The Sistas Van could be heard rolling down community streets all 30 days this April.

The painted sedan has “A Mobile Healing Unit” splashed across its sliding doors. It carries essential supplies such as female condoms to Black women and girls who may be quarantined with an abuser.

Nonprofit advocacy organization the Black Women’s Blueprint (BWB) has strived to provide "a path to Black liberation through a feminist lens" for the last 10 years according to its website.

The increased Sistas Van effort is a part of The Matriarchy Project, which was launched by the organization this year, to drive awareness around sexual and patriarchal violence against Black women. While the project is titled after the women it supports, it declares the safety of women is not women's responsibility.

Thus, this particular project also amplifies the voices of Black men, as the #DearBrother hashtag asserts, who are the allies and advocates that survivors deserve.

“We envision the #DearBrother campaign as a virtual toolkit for men to build up long-term strategies for combating violence and misogynoir in the home,” Courtney Hunter, the associate editor for BWB's editorial offshoot, Mama Black told Blavity. "We needed to give people, … specifically men, the tools to do a self-intervention at home, and we needed to really emphasize that whatever fears or anxieties they might be feeling, men can’t continue using Black women as their punching bags when things take a turn for the worse.”

The Mama Black editor believes that this call for Black men to get more present in community healing could have a ripple effect — as intimate partner violence certainly does, she says.

“Historically, we’ve seen that when Black women are endangered, the whole community suffers,” Hunter said. “People are realizing how dangerous and alienating our communities can be for Black women and girls and are showing a desire to look more deeply into these issues. What has been really encouraging is that men have been reaching out via social media and asking how they can be a part of the campaign. I think it is slowly becoming a space where men can talk to each other about domestic violence in a generative way and seriously reconsider what they’ve been taught about their role as Black men.”

The #DearBrother campaign not only offers men tips for becoming allies but highlights poignant words of wisdom from Black men who've long allied themselves with Black women.

Of the dozens of colorful Facebook posts, penned with encouraging words for allies and advocates, Hunter said she was struck by one #DearBrother entry in particular.

Scholar and writer Ahmad Tyree Greene writes: “Understanding the root, the toxic root of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, means that Black men must always care about and advocate alongside Black women and girls.”

For Hunter, Greene’s words illuminate the chasm that lies between Black women and the men she describes as their “would-be allies.” She says, it’s not until Black men are prepared to take a critical look at themselves, that the community can heal.

“In social justice spaces, a lot of the times we’re working with people who benefit from misogynoir. These people can express a desire to dismantle the white supremacist, capitalist, imperialist state, but are often reluctant to divest entirely from patriarchy because it grants them the ability to exploit others," she explained. "Many are not willing to give up that power at first."

Still, she said, Greene’s words carry hope for a future radicalized by true love and allyship.

“I like this quote because it’s a reminder that the best way to counter oppressive mindsets in our would-be allies is through radicalization,” Hunter said. “The scaffolding for these systems of oppression has been forged through the trauma of Black women. When Black men begin to understand that, and really sit with it, that’s when they can start to become real advocates both for Black women and for themselves.”

While the #DearBrother project will come to an end at the close of April, the Sistas Van services communities year-round.

Survivors of domestic violence have found themselves in even greater danger in times of peril or natural disaster amid shelter-in-place orders due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Cycles of violence in survivor households are intensifying, so the urgency of our response is reflecting that increase in severity,” Hunter said. “Many abusers violate their partners by refusing to put on a condom during sex – to address this, Sistas Van has been stocking up on female condoms, so that survivors will have the tools to protect themselves. Plan B is another essential tool we are distributing so that survivors can prevent pregnancy after rape and sexual assault.

Hunter, 27, said that these supplies are often left out of the national conversation on “essentials.”

“Pregnancy prevention items like these are incredibly important for survivors, but not everyone considers them 'essential' resources,” she explained. “With Sistas Van, however, we can tackle this need. One that, unfortunately, is often left either neglected or totally unaddressed.”

Nevertheless, in the fight for Black women and girls, #DearBrother calls not to survivors, but to the Black men that love them.

For more information on Black Women’s Blueprint, or to donate to Sistas Van, visit their website.

Black Women's Blueprint

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