The Problem Isn’t Black Feminism, It’s Black Naivety

By:  H.T., Website:  Rogue Black Nerd

One misconception a lot of women have about how black men feel regarding the concept of black feminism is that we just wish black women would shut up and go back to being barefoot and pregnant.  This is not true.  See, if anything, white people have proven that we can have an exponentially more feminist society while still needing to work on its issues.  It’s true, many white men in power abuse it via how they treat women.  But this is not to say that white women haven’t made gains themselves in society, made more obvious by the fact that this fight against sexual harassment is even happening.

But when it comes to black women, and namely black feminism, in terms of how we relate to black men, shit goes sideways.  For one, a great deal of power plays that black feminists pull off usually involves white men, namely very left leaning and more privileged than black men, yet black men are attacked more often than not for having more privilege than them.  But make light of this and you will be labeled an angry hotep who hates black women.

Furthermore, the slut walk movement.  This movement is annoying, not because it’s black women wanting to be sexually liberated, but rather it’s selling this idea that black women need to base more of their identity on their sexuality and not let the judgements of the world stop them.  Never mind that as I said before, black women can’t complain that black men have no act right when the non-acting right black men are who these “sexually liberated” women are fucking while straight up ignoring good men.  Sex is undoubtedly the greatest motivator for any man so much so that a great deal of why things are bought is for sex.  What’s more, we can’t pretend that sex appeal lasts forever.  Amber rose, simply put, can’t look the way she looks now.  Very few women do past menopause.  But make light of this and you are called an ashy loser who will never get pussy.  Never mind that of the men you see defending them on this, few, if any, are fucking the women they’re fighting for.

Then there’s the “black men are trash” movement.  The conflict here is that these are women stating real grievances, the issue is what men are required to do in solidarity.  Black men must, in short, be vigilant in calling out other black men in their actions towards black women.  This goes to the often discussed issue of “Why don’t the good black men stand up against the thugs?”  Well, the answer is simple:  at this point, it would become a combination of mass snitching and well…you saw The Punisher, right?  That.  If the good black men of the black community rose up and straight up imprisoned or killed all its bad elements, I’m not sure these women would like the results as this would likely make light of the fact that many of them are addicted to making bad choices in men.

Then there’s the effeminization of black masculinity.  I want to make this clear, I am NOT saying they’re trying to turn black men gay.  What I am saying is that the idea of what is a masculine man has gone from the image of a protector to that of a platonic best friend.  For as much as black women shat on us for not finding Leslie Jones attractive, they sure had no issue with pushing for an image of ideal attractive black men to look less NBA and more WNBA.  What’s more, even our male leaders aren’t strong and damn near effeminized.  Shaun King, Deray and even that annoy little shit Gazi Kodo.  The long hair, the high cheekbones, the focus on more skinny and waif body types, the clothing that has men dressed like backup dancers from the 80s…and then there’s #MasculinitySoFragile

The #MasculinitySoFragile crowd is annoying because it honestly feels like every which angle that can be used to say “Ha!  So you were attracted or turned on by another man,” but wonder why so many men are against being labeled that.  It’s because, simply put, we understand that having been known for having even one homosexual experience makes us unappealing to a great deal of women, so we’d rather not have that on our records.  Honestly, if I had to guess, this feels like a culture-wise vetting process for men to see who will get to pass their genes on.

Maybe more than likely that’s what this is.  Maybe all this making black women more focused on sexuality and career than class and family is a great big plot to culturally route us into being the more tolerable image of blackness that well, the world would rather see of black people:  our women highly sexualized and focused on hypergamy and our men emasculated and neutered to where they pose no real threat.  Perhaps.  But I hope I’m wrong.