Intersectionality, as explained by Kimberle Crenshaw, refers to the interconnected nature of social issues that, when discriminated against, result in a hybrid or compounded form of discrimination (Crenshaw, 2018). These issues in the context of this discussion are family, race, and class. The meaning of the phrase ‘the traditional family ideal bears a striking resemblance to social hierarchies in U.S. Society implies that just like the social class system, the traditional family system in its fashion perpetuates discrimination. This is in the sense that the gendered aspect of the traditional family can be discriminative to women and men. It assumes and propagates the fact that men or boys are naturally the heads of family, and women are nothing but their subordinates. Men may also be targeted in order to weaken the family.
According to the ACLU article (Robinson, 2018), beyond the gender aspect, the United States of America government, even before the Trump administration, has been a culprit of reawakening the use of the traditional family as a tool of perpetuating racial and social class discrimination. Such that attacking families of minority groups such as African Americans, Native Americans, and Latinos have been a classic way of weakening and discriminating against them beyond race and wealth. A classic example of Native Americans is given. The white man was determined to wipe out any form of Native culture left by separating Native American boys from their families through school. At boarding school, these boys were completely segregated from culture as they were not allowed to wear their traditional clothing nor speak Navajo, their native language. The Baptists used Christianity and education to weaken their family unit. This meant that they were determined to wipe out the dominance of any form of Native Americans as a racial group who were by the social construct of lower hierarchy, through all means.
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