With all the craziness going on between presidential nominees – Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump – it is easy to get lost in the sauce when it comes to the black community and our needs. However, please don’t lose faith because the following 15 women from both past and present are here for the cause. They believe in justice. They believe in women. And most importantly they believe in the power of having rights. Get some insight into this powerful group and the work that they do!
Shirley Chisholm
Shirley Chisholm is a household name. She was the first black woman to be elected to Congress, but is best known for her work on several Congressional committees throughout her career and has become somewhat of a pop culture icon in recent history for her political and academic achievements.
Dani McClain
After conservative talk show host Glenn Beck called President Barack Obama a racist, McClain, a writer and staff member of the online activist group Color of Change, worked to get companies to pull their ads from his show. She garnered close to 300k signatures on the petition and was successful at getting heavyweights like Procter & Gamble and GEICO, to pull their ads.
Majora Carter
Majora Carter received a MacArthur “genius grant” for creating green-collar job training and placement in urban areas. Her biggest project to date has been in her own backyard with the revitalization of the Bronx River, taking it from an eyesore to the areas first waterfront park in 60 years.
Helen Gayle
After 20 years of working on HIV/AIDS at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Gayle used her knowledge to direct global health issues for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She also chairs the Obama administrations’ Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS. Gayle, who is also the president and CEO of CARE USA, a humanitarian organization fighting poverty in more than 70 countries with a special focus on women and children.
Angela Davis
Angela Davis, is yet another household name. She joined the U.S. Communist Party and was jailed for charges related to a prison outbreak, though ultimately cleared. Known for books like Women, Race, & Class
, she has worked as a professor and activist who advocates for gender equity, prison reform and alliances across color lines.
Gina McCauley
McCauley’s website What About Our Daughters — states that it is: “Unapologetic, Uncompromising and Unbowed in Defense of Black Women and Girls.” She began the blog in 2007 in response to Don Imus’ infamous “nappy-headed hos” comment about a women’s basketball team. She is also the founder of Blogging While Brown, which is an annual gathering of black bloggers and the Michelle Obama Watch blog.
Pernessa Seele
While working at New York City’s Harlem Hospital during the late 1980s, Seele saw a huge amount of African-Americans suffering horribly with the AIDS epidemic. In response, she started the Harlem Week of Prayer for the Healing of AIDS in 1989. It was the beginning of the Balm in Gilead, an organization that encourages churches to fight against AIDS.
Mandy Carter
Mandy Carter begin her activism career in 1968 during Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.’s Poor People’s Campaign and has spent her life fighting for justice of the LGBT community of color. She is a founding board member of the National Black Justice Coalition, an organization for empowering black lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals, and has used her organizing experience to co-chair the LGBT steering committee for Barack Obama’s presidential run.
Lateefah Simon
At 19, Simon became the youngest executive director of San Francisco’s Center for Young Women’s Development. She went on to specialize in prison restructuring. While heading up San Francisco’s Reentry Services division, the programs she implemented for former offenders helped cut that city’s recidivism rate to less than 10 percent.
Flo Kennedy
Flo Kennedy was one of only a handful of black women students admitted to Columbia Law School in the first half of the 20th century. She, known for her brash style, eventually became a strong and colorful defender of the rights of women. She founded the Feminist Party which went on to nominate Shirley Chisholm for President in 1972. Flo traveled the country speaking on feminist issues until her death in 2000.
Tracie Washington
After Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, Washington was displaced, but returned to her native city and created Louisiana Justice Institute, a legal-advocacy organization devoted to social-justice campaigns. Washington is working to make sure that New Orleans’ most vulnerable communities have access to housing, education and health services.
Malika Saada Saar
The founder of the nonprofit Rebecca Project for Human Rights , Saar works to reform policies that affect women and girls in health, child-welfare and criminal-justice systems in the U.S. and Africa. She has fought for the civil rights of low-income and homeless families, and was instrumental in getting the Craigslist adult-services section shut down in 2010.
Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks’ refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus led to an organized boycott and the city’s removal of bus segregation. An iconic legend for sure, we will always honor her bravery and her life long commitment to fighting for civil rights in the U.S.
Malika Cyril
Malika Cyril founded the Center for Media Justice in 2002 to ensure that “movements for justice have a public voice.” In 2007 Cyril organized youth activists and people of color to challenge the dominance of the corporate radio giant Clear Channel in the San Francisco Bay Area and to ensure that the voices of local hip-hop artists and community members were heard.
Harriet Tubman
Like Rosa Parks, Ms. Tubman is a legend and frankly one of American history’s most prominent figures. Harriet Tubman was responsible for rescuing around 300 former slaves from the South and escorting them to freedom via the underground railroads that led to Maryland.
A few years ago, the model-turned-DJ created the nonprofit organization Black Girls Rock! Her goal was to build the self-esteem of young women of color by offering mentorship and enrichment through arts programs. With the growth of the brand, she has created the annual televised Black Girls Rock awards where the likes of Michelle Obama and other trailblazers have been honored!
Tracie Washington
