"Domestic abuse and rape effect women of color differently than they effect white women because both the programs developed to help abused women and the laws created to punish domestic violence ignore the ways that race and gender discrimination combine to exclude women of color. Women of color lack political influence and are largely excluded from policy decision making, and thus their concerns are overlooked or misunderstood. Women of color who are victims of domestic abuse must organize to gain greater political power and remedy the effect that racism has on ignoring or discounting the violence they face as women."