I was going to head to bed a bit earlier tonight but I saw something on my facebook timeline that propelled me to speak. It's no secret that the black community has its issues when it comes to family dynamic in that we seem to not be together the way we were when our parents were coming up, and certainly before them. At a certain point we stopped valuing and placing emphasis on staying together and started this whole dynamic of quick relationships and even quicker separations and/or divorces.
Tonight I am not going to hit anyone with statistics or even a list of sources to back what I have to say up. I am going to go completely off of my experiences as a black woman in this current climate. I have been off and on in a relationship for the better of twelve or so years. We started out strong and then, as with any relationship that's not completely solid, things started going bad and eventually just ran off into a ditch. We are currently still in the ditch but working to tow it out.
In this whole experience of being in this relationship I have always had issues with my mates lack of respect for me as it pertains to disrespect from his family and, at times, disrespect from him. We can normally figure our issues out and correct miscommunication but when it came to his family being rude he was always very silent. I can't recall many times where he stood up for me and never stood up for me where I could actually see it. For all I know he could be lying about that as he's known to lie from time to time for various reasons that I don't altogether understand. Nevertheless one can only hope that this is something he's working on as we are in totally different positions at this time in life and anything less than respect will guarantee that not only is he going to get cussed out but so is his family. Gone are the days of never sticking up for myself in hopes that he does because I don't have any faith that he ever truly will however, with work on his end, that faith could change.
A similar situation happened on my facebook timeline. There was an acquaintance who was having a bit of a tiff with her brother in law. This man was calling her everything but the child of god on her own facebook page, under a story that had nothing to do with anything. It seemed like he just had an axe to grind and chose that time to be a bitch. Well, he rambled off the insults of her being a bitch, whore, welfare queen, etc and even called her mother a bitch. There was absolutely no respect in this situation. I have always been of the school that if you have a familial issue or grievance to hash out you work it out amongst yourselves, you don't include everyone in your business. He, however, added everyone in his business by posting on her public page so me and another woman decided to take up for her. The bigger situation here is that her husband was nowhere to be found on that post. Nowhere at all. He said nothing, nada, zilch, nine in her defence. I didn't even see a "hey bro, let's move this to messaging" or a call me message in the least. He just let his brother unload on his wife for a good two hours off and on with me and the other woman taking up for her, as well as her mother.
What's funny about this whole ordeal is that I was going down the timeline in a group that we are all in and came across a controversial post. I didn't see the big deal about the post and neither did 99% of the other commenters but he found a huge problem with it and let his feelings be known. He was calling people immature, "bitch niggas" and everything else. You could feel the rage emanating from the computer screen when you read his comments. After a while his wife jumped on and attempted to take up for her husband. It wasn't that big of a success but at least she tried, right?
Why is this a big deal? Well, both of these situations is surrounding the same people. In one situation you have a very quiet and meek individual who is allowing another man (brother or not) to disrespect his union, disrespect their newborn and disrespect the mother in law but in the next situation you have an angry and obnoxious man who is going at other women on the post and making his feelings known. This is a group and thread of people that, chances are, he doesn't know in person but he still spent the energy in trying to get them to understand why the post was offensive and then having an angry response when they failed to see his way of things and then you had a wife coming in to protect her man.
This is the current climate of the relationships in this community. It's almost like the roles have reversed and the black man is passive and scared while the black women are protecting their relationship and their mates honor. I am not a fan of this role reversal. When I think strong, black man I think of a man who can handle his own. He may not have all the money in the world but he takes care of his and will never be the type to let someone (family or not) negatively cross him or his union. It seems a lot of black men are not that these days but they are wanting and requiring a higher level of respect and submission than they have shown themselves worthy of having. Everything that this man has displayed reeked of scared little boy with a penchant to go after women he doesn't know in a forum he doesn't have to be in but when the drama was brought to his front door with a man he knows really well he ran with his tail between his legs. I could say that this is not typical but I am actually dating one like this right now. He can have all the disrespect in the world for me when he gets mad. I become every bitch and whore he can think of but when his family opens their mouths he has nothing to say, even if that means allowing those people to disrespect the union we are supposed to be in.
What I don't understand is how black men think that being with a black woman and not respecting her is going to serve them in the end. I want to know why they think that allowing other men to disrespect is going to gain them respect and submission. I actually just watched a video on YouTube about this earlier as well, the Zo What Morning Show. I will link that video with this blog.
I don't know what's going to become of the black man and, by extension, the black relationship but they are going to have to get it together. Get it together in the sense that they no longer agree with allowing people to disrespect their women and children. Get it together in the sense that they, themselves, hold each other to the same standard that they, themselves, won't be disrespecting women and children so much so that they will check other men if they witness it happening. It's easy to point out what others need to do but it takes a real man to look in the mirror and see what the issues are and work, actively, to change it. Until the black man gets his soul on the right path, get his spirit right and gain their dignity back this community will always be off in a ditch because, contrary to popular belief, black men are actually the forerunners in this community. It only looks like women are the forerunners now because the black man has checked out and started dating other races in hopes that the grass is greener but in the end the same issues they had with black women will always manifest in other race relations because our issues are embedded within us. No amount of running from self and hiding in the bosom of other races of women is going to erase those issues.
Black women, we are not off the hook. There comes a time in all of our lives where we have to require more of the men we are with. We have to hold them to a higher standard and actually require them to reach that standard while not settling for less. I am not speaking financially. You can have all the money in the world and still be in a jacked up relationship. Never get blinded by dollar signs. We need to make sure that once that man has elevated to a level of being able to lead us we actually let them lead us and not take over things he's actually handling. We need to make sure that the standard is set from the get-go that disrespect, lying and cheating is not going to be tolerated and then stick to our guns if they do it by leaving the situation alone. Stop trying to make a minute man into a forever husband because it won't work, their mindframe won't be in the real game. We need to also hold ourselves to a higher standard and work to achieve that standard as well. No longer is it cool to sit back and collect welfare when you're able-bodied to work or try and shack up with a "sugar daddy" to prevent actually working for self and doing for self.
All of this is the result of white supremacy. I know some will throw their head back and sigh but it's true. The deterioration of the black community was a plan. It was a plan that, unfortunately, has worked. To have the entire community together, in loving unions, is to have the possibility of us wanting change, collectively. Right now we want change and we know things have to change but we aren't in a position to actually come together and force the system to change because we are busy still going at each other over issues that was planted into our community by the white supremacists and worrying about dumb shit like hair weaves and who's more conscious. At the end of the day we need to get ourselves together and it starts at home. Ignore the programming we have been forced into and build up our community again. Once we become one again is when we can finally kill that system of lies and depression we call white supremacy and replace it with a system of justice. This will never happen until the black man and the black woman repair the relationship between us and that begins with first acknowledging that there is a serious issue and then actively working to unpack those issues and work through them.
Zo What Morning Show Discussing Black Relationships with Tariq Nasheed and Margo Hudson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edLXMzupk68
