The Exploitation of Bloodmothers and Othermothers in Capitalism
Capitalism has created yet another system of exploitation within the institution of Balck motherhood.
“We, as Black women and people, understand the system is something put in place to make us work hard,” says Joan Lewis, a black mother and home healthcare worker living in Atlanta who is also a member leader of the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA). “It’s the truth that we get exploited,” she says. “It’s the truth that we get exploited, especially domestic workers, because we’re doing a job that nobody values.”
As expressed by Lewis, Black women are systematically exploited by capitalist society. Being the most vulnerable group of people in society, Black women are subject to the harsh realities of capitalism. Studies show that while there are more Black women than white women in the workforce, Black women are significantly more likely to experience poverty along with many other factors.
Many fail to acknowledge that Black women in capitalism are not just women. There are many intersecting facets to their identities, one of those being that they are mothers. In exploiting Black women, specifically Black mothers, capitalism interferes with Black motherhood, as well as the social development of Black children. But does capitalism really care? No. Black women are already vulnerable enough due to the intersectionality between race and gender, but they are made even more vulnerable when entering Black motherhood because (1) they are carrying the burdens of being a Black woman in America and (2) now they must protect their children against the harsh realities of being a Black child in America. Capitalism benefits from the vulnerability of Black mothers because this vulnerability makes them easy targets for exploitation in order to produce surplus profits.
Due to systems of exploitation embedded in capitalism, Black mothers need to work twice as hard to outgrow the level at which capitalism places them. Higher levels of income will open up the door to greater resources that will help them provide their children with better educational opportunities and safer environments to continue developing in.
As we know, in order for capitalism to succeed there must be an exploitable class of workers. It is this need for higher levels of income that precisely makes Balck mothers in capitalism easy targets to become the exploitable class in capitalism. Systems of exploitation are purposely put in place to exploit labor from the most vulnerable groups of people in America for the purposes of producing surplus profit. Exploitation makes black mothers subject to poverty, deprivation of time with their children, rape, domestic violence, and death, which in turn makes black children subject to many other factors.
According to Patricia Hill Collins’ “Black Women and Motherhood (Links to an external site.)”:
Children orphaned by sale or death of their parents under slavery, children conceived through rape, children of young mothers, children born into extreme poverty or to alcoholic or drug-addicted mothers, or children who for other reasons cannot remain with their bloodmothers have all been supported by othermothers, who […] take in additional children even when they have enough of their own.
Capitalism’s exploitation and such low placement of Black women in society produces a need for assistance in Black motherhood. This assistance has appeared in the form of othermothers, “women who assist bloodmothers by sharing mothering responsibilities” (Collins 178). The need for othermothers that capitalism has created in order for bloodmothers to survive Black motherhood has made othermothers central to Black motherhood as an institution. In addition, othermothers contribute greatly to social production — the work that is required to maintain people as social beings in society.
Some may wonder why this assistance is in the form of othermothers and not in the form of father figures. Patriarchal capitalist society has made it so that it is the women’s responsibility to take care of the private sphere while it is a man’s responsibility to take care of the public sphere. The division of gender in the public and private sphere makes it so that othermothers are deemed to be more fit to provide the kind of assistance that Black women need in their motherhood journey. Not only this, but the emotional aspect of motherhood gives bloodmothers a sense of comfortability and relatability.
While it is a great thing that bloodmother and othermothers have created such a strong community to provide agency for one another, capitalism has created yet another system of exploitation for unpaid labor. Capitalism has already exploited the labor of Black mothers, which forces them to seek out support from othermothers to help maintain their children. This creates an entirely new system of exploitation because the unpaid labor of othermothers is not being accounted for. The unpaid labor of othermothers is the necessary labor needed to help bloodmothers maintain Black children as social beings, but it is also the necessary labor that allows bloodmothers to continue working under the capitalist exploitative system. In supporting bloodmothers, the domestic work of othermothers is exploited and unaccounted for. Capitalism has created a never ending cycle of exploitation that demeans the domestic work and motherhood of both bloodmothers and othermothers.
In a perfect world, we would wish that everyone would be treated fairly under capitalism and received the support unique to his or her own needs in order to truly be treated equally. However, exploitation is rooted so deep into capitalism that it seems almost like an ideology or paradigm by which it goes by. Dismantling these exploitative systems in capitalism cannot be done by simply providing band aid solutions as we have seen in the past. We must address the more deeply rooted issue: race, class, and gender divisions. In order to end race, class and gender divisions in the private and public sphere we must advocate for equity in order to truly achieve equality for all.
