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HOWEVER, you seem to care about these black women. You give all this advice to the black woman, but you just shun the black man! He can go to hell for all you care. You act like the black man and black woman are two entirely separate people!
That would be because we are. Black women and black men are not the same. I know it's a difficult concept for some people to comprehend, but a woman cannot be a man, and a man cannot be a woman. (Not without surgery, anyway.) We are different. With different goals, mores and agendas. Black men are going to do what black men are gonna do. I really have little to no interest in what their agenda is, seeing that I'm not a black man and have no role to play in that. It's not my job to teach a grown-ass man how to be a man. If he somehow missed out on that, I'm sorry for him, but I certainly don't want a boy-man in my gene pool. Who knows if that foolishness can't somehow wind up on my child's DNA.
My husband was taught to be a man by his father, as all men should be. My son will be taught to be a man by his father. No surviving culture has ever relied on women to socialize boys to manhood, and I strongly advocate that women avoid boy-men who haven't been socialized by other men into that role.
Funny, how its all the women in IRR who are the most offended by this topic....
I'm not offended by the topic. I'm pointing out the absurdity of the topic and recommending that black women avoid it. It take a lot more than this nonsense to offend me.
Go back and read again. There have only been 3 women in this thread. I can only speak for myself in saying that I have NEVER been in an IRR and have no plans to be in one. There has only been ONE woman, out of us three, who has promoted IRR as an alternative to black men.
You really read this wrong, and I think that you should go back and read what's actually there and not what you think is there before trying to throw zingers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PKCorey
Funny, how its all the women in IRR who are the most offended by this topic....
I'm glad you found someone to be with and have children with, but children are out of the question for me, so that changes the dynamic. I have no biological clock to be in a race against, so I can take all the time I want.
I misunderstood your post. I thought you said you'd given up on love entirely. My bad.
If you want to have a discussion - you need to add to the discussion!
Quote:
Originally Posted by brownhornet
Black women and relationships... man I think the server would crash if I really said all I wanted to say on this one lol. Ill sit back and watch.
Brownhornet - Damn it, just say it !
This is an Internet Forum, you are using a screen name... unless you have a lot of IRL friends here, what's the harm in speaking up and saying it like you see it? At worst, you'll get shot down, but if people do it right, you'll get some constructive criticism out of the exchange and you can you can use that to grow and change.
+++++
Personally, I feel somewhat caught in the middle of this one. I have black girlfriends, and I am married to a black man. I am white and as you might imagine, I catch the heat from SOME black women just because I am married to "one of their men".
My husband gets annoyed by this type of attitude from black women, he says "You don't see anyone's name tattooed on my forehead, do you?" I've asked him why he never really dated black women... he used to say because black women are bossy. There, I said it. Note, I said he used to say that... I haven't heard he say that in a long time, I think his attitude is changing a bit.
The fact is, now that I'm older and hopefully a little wiser, I sympathize with black women who get po'd when they see black men with white women. I sometimes wonder if my husband will ever get bored with the novelty of being with a white woman and will dump me for a sista. It's nonesense thinking, because after all my husband and I have been through together, our bond is strong, and truthfully, I believe he's never been one to step out on me..... so I really am not worried about it now. But I wonder sometimes if a black woman might have been a "better" for my husband, maybe she would have understood him and supported him better than I have been able to do, maybe she wouldn't have made the same mistakes I have made.
I know my husband got what he was looking for, he only dated a couple of black girls before he met me, all of his long-term relationships prior to me had been with white women. But I wonder if, as he gets older, if he ever regrets the decisions he made in this area when he was young. He has had a mid-life crisis of sorts as of late and feels a strong need to move back home to Georgia, and to once again live amongst his own kind - both southerners and black folks. Fortunately, I loved Atlanta and I have gotten over the issues I had with Atlanta which propelled me to force the move back to Minnesota when we found out we were expecting our first child... in fact, I am all but 'over' living in Minnesota [but that's another topic.]
From my AA girlfriends, I have learned to not all respect, but also admire black women. They have proven themselves to be strong, independent and resourceful - they put up with an incredible amount of BS from society and come out on top time and time again.
I was honestly very, very naive about race relations when I met and married my husband. I grew up in an all-white rural community in Minnesota, and before I met my husband, I had never even had a black friend, much less dated a black man previously. That sounds really strange if you grew up in Georgia, or anywhere in the south, but in Minnesota it is seriously very easy, in some rural areas, to live one's entire life with little to no exposure to AAs. More so 20-30 years ago than today, but it is still possible today.
Anyways, I met my husband 6 weeks after I moved to Atlanta. We met at a hole-in-the wall on Peachtree Street called the Stein Club - he was an art school student, I was working as a paralegal at a private law office located downtown. My friend I had followed down here from Minnesota introduced me to him, and we hit it off almost immediately.
We got married a year after we met. We were young, he was 25 and I had just turned 22 when we got married. I had a 'born again' experience and told him we needed to either break up or get married, so we got married. Not a lot of forethought went into the decision to get married. We did not "have" to get married, but soon enough we felt we "had" to stay married - our first child was born 18 months after we exchanged vows.
We've been through a lot in the 18 years we have been married, including a three-year separation - we reconciled nearly 5 years ago. A huge part of our marital difficulties stemmed from my not understanding how to relate to my man as a black man... I didn't fully understand his culture and therefore I didn't fully understand him and I did not understand we were clashing in the areas of our black/white AND our northern/southern differences - not to mention our male/female differences!
We both come from middle-class backgrounds, so much of our values and expectations were very similar, we have been VERY blessed to nearly always have been on the same page with regards to raising our four children together, and that was the glue which kept us talking to one another in the darkest days of our marriage.
But in some areas, specific in areas of black/white culture, there have been significant trouble in our marriage and I have thought, from time to time, would it be this difficult if I had married a white guy? In truth, I suspect the answer to that question is simply I'd have a different set of differences to work out with a white guy vs my husband... in all relationships, it takes a lot of HARD WORK to truly understand one another.
Maybe our obvious "contrasts" have been an asset in the end, because we cannot pretend for a minute that we are coming to the table from the same place as the other partner in this relationship.
Relationships are always hard, and always an ongoing process. In some areas I was too much in control in the early years of our relationship, in other areas I was too passive... we have both grown in the past 18 years, and we have learned to be life partners. But it did not come easily. It REALLY was not easy.
Now that I'm older and wiser, it actually bothers me that more black men don't value and respect black women. I am grateful white men are increasingly willing to date black women, but I also know from experience, a bi-racial relationship/marriage is NOT for everyone. Telling black women they are free to date outside of their race, just as black men have done, is one answer - but it's not the whole answer. [I hear you LadyRo]
I know there is considerable pressure at times, within the black community, for blacks to only date blacks. One of my black girlfriends apparent forgot who she was hangin' with for a moment recently when she started going off about rumors she'd heard that her younger brother had gotten a white girl pregnant. She held nothing back, and I was like "whoa" - I mean what she was saying was intense.
I actually sensed a lot of HURT behind my friend's words, it was as if she was PERSONALLY offended by the news her brother was stepping out with a white woman. And I don't think it was the stepping out part which bothered her, he's done that previously - with the same result. I personally would have been ticked at him for not being faithful to the mother of his children, but it was the fact her brother was doing a white woman, without wearing a condomn - apparently - which got her fired up. [Judging from how many kids this guy has, with several women - I doubt he ever wears a condom.]
I am somewhat mixing apples and oranges when I relay this story, because this friend of mine is from the "generational poverty" culture, which we discussed in a prior thread, so her and I already have significant differences in how we view life - never mind the black/white business. For example, I asked my friend once how her brother could possibly support 9 children. She said he supports the children he lives with. I said he needed to be supporting ALL of his children, irregardless of his current relationship with the baby's mamma. She looked at me like I'd said something totally outrageous - she said those girls knew what they were doing when they had those babies, "Those kids are the responsibility of their mammas, just like my kids are my responsibility. I'm not asking anyone to help me with my kids, I take care of my children. " Although all her kids happen to have the same dad and he lives with my friend, so he does contribute to the household -if he didn't, she'd give him the boot in a heartbeat.
In this particular friend's relationship it's her house, she rules the roost, and her guy goes by her rules or he is out the door. I try to talk to her about the concept of "partnership" in a marriage/relationship, and she tells me she is in a "partnership", but in truth, she makes all the decisions in her household. She oftentimes thinks I ought not give my husband the time of day... she says that one minute, and the next she is telling me I need to respect and support my husband as a black man. She's constantly contradicting herself, and when I try to call her on it, she denies it! Once in a GREAT while she will concede a point, but once that happens you better mark your calendar, because it's not going to happen again for a good long time. Her and I have a lot of heated conversations - to say the least - it's a wonder we are still close friends after two years of knowing one another. She says she likes me because I'm not trying to be something I'm not, and I'm trying to better understand my husband and do right by our four bi-racial children. As good as her advise and insight is at times, I also have to do a lot of separating the wheat from the chaff - because oftentimes what she brands as "the black experience" is more so the culture of generational poverty. But not always.
I don't know if my friend's tirade on black men not sticking to black woman was more so socio-economic. I'd tend to think so, only my husband's Uncle was so horrid about my husband marrying me - that Uncle is a lawyer and lives in Chicago's Hyde Park... very unlike my friend, who grew up in Chicago's Cabrini-Green Projects. But they both get IRRATE at the thought of black men dating white women. I mean my husband's Uncle held NOTHING back when he personally called me up and told me what he thought of his nephew marrying a white girl from Minnesota.
My husband's other brother married a Filipino woman and reports the same uncle is now shunning them. [Although I don't think she got a threatening phone call from the Uncle just prior to marrying my BIL.]
Okay, I am trying to speak from my own experiences and perspectives here, because this is what I can add to the conversation. I am interested to hear input from men - especially black men.
I'm pretty sure, somewhere in there, I gave some of you something to respond to... so let's hear it!
Last edited by StPaulEastSider; 05-18-2009 at 02:43 PM..
Reason: spelling
Go back and read again. There have only been 3 women in this thread. I can only speak for myself in saying that I have NEVER been in an IRR and have no plans to be in one. There has only been ONE woman, out of us three, who has promoted IRR as an alternative to black men.
You really read this wrong, and I think that you should go back and read what's actually there and not what you think is there before trying to throw zingers.
Actually, you weren't one of them and its been more than 3 women in this topic....
No, I haven't given up on love. I've given up on trying to show/convince black men that I'm not a member of the bitter black women's brigade. They don't care. All many (not all) of them see is "black female" and all bets are off. So, I let them stew in their own misery and go on living my life, even if that means I'll live it alone.
A lot of people think being alone automatically makes someone lonely, and that's not the truth. Do I get lonely? Yes, at times, but not all the time, or even most of the time. And, certainly not enough to justify being with a man who has a messy life. If he can't keep his life in order, why would I want him in mine?
Quote:
Originally Posted by RoslynHolcomb
I misunderstood your post. I thought you said you'd given up on love entirely. My bad.
Gotcha! I think that's very smart. I think this whole 'black women are all bitter' schpiel is a ruse in the first place. Surely they're not that stupid. It's been my experience that the ones who claim that want you to bend over backwards proving that you're the exception. I call shenanigans on that crap. Bring me my broom. Don't fall for the okey-doke. Anyone who operates on such stereotypical nonsense is too stupid to breed and really should be left out of the gene pool altogether.
I agree with you on the issue of being alone. I think many women make absurd choices out of desperation. That's why I'm such a strong advocate of casting a wide net, but you obviously are operating from a different and quite clever viewpoint altogether.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LadyRo
No, I haven't given up on love. I've given up on trying to show/convince black men that I'm not a member of the bitter black women's brigade. They don't care. All many (not all) of them see is "black female" and all bets are off. So, I let them stew in their own misery and go on living my life, even if that means I'll live it alone.
A lot of people think being alone automatically makes someone lonely, and that's not the truth. Do I get lonely? Yes, at times, but not all the time, or even most of the time. And, certainly not enough to justify being with a man who has a messy life. If he can't keep his life in order, why would I want him in mine?
At the time you made your post, there had only been 3 women in the thread that I was aware of. Me, RoslynHolcombe, and the OP. Other posters could be women, I guess. (shrugs) And, based on that, I said you were reading the thread incorrectly because your comment seemed to come out of the blue. It's not a big deal.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PKCorey
Actually, you weren't one of them and its been more than 3 women in this topic....
I'm not reading into anything but thanks
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