Why Should Black Men Get Married?
http://www.justfourguys.com/why-should-black-men-get-married/
“Genius is knowing what’s important.”
-Albert Einstein
Last Friday after a rather lengthy hiatus (and due to popular demand, I might add), I resumed my Rambunctious Truth-Teller in Residence post at the popular Afrosphere hangout, Very Smart Brothas; the discussion centered around Damon “The Champ” Young’s impending nuptials, which gave my leave to pose a series of questions obtaining on “Black relationship” concerns, in this case Marriage. The responses, as one might expect, were quite interesting, to say the least.
Unfortunately, however, yet hardly surprising, the responses in the main, just goes to show that too much of an ostensibly “good thing”, in this case “education”, can actually prove to be quite a bad thing, if one isn’t very, very careful. I say this because last Friday’s responses to my series of questions could not be a better case study in just How Obtuse Can Black Folk Who Read Good can actually be. Because my time was limited, and because it was clear that my interlocutors either didn’t get what I was getting at, or was willfully trying to sidestep it, I thought to use my post today to clarify matters. To that end then, I have taken the liberty of reposting both my initial comments to VSB, as well as selected comments by certain of its forum participants, so as to spare the J4G audience the pain of having to wade in the morass that is the Disqus commenting system – an entity that I hate with the passion of a thousand Suns(!).
So, with all that said, let’s get right to it.
Much has been said about the role and purpose of Marriage in the Black community at present, much of it driven in the ways and manner that Black Women in particular like most – (for example, ever notice that all of the books, panels, blogs, and the like all proceed from the premise that Black Women, as a group, are automatically “wife material”, while the “hubby potential” of Black Men, again, taken together as a group, is always suspect?) however, what doesn’t get much shine in our time, are the series of questions I posed on VSB last Friday. This, should NOT be seen as an accident, the lack of such questioning in the larger “conversation” – as I and indeed quite a few other observers have long noted, the “conversation” is weighted and tilted in such a way, that it tells the Sistahood what they want to hear – not what they NEED to hear. Indeed, in many ways, there are costs incurred on those who deign to do the latter – hence one of the ways in which Black America enforces its notorious Group Think – and to be sure, there are Black male cohorts who greatly benefit, either directly or indirectly, by telling the Sistahood what they want to hear, or failing that, and if nothing else, by not rocking the proverbial boat.
What are these series of Burning Questions I broached last week, you may ask? Simple:
WHY, should a Brotha put a ring on it, in our time, today, in 2014? What are the incentives for him doing so? What benefits accrue to him for doing so – first and foremost legally, and secondarily socially, that he could NOT get remaining unmarried? What costs does he incur in doing so, that remaining unmarried would protect him from?
Secondarily: are Black Women, taken together as a group and in aggregate, marketing themselves as attractive and viable options for marriage? And if so, how are we able to assess and measure this?
In short, what I am asking is, “What’s in it for me?” for a Brotha to put a ring on it?
My argument is a simple one: that one of the key reasons – not the only one, perhaps not the most important one, but a key reason, nonetheless, as to why so relatively few Brothas are putting a ring on it in comparison to American Men of other races at this time and over roughly the past four decades, is due to the amount of perverse disincentives, costs and social penalties that have outstripped the incentives, benefits and social status, for “Manning Up”, over roughly the past 50 years. And as we all know, any social trend that hits White America, hits Black America doubly hard.
I further submit that for those who liken themselves to “saviors” of the Black community, until or unless they are willing to address themselves to the argument I have raised here and elsewhere, head-on and without flinching or sputtering – about the utter lack of incentives in our time for Brothas to put a ring on it, etc — the state of affairs we now accept as the New Normal, will continue, unabated. Black Men, like all Men, are reacting RATIONALLY to these changed incentive structures, as Dr. Helen makes clear in her excellent book “Men on Strike” – indeed, she devotes an entire chapter to this topic, entitled “The Marriage Strike”, and I’ve had the chance to interview her, and which will appear here very soon, so definitely stay tuned for that. While her book doesn’t deal with the Black Male aspect specifically, it nevertheless examines many of the themes we are taking up today, and repays close study. The fact that Black Male marital rates have fallen off a cliff from its high point in the 20th century, really says it all; it’s time it got its focus.
Annnnnd they’re off!
You see, the very act of ASKING such a series of questions, is enough to send the Sistahood and their Black male enablers into a series of Rain Man-like conniptions; you see, Black Men, like all Men in contemporary American life, are not to have any notions of what they’d like their own lives to be; theirs is not to ask why, but to do and die – and all in the service of the Strong Independent Goddess Black Woman, no less. Everyone reading this knows darned well that not only is it perfectly socially OK for just about any Woman, regardless of her own SMP position, to have her list of demands in a potential hubbie – but woe be to the Man who even gives the impression that he might ask for the same of a (Black) Woman. Let’s hear it for Equality!
But, the questions cry out for direct examination and then, plain answering. And since it is clear that precious few over at VSB last Friday had the will to do so, I think the following example(s) from yours truly’s own life, will suffice to drive home the pink elephant in the middle of the living room, that the VSB crowd refuses to openly admit.
Now, before we let er rip, a few simple ground rules for our VSB friends and anyone else reading this who may not be familiar with how we get down at J4G:
1. Please do not attempt to obfuscate the discussion; if you are not prepared to engage the topic *as presented*, don’t even bother.
2. While mildly entertaining, Ad Hominem retorts DO NOT an actual, reasoned, rational response make. They do make for good mocking fodder, though. Of you.
3. The normal laws of physics do not apply here; we are in a Quantum Zone, which means, anything I pretty much deem to be outta pocket I will delete, without warning, explanation or reason – now you see it, now you don’t. I do this, aside from the fact that I can, but also because I want you to, in the words of that great philosopher Jay-Z, focus, Man!
In short: there will be no room – not one inch – for you to do what usually goes on over there at VSB. You will engage the topic as presented, without recourse or reference to anyone or anything else. If you disagree with my premise, you will by all means have the chance to make your case – but be forewarned. If I suspect you to be sloshing around squid ink, chances are very high that said squid ink will disappear, again, without warning, explanation or reason. This will properly keep the focus on the issues I have presented (as well as keep the discussion free from clutter), in all its sparkling clarity, and have long needed to get the airtime it so rightly deserves.
Got it?
Back In The Day
On one fine Spring morning circa 1970 or so, Obsidian’s dad – henceforth known as Papa O – was cruising north on Broad Street in North Philly; he had spent the weekend with friends on a visit from Brooklyn, NY where he worked as a longshoreman, hitting up the renowned jazz clubs and was heading back home to the Big Apple. He was barely a mile away from I-95 in his white Coup de Ville, when he suddenly saw something approaching from 9 o’clock:
It was Obsidian’s mom – henceforth known as Mama O – sashaying to work at the local hospital. She was a nurse, and back then, nurses wore the kind of uniforms that today are more the stuff of, ahem, boudoir fantasies (sadly, nurses today wear those God-awful “scrubs” – BONER KILLER for real). Now, I ain’t trying to brag or anything, but I’m just sayin’ though, Mama O in her day, was HAWT. I’ve heard stories from people who knew her from way back when, about how she had to beat the fellas off with a stick before and after she got married, and I’ve seen quite a few pics of her courtin’ days with dear old dad – I can most definitely see how and why he did what he did. Remember that poem Jill Scott read - “The Thickness“? Well, imagine that aged by a few years (Mama O was 19 at the time), in a cute nurse’s uniform. 5’3″, “redbone”, light colored eyes, beautiful face, hour-glass figure, “Piyaah!” behind, you get the picture. Puts the “B” in “Buxom”.
Papa O busts a U-turn on Broad Street with the Fierce Urgency of NOW during rush hour traffic, risking getting killed in the process, runs partially up on the curb, drives past Mama O by a few car lengths, puts it in “Park”, hops out, spits mad GAME, gets the digits, does a whirlwind round of Courtin’, and they get married a month later – and don’t part until he dies, thirty years later. That’s what being Young AND Hawt will do for you, ladies.
For Papa O – who was 35 at the time – and dare I say, the vast majority of the fellas reading these words – the incentives to put a ring on it was as clear as that Spring day he first laid eyes on Mama O:
1. She’s young – at Peak Freshness and Ripeness; in other words, and to quote my Man Rollo, Papa O got the best of what Mama O had to offer of herself, when it actually mattered – not some “stale” stuff well past its “sell by” date
2. She’s HAWT – see above
Put that together with the Times in which Papa O lived – despite being in the shadow of Jim Crow, he was able to earn for a family; the laws supported his being Lord & Master of his home; and society honored his role as Hubbie and Daddy. The result?
Five human beings raised successfully to maturity, none of whom were statistics and would become productive Americans; three would go on to marry themselves, producing a half dozen grandchildren, who themselves would be on track to doing well in life. All this, with my mom having no more than a high school and nursing school degrees, and my dad having a grade school education and completing his GED in the Marine Corps before shipping off to Korea, and then going to Vo-Tech school on the G.I. Bill after he came home.
Not bad.
Ask any Man reading this, and they will tell you, those are some hella incentives. Talk about “Whistle while you work”! Talk about “Yabba-Dabba-Do”! A Man will work like the devil for a deal like the above…I’ve seen it firsthand. Look at him go!
Now, let’s compare and contrast to today, shall we? Please share with me, the following passage from the critically acclaimed “Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage”:
“The gap between childbearing and marriage is most evident among our African American mothers, a difference we attempt to explain in our conclusion. Nell, a thirty-five-year-old mother of three, also thinks one should be thirty or forty before marriage. She cautions her daughters: “Wait. Wait till you finish being out there in the world, exploring…yourself and other people.” Dorothy, a thirty-six-year-old African American with two children ages five and eleven, says, You should finish school. If (I) had to (name an age)…twenty. I don’t know, probably twenty-five.” However, Dorothy believes that marriage should wait until one is “I’d say thirty… At twenty-five, you know, you still might want to go out with your friends.” She explains, “When you get married, your life stops changing.”
Shante, a seventeen-year-old African American mother of a newborn, tells us, “I guess about thirty-five. Because I guess a lot of people want to go to college after they get out of high school. So that’s four years… And after that…you wanna have a nice job, get promoted, this and that, get your career going. Nice house and…whatever.” However, her views about the ideal time for marriage also reveal that a young woman should be sure she’s had her fun, for marriage is about settling down to serious business. She says, “Have fun by yourself and then just explore…especially the people who want to travel a lot (need to) do all their traveling and then come home to settle down. That’s when you’re like thirty, thirty-five years old… You got maybe another fifty more years before you’re about to die.”
One particularly interesting story regarding the timing of marriage comes from Natasha, a seventeen year-old African American mother of an infant, whose own mother joins our conversation in mid-course. This forty-two-year-old grandmother warns Natasha against an early marriage because she “didn’t live her life yet,” but says she herself is now ready to marry because she’s had all the fun there is to have. “The best time to get married is past forty… If y’all wanna cheat, whatever, y’all done all that at a younger age. Once you get past forty it ain’t nothing else out there. Then you’re supposed to be ready to settle, like what I’m getting ready to do. I’m forty-two and getting married in August…I done did everything, you know what I’m saying? We tired. Ain’t nobody looking for nothing else. Ain’t nobody looking for no other man or woman. We tired now so we gonna marry each other. Don’t get married right now ’cause you didn’t live your life. How do you know that might be the only man or woman you wanna be with over the years?” (pp.109-111)
Hands up, all you gents just chomping at the bit to wife up the ladies like Natasha’s Mama! The line forms to the left…
For those who had a hard time seeing what I was saying last Friday over at VSB – is the picture a bit clearer now? Why in the Hades should Papa O, or his scion, wife up Sistas in our time who:
1. Believe the best time to get hitched is when they’ve done “exploring themselves” and errbody else
2. Believe the best time to get hitched is when they are darn-near post-menopausal
3. Have at least a few kids in tow – often by different Baby Daddies
4. “Demand” that they want “that white-picket fence dream” – complete with a Chuuch wedding AND white dress(!)
5. And, as Roissy rightly points out, are often just a bit too rotund - no matter how hard they try to “reframe” it as being “thick”
And you mean to tell me, that THIS, is a great deal?
Really?
How? Please explain?
For those of you Sistas out there talking smack about how you ain’t a Hoochie Mama, youse a “respectable” Sista and all that, OK fine – swap out the rotundness and plug in its place your FICO score, because far too many of you got that Sallie Mae monkey all over your back, and that’s just for starters. Like your Shaniqua sisters in the hood, you too think you should “have all your fun” before its time to “settle down” – and let’s keep it brutally 100, how is that workin’ out for the whole lot of ya? Hmm?
Yea. That’s what I thought.
History Repeats Itself – The Thickness Revisited
Several decades after Papa O met Mama O, their bouncing baby boy, Obsidian, encounters a very similar set of circumstances – he too meets a 19-year-old chippie when in his mid-30s, only he didn’t hit a Moving Target to do it. He didn’t have to – she stepped to him. (By the way, for the ladies reading along who are north of 35 – it is true that a big problem you face out on the mating market is the ever-decreasing number of viable, desirable males – but that’s only the half of it. You have another pressing problem – you are now competing against Women who are literally half your age…and as we see here, Men can and will respond, with the utmost speed, urgency and quickness, to Youth in a Woman. I’m just sayin’ though)
What a difference a few decades make, indeed!
Nor did the son have to put a ring on it the same the dad did – Obsidian the Younger was able to enjoy all the wifely bennies by having his 19-year-old blushing lady as a live-in lover, for more than two years…and boy, what a vanglorious more-than-two -years it was!
*lapses into misty-eyed reverie of deep satisfaction…*
But alas, all good things must come to an end, and we decided that it was best that she focus on her studies in the STEM field at one of Philly’s universities; I bid her adieu and kept it movin’.
Shortly thereafter, the O-Man encounters another lady, this time one who is twice the age of Ms. Hey 19 (and five years older than myself at the time), and she’s no slouch either – in fact, on many measures, first and foremost physical, she’s a close match to the aforementioned Ms. Hey 19…graduated near the top of her class from a prominent East Coast university, was also a career nurse, very curvy, very buxom, very hippy, very creamy, pretty face, yes Lawd…think a Redbone, slightly hopped-up version of Christina Hendricks. It was just, she’s, well, older.
One night, while attending one of those Love Jones knockoff-type events, I run into Ms. Hey 19 – only problem was, that Ms. 40 (DDD) tagged along, and I didn’t anticipate Ms. Hey 19 being there, thinking that me and Ms. 40 (DDD) could take in an evening of NeoSoul music, poetry reading and all the usual stuff that accompanies the Incense Crowd. Ms. Hey 19 sought me out, hugged and kissed me in a way that telegraphed that it was more than “just friends”, and Ms. 40 (DDD) instantly started looking concerned…which, for Sistas, means the Daggers of Death. I could feel the heat rays from Ms. 40 (DDD)’s eyes…
Awkward!!!–but I played it off like Mos Def circa 1999, and introduced them to each other, chatted a bit and then gave an excuse as to why Ms. 40 (DDD) and I just had to be running along now…
Of course, the damage was done, and I knew it…but I was hoping that the whole thing would blow over. I was wrong.
This was because Ms. 40 (DDD) knew that she wasn’t the One – but until she had actually met Ms. Hey 19, she could only chalk it up to an inkling, a feeling; there was no smoking gun, so to speak. Being face to face with someone like that though, well, you know. I did everything known to Man not to discuss Ms. Hey 19 — and when I don’t want to discuss something, I have a very good way of shutting everything down. I thought I was in the clear.
I was wrong.
One day, about a week after the Love Jones knockoff event incident, over breakfast (all the ladies in my life have made me breakfast as a matter of standard operating procedure – in varying states of undress), it all came tumbling out; Ms. 40 (DDD) burst into tears, and I mean Angela Bassett as Betty Shabazz in Malcolm X sobbing when he was assassinated tears. Between sobs, she said that she knew she wasn’t the One, that Ms. Hey 19 was, that she would never be her, and that she was so hurt. By the way, fellas, it is important to elicit tears from your Woman; this is perhaps the singlemost incisive “test” of how you can tell if she loves you at all, and if so, how much. If she’s violently, uncontrollably shaking and rocking with it; if she’s got snot from the nose with it; if the tears are falling down like a mighty stream with it; then YES, she is in “Twu Wuv” with you.
And that is a powerful, even beautiful, thing indeed. I have experienced this quite a few times.
At any rate, bless her heart, Ms. 40 (DDD) tried, she really, really did; rolled out the Wifey carpet, pulled out all the stops…it just wasn’t enough, and we both knew it. When two Women are about evenly matched on everything that matters to Men except age, all things being equal, the younger gal wins. And the ladies need to know this, in no uncertain terms, so they can clear the ideological cobwebs out of their head.
Give Me The Reason
Some of my interlocutors have agreed that there are no longer any positive incentives for a Brotha in our time to put a ring on it – however, there remain “reasons” – like “love”. The problem with this notion, is that it belies a fundamental lack of understanding of just how Men register that emotion, and what it means in fundamental reproductive value terms.
For Men, “love” can be and often is directly related to the reproductive value a Woman possesses – as seen in the example above of Papa O. And by no means, is that example singular or unique- we’ve all seen it over and over again.
For those of you who are rabid reality-TV show watchers, you may be familiar with a program called “Ice-T Loves Coco” – featuring the veteran rapper-turned-Law & Order SVU actor, and his pin-up bride. Look at the title of the show, look at Coco, read up on how they met, and you will understand what love means to a Man, pronto.
Other well-known examples: Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. Jigga and Queen Bey. All these Men deeply love(d) these Women. A quick look at their pics at their peak, i.e., youth, explains why.
Elizabeth Taylor’s beauty was so over the top that she was able to get upwards of a dozen Men to put a ring on it - one of them twice.
And for the Bible thumpers in the crowd who want to proffer some kind of arcane/esoteric/archaic theological/spiritual/metaphysical “reasons” as to how and why a Brotha should put a ring on it in our time, I have a much simpler Biblical anecdote - its called King David, and Bathsheba. We all know the story, right? One day Dave saw Bathsheba bathing on the roof, and fell in love right there on the spot…and the rest, as they say, is history.
Do you honestly think that King David would have wifed up Bathsheba if she had three Baby Daddies, a small litter of kids, could have been mistaken for the Michelin Man at twenty paces, had “explored herself” and was old enough to be Dave’s auntie, if not mom?
Ladies, please understandeth this: all Women will not be Beautiful; but all Women WILL be Young. And it is that Youth that all of you will possess, that forms the basis for about the most powerful weapon in your arsenal when it comes to choosing a mate…and when its gone, its gone. Sure, all things are relative, and we all know notable exceptions, because exceptional people exist – Melissa Harris-Perry instantly comes to mind. I would wager a princely sum if I were a sporting fellow, that a simple plurality of the fellas here, regardless of race or station, would agree with me that MHP is an attractive Woman, despite her current age of 40, and the fact that she is a mom and twice married, once divorced. If her current marriage were to go down in flames today or tomorrow, it would not be long before the line began to form of the Brothas vying for her hand. Compare and contrast that to Gwen Ifill - no disrespect – how many Brothas have you heard, pining away for her?
And that’s my point: what both Sistas have in common, is that both will have been Young, and as such, both will have had the chance to land a mate. But does anyone here honestly think that Ifill is on eyefull-par with MHP?
Fellas?
Beware Of Flatterers
Many centuries ago, a very Wise Man counseled anyone in or aspiring to power to “beware of flatterers”, because such people, by existing to tell you what you want to hear, actually forge the basis of your ruin. Instead, Niccolo Machiavelli counsels those who would be powerful to seek out advisors who do not hesitate to tell them the truth, no matter how distasteful it may be.
Black Women in our time, are a most powerful bloc indeed. In fact, an entire cottage industry has cropped up around them – a multi-million dollar multimedia fiefdom - all geared to telling Sistas exactly what they want to hear – and they are so good at it that despite Sistas themselves talking smack about it, they continue to keep these flatterers flush with cash and prizes (read: Booty). Trust me when I tell you, that the fact that what you’re reading here is not seen in the aforementioned fiefdom is not an accident; many of the very marketers who make big money off of you and your misery, know that what I am saying here is true like a MoFo – but, as I have said, there’s too much money to be made, and Booty to be humped, to do otherwise. Incentives after all, do matter.
A Wise Woman is one who listens carefully to the relatively few Brothas around her who are willing to tell her the truth, even it it deeply hurts her. Better to experience momentary pain now than a world of everlasting hurt tomorrow – and that is precisely where so many of you are headed.
And what, pray tell, is the truth? It is this:
That the incentives for Brothas to wife it up today, in 2014, have vastly changed from what they were, even a half century ago; coupled with ever-increasing costs of varying stripe, along with diminished social status for “doing the right thing”, AND far too many of you Sistas blowing your feet off do to things I and so many others have covered here and elsewhere, and it is a wonder that any Brothas manage to marry at all in our time. True, on some levels, life has never been better for Women, and quiet as its kept, that includes Black; but it has also come with some real downsides and tradeoffs, to say nothing of a system that is geared for an increasingly shrinking number of people to able to achieve “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” in our time. The very system that has set so many of you free, has also made it so that you have effectively priced yourself out of the mating market – and the incentives for the Average Brotha to put in a Herculean effort just to get your attention, let alone be in contention to go the longhaul, is simply just not worth it. All of these things, and many, many more, explain how and why the SMP in Black America, is the way it is (read: a HOT MESS), in our time…and since none of us are going back, I say the next best thing all of us can do, is at least understand how and why we got to this point in the first place.
There’s more that I have to say, but I’ll save it for the comments.
Is it becoming clearer now, boys and girls?
Always remember: if you want to understand any problem, it is helpful to use Occam’s Razor, instead of a dull-arsed butterknife.
Comment & reply, holla.
Now adjourn your arses…
The Obsidian
http://www.justfourguys.com/why-should-black-men-get-married/
That combined with everything you outlined about this society makes the marriage situation none too surprising.
