South African Lockdown (seasons 1 through 4) have been rough, and will yet be so. As I write this, we’re at 600 000+ cases of that Rona. As part of “essential services”, work carries on, but at a different rhythm. The one change that this altered cadence has wrought is that I, Gugulethu Mhlanga, actually slipped on my cobwebbed takkies, and hit the tar. (Because staying healthy is vital and a privilege). This is monumental. Anyhoo. Point is, I walk regularly with my mom and sister.

It was on one of these treks through the rough terrain of suburbia, when Asian Bae passed us for the second time jogging in the opposite direction, we got to talking about racism. Again.

You may ask why I’m revisiting this topic now, when the conflagration that is Black Lives Matter has been relegated to second-tier news. Three reasons.

Firstly, full-time job.

Secondly, I took my sweet time because fighting for the right to occupy my space is not a current affairs discussion or trending topic. It’s where I reside. It’s where my thoughts simmer. Is it an unhealthy place? My dyspepsia says yes. Yes it is. Nonetheless…

Thirdly, this kind of discussion is multifaceted. And each facet holds…a significant amount of rage. And rage is exhausting (can I get a witness), as are injustice and wilful ignorance. The rage needed to be privately processed. These conversations are exhausting, and apparently we need to have them again.

Anyhoo, back to our climbing of every mountain and fording of every stream and Asian Bae jogging past us for the second time.

We got to talking about working while black, as women, and how we are in a constant tension of being there but not feeling fully heard. How our workplaces bank on us being a silent workforce, there for the BBBEE points so that the chiefly male-dominated status quo can go unchecked.

There are some who believe that the introduction of broad-based black economic empowerment (BBBEE) meant that unqualified people were unjustly put into positions at the time. I can’t speak to that, as I was in high school at the time. I do know, however, that this is still a favourite idea bandied about at demelanated braais (listen, I’ve lived in the Winelands, and I’ve been to a few).

I think this particular viewpoint is favoured, because we know that the first attempts of companies to seem ‘BEE compliant’ were clumsy at best and fraudulent at worst. Anecdotes abound of how some people “borrowed” identity documents belonging to unsuspecting company and domestic employees. In the next publishing of boards of directors, African peoples’ names suddenly appeared. (Those same names deemed undesirable before 1994, by the by). Not surprisingly, the same fraudulent folks are often the ones that yet hold on to the idea that all black people are less qualified.

Moving right along.

In our conversation, Mom and I got to comparing what being black working women looked like post-1994 (for her) and now (for both of us). How did the post-1994 generation of black working women enact change for this (my) new generation of adults? Our numbers have increased, I guess, but not much else has fundamentally changed. For, despite the window-dressing of BBBEE, the notion of the vocal black woman is still largely an anomaly. Speak up or dare to exercise your authority as a black woman, and you will be told in subtle and blatant ways to “know your place” and “get back in your lane”.

Our blackness: welcome (for the BEE points).

Our womanhood: same.

Our labour: here for it.

Our voices: welcome only in as far as they support those at the top (usually a particular demographic; read in between the lines, fam.)

We are allowed to show up in the workplace…until we speak our opinions. Then we are angry, too strident, too opinionated, divisive, aggressive, passive aggressive, etc.

Why is the workplace, 26 years later, still unused to having black women in full voice, taking up space? Because our mothers were busy fighting another battle: that of being the ones to take the first steps into assimilation. From being imprisoned for demanding human rights, to being ‘permitted’ in white workspaces, neighbourhoods, schools. In a single lifetime? I believe it was somewhat dizzying. It was a lot, and bordered on the miraculous.

However.

Patterns of being, of navigating this world, were already established for many of our mothers. If you were told your entire life that white was the norm, and you were a second-class (or third-class, because: patriarchy) citizen in the land of your ancestors, then the 27^th of April 1994 didn’t necessarily raze that false foundation. The slate of memory still held the inscription that silence, and not rocking the boat, might ensure that you lived another day to raise your family. The gevaar hadn’t really left us. It was embedded in those who had benefitted from the pre-‘94 regime. And so silence, as a way of being, often continued in the workspace.

And that generation of women was already busy raising the next generation the only way they knew how. They raised us for a world that would literally imprison and ‘disappear’ anyone vocal enough to become noticed by the security police. They wanted to keep us alive, because their trauma told them that quiet keeps you alive.

My mom’s default (even as an adult) is still to try to temper my rage, for my survival I guess. I have lost count of how many times I would be reprimanded for considered, yet unfiltered, thoughts just flying out of my mouth.

Again, their generation experienced first-hand the cruelty of a repressive regime. (If you don’t consider the apartheid regime as repressive, dear reader, you are privileged, and might want to leave this blog page and never come back. Just saying.)

As girls, we were socialised to be quiet and agreeable, almost unremarkable.

Their generation won us the freedom of choice as to where we could access education. And that, in and of itself, had been a costly battle. So when we encountered microaggressions and racist hair policies at our mixed schools, our mothers acquiesced to those demands. The battle they had finally won, had been costly. So costly, that I believe a large majority had no more energy for the next battle.

This business of fully taking up space, is our battle.

And now here we are, trying to fully occupy spaces that just one generation ago were sealed shut. No wonder we’re still at this point of being seen, but not heard. No wonder.

In our generation, we still have a lot of black woman firsts: CEOs, CFOs, neurosurgeons, oncologists, professors. We are laying down the trails for those to come. We often don’t have a pattern of how to do it in the fullness of our black womanness; the majority of our mothers are unable to advise us there. Our only examples are often those who never wanted us in these spaces in the first place. And here’s an observation I have made: unless you meet with an exceptional mentor, those examples are unlikely to encourage you. It’s not in their ego’s interest to see you fully occupy your space; they prefer the “old boys’ club”. Prepare for elaborate gaslighting.

Here’s another observation: yes, we as the black community are getting better at encouraging one another, but we can also be our own enemies. In conversations with other black women, I hear tales of the most brutal disrespect coming from our own: black people who report to them. Brutal, because it is least expected from that quarter. Black people maintaining white supremacy. That is a whole other conversation we need to have.

This makes this business of forging the path doubly difficult. Did I mention costly?

What is the cost? I’m glad you asked. Physical and mental exhaustion and ill health. Strained family relationships. An exquisite kind of isolated loneliness.

So we plod on in silence.

And let a lot of things slide for the sake of “harmony”, or being a “teamplayer”. That quest for “harmony” ends up exhausting us, as it often benefits only select members of the team.

Letting things slide, I’ve found, is not a sustainable way of showing up. Again, my dyspepsia tells me so. Showing up day by day, having to silence yourself, is no way to live. Your opinion should matter.

Worried about being told “You’re not a team player”? All members of a healthy team need to have their voices heard. In a real team, when you voice your opinion, you put another perspective into play. The result is to challenge the status quo, either to see its merit more fully, or to start pulling down a straw man. Even if you lose that particular battle, you make progress towards winning a greater war.

If your opinion is consistently silenced, then what y’all have is not a team, but a top-down dictatorship that only included you for the optics.

Black woman, you have earned your right to speak, as much as any human being did. If you occupy a space of authority, occupy that space responsibly. And by that I mean, as much as you respect others voices, let your voice be equally heard at that table. Remember, a lot of people are invested in a system that maintains an “old boys’ club” mentality, and so are threatened with your presence. But we’re not going anywhere. We are here.

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