This past week, I watched with frustration as Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson was incessantly and unfairly interrogated at her confirmation hearings. As pointed out by Dennie and Kelly in the attached article, Jackson was subjected to misogynoir during these hearings. The term misogynoir, coined by Professor Moya Bailey in 2008, “encapsulates the specific hatred directed towards Black women, who face discrimination on the basis of both race and gender.”
Despite being more qualified than many of the existing justices, Jackson was villainized and belittled by several of her colleagues, including Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Senator Marsha Blackburn. She was ceaselessly questioned about her views on racism and was posed questions to which her white counterparts would never be expected to have the answers. Senator Blackburn accused Jackson of having a “personal hidden agenda to incorporate critical race theory” into the American legal system. In this clip, Senator Cruz can be seen asking Jackson ridiculous questions about CRT and whether or not she believes that “babies are racist.”
At the end of the article, Dennie and Kelly expand upon the misogynoir to which Jackson was subjected. The final paragraph, which I found most illuminating, reads as follows:
“Against tremendous odds, [Jackson] demonstrated her incredible preparation, competence, and an even temper through the entire proceedings. But, there is a special kind of violence in having to endure abuse with a smile on your face. Men can scream, cry, spew sarcasm and and otherwise rant without their outbursts posing an obstacle to their confirmation. The same isn’t true of women, who are already stereotyped as emotional and unfit for leadership. Black women in particular have to patiently over-perform in order to combat racist tropes of the ‘angry Black woman.’ And these pictures from the respective confirmation hearings of Judge Brown Jackson and Justice Kavanaugh are worth several thousand words.”
