As we continue our Black History Month exploration, we turn to a critical theme: victimhood. For Black folks, this concept is deeply fraught. We are constantly expected to prove our resilience, to push forward despite harm, to avoid appearing weak or in need. When we name our pain, we are often met with gaslighting, dismissal, or the accusation that we are playing the victim. The truth is, we are victims—of systemic oppression, of historical and ongoing violence, of interpersonal harm. The problem is not victimhood itself, but the way it has been distorted and weaponized against us.

Understanding the shame around victimhood: a trauma-informed perspective

Dominant narratives equate victimhood with weakness, helplessness, or failure. This is particularly true for Black people, whose survival has been mythologized as proof of our unbreakable strength. But what happens when we internalize these narratives? We silence our pain. We deny ourselves the right to grieve. We feel shame for needing rest, care, or support.

Appropriate victimhood is the radical act of acknowledging harm without shame. It is saying: This happened to me, and it mattered. It is a refusal to gaslight ourselves into minimizing our own suffering for the comfort of others. The Black Lives Matter movement is an incredible example of collective appropriate victimhood.

The reframe: why victimhood matters

Victimhood often triggers:

Feelings of powerlessness, reminding us of past experiences where we lacked control.
Internalized shame, as we’re conditioned to see victimhood as weakness.
A loss of agency, leading us to believe our experiences are entirely shaped by others.

But, APPROPRIATE victimhood is different. It’s about acknowledging your vulnerability within a harmful system while reclaiming your agency to create safety and change. It allows you to hold both truths

“I have been harmed.”
“I have the power to heal and move forward.”

When we embrace this perspective, we recognize that fear and victimhood are not obstacles but guides, helping us identify what needs attention and how we can transform. To fully grasp the healing potential of appropriate victimhood, we must understand how it differs from its weaponized counterpart.

Weaponized victimhood vs. appropriate victimhood

Weaponized victimhood is a tool often used by dominant groups to evade accountability. We see this in how white fragility operates—when white folks center their discomfort over racial conversations and position themselves as the true victims to avoid responsibility. The same pattern appears in other dominant identities: men who weaponize victimhood to dismiss conversations about patriarchy, or able-bodied people who center their feelings over discussions on accessibility.

Appropriate victimhood, on the other hand, is about truth telling. It allows us to recognize harm without distorting it into a tool of control. It creates space for genuine healing, rather than cycles of avoidance, resentment, or internalized oppression. When we distinguish appropriate victimhood from its weaponized form, we can begin to understand its transformative effects.

The impact of leaning into appropriate victimhood

Acknowledging our victimhood is not just an intellectual exercise—it creates real psychological and physiological shifts. Fear, after all, does not just live in the mind; it is stored in the body and shaped by our environment. When we begin to name our experiences honestly, we may notice deep, sometimes unexpected reactions:

Anger and rage may surface in new ways. After years of suppressing or sidelining fear or pain, feeling anger can be profoundly disorienting. It may feel destabilizing at first, but it is also a sign of reconnection—to your body, your truth, and your rightful sense of injustice.
Others may struggle with your truth. Speaking openly about your victimhood may expose the fragility of those around you. Some may try to dismiss, downplay, or deflect from your experiences, which is why it is essential to lean into this work in safe spaces—therapy, loving relationships, professional or personal support groups, or other communities that honor your healing.
New boundaries may become necessary. As you reclaim your narrative, you may recognize relationships, environments, or dynamics that are no longer aligned with your well-being. Establishing new boundaries is not about isolation—it’s about protection and self-honoring.

And most importantly: on the other side of appropriate victimhood is agency.

When we allow ourselves to fully acknowledge harm, we also uncover new power. Suppressing our pain keeps us stuck in cycles of reaction and survival, but naming our experiences with clarity allows us to shift our reality. We cannot change what we cannot see. When we embrace the truth of what has happened to us, we create space for safety, intention, and transformation. Understanding these impacts allows us to chart a path forward in our healing journey.

Survivance and resistance: what victimhood reveals

Since appropriate victimhood helps us lean into our agency, it also reveals to us places of survivance—a term coined by Indigenous scholars to describe not just survival, but the active continuation of culture, identity, and strength despite overwhelming violence and trauma. For Black folks, specifically, we have a long, robust history of resistance and responses to state-sanctioned violence that we can draw upon during vulnerable times. In moments when we feel the weight of our harm, we also have access to a deep well of survivance that has allowed us to not only endure, but to thrive in ways that honor our past struggles.

As scholar Gerald Vizenor (Anishinaabe) explains, survivance is about living beyond mere survival, a continual process of resistance, reassertion, and persistence in the face of systemic oppression. This is the legacy that Black folks, too, carry: one that speaks not only to endurance, but to the transformative strength that comes from living through generations of harm while creating new spaces for life, love, and freedom.

Moving toward healing

To embrace appropriate victimhood, we must:

Acknowledge the harm we’ve endured—without minimizing or justifying it.
Reject the idea that naming harm makes us weak—it makes us human.
Resist the pressure to “move on” without processing—grief and healing take time.
Call out weaponized victimhood when when it is safe to do so—especially in dominant identities that use it to escape accountability.
Honor the strength in our vulnerability—leaning into appropriate victimhood reveals not just our wounds, but also our power to heal and transform.
Set boundaries to protect our healing process—this includes both emotional and physical boundaries to safeguard our energy and vulnerability.
Lean into community and support networks—healing is rarely a solo journey. Be intentional about who you allow to witness your process, and seek spaces that hold you with care and love.
Recognize that survivance is an active, ongoing process—our endurance is not passive. It is the active, resilient continuation of our identity and culture despite harm.

Reclaiming our right to acknowledge pain is part of our liberation. It is a step toward healing that allows us to move through fear, rather than be controlled by it.

With you in The Deep End,

V Woods

Diving deeper: the receipts

My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem
Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination by Robin D.G. Kelley
The Healing Wisdom of Africa by Malidoma Patrice Somé
“The Uses of Anger” – Audre Lorde, reflected upon by philospher Myisha Cherry in The Case for Rage: Why Anger is Essential to Anti-Racist Struggle
Survivance, Gerald Vizenor

Part 2: Embracing our truth - the power of appropriate victimhood