RAPE IGNITES A NATION DURING CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT by Carmen Rivera

Introduction by Kiilu Nyasha:

As a Black woman who grew up in the 1940s, ‘50s, and 60s. I’m fully aware of the treatment of colored girls and women not only by White men, but men of every description.  I’m old enough now not to be too embarrassed to state that I was raped numerous times and didn’t even know it was rape.  It was referred to as Bogarting when men forced you into sex against your will in those days.  There were no phrases like “date rape,” or “sexual harassment,” though both were quite common, the latter mostly in the work place.  Black women were singled out particularly due to the prevailing racist notion that we were animal-like and oversexed.