The Married Women’s Business show on the @drboycewatkins1 channel is making Black history…
Me, here in the rasx() context, has been researching with the Internet since the late 1990’s. So take it seriously when me say that this video is straight-up Black history: The kids running Blavity will never make media like this. Here we have two, functional, grown Black women talking about being proud of being frugal and being Black at the same time. They are also talking about how child support payments can be devastating to a young man’s economy.
I don’t need to be introduced to the subject matter of this video by which I am so smitten. Just a few days ago, I discovered (through the self-evaluation, required by her school) my daughter was doing poorly. Her private school costs me more than twice the amount of money that homeboy from the YouTube video is taking home (after working overtime). My daughter’s mother is one of the most intelligent Black women I have ever met. She has a college education—yet she allowed her daughter to sit up for a year doing what I interpret is nothing. Moreover, her Kenyan-born, doctorate-bearing teacher (who has direct contact with me on Facebook) did not even bother to alert me that my daughter was doing so poorly—which is in stark contrast to my understanding of her earlier school performance.
Would not “strong black women” make an effort to let a “dead-beat Dad” know what is going on—at least once? —even when there is a low-ass expectation of any action taken by the alleged absentee father? So, anyway, let’s do what most Black women are interested in when I bring this subject matter up: let’s talk about what I need to do to rectify this matter.
Here is what I need to do: I need to address my daughter’s education as if she is getting help from no-one except me. Even though my daughter’s mother is more than qualified to homeschool our child, I must ask my daughter’s private-school teacher to show me all of my daughter’s work (previously, I assumed that this would be insulting to my daughter’s mother—this is no longer the case). Even though I know I have spent more hours working than both of these “strong black women” put together (doctorate or not), I will find the time to tutor my daughter myself—especially in mathematics and science.
(Sidebar: yes, it is true that my daughter’s mother asked me over a year ago to tutor my daughter in math and I failed to do so—by my failure should not give one the excuse to, say, let my daughter not turn in her science project to date even though it is two weeks overdue. I just found this out a few days ago by the way… my mother would be totally pissed…)
So, whenever anyone dares to attempt to put together a biography of my life, they may run into the question, “Why did Bryan spend so much time alone? Where’s all these Afro-centric people he keeps writing and talking about?” My answer is not flattering. It will not make @Ava run out and do another Disney movie with an all-black cast. Regardless of my answer, I know that my mother (who recently passed away) would be at odds with these women that came through my life, making her grandchildren. I know she would say (in private) that these young women ain’t shit.
And this is why these YouTube women on Married Women’s Business are making Black history. My mother would still not be impressed with these sisters until she sees actual proof of their day-to-day behavior—but I am nevertheless very impressed with these two because the performance of their rhetoric is so different from the black-plastic trifle most “conscious” colored folk get on stage with…
Here are a few things I would add to their repertoire:
- Black women need to stop overvaluing socializing while rejecting/delaying/falsifying inner-realizing—I know from experience that what I am asking for is damn near impossible—and now I know why elder Black women from my childhood used to complain about this all the damn time (you will see how complicated this can get when a sister does her “inner work” in a social context—also your education will tell you that there is no anti-social African tradition).
- Black women need to be competitive with each other in their ability to collaborate and magnify power instead of isolating and attempting to duplicate what they often mistake is power—this need is a matter of tradition rather than some preference of some dude writing a Blog.
- Black women need to be honest with themselves, starting with how much many of them profoundly and super-naturally hate Black men—it is no accident, the King-James-based phrase, ‘there is enmity between male and female.’
- Black men need to stop giving young Black men the impression that they have some kind of secret, sexually-gratifying power over women (which is the foundation of “rape culture”)—this would ultimately require rejection of the concept of patriarchy which I have found is impossible for so-called Black people.
- Black men need to understand that their partner does not need to “make” money; we need to respect and value how our partner would help us not lose money.
(Sidebar: I knew as a young, stupid 20/30-something that all of the relationships that produced children in my life were ridiculously optimistic ‘experiments’ in view of what happens to highly-educated Black men (according to what I was told in the late 1980s, many of us end up having no children—or no Black children). Not a single one of these people being called “mother” ever expressed any kind of devotion, allegiance or I daresay, “undying love” with regard to me. Moreover, I deliberately went after outliers, women who are very nontraditional and appear to be creative or artistic—and this alone nearly cost me my life. I knew my time was running out and I had to make moves to have Black children before I got too old. This statement sounds “weird” to almost everyone on earth (except to truly Afro-centric, scholarly people from the late 1980s): it is my duty as a Black man with my education/consciousness level to have Black children (not all of us can engage and educate other people’s fucked up kids; some of us literally have to breed a family line for ‘the future of mankind’—sounds pretentious, eh?). This, of course, sounds “crazy” (so you should rejoice in my “misfortune”)—but that is how it go when you “love” Black people more than Black people “love” themselves. Bottom line: any kind of shit that happens to me because of my relationships that produce children is my fault. I would never recommend or suggest that my children—especially my daughter—do these same, idealistic ‘experiments.’ Given the magical chance to repeat my miserable 20/30s over again, I would do the same, humiliating, ridiculously-expensive, crazily-suicidal thing all over again (but would probably save more money). The problems I am having with my children are because all Black people are having problems—*profound *problems on a Biblical, apocalyptic scale (not some relatively petty bullshit a couples therapist can fix). I now know that a Black woman who has not fallen into the typical traps that has fucked up my life is either being counselled by self-sacrificing elders (incredibly rare) or is a divine, super-genius (profoundly rare). I would not be truly Black when I fail to say that I am truly, truly happy for these sacred women (and their ugly, white husbands—just kidding).)