One thing I keep thinking about is how Black women vote. They vote Democrat. They vote at a higher rate than any other demographic. And they were the last to get the right to vote.

They are the backbone of the electorate.

Black women in that time have also become the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs. The most highly educated people in America.

And they never really sit an election out. They never really vote Republican.

But often people say “black people get nothing from Dems.”

It’s normally Black men who say we get “nothing” for voting dem and those same men are more likely to sit out or even vote republican. Speaking only of our community.

So what about Black women being the leaders in the area of organizing the vote and voting dem is “nothing?”

Where is the disconnect? Black women dealing with double marginalization (minimum) seem to always rally to vote dem and vote at a high rate. And that work is dismissed as “getting nothing” so often.

What does that really mean? Why is it so easy to dismiss the majority of Black women as knowing nothing and essentially throwing away their votes? And it’s often from the same “trust black women” type people.

When it was on the line for Doug Jones people thanked Black women

A few years later people are back to saying “you got nothing for that.”

And even if you bought that premise that Dems don’t do anything that benefits Black people... is it not obvious what Republicans are doing is significantly directly harmful to us on purpose?

And I don’t know if you’ve noticed more Black women are running for and winning office than ever before. Is this “nothing” as well?

This take doesn’t add up and when I see reasonably smart people start tweeting like that I have to ask questions.

Who defines “nothing” for the Blaxk community? The women who tirelessly work day in and day out to organize our votes, initiatives and movements or the dudes who come in beating their chests and withholding their votes loudly every four years?

I feel like the group who is least like to vote for Trump but most likely to actually vote should hold more weight than anyone in this current moment.

And this isn’t tokenism. This isn’t saying “they’re doing this to save us.” Or even “they’re doing this to save themselves.”

This is me watching the smartest, savviest voters in the game get in formation and wondering why people who see this dismiss it so easily.

So many brothers are so smart but have a huge hole missing in their analysis because they don’t actually respect Black women as equals. Their work and the gains from their work is just “nothing” whenever it’s time to dismiss them to the back of the room.

Michelle Obama, Stacey Abrams, Kamala Harris, Ayanna Pressley, Maxine Waters, Valerie Jarrett and more just giving away their votes for “nothing?”

So the 13% of Black men voting for Trump... that’s not voting for “nothing?”

Anyways. Just something I’ve been thinking about for years. How do people reconcile that... disrespecting Black dem voters and their work as nothing but claiming to respect and support Black women...

I don’t think both are truly possible. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2020/08/04/black-women-democratic-politics-votecast/112750634/

Whoops. I forgot one more thing... Black men did turn out and vote and support when it was Obama on the ticket. A black man.

It makes you wonder if the "nothing" here is just a black cis-het man at the front of the ticket... and then after that it went back to "getting nothing"