Unfinished Business: Black Women, the Black Church, and the Struggle to Thrive in America by Day Keri

Author:Day, Keri [Day, Keri]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orbis Books
Published: 2012-08-31T16:00:00+00:00

Welfare Policy and Structural Violence

Regulations produced by welfare policy for poor black women also intersect with high rates of domestic violence. The problem of domestic violence is perpetuated and exacerbated by welfare mandates that ignore the violent realities that women of color experience, particularly black women. These experiences of violence are reinforced by welfare reform measures that dismiss such experiences and the ways in which these experiences impede poor black women’s capacity to fulfill the requirements demanded to receive welfare benefits. As a result, welfare policy itself becomes a form of structural violence; the policy supports structures that do not take into account factors that cannot be controlled but that do contribute to poor black women’s deprivation.

Domestic Abuse

Connections among welfare, poverty, and violence frustrate many poor black women’s efforts to thrive. Contemporary research suggests that “black women experience violence to a greater degree than other women, that they are more vulnerable to control by the state, and that they make up the largest percentage of women on welfare, but not the highest number.” Black women’s reported rates of intimate partner violence are 35 percent higher than the reported rates of white females. Moreover, black women “report intimate partner violence at a rate 22 percent higher than women of other ethnicities.”48 As a result, poor black women use welfare as an “immediate strategy to deal with domestic violence.”4 9

For example, Davis refers to a thirty-eight-year-old African American woman named Clemmie, who accessed welfare to escape her abuser. Clemmie had four children who excelled in school. Clemmie’s abuser became violent over time, even holding a gun to her head in front of a group of family and friends. Out of fear, many of her family members, including her sister and mother, alienated themselves from her and her situation. Davis remarks, “The more Clemmie tried to get out of the relationship, the more violent her abuser became. After her abuser threatened to kill her and her children for refusing to sell drugs, she fled, seeking refuge at a shelter for victims of domestic violence.”50 Clemmie’s story contradicts the image of welfare women as lazy and indolent, capitalizing on the taxpayers’ dollars. Her need for welfare was a direct result of the abuse she endured. She simply needed the means to establish a safe home for herself and her children.

It has been noted, however, that claims of domestic violence are not always believed by the welfare agencies. Davis recounts the story of an eighteen-year-old African American female named Leslie, who sought public assistance for herself and her unborn child in response to the domestic violence she experienced at the hands of her mother.

Leslie stated to the caseworker in her first interview that she could not seek assistance from her mother because they “fought.” The caseworker interpreted Leslie’s statement to mean that she and her mother had “passionate arguments.” When Leslie attempted to clarify what she meant, the caseworker became deeply suspicious. The caseworker was visibly annoyed and told Leslie that “she’d better think about what she had said because the charge of parental abuse is very serious.

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