The Foggles
Self-mappingIn this day and age when youth is worshipped, what benefits are there to having a few more years on the clock?
I will tell you two, and the first is that by being older you would have developed an understanding of yourself and how your mental and physical and indeed emotional systems work to be able to have the necessary control you need to take life forward.
The next benefit is that you would have hopefully developed your own self-composing and self-assuring and indeed self-soothing and calming routines. In other words you have your emotions and reactions in check and tucked in!
I will illustrate by saying that you will understand better how you learn, how best to study (coffee at 45 mins interval), how a hat tilted to the left is more flattering, how a white house interior is draining of your creative energies, how not reading anything the day before your exam is better for your performance, that you are likely to come down with a cold if your feet get cold etc etc. All these understanding of how you perform, your emotional interior comes with time and trial and error over the years. This is your edge.
How detailed is your self-map?
Black men and women cannot be 'saved' together. This is because black women putting any effort into uplifting black men is simply making black men better able to crush down black women. Its like feeding your tormentor!
Too proud to ask for directions
I have noticed that there is a push back to 'Is marriage for white people', coming from a faction of black women who feel that no one should be focussing on us or and intsructing black women on what to do re relationships, and that we should be left alone. I can agree that yes it does get tiresome to be in focus (although I dont think that bw have been focussed on more in this regard considering that we had 'Sex and the City', on for over ten years, focussing on the issues of unmarried white women, and also by virtue of the fact that our own situation is extreme there is naturally going to be some focus attention!), however this position suggests that black women have it all together, but that is far from the truth.
Black women are not getting it right, if they were then the astronomical number of singleness would not be there for all to see. I am uncomfortable with the 'dont focus on us' position because it traps black women in their problem, it is saying to black women 'just keep doing what you are doing'. Yet black women are NOT doing well so yes they do need some instructions and things pointed out.
Because black women havent made the grade and they live in a strongly mind guarded place, thousands of us wouldnt mind some advice, guidance, direction or plain laying things out in the open for us to see and make a clear choice for our futures.
I will also add that, there is a time for wearing sack cloth, we might as well get it over with so we can move on?
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5 comments:
As I get older I definitely feel as if I'm getting better. I'm becoming more peaceful, more comfortable with my decisions--both my successes and failures--and I'm becoming more comfortable being alone (and I mean that in a good way, not a "I've resolved myself to buying a bunch of cats to keep me company!" kind of way, lol).
I've seen plenty of push back against "Is Marriage for White People" too, but thankfully Mr. Banks just keeps going. He's supposed to be on CNN with Anderson Cooper here sometime this week.
I know some BW don’t like it but ultimately I think all these discussions are GOOD. It forces people to take a look and maybe have the uncomfortable conversations that they’ve been trying to avoid for years. Even the focus of the discussion is starting to change and not just be about BW in particular but on BM as well and why it is that BM are not measuring up to women’s standards. This is why I think these conversations are ultimately good and will change the course for BW in the future.
I knew when I first saw the Wall Street Journal article there would be an uproar, but I think what's so scary to some people is who is saying this: A "good black man".
This is a man who is himself married to a black woman, who is educated, and who is being honest. Rather than telling BW to silently wait for "good black men" like him to come along and rescue them, this is a man instead saying, "You ladies might want to expand your options if you actually want to get married".
And the real terror is that due to who he is and what he's about, he's a lot harder to dismiss.
When it was bloggers like you and Evia and other black women BWE members, twisted persons could/would just chalk it up to "oh, they're sell outs who couldn't find a black man/traitors to the race/etc."
He is pretty much the definition of nemesis in terms of being the anti-thesis of that viewpoint.
If you guys were scary to these sort of backward people (which I don't doubt), this man and his book must be an absolute living nightmare.
And make no mistake, the right people are getting the message, and they are gone. Time is winding down for DBR leeches and their ilk.
Toni (and Halima),
I think you hit the nail on the head about the reaction to Banks, and it's interesting how the "black men only" BW crew are pushing back so hard against Banks -- almost worst than black men even! As Toni said, the fact that Banks is who he is (highly educated BM married to a highly educated BW) and is saying these things might be too much for certain BW to handle... addressing uncomfortable truths is never a fun exercise, and it's easier to dismiss this issue by bringing up the usual excuses -- like, "I believe in black love," "white men aren't approaching black women in droves," and other commonly used phrases.
Banks' book was like a battering ram to that wall of excuses, and a lot of BW aren't ready to really address the ugly truth.
You might be interested in this latest article about Banks' book and the positive response he received...
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/ct-x-1102-trice-column-20111102,0,2490324.column
Finally, Banks is not alone, although he is the most vocal. I have quietly heard among some older BM in his age range that they are worried about their daughters' dating prospects. These BM raised their daughters to be smart, well-rounded, high-achieving, ladylike, etc., but these fathers admit that wherever they look, they don't see enough young black men who would be potential quality mates. These fathers don't want their daughters to remain single or marry a DBR... while these men aren't openly pushing for their daughters to date IR, they don't oppose it either... they recognize what's out there, and don't expect their daughters to fall on the sword on young black men's behalf.
So there are a lot more Ralph Richard Bankses out there than one might think... older BM who are quietly applauding him for taking on this very difficult topic.
(Oh, and I'll be in touch this weekend Halima! ;))
It's funny because the other day i was reading an article by a black woman and she was going off about the book and she made a really nasty comment basically saying that some black friends of hers were dating white men and that some preferred black men and people should leave them the "f" alone if they preferred black men yada yada yada basically she was mad that she had options (lol) I think these women keep holding out for men who will never marry them and make them wives because they simply don't want to. Not becuase of racism or feminism, it's just those black men do not want to get married. According to the book those are the men who should be able to marry but don't. We will be seeing more of these types of articles especially from black women making excuses for black men.
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