#Blackwomenmatter

Philippe Buteau//Staff Writer

Black women make less money, receive less education and are more likely to suffer and die from sickness and disease than anyone else, according to the Center for American Progress.

In 2014 and 2015 nine black women were among those killed by police and named in a report by the African American Policy Forum, a think tank hosted as part of the Center for Intersectionality and Social Policy Studies at Columbia Law School.

To give voice to the challenges black women face, Esi Fynn-Obeng, Alexis Hyatt, Amber Clark, Cleophina Raymond and Terrika Faison put their issues into context for University students and generate ideas about what can be done, the affiliate chapter of the National Organization for Women hosted their first forum of the fall semester on Sept. 24.

“We’re here to show you why we matter,” said Fynn-Obeng, president and co-founder of the African Student Association. “The narrative of violence against black women is getting erased.”

The forum provided a platform to Fynn-Obeng and a panel of four other black women who represented the Black Student Union and Dream Defenders.

Hyatt, Clark, Raymond, Faison and Fynn-Obeng critiqued the University’s diversity, gave suggestions of how black men can support black women and set requirements for the 2016 presidential candidates.

Fynn-Obeng, a senior sociology and communication arts major, said the University is a replica of the status quo.

“It’s fake progression,” Fynn-Obeng said.

She asked the audience to think about the University’s faculty and staff in regards to its diversity.

“Be Worlds Ahead on all issues,” Fynn-Obeng said.

People in the audience pointed out that there are scholarships available and that it is up to young black students to seek out and make the effort to become eligible for them.

However, the Florida Legislature has reduced the amount of money available for the Bright Futures scholarship and raised the academic requirements the last three years.

Funding has gone from $436 million in the 2009 to an estimated $239 million this year. A Senate bill to reduce the minimum SAT and ACT scores required for students to be eligible and increase the minimum weighted GPA died in a committee in May.

Only 21.4 percent of African American women had a college degree or higher in 2010, compared to 30 percent of white women, according to CAP, an independent nonpartisan policy institute that is dedicated to improving the lives of Americans.

Raymond, a BSU member and senior biology major, said the University is 13 percent black but involvement among them is only about 1 percent.

Fynn-Obeng, other panel members and students in the audience acknowledged that the University is in Miami-Dade County, the predominantly Hispanic piece of South Florida.

But despite the ethnic makeup of the county Fynn-Obeng said the University should promote its Black History Month events just as much as Hispanic Heritage Month.

To help black women push through blocks that are hardest on them, the panel said there has to be more support from black men and an end to the rebuttal of “all lives matter.”

“It is a black man’s duty to support black women,” said Hyatt, a sociology major.

Hyatt said “‘all lives matter’ erases the black experience in America” and stressed that “Black lives matter” does not mean the lives of black people matter more.

While white women are more likely to have breast cancer, black women have higher overall mortality rates from breast cancer; they also have higher rates of human papillomavirus and cervical cancer, with mortality rates double those of white women, according to CAP.

The five women were the focal point but the discussion included an audience of students, more than 100 strong, who were as diverse as their various hair styles and colors.

Faison, a senior criminal justice major, sports a blonde mohawk and said she would not change her hair for a job interview and is only questioned by her father.

“If anyone told me I had to change my hair, then that’s not the job for me,” Faison said.

For women in the workforce, after getting their foot in the door, the next challenge is equal pay.

The most current available data from CAP show that black women only made 64 cents to the dollar compared to white, non-Hispanic men in 2010. White women made 78.1 cents to the same dollar.

Fynn-Obeng said to Student Media before the forum began that the “scripts black people” play in America and the stereotype of black women as “strong, overbearing and bitter has oppressed us.”

“I believe there has to be a new way for black women to feel empowered and empower themselves,” she said.

 

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