go to work and women stay at home and then they say how we women can’t do the same thing as men. Some other roles in general are when women are expected to dress up in a feminine way and being polite. But Men have to be strong and brave. Some roles at home are when women have to cook, do all the cleaning and washing in the household but for men they would just to work, take care of the bills which to me are like very simple task to do. In my opinion I think that most of these roles are not fair for both genders, it shouldn’t be oh you focus on thing and I focus on the other. I feel like both genders should have equal roles and even in general having equal rights. I feel like these type of issue’s are still being seen seen today because as they mention before it’s like a tradition. These roles are able to affect both male and female because of the relationship there is in the household, behavior and also health. Gender roles are important to society because it tells us how each gender can change over time and the equality that both should have. To me I don’t see anything wrong where both gender’s learn the same things and not just learning certain things. I see gender feminism as having many inequality’s and men should realize that we are humans but different genders and being able to do the same things. If both genders were to have equality both would have the benefits to live free I believe because there would be no more inequality’s.Overall I really hope at a certain type of period there would equality for both genders and not have to deal with many other issues. It would be amazing to see that change happen, I still see both genders facing inequality between each other and it’s probably because of a tradition it is.