that goes to the sexual stereotypes of black females.
Whether innocently or consciously, their [white feminists'] pronouncements have facilitated the resurrection of the timeworn myth of the Black rapist. Their historical myopia further prevents them from comprehending that the portrayal of Black men as rapists reinforces racism's open invitation to white men to avail themselves sexually of Black women's bodies. The fictional image of the Black man as rapist has always strengthened its inseparable companion: the image of the Black woman as chronically promiscuous. For once the notion is accepted that Black men harbor irresistible and animal-like sexual urges, the entire race is invested with bestiality. If Black men have their eyes on white women as sexual objects, then Black women must certainly welcome the sexual attentions of white men. Viewed as "loose women" and whores, Black women's cries of rape would necessarily lack legitimacy (Davis, 1983, pp. 181-2).
Where homosexuality in the black culture is concerned, the overarching point to be of this is that, in culturally conventional heterosexual terms, black sexuality per se is manifestly aberrant. One index of this point is that, from the point of view of the mainstream culture, interracial heterosexuality is also considered aberrant: "Social myth tells us a black woman who dates a white man is moving into a better, safer world, but a white woman who dates a black man is in all probability being sexually brutalized" (Monroe, 1990, p. 17). In this regard, Monroe cites studies that raise the related issue of how interracial sexuality is perceived in the black community.
Among minorities, black women are the most conservative in their attitudes toward interracial marriage . . . . The reasons are complex. The researchers found that, in general, women are more likely to select a mate on the basis of ambition and earning standards; men are more likely to choose a mate for her ap...