Five years after #MeToo, Black survivors mobilize for themselves
Long before the phrase ignited a global reckoning, Kaia Naadira had already recognized the power of “me, too.”
As Ms. Naadira grew up, those words reverberated through their childhood home in Selma, Ala., where their mother, activist Tarana Burke, founded the movement in 2006 to support Black and Brown women and girls who had survived sexual violence.
“Even before this moment, the work was so impactful in our community,” said Ms. Naadira, now 25. “There were so many girls in our community who didn’t have a language for things that they were going through and had no place to talk about what they were going through.”
This fall marks five years since #MeToo exploded into a worldwide movement of solidarity, revealing the breadth of sexual harassment and assault stories around the world. But while the movement was started largely for them, many Black survivors felt sidelined in the media’s coverage. They marked this year’s anniversary, they said, with activism, resilience and frustration.
Some are still redefining or rebuilding their personal and professional lives after coming forward. They have learned to build communities and support systems on their own.
That included Ms. Naadira, who struggled through their own trauma after they were raped at a college party in 2015. Ms. Naadira said they felt triggered by that experience as they joined Ms. Burke for #MeToo events around the country. “I reached a point where I couldn’t handle it anymore,” Ms. Naadira said.
Out of “pure desperation and hope,” Ms. Naadira confided in their mom, who they said “helped me to express myself in ways that wouldn’t hurt me.” One of those outlets was writing. Naadira’s essay about rewriting
trauma was published in Ms. Burke’s book “You Are Your Best Thing: Vulnerability, Shame Resilience, and the Black Experience” last year. Ms. Naadira also wrote a blog for Me Too International, recounting their journey after their assault.
“That was so liberating for me,” they said. “To take the time and actually have my own space to ... tell this story, it meant a whole lot.”
American history traces a long legacy of testimony and activism from Black women about sexual violence, reaching as far back as the 1800s. But the challenges for them to be heard, believed and supported remain. That includes financial challenges for Black-led advocacy groups, activists say.
The way Drew Dixon, 52, sees it, “the cavalry never came for Black women in the #MeToo movement.”
Ms. Dixon, a record producer, television producer and writer, joined several women in 2017 in publicly accusing hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons of rape. She also accused record executive L.A. Reid of harassment. Mr. Simmons has repeatedly denied all allegations; Mr. Reid, in a statement at the time to the New York Times, apologized if his words were “misinterpreted.”
She sees “almost no progress” since, she said, pointing to the case of R&B singer R. Kelly. It took decades of accusations, a Lifetime docuseries and a viral hashtag before Kelly faced and was convicted of charges of child pornography, child sex abuse, sex trafficking and racketeering in two federal trials over the past year.
According to the National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community, for every Black woman who reports a rape, at least 15 other Black women do not report their abuse. Among the reasons, experts say, is a fear that accusers will be blamed.
It’s a reality that turned Ms. Dixon into a survivoractivist, she said, as her story garnered widespread attention.
Carmen LoBue, a filmmaker in their early 30s, also felt unsupported after an experience with sexual misconduct in the workplace.
In 2015, LoBue started working as a server at a trendy bar-eatery in New York City. The tips were great, they said, but they had also hoped it would be an environment welcoming to queer people like them. “I wanted to work in a diverse setting that would offer you freedom to be yourself,” LoBue said.
Instead, they felt their nonbinary identity made them a target, and in a toxic workplace environment, they experienced months of sexual harassment from their supervisor, they said. “Being myself and being out — I didn’t think that that was going to lead to me being objectified and sort of hypersexualized in a way that I know is possible now,” LoBue said.
LoBue reported the behavior and was fired shortly after.
But it led to a new path. Over the next few years, LoBue set out to make a documentary examining the various forms of harassment marginalized groups face. The project introduced them to different movement spaces and prominent survivor-activists, they said.