Dear Occupy Wall Street,
I support you, really I do. But the time has come to move beyond occupying to accomplishing. It's time to adopt an agenda and push it. Need an agenda? Take this one:
1) Re-enact Glass-Steagall.
2) Overturn Citizens United by constitutional amendment and strip corporations of personhood and speech rights.
3) Repeal the Bush tax cuts for the top 1%. If these cuts were supposed to help the "job creators" create jobs, we wouldn't have so much unemployment.
4) Pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting CEOs from making more than 40 times in salary, benefits and stock options than the annual salary of the lowest paid employees in their companies.
5) Break up banks that received TARP money so they're no longer "too big to fail."
6) Prosecute the CEOs of the commercial banks, mortgage lenders, investment banks, and rating agencies that precipitated the real estate bubble.
I know this doesn't encompass all the issues you're protesting about, but it's a good start.
Here's a tagline for you, borrowed from the late comedian Robin Harris:
"We don't die; we occupy."
You're welcome. Rock on, Occupy Wall Street.
How To Avoid Becoming a Holiday Hostage
You know the feeling: You're at a holiday party that you either didn't want to attend or realize that you shouldn't have attended. You can't find a polite or other exit because you came with someone else or committed to stay. And you are dying inside of boredom or shame and contemplating faking a heart attack to get out of this sorry POS called a holiday party.
You, my friend, are a holiday hostage. And I'm here to make sure this never happens to you again.
Here are the basics for avoiding becoming a holiday hostage.
1) First, have a game plan that includes a lot of "noes". Before all the holiday events start appearing in folks' minds and on your schedule, find out the ones you want to avoid and calendar in conflicting appointments on your calendar. No one has to know that those appointments are with yourself. If anyone asks if you can attend something, tell them, "I need to check my calendar," followed with, "I'm so sorry, but I committed to getting together with my old friend Mia." They don't need to know that "Mia" is short-hand for "Me, uh, myself, and I." Even better: Tell them you're getting together with THREE dear old friends (Me, myself, and I). They don't need to know who they are.
2) Second, if you have to attend an event, always, ALWAYS, drive yourself. Let any passengers know that when you're ready to go, they either have to leave with you or find a way home. The easiest way to become a holiday hostage is to agree to ride with someone else. There have been events where Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB) and I have ridden in separate cars because I refused to be a hostage.
3) Third, if you can't drive yourself, have someone fake call you with an emergency that will force the driver to take you home. Any woman who dated in the '90s knows this trick: You have your girlfriend call you in the middle of a first date with a fake emergency so you'll have an excuse to leave if you want to. Apply the same to holiday events. If you're enjoying yourself, you stay and thank her for the call. If not, you alert your driver promptly of your "emergency." Who knows? Your driver might want out of this event, too. Even better: Have your driver place the fake call.
4) If you can't drive by yourself because you are going with a spouse or significant other, have an escape code word or phrase. This code word or phrase, once worked into conversation, is your signal that one of you is ready to go and the other better hustle up and git to gittin'. Your code word or phrase needs to be something that will catch your spouse's or significant other's attention without catching the attention of your hosts or other guests, and it needs to be something that isn't so mundane that it would be overlooked. Try a current event and build your code word or phrase around that event. For example, if your code word or phrase is "cadaver dog," build it around the earthquake in Turkey, to wit: "Hey, have you been following the news about that earthquake in Turkey? I hear they've flown in cadaver dogs from the United States to help with the recovery." The earthquake in Turkey is still current news, and "cadaver dog" is enough to get your spouse's attention without alerting others, to wit, whispering in your spouse's or significant other's ear: "If you don't bring your sorry ass on, they're going to need a cadaver dog to find you when I'm done."
5) If you have to ride with someone else for whatever reason and can't have a code word or phrase, bring your favorite alcohol. If you're going to be a holiday hostage, might as well be a drunk one. Instead of feeling bored or ashamed by the event, BECOME the event. Get drunk off your ass, do a strip tease, and make sure you'll never be invited again. Problem solved.
Unless, of course, it's your office party, in which case you might find a pink slip waiting for you when you get back to work.
Happy Holidays!
You, my friend, are a holiday hostage. And I'm here to make sure this never happens to you again.
Here are the basics for avoiding becoming a holiday hostage.
1) First, have a game plan that includes a lot of "noes". Before all the holiday events start appearing in folks' minds and on your schedule, find out the ones you want to avoid and calendar in conflicting appointments on your calendar. No one has to know that those appointments are with yourself. If anyone asks if you can attend something, tell them, "I need to check my calendar," followed with, "I'm so sorry, but I committed to getting together with my old friend Mia." They don't need to know that "Mia" is short-hand for "Me, uh, myself, and I." Even better: Tell them you're getting together with THREE dear old friends (Me, myself, and I). They don't need to know who they are.
2) Second, if you have to attend an event, always, ALWAYS, drive yourself. Let any passengers know that when you're ready to go, they either have to leave with you or find a way home. The easiest way to become a holiday hostage is to agree to ride with someone else. There have been events where Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB) and I have ridden in separate cars because I refused to be a hostage.
3) Third, if you can't drive yourself, have someone fake call you with an emergency that will force the driver to take you home. Any woman who dated in the '90s knows this trick: You have your girlfriend call you in the middle of a first date with a fake emergency so you'll have an excuse to leave if you want to. Apply the same to holiday events. If you're enjoying yourself, you stay and thank her for the call. If not, you alert your driver promptly of your "emergency." Who knows? Your driver might want out of this event, too. Even better: Have your driver place the fake call.
4) If you can't drive by yourself because you are going with a spouse or significant other, have an escape code word or phrase. This code word or phrase, once worked into conversation, is your signal that one of you is ready to go and the other better hustle up and git to gittin'. Your code word or phrase needs to be something that will catch your spouse's or significant other's attention without catching the attention of your hosts or other guests, and it needs to be something that isn't so mundane that it would be overlooked. Try a current event and build your code word or phrase around that event. For example, if your code word or phrase is "cadaver dog," build it around the earthquake in Turkey, to wit: "Hey, have you been following the news about that earthquake in Turkey? I hear they've flown in cadaver dogs from the United States to help with the recovery." The earthquake in Turkey is still current news, and "cadaver dog" is enough to get your spouse's attention without alerting others, to wit, whispering in your spouse's or significant other's ear: "If you don't bring your sorry ass on, they're going to need a cadaver dog to find you when I'm done."
5) If you have to ride with someone else for whatever reason and can't have a code word or phrase, bring your favorite alcohol. If you're going to be a holiday hostage, might as well be a drunk one. Instead of feeling bored or ashamed by the event, BECOME the event. Get drunk off your ass, do a strip tease, and make sure you'll never be invited again. Problem solved.
Unless, of course, it's your office party, in which case you might find a pink slip waiting for you when you get back to work.
Happy Holidays!
The Death of Honor
Honor is dead, y'all, plain and simple. Conrad Murray put it on life support, it flatlined with JoePa, and it died quietly with the passing of Heavy D.
Conrad Murray put honor on life support when he had the temerity to not only insist on a trial on his involuntary manslaughter charge in the homocide of Michael Jackson, but then attempted to blame Jackson for his own death. The question whether Murray had any honor was answered in the negative when his mistresses took the stand, when the argument was made that Jackson administered the fatal dose of propofol himself. Regardless of how Jackson got his last dose of propofol, he could not have had access to it but for Dr. Murray. To blame a dead man for his own death that could not have happened but for your own actions? Absolutely no honor. It would have taken me all of nine minutes, not nine hours, to vote to convict Murray, and that's including six minutes for going to the bathroom. If Murray had had any honor, he would have pled guilty.
An honorable man takes responsibility for his actions, no matter how horrific they may have been.
Then came allegations that Penn State football legend Joe Paterno knew that one of his former assistant coaches was alleged to have sodomized a child, that one of the assistant coaches, a graduate student, witnessed the act. Sure, JoePa reported it up the chain of command within the university, but honor demanded more -- that he go to the police because a child's safety was involved. Children can't defend themselves from predatory adults. If JoePa could play a paternal, protective role with his players, who are clearly capable of protecting themselves, why couldn't he have picked up the phone and called the police to protect a child who couldn't protect himself?
An honorable man stands up for those who can't stand up for themselves, especially children.
And just when honor was flatlining in State College, PA, we heard of the passing of Dwight "Heavy D" Myers of "Heavy D and The Boyz" fame. It's no secret that yours truly hasn't been an ardent fan of hip-hop, but I loved Heavy D. Why? Because his rhymes didn't demean women. You could listen to his music, and he was all about loving women and women loving him, and loving him as he was -- The Overweight Lover. I never felt that I had to put my feminism on the shelf to enjoy a Heavy D song. I never felt excluded from his music because of misogyny or profanity. I didn't have to be less than myself to enjoy a Heavy D song. In fact, in one of his songs, "Is It Good To You?", Heavy D raised the bar as far as what we women should expect from men in the romance department.
An honorable man honors and respects women.
And so it appears that honor has died. May it rest in peace.
Conrad Murray put honor on life support when he had the temerity to not only insist on a trial on his involuntary manslaughter charge in the homocide of Michael Jackson, but then attempted to blame Jackson for his own death. The question whether Murray had any honor was answered in the negative when his mistresses took the stand, when the argument was made that Jackson administered the fatal dose of propofol himself. Regardless of how Jackson got his last dose of propofol, he could not have had access to it but for Dr. Murray. To blame a dead man for his own death that could not have happened but for your own actions? Absolutely no honor. It would have taken me all of nine minutes, not nine hours, to vote to convict Murray, and that's including six minutes for going to the bathroom. If Murray had had any honor, he would have pled guilty.
An honorable man takes responsibility for his actions, no matter how horrific they may have been.
Then came allegations that Penn State football legend Joe Paterno knew that one of his former assistant coaches was alleged to have sodomized a child, that one of the assistant coaches, a graduate student, witnessed the act. Sure, JoePa reported it up the chain of command within the university, but honor demanded more -- that he go to the police because a child's safety was involved. Children can't defend themselves from predatory adults. If JoePa could play a paternal, protective role with his players, who are clearly capable of protecting themselves, why couldn't he have picked up the phone and called the police to protect a child who couldn't protect himself?
An honorable man stands up for those who can't stand up for themselves, especially children.
And just when honor was flatlining in State College, PA, we heard of the passing of Dwight "Heavy D" Myers of "Heavy D and The Boyz" fame. It's no secret that yours truly hasn't been an ardent fan of hip-hop, but I loved Heavy D. Why? Because his rhymes didn't demean women. You could listen to his music, and he was all about loving women and women loving him, and loving him as he was -- The Overweight Lover. I never felt that I had to put my feminism on the shelf to enjoy a Heavy D song. I never felt excluded from his music because of misogyny or profanity. I didn't have to be less than myself to enjoy a Heavy D song. In fact, in one of his songs, "Is It Good To You?", Heavy D raised the bar as far as what we women should expect from men in the romance department.
An honorable man honors and respects women.
And so it appears that honor has died. May it rest in peace.
The Power of "No"
My husband, Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB), and I opened a joint checking and savings account at a local credit union. Towards the end of the transaction, the credit union rep tells us he needs our signature on something. He slides across the desk a proxy agreement that would allow the credit union to vote our shares for three years. BMNB and I read the agreement at the same time, and, without looking up or looking at each other, we say in unison, "No."
"Are you going to commit to attending shareholder meetings, then?", the credit union rep inquires, semi-indignantly.
Again, we say in unison, "No." And we explain, "We don't have to."
I then explain, "I don't give a proxy to Warren Buffett to vote my shares of Berkshire-Hathaway, just in case Uncle Warren gets a wild hair and decides to lose his mind. I'm surely not going to give my proxy to you. " One tiny thing I forgot, though: I don't have voting shares in Berkshire-Hathaway. I own Berkshire-Hathaway B, not Berkshire-Hathaway A.
That said, the point remains the same. "No" is a powerful word, and we need to use it more often because it expresses so much.
I was amazed at how calmly the credit union rep slid that agreement across the desk and attempted to pass it off as something we had to sign as a condition of opening our account. I won't say that BMNB and I are the most business-savvy folks on the planet, but we knew enough to know that a proxy agreement is not mandatory. "No" for us expressed to the credit union rep that we were more knowledgeable about our options than was he and we refused to accept the only one provided to us.
It got me to thinking of more instances when the power of "no" expressed more than refusal. An elder relative of mine was approached by her sister to sign a quit-claim deed relinquishing her interest in two pieces of property arguably held in the name of her and all her siblings for a mere $10. All the other siblings had signed. After much consternation, she said "no." Then the madness ensued. Tears, disappointment, manipulation, and one high-powered attorney's efforts to get her to sign rained down around her, and despite it all, she stood her ground and remained resolute: No.
For her, "no," wasn't just an expression of a refusal to sign. It was an expression of hurt, hurt that a sibling would try to wrest from her property that their mother intended she have. "No" was a way to put the brakes on a questionable transaction, to "lawyer up" like her sister did, to come to a previously non-existent negotiating table with information, options, and to possibly obtain a different result. "No" is a powerful word, y'all.
Think of it: Netflix customers said "no" to splitting streaming and DVD rental services, resulting higher fees, and Qwikster. Now Netflix is rethinking its course of action and Qwikster is no more.
Bank of America customers said "no" to a $5 fee to use their debit cards to spend their own damn money. Bank of America is walking back its decision, saying the corporate analog of, "My bad."
Occupy Wall Street protesters said "no" to Wall Street corruption and greed and Washington's complicity with it all. This expression of "no" speaks not only as a refusal to continue to go along, but a consciousness-raising movement, giving a name to the rest of us who continue to be screwed by capitalism run amok: The 99%.
Even a rooster expressed his "no" and his disapproval of BMNB being on his property this weekend, attacking BMNB as he attempted to help me to pick up something on the rooster's property. With BMNB being the only other male on the property and arguably a threat to the rooster's good thing -- unlimited food and sex with the hens -- the rooster thumped BMNB on the back of the leg with a wing and crowed his "no."
"No" gives us the power to do alot, including:
* Refuse to accept the status quo
* Refuse to accept what's being offered
* Express anger
* Express outrage
* Express hurt
* Allow time to consider different options
* Express superior knowledge of available options and exercise those options
* Express suspicion or discomfort based on instinct and act on that instinct
"No" is indeed a powerful word that we need to use more often.
In this recession, many of us have had to sit on our "noes" in the workplace for lack of options, for fear of losing the jobs we have. What employers don't realize is that recessions don't last forever, and many employees are going to express their "noes" by retiring, finding better jobs, or just developing other streams of income and walking away.
"No" is a powerful thing. Use it.
"Are you going to commit to attending shareholder meetings, then?", the credit union rep inquires, semi-indignantly.
Again, we say in unison, "No." And we explain, "We don't have to."
I then explain, "I don't give a proxy to Warren Buffett to vote my shares of Berkshire-Hathaway, just in case Uncle Warren gets a wild hair and decides to lose his mind. I'm surely not going to give my proxy to you. " One tiny thing I forgot, though: I don't have voting shares in Berkshire-Hathaway. I own Berkshire-Hathaway B, not Berkshire-Hathaway A.
That said, the point remains the same. "No" is a powerful word, and we need to use it more often because it expresses so much.
I was amazed at how calmly the credit union rep slid that agreement across the desk and attempted to pass it off as something we had to sign as a condition of opening our account. I won't say that BMNB and I are the most business-savvy folks on the planet, but we knew enough to know that a proxy agreement is not mandatory. "No" for us expressed to the credit union rep that we were more knowledgeable about our options than was he and we refused to accept the only one provided to us.
It got me to thinking of more instances when the power of "no" expressed more than refusal. An elder relative of mine was approached by her sister to sign a quit-claim deed relinquishing her interest in two pieces of property arguably held in the name of her and all her siblings for a mere $10. All the other siblings had signed. After much consternation, she said "no." Then the madness ensued. Tears, disappointment, manipulation, and one high-powered attorney's efforts to get her to sign rained down around her, and despite it all, she stood her ground and remained resolute: No.
For her, "no," wasn't just an expression of a refusal to sign. It was an expression of hurt, hurt that a sibling would try to wrest from her property that their mother intended she have. "No" was a way to put the brakes on a questionable transaction, to "lawyer up" like her sister did, to come to a previously non-existent negotiating table with information, options, and to possibly obtain a different result. "No" is a powerful word, y'all.
Think of it: Netflix customers said "no" to splitting streaming and DVD rental services, resulting higher fees, and Qwikster. Now Netflix is rethinking its course of action and Qwikster is no more.
Bank of America customers said "no" to a $5 fee to use their debit cards to spend their own damn money. Bank of America is walking back its decision, saying the corporate analog of, "My bad."
Occupy Wall Street protesters said "no" to Wall Street corruption and greed and Washington's complicity with it all. This expression of "no" speaks not only as a refusal to continue to go along, but a consciousness-raising movement, giving a name to the rest of us who continue to be screwed by capitalism run amok: The 99%.
Even a rooster expressed his "no" and his disapproval of BMNB being on his property this weekend, attacking BMNB as he attempted to help me to pick up something on the rooster's property. With BMNB being the only other male on the property and arguably a threat to the rooster's good thing -- unlimited food and sex with the hens -- the rooster thumped BMNB on the back of the leg with a wing and crowed his "no."
"No" gives us the power to do alot, including:
* Refuse to accept the status quo
* Refuse to accept what's being offered
* Express anger
* Express outrage
* Express hurt
* Allow time to consider different options
* Express superior knowledge of available options and exercise those options
* Express suspicion or discomfort based on instinct and act on that instinct
"No" is indeed a powerful word that we need to use more often.
In this recession, many of us have had to sit on our "noes" in the workplace for lack of options, for fear of losing the jobs we have. What employers don't realize is that recessions don't last forever, and many employees are going to express their "noes" by retiring, finding better jobs, or just developing other streams of income and walking away.
"No" is a powerful thing. Use it.
Is Marriage For White People? Negro, Please.
Ralph Richards Banks' book, "Is Marriage for White People?: How The African American Marriage Decline Affects Everyone," challenges black women to stop marrying down -- settling for black men who aren't as educated or accomplished as we are -- if we marry at all, and instead start marrying out -- that is, outside the race. Banks says that black women are the least likely of women of any ethnic group to marry outside of our race. He posits that, although we've stood by black men despite the fact that the number and quality of black men available to us is nowhere near equal, the best thing we can do for ourselves and for our race is to marry outside of it.
Negro, please.
First, some disclaimers. I'm not opposed to interracial marriage. There are many, many interracial marriages within my family, and I've always believed that sometimes love chooses you, not the other way around. All my family are all my family, regardless of race.
Second, I'm an educated black woman happily married to an educated black man, both of us Stanford alums, as is Professor Banks. My husband, Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB), tells me that at our last college reunion, somebody said that upwards of 70% of Stanford alums marry other Stanford alums. When we attended Stanford, I don't recall the number of black women outnumbering black men so much that black women felt they couldn't find a black man. Most of the black women I know who dated at Stanford dated black men, but that was during the '80s. In fact, interracial dating was so derided in the Stanford black community at the time that we had a term for it: Skiing.
Third, although I'm happily married to a black man, I married later in life -- five days before my 40th birthday -- so I've spent more of my life single than married. While I was single, I went on a date with someone outside of my race only once. It took only one date for me to decide this:
Interracial dating was not for me.
Mind you, it's not that I'm not physically attracted to men outside my race, at least younger ones. Were I single, I wouldn't kick Brad Pitt or George Clooney out of bed, so to speak, although when it comes to maintaining looks in old age, my money's on Denzel. Sorry, but black don't crack, and I like that.
The reason why interracial dating wasn't for me was because, in my brief and limited interracial dating experience, I discovered that what I prized, what I longed for in a marriage, was a cultural connection and a bond that comes from having grown up and lived black in America.
As I sat in some hoity-toidy bar in Palo Alto with my white date, an investment banker or stock broker, I don't recall which, his conversation was more about status -- and whether I, as a Stanford/Harvard/Princeton alum measured up to his -- than shared life experiences. It forced me to ask myself, "Was a shared cultural connection so important to me that I'd be willing to forgo marriage if I couldn't find that in a mate?"
The answer for me was an emphatic "Yes." So much so that, in 2000, I decided that I wasn't going to marry at all. I was going to move forward with my life by buying a house and adopting a child. I had been so disappointed by the black men I'd dated, BMNB included (we'd dated for seven years prior during the '80's and briefly again in the '90s), that I'd thrown up my hands and given up on the idea of marriage, period. If I couldn't have what I wanted -- a marriage to a black man -- I wasn't going to settle for what I could have. It was a year later that BMNB and I reconnected, hashed out our differences, and decided to move forward as a couple. I had even told him, though, that I had given up on marriage and I was done with men because I hadn't found a suitable black man. He basically talked me out of my position and later proposed for the second time in a decade. I'm glad he did.
What Professor Banks may not realize is that perhaps black women prize that cultural connection in a mate as much as I did, so much so that they're not willing to settle for anything different, even if it means not getting married. According to Banks, only 9% of black women marry outside of our race, while Asian and Latina women marry interracially at rates closer to 50%. Maybe black women value a shared culture more than Asian and Latina women. Maybe we don't want to get married that badly. I don't know.
What I do know is that when I describe something racist that happened to me during my day, I don't have to "prove" to BMNB that what happened was racist or that I'm not paranoid. When I use phrases and terms unique to black culture like, "If you don't know, you better ask somebody," or "I don't have to do anything but die and stay black," or "Aw, sookie, sookie," BMNB gets it without explanation. When I talk about the double standard of race -- that the rules for black people in a white America are different -- BMNB doesn't even question me about the truth of what I'm saying because he's lived it, too. I don't know if I could live the rest of my life with someone who wasn't similarly burdened, especially if he experienced white privilege and didn't realize or acknowledge it.
I also thought it would be unfair of me to marry someone outside of my race if I considered myself to be "settling." What person deserves to be a second choice? If culture is so important to me that marrying any man who doesn't share my culture would be a second-level choice to me, how would it make that man feel? What kind of marriage would it be if I married someone I would always consider to be lacking in something so important to me?
At the end of the day, black women need to be true to themselves and what they value, whether it's shared culture or whatever they value most in a mate, and choose accordingly, whether that leads to interracial marriage, intraracial marriage, or staying single. If they are open to marrying outside of the race, great, but I don't think they owe the black race anything by marrying outside the race for the purpose of preserving the race or black culture. As BMNB says, "Black women ARE black culture. The culture resides in them." Telling us that we need to marry outside of our race in order to preserve the race is a lot to ask of us if we're not inclined to do so. We owe it to ourselves to be happy, period.
And for me, that happiness was in marrying a man who understood the phrase, "Negro, please."
Negro, please.
First, some disclaimers. I'm not opposed to interracial marriage. There are many, many interracial marriages within my family, and I've always believed that sometimes love chooses you, not the other way around. All my family are all my family, regardless of race.
Second, I'm an educated black woman happily married to an educated black man, both of us Stanford alums, as is Professor Banks. My husband, Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB), tells me that at our last college reunion, somebody said that upwards of 70% of Stanford alums marry other Stanford alums. When we attended Stanford, I don't recall the number of black women outnumbering black men so much that black women felt they couldn't find a black man. Most of the black women I know who dated at Stanford dated black men, but that was during the '80s. In fact, interracial dating was so derided in the Stanford black community at the time that we had a term for it: Skiing.
Third, although I'm happily married to a black man, I married later in life -- five days before my 40th birthday -- so I've spent more of my life single than married. While I was single, I went on a date with someone outside of my race only once. It took only one date for me to decide this:
Interracial dating was not for me.
Mind you, it's not that I'm not physically attracted to men outside my race, at least younger ones. Were I single, I wouldn't kick Brad Pitt or George Clooney out of bed, so to speak, although when it comes to maintaining looks in old age, my money's on Denzel. Sorry, but black don't crack, and I like that.
The reason why interracial dating wasn't for me was because, in my brief and limited interracial dating experience, I discovered that what I prized, what I longed for in a marriage, was a cultural connection and a bond that comes from having grown up and lived black in America.
As I sat in some hoity-toidy bar in Palo Alto with my white date, an investment banker or stock broker, I don't recall which, his conversation was more about status -- and whether I, as a Stanford/Harvard/Princeton alum measured up to his -- than shared life experiences. It forced me to ask myself, "Was a shared cultural connection so important to me that I'd be willing to forgo marriage if I couldn't find that in a mate?"
The answer for me was an emphatic "Yes." So much so that, in 2000, I decided that I wasn't going to marry at all. I was going to move forward with my life by buying a house and adopting a child. I had been so disappointed by the black men I'd dated, BMNB included (we'd dated for seven years prior during the '80's and briefly again in the '90s), that I'd thrown up my hands and given up on the idea of marriage, period. If I couldn't have what I wanted -- a marriage to a black man -- I wasn't going to settle for what I could have. It was a year later that BMNB and I reconnected, hashed out our differences, and decided to move forward as a couple. I had even told him, though, that I had given up on marriage and I was done with men because I hadn't found a suitable black man. He basically talked me out of my position and later proposed for the second time in a decade. I'm glad he did.
What Professor Banks may not realize is that perhaps black women prize that cultural connection in a mate as much as I did, so much so that they're not willing to settle for anything different, even if it means not getting married. According to Banks, only 9% of black women marry outside of our race, while Asian and Latina women marry interracially at rates closer to 50%. Maybe black women value a shared culture more than Asian and Latina women. Maybe we don't want to get married that badly. I don't know.
What I do know is that when I describe something racist that happened to me during my day, I don't have to "prove" to BMNB that what happened was racist or that I'm not paranoid. When I use phrases and terms unique to black culture like, "If you don't know, you better ask somebody," or "I don't have to do anything but die and stay black," or "Aw, sookie, sookie," BMNB gets it without explanation. When I talk about the double standard of race -- that the rules for black people in a white America are different -- BMNB doesn't even question me about the truth of what I'm saying because he's lived it, too. I don't know if I could live the rest of my life with someone who wasn't similarly burdened, especially if he experienced white privilege and didn't realize or acknowledge it.
I also thought it would be unfair of me to marry someone outside of my race if I considered myself to be "settling." What person deserves to be a second choice? If culture is so important to me that marrying any man who doesn't share my culture would be a second-level choice to me, how would it make that man feel? What kind of marriage would it be if I married someone I would always consider to be lacking in something so important to me?
At the end of the day, black women need to be true to themselves and what they value, whether it's shared culture or whatever they value most in a mate, and choose accordingly, whether that leads to interracial marriage, intraracial marriage, or staying single. If they are open to marrying outside of the race, great, but I don't think they owe the black race anything by marrying outside the race for the purpose of preserving the race or black culture. As BMNB says, "Black women ARE black culture. The culture resides in them." Telling us that we need to marry outside of our race in order to preserve the race is a lot to ask of us if we're not inclined to do so. We owe it to ourselves to be happy, period.
And for me, that happiness was in marrying a man who understood the phrase, "Negro, please."
A Seat at the Table of My Family's Revolution
"If you aren't doing your life mission, you need to get in the face of God and figure out what it is."
~ My friend Sharon from Denver
A while back, I wrote a blog entry about starting a family revolution to make sure that the bad things that have happened to my family as a result of this recession -- foreclosures, unemployment, wage cuts, etc. -- won't happen again. This revolution is part of what I've come to know is my mission: To share what I know and uplift my family.
I didn't get a chance to report back on how the first meeting for my family's revolution, a series of talks titled "Something to Think About," went on October 8 (see blog entry about the revolution here). What I'd like to do is give all of you readers a seat at the table, so to speak. Whatever topics Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB) and I cover with our family in this series of talks, I'm going to cover with you.
At our first meeting, only one couple, my niece and nephew-in-law, attended. I'm not dismayed. More younger family members have committed to come to our next meeting in December, but in any event, BMNB and I will have discharged our duty to share, or at least attempt to share, what we know. We discussed writing a family mission statement and the ground rules for the family sou-sou we're going to form at the next meeting. Below is the agenda from the meeting. It lays out what we're going to be talking about. Maybe you and your family will want to follow along.
I do want to touch briefly on having a family mission statement. Whether you're single or part of a family, you should have a mission statement. Why? Because it helps you focus on what you're on this earth for, helps your prioritize how you spend your time, and makes it much more easier to say "no" to things that don't serve your mission. For example, I have been urged by a few folks to run for a seat on the board of my HOA or to run for city council. For most of my life, I've been one to chase a challenge without really weighing what I'd get out of the challenge other than a sense of accomplishment. I had an unsettled feeling in my soul that I didn't want to pursue these challenges. After I referred back to my own personal mission statement that I wrote long ago, it hit me: These challenges are not part of my mission. They're not what I'm put on this earth to do, even if I know I could do them well. Once I realized this, I felt grounded in my refusal.
BMNB and I have drafted a family mission statement. It's still in the works, but here it is:
The Black Man Not Blogging Family's Mission Is To:
BWB
~ My friend Sharon from Denver
A while back, I wrote a blog entry about starting a family revolution to make sure that the bad things that have happened to my family as a result of this recession -- foreclosures, unemployment, wage cuts, etc. -- won't happen again. This revolution is part of what I've come to know is my mission: To share what I know and uplift my family.
I didn't get a chance to report back on how the first meeting for my family's revolution, a series of talks titled "Something to Think About," went on October 8 (see blog entry about the revolution here). What I'd like to do is give all of you readers a seat at the table, so to speak. Whatever topics Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB) and I cover with our family in this series of talks, I'm going to cover with you.
At our first meeting, only one couple, my niece and nephew-in-law, attended. I'm not dismayed. More younger family members have committed to come to our next meeting in December, but in any event, BMNB and I will have discharged our duty to share, or at least attempt to share, what we know. We discussed writing a family mission statement and the ground rules for the family sou-sou we're going to form at the next meeting. Below is the agenda from the meeting. It lays out what we're going to be talking about. Maybe you and your family will want to follow along.
I do want to touch briefly on having a family mission statement. Whether you're single or part of a family, you should have a mission statement. Why? Because it helps you focus on what you're on this earth for, helps your prioritize how you spend your time, and makes it much more easier to say "no" to things that don't serve your mission. For example, I have been urged by a few folks to run for a seat on the board of my HOA or to run for city council. For most of my life, I've been one to chase a challenge without really weighing what I'd get out of the challenge other than a sense of accomplishment. I had an unsettled feeling in my soul that I didn't want to pursue these challenges. After I referred back to my own personal mission statement that I wrote long ago, it hit me: These challenges are not part of my mission. They're not what I'm put on this earth to do, even if I know I could do them well. Once I realized this, I felt grounded in my refusal.
BMNB and I have drafted a family mission statement. It's still in the works, but here it is:
The Black Man Not Blogging Family's Mission Is To:
- Serve God and put Him first
- Love, encourage and uplift our family and friends
- Use all our gifts for God's purpose for us
- Share our knowledge
- Uplift and serve our race and community (I define "community" very narrowly)
- Love, respect, and take care of each other and our children (no, we don't have kids yet. We're working on it.)
- Raise our children to be good, educated, God-loving people who can stand on their own when we're dead
- Enjoy our lives
- Maintain good health
Again, it's a work in progress, but it definitely helps in shaping how we spend our time. We're using Steven Covey's "Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families" to help us shape our family mission statement, and we highly recommend it.
We also talked about the benefit of holding regular family meetings. BMNB and I have family meetings to discuss our goals and accomplishments in five areas: our household, our health, our individual and marital goals, our family goals, and our community goals. It is through our family meetings that we started working on our family mission statement. We congratulate each other on accomplishing our goals (BMNB finally got some real glasses -- YAY!) and encourage each other to accomplish what remains to be done. Our family mission statement may reshape how we hold our family meetings, but the meetings are crucial. They force us to stop, get off the hamster wheel of life, and reflect on what we really are here to do and what we really want to do. A life without some introspection is an aimless life, IMHO.
As for the sou-sou, we decided to start small: $25 per family per month. Any family that fails to pay on time forfeits what they've contributed. We'll see how it goes.
Here's to my family's revolution, and perhaps your family's, too.BWB
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
A Series of Family Talks
AGENDA
October 8, 2011
I. Prayer and Call to Order
II. Purpose of "Something to Think About"
- Knowledge: Share what we know (mistakes and all); learn what we don't
- Encouragement: Helping each other reach our goals
- Action: Holding each other accountable for taking positive steps toward our goals
III. Five Goals for The Family:
- Financial Literacy
- Home Ownership
- Having a Career
- Educating Our Kids to Prepare Them for College or A Vocation
- Multiple Streams of Income
IV. Topics to Be Covered
Financial Literacy
- Credit
- Budgeting
- Investing
- Retirement Planning
- Insurance
Career
- Finding the Career You Want
- Getting the Career You Want
- Keeping the Career You Want
Education
- Taking Stewardship of Your Child's Education
- Education Financial Planning
Home Ownership
- Mortgages
- Finding Your Home
- Home Buying Process
- Home Maintenance
Multiple Streams of Income
- Starting a Business
- Capital and Small Business Finance
- Business Plan Writing
- Marketing
V. Today's Topics:
- Writing a Family Mission Statement (Resources: Steven Covey, "Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families, pg. 77-95 on writing a family mission statement)
- Starting a Family Sou-Sou (Resource -- My blog entry, "Got Sou-Sou?")
Bloggin' At Ya From An Undisclosed Location On A Blessed Mission
Gentle Readers,
Yours truly has taken some time away, and I'm blogging from an undisclosed location on a blessed mission. My friend, whom I'll just call Sharon from Denver, is writing a book that I would consider a blessed mission. I'm finalizing "Dangerous Thoughts of An Uppity Negress," so we're helping each other.
You see, Sharon's book is about making Christianity accessible to real people and, more importantly, and I quote, "separating your relationship with Christ from the confines of conventional church culture." She's using her life as an example, telling stories about separating her walk with Christ from church culture and learning not to confuse the two. I'm blogging about it to prompt her to continue writing and to whet your appetite for the book once it's done.
If you'd like to encourage her, her email address is RealChristian4Christ@yahoo.com. Here's to all the Christians who struggle every day to walk with, but never walk away from, Christ. Sharon wants to help you walk toward Him, not away from Him, by helping you discern what is truly of Him and what is simply "church culture."
In the parlance of our young folks today, "Wait for it . . . . "
Yours truly has taken some time away, and I'm blogging from an undisclosed location on a blessed mission. My friend, whom I'll just call Sharon from Denver, is writing a book that I would consider a blessed mission. I'm finalizing "Dangerous Thoughts of An Uppity Negress," so we're helping each other.
You see, Sharon's book is about making Christianity accessible to real people and, more importantly, and I quote, "separating your relationship with Christ from the confines of conventional church culture." She's using her life as an example, telling stories about separating her walk with Christ from church culture and learning not to confuse the two. I'm blogging about it to prompt her to continue writing and to whet your appetite for the book once it's done.
If you'd like to encourage her, her email address is RealChristian4Christ@yahoo.com. Here's to all the Christians who struggle every day to walk with, but never walk away from, Christ. Sharon wants to help you walk toward Him, not away from Him, by helping you discern what is truly of Him and what is simply "church culture."
In the parlance of our young folks today, "Wait for it . . . . "
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