Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower

by Brittney Cooper

We wonder why young men hate women and, sometimes, the sad truth is that their mamas and aunts and sisters act as an arm of the patriarchy by parroting the refrain that “girls simply can’t be trusted.”

far too many women leave behind the freedom feminism offers because they want to stay on patriarchy’s dick, which is to say they want to secure their straightness and their options for getting chosen.

In every part of their lives, young men need access to conversations about what it means to be a man in ways that are not rooted in power, dominance, and violence.

freedom to travel and freedom to be happy are civil rights or legal rights, they exist entirely at the whim and fancy of the U.S. government. If however, these matters are natural rights, they are not bound by the exigencies of policy and procedure.

“If I didn’t define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people’s fantasies for me and eaten alive.”

White privilege works by making the advantages white people have invisible while making the supposedly “poor” choices of people of color hypervisible.

We can’t kill. But we can slay.

my approach to life is to view feelings as employees that can’t be trusted—which is to say, my feelings are subject to intense micromanagement.