Module: HST4605 Race and the Desire for Difference
By: Aisha Parmenter
The notion of ‘black peril’ has persisted in multiracial societies since its prominence in 19th century colonies. Specifically, it refers to panics in settler societies over ‘native’ men’s alleged plots to rape and sexually assault white women, but more generally it is based on racialised colonial distinctions between the ‘civilised’ European and the ‘savage’ native.[1] Based on this pretence, ‘black peril’ was largely a fabrication.[2] In contrast, ‘white peril’ was far more of a reality, yet it was largely ignored.[3] The fabrication of ‘black peril’ against the reality of ‘white peril’ epitomises the intersection of racial and sexual repression, as ‘black peril’ panics were used to justify the exploitation of material and human resources, as well as to promote sexual demonisation through channelling Victorian sexual attitudes, anxieties over miscegenation, and enforcing patriarchal structures. Therefore, this essay will argue along with historians such as John Pape and David Anderson, that ‘black peril’ was productive and useful for colonial societies in its function of maintaining racial hierarchies and entrenching white supremacy, and the patriarchal values that came with it; notions which formed the foundations of colonialism.[4]
The fundamental purpose of colonialism was to source inexpensive labour and resources. Racial ideology emerged from this as a justification for the violent exploitation that facilitated economic gain, enabling the assertion of white rule. ‘Black peril’ can be seen as an extension of this ideology through the context of its emergence in direct correlation with threats to imperial power. For example, the ‘black peril’ scare in Southern Rhodesia emerged in the wake of the 1896 war of resistance.[5] The relationship between the sexual fears of ‘black peril’ and the maintenance of colonial control is articulated by John Pape: ‘attributing an ungovernable libido to black men corresponded well with the tenets of Social Darwinism which formed such a crucial ideological underpinning to colonial conquest.’[6] This forms the basis of ‘black peril’s’ productivity for colonial societies, as economic exploitation was central to the colonial project but relied on racial hierarchies to be maintained.[7] The way in which rape scares almost entirely led to the violent repression of native men evidences how ‘black peril’ was manipulated to serve the colonial project.[8] This view is supported by historians such as Charles Van Onselen, who argues that ‘‘black peril’ scares have been widely interpreted as a function of the political economy of settler colonialism.’[9] In other words, ‘black peril’ was economically productive for colonial societies because it emerged to consolidate white rule whenever disturbances in the economy politic were severe enough to disturb the authority of racial ideology.[10]
Although ‘black peril’ did emerge as a form of social control in the face of challenges to the material interests of Europeans, David Anderson takes this further by suggesting that economic downturn experienced in settler societies were ‘a conduit for anxieties that were already in place’[11], and that ‘black peril’ was thus useful in a more nuanced way. In essence, ‘black peril’ worked to associate sexual behaviour with ‘blackness’, proving it inferior and degenerative, thus promoting Victorian attitudes surrounding sex, preventing interracial sex, and enforcing patriarchal structures. All of these elements served to maintain the racial structure fundamental to the colonial project. Historians such as Robert Young and John Pape maintain a ‘deep connection between sexuality and racism’[12] and assert that ‘the oversexed black male was simply a product of a racist imagination.’[13]
‘Black peril’ panics largely reflected Victorian fears about sexual degeneration, and thus enabled such fears to be manipulated to undermine virility associated with ‘native’ men, promoting white sexual repression and serving the white male settler. Sex in the Victorian period was characterised by ideas of moral degeneracy in response to the ‘nightmarish spectre of sexually transmitted disease.’[14] This concern popularised sexual restraint and purity, values which came to be associated with strength of British character.[15] Alongside anxiety over the ‘dangers’ of sexual activity, emerged fears about white sexual inadequacy in contrast with ‘over fertile’ non-whites, threatening the white supremacist basis of colonialism. For example, Young identifies how the hyper-fertility of non-whites is depicted in De Quincy’s description of the orient as the ‘workshop of peoples … a vast machine of endless self-reproduction.’[16] These images emerge in contrast to the perceived ‘disorder’ of ‘tropical neurasthenia’ among white men, which denoted the loss of vigour and manhood, and related poor sexual performance to illicit forms of sexual relations with ‘natives.’ This promoted white fears of being ‘overrun’ by other races, which would threaten racial hierarchies and colonial rule. Therefore, ‘black peril’ emerged at this time to invert these associations in order to subvert non-white prolificacy. This is evident in how Young highlights that ‘the yardstick of racial difference consists of the ‘excess of fertility’ of the primitive over the civilized races’[17], associating sexual reproduction with racial inferiority. This association is evident in the way in which ‘the contraction of syphilis by British troops serving in India was the most commonly cited example of imperial ‘pollution’ from the late nineteenth century’[18], demonstrating how ‘native’ sexual behaviour was disproportionately vilified. Therefore, as argued by Jock McCulloch, the emphasis placed on sexual purity and restraint by ‘black peril’ panics enabled white settlers to use ‘whatever leverage they could to consolidate their notion of ‘white virtue’’[19] which was key to maintaining the structure of colonial societies.
The hysteria of ‘black peril’ panics served to maintain white racial purity by criminalising interracial sexual relations. The ‘savage’ tropes promoted by colonial racism presented a hypersexualised image of black people – a stereotype identified by Young who asserts that ‘blackness evokes an attractive, but dangerous, sexuality, an apparently abundant, limitless, but threatening, fertility.’[20] This provoked anxiety over miscegenation, especially among white men, due to concerns that white women encouraged the advance of non-European males.[21] This placed new emphasis on the need to police interracial sexual boundaries, especially when considering the repressive nature of British sexuality. This necessity was intensified by the frequent transgression of racial separation in colonial societies. In Southern Rhodesia, by 1904 there were over 6,991 African domestic workers, which meant that white women spent most of their days alone with black male servants.[22] These factors combined to create pervasive anxiety over miscegenation, especially after 1900 when more and more white women were settling in the colonies.[23] The arrival of new settlers made it even more important to establish the cultural and social values of the society; considering Hildegarde Hinde’s assertion that ‘newcomers from Europe … were ignorant of Africa and prone to errors of judgement with their domestic servants.’[24] Anxiety over interracial sex and the way in which it undermined colonial control was demonstrated in the treatment of mixed race children, most of whom were born as a result of the ‘white peril’ reality. Mixed race children were commonly referred to as ‘mulatto,’ essentially meaning ‘inferior beast’ that cannot reproduce, and on top of this, illegitimate children were unsupported or acknowledged by their white fathers.[25]
This degrading treatment showed how miscegenation was a perceived threat to the ‘purity’ of the white race and the maintenance of the racial hierarchies that were so fundamental to colonial societies.[26] In response to these fears, ‘black peril’ tropes were used as a tool to instil fear in the white population over the consequences of interracial sex, which would prevent racial ‘impurity’ and maintain white supremacy.[27] For example, the Immorality Suppression Ordinance (ISO) of 1903 criminalised interracial sex, awarding five years for a black man found guilty and two years for a white woman.[28] Furthermore, law changes in 1916 extended arrests to ‘the raising or opening of any window, blind or screen of a room, or the trap door or flap of any privy… .’[29] The basis of this is summarised by Anderson; who argues that white virtue in Southern Rhodesia depended upon maintaining rules of social distance and intimacy, with peril accusations being ‘driven by fear and the desire for retribution and cleansing.’[30] Irrational white attitudes over interracial contact is where ‘black peril’ proves to be less productive for colonial societies, as they promoted the removal of black men from domestic help; which would have disserved the white population on the basis of a false premise.[31] However, the fact that ‘black peril’ still worked to uphold racial hierarchies, the foundation of a colonial society, at the expense of this proves that overall it was useful for such societies in the face of miscegenation.
‘Black peril’ also served to enforce patriarchal structures in colonial societies which were used to preserve white male superiority, the notion upon which colonial society was justified. As identified by David Anderson, ‘in both the colony and the metropole, strong ideals of racial superiority were combined with patriarchal attitudes which recognised rights of men to protect their property in women.’[32] This was facilitated upon the basis of ‘blackness’ being associated with danger, especially that of a sexual nature. In 1903, the ISO passed in Southern Rhodesia awarded the death penalty for anything which could be seen as ‘attempted’ rape.[33] Acts as minor as being in the same room with white women at the ‘wrong’ time was treated as evidence of attempt to rape. The promotion of the image of a ‘dangerous’ black man came hand in hand with archetypal images of the passive white woman and white male saviour. This led to major restrictions on the freedoms of white women all in the name of their ‘protection’, such as restricting them to their homes.[34] Women’s ‘social etiquette’ was also policed, as many were considered to not know how to ‘properly’ conduct themselves and by doing so were sending the ‘wrong message’ to black men.[35] This promoted the sense that white women needed to be protected from sexually ‘dangerous’ black men by ‘pure’ white men, consolidating the archetypal image of white male superiority and civility.[36] In Southern Rhodesia, there had actually only been 162 cases of sexual offence out of 10,000 adult male domestic workers by 1912, a figure which even disregards the questionable evidence that was provided against defendants.[37] Therefore, the entrenchment of the patriarchy in colonial societies facilitated the ‘white peril’ reality, which was another tool for racial subjugation and oppression, yet remained ‘untouched by penal sanctions of immorality legislation throughout the colonial period.[38] Patriarchal attitudes deeply entrenched white superiority in colonial society because it also conditioned white women to see black people as competitors in some respects, as they were all subjugated in some way by the white man. It is clear how patriarchal ‘white saviour’ imagery worked to promote the general ‘civilising mission’ which underlay colonialism.
The intersectionality of ‘black peril’ across racial and sexual lines shows how race never exists in isolation, and thus always works in relation to other power dynamics. This shows how useful ‘black peril’ was to colonial societies by maintaining a number of hierarchies and structures, all of which worked to preserve white supremacy and black inferiority. Like all oppressive policies, it could be suggested that ‘black peril’ was unproductive because it was later harnessed by nationalist groups to expose colonial hypocrisies through ‘white peril.’[39] However, the centrality of racial hierarchies to colonial societies, and the way in which ‘black peril’ tropes pervade society even to this day, demonstrate how the stereotypes fabricated by white settlers serve colonial societies’ most fundamental functions. The supercilious hyper-sexualisation and villainization of black people today shows how colonial tropes such as black peril pervade modern society, preserving white supremacy by controlling and repressing black lives, particularly through the criminal ‘justice’ system.
Footnotes
[1] Krista O’Donnell, ‘Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence, and Domestic Work in German Southern Africa 1904-1915’, Journal of Women’s History, 11:3 (1999), p.32. [2] Norman Etherington, ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, Journal of Southern African Studies, 15:1 (1988), p.36 [3] Ibid., p.710. [4] David Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society: “Black Perils” in Kenya, c. 1907-30’, The Journal of Imperial Commonwealth History, 38:1 (2010), p.66. [5] John Pape, ‘Black and White: The ‘Perils of Sex’ in Colonial Zimbabwe’ Journal of Southern African Studies, 16:4 (1990), p.701. [6] Ibid., p.702. [7] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.48. [8] Carina Ray, ‘Decrying White Peril: Interracial sex and the Rise of Anticolonial Nationalism in the Gold Coast’ American Historical Review, 119:1 (2014), p.32. [9] Ibid., p.48. [10] Etherington, ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, p.36. [11] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.66. [12] Robert Young, Colonial Desire: hybridity in theory, culture, and race (London: Routledge, 1995), p.91. [13] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.707. [14] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.47. [15] Ibid., p.47. [16] Young, Colonial Desire, p.92. [17] Ibid., p.92. [18] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.48. [19] Ibid., p.48. [20] Young, Colonial Desire, p.91. [21] Etherington, ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, p.47. [22] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.701. [23] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.48. [24] Ibid., p.67. [25] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.716. [26] Young, Colonial Desire, p.91. [27] Etherington, ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, p.49. [28] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.703. [29] Ibid., p.715. [30] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.66. [31] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.703. [32] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.67. [33] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.703. [34] Krista O’Donnell, ‘Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence, and Domestic Work in German Southern Africa 1904-1915’, Journal of Women’s History, 11:3 (1999), p.32. [35] Etherington, ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, p.38. [36] Anderson, ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society’, p.66. [37] Pape, ‘Black and White’, p.709. [38] Ibid., p.717. [39] Carina Ray, ‘Decrying White Peril’, p. 81.
Bibliography
Anderson, D. ‘Sexual Threat and Settler Society: “Black Perils” in Kenya, c. 1907-30’, The Journal of Imperial Commonwealth History, 38:1 (2010)
Etherington, N. ‘Natal’s Black Rape Scare of the 1870s’, Journal of Southern African Studies, 15:1 (1988)
Fanon, F. Black Skin, White Masks (London: Pluto Press, 2008)
O’Donnell, K. ‘Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence, and Domestic Work in German Southern Africa 1904-1915’, Journal of Women’s History, 11:3 (1999)
Pape, J. ‘Black and White: The ‘Perils of Sex’ in Colonial Zimbabwe’ Journal of Southern African Studies, 16:4 (1990)
Ray, C. ‘Decrying White Peril: Interracial sex and the Rise of Anticolonial Nationalism in the Gold Coast’ American Historical Review, 119:1 (2014)
Young, R. J. C. Colonial Desire: Hybridity in Theory, Culture and Race (London: Routledge, 1995)
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