White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color

by Ruby Hamad

White women continue to reap the benefits of the default to innocence they have been granted—but only when this innocence can be used to bolster whiteness as a system of power. “Women for Kavanaugh” demonstrates the pivotal role White Womanhood still plays in the maintenance of this system, but for some white women this privilege comes at a catastrophic cost. Not believing white women like Ford who make allegations—no matter how credible—against white men has its roots in this tragic and unpalatable history: usually, when white women made rape claims against black and brown men they were lying, and white men knew they were lying, because the cry of rape and attempted rape was itself a ruse for justifying white racial violence and fortifying white economic, social, and political domination. Sure, this gave white women a measure of power over black men and over women of color that they lacked in other areas of their lives, but it also ensured they stayed right where they were, sandwiched between white men and men of color in that racial and gendered hierarchy, with women of color lagging below. White men have been socialized by centuries of white supremacy not to believe the sexual allegation claims of white women—unless the accused is a man of color.