Do Black Men Love Black Women As Much As We Love Them?
As Black people – across genders, sexualities, shades, ages, and geography – we share a common fate of living through and trying to survive global white supremacy. But what happens when certain groups of Black people have more power over others? What happens when we, as Black women, deal with the intersection of oppressions – white supremacy and patriarchy?
For generations, Black women have been fighting, organizing, and laying our bodies on the line to protect our brothers and ourselves from white supremacy. Under the system of patriarchy, which gives cis men power and preference over women and non-binary people, what happens to Black women, if Black men aren’t also our allies fighting against the patriarchy that shrinks and kills us?
Two of the greatest American thinkers and writers in history, Nikki Giovanni and James Baldwin, talked to each other at length about what Black men and Black women owe each other in a 1971 episode of the TV show Soul.
Giovanni speaks to Baldwin of the ways that Black men have taken out their frustrations over white supremacy onto the Black women who love them. “I’ve caught the frowns and the anger,” Giovanni says. “You come home and I catch hell. Because I love you, I get [the] least of you. I get the very minimum. And I’m saying fake it with me. Is that too much of the Black woman to ask of the Black man?”
In 2022, as we mark the deadliest year on record for Black trans women; at a time when one in four Black women experience domestic violence, one in four Black girls will be sexually abused before the age of 18, and one in five Black women are survivors of rape, we’re long overdue for another conversation about protecting Black women and what we owe each other.
“[Black women have] been made to feel not just that it’s our duty to support Black men but that being loved by Black men is the ultimate validation,” prolific writer and culture critic Jamilah Lemieux shares on “Obligation,” the latest podcast episode of Truth Be Told with Tonya Mosley. “I want for Black men to love and care for Black women the way that we love and care for them,” she says. “It’s more than a gut feeling that this love is not reciprocal.”
The Baldwin to her Giovanni on the podcast is the prophetic writer and professor, Kiese Laymon.
“When there is no duty [for Black men] to collectively defend Black women unless it appears that the person doing the harming of Black women is white men…I know then we’re in a place where asymmetry is a kind way of saying it,” Laymon says in response.
In the episode, Lemieux and Laymon break down Lemieux’s mega-viral Vanity Fair article, “Dave Chappelle and the Black Ass Lie That Keeps Us Down.” Using Chappelle’s career of misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia as an example, Lemieux writes in an early contender for best essay of 2022, “Black America’s version of “the big lie”—“the Black ass lie”—is that Black men have it worse than any other group of Black people.” It’s this belief, she explains, that can prevent Black men from fully understanding the struggles of Black women and even their own complicity in those struggles, and therefore, the obligation to help lift the burden.
“The deeper question for me,” Laymon says, “as a Black man who has reaped the benefits sometimes in asymmetrical relationships where Black women have loved me far deeper, and far more rigorously than I have loved them, is once you know that, as a Black man, do you have an obligation to not engage in romantic relationships with Black women until you as an individual feel the same equal duty? And unless you’re willing to go out there and do the work that Black women have done to protect us, regardless of who’s coming at us?”
Listen to the whole podcast below:
Featured image by Getty Images
Smile, Sis! These Five Improvements Can Upgrade Your Oral Hygiene Instantly
This article is in partnership with Sensodyne.
Our teeth are connected to so many things - our nutrition, our confidence, and our overall mood. We often take for granted how important healthy teeth are, until issues like tooth sensitivity or gum recession come to remind us. Like most things related to our bodies, prevention is the best medicine. Here are five things you can do immediately to improve your oral hygiene, prevent tooth sensitivity, and avoid dental issues down the road.
1) Go Easy On the Rough Brushing: Brushing your teeth is and always will be priority number one in the oral hygiene department. No surprises there! However, there is such a thing as applying too much pressure when brushing…and that can lead to problems over time. Use a toothbrush with soft bristles and brush in smooth, circular motions. It may seem counterintuitive, but a gentle approach to brushing is the most effective way to clean those pearly whites without wearing away enamel and exposing sensitive areas of the teeth.
2) Use A Desensitizing Toothpaste: As everyone knows, mouth pain can be highly uncomfortable; but tooth sensitivity is a whole different beast. Hot weather favorites like ice cream and popsicles have the ability to trigger tooth sensitivity, which might make you want to stay away from icy foods altogether. But as always, prevention is the best medicine here. Switching to a toothpaste like Sensodyne’s Sensitivity & Gum toothpaste specifically designed for sensitive teeth will help build a protective layer over sensitive areas of the tooth. Over time, those sharp sensations that occur with extremely cold foods will subside, and you’ll be back to treating yourself to your icy faves like this one!
3) Floss, Rinse, Brush. (And In That Order!): Have you ever heard the saying, “It’s not what you do, but how you do it”? Well, the same thing applies to taking care of your teeth. Even if you are flossing and brushing religiously, you could be missing out on some of the benefits simply because you aren’t doing so in the right order. Flossing is best to do before brushing because it removes food particles and plaque from places your toothbrush can’t reach. After a proper flossing sesh, it is important to rinse out your mouth with water after. Finally, you can whip out your toothbrush and get to brushing. Though many of us commonly rinse with water after brushing to remove excess toothpaste, it may not be the best thing for our teeth. That’s because fluoride, the active ingredient in toothpaste that protects your enamel, works best when it gets to sit on the teeth and continue working its magic. Rinsing with water after brushing doesn’t let the toothpaste go to work like it really can. Changing up your order may take some getting used to, but over time, you’ll see the difference.
4) Stay Hydrated: Upping your water supply is a no-fail way to level up your health overall, and your teeth are no exception to this rule. Drinking water not only helps maintain a healthy pH balance in your mouth, but it also washes away residue and acids that can cause enamel erosion. It also helps you steer clear of dry mouth, which is a gateway to bad breath. And who needs that?
5) Show Your Gums Some Love: When it comes to improving your smile, you may be laser-focused on getting your teeth whiter, straighter, and overall healthier. Rightfully so, as these are all attributes of a megawatt smile; but you certainly don’t want to leave gum health out of the equation. If you neglect your gums, you’ll start to notice the effects of plaque buildup, which can irritate the gums and cause gingivitis, the earliest stage of gum disease. Seeing blood while brushing and flossing is a tell-tale sign that your gums are suffering. You may also experience gum recession — a condition where the gum tissue surrounding your teeth pulls back, exposing more of your tooth. Brushing at least twice a day with a gum-protecting toothpaste like Sensodyne Sensitivity and Gum, coupled with regular dentist visits, will keep your gums shining as bright as those pearly whites.
Megan Thee Stallion Shares The 'Intense' Workout Routine That’s Got Her Snatched
One thing about Megan Thee Stallion is that she’s going to motivate you to stay active. From afar, she seems like the perfect gym bestie, and up close, it looks like her workouts would have us gasping for air. But hey, she doesn’t call her routines “bootcamp” for nothing.
After an extended break from social media and the public eye, the Houston Hottie is back sharing the high-energy workouts that are keeping her lean and she’s happy to report that “the results have been resulting."
The 28-year-old rapper dropped an Instagram Reel, detailing the workout routine that’s putting her endurance to the test. With the help of her personal trainer, Megan has one word in mind when it comes to her progress and that’s: “Consistency.”
The “Savage” artist has been traveling, making “hot girl moves," and after returning from a trip to New York, she expressed that her trainer is pushing her to keep the same energy back in the gym.
“I had just gotten back from New York and I told my trainer, ‘Look, friend, I was having a time. Can you please take it easy?’” Megan said. “He said, ‘Hmm, I’ve seen you doing all that hot girl s—, so what you need to do is get in that gym and have that same energy.’”
Her trainer then instructed her to do jumping squats with an exercise ball and resistance band around her legs for an extra burn. “I put my thing down, flipped it, and reversed it and that’s what happened. This sh– burned like a motherf—,” she teased in the video’s voiceover while executing both forward and backward jumping squats.
It’s clear that when it comes to Megan’s fitness, her trainer doesn’t play around about pushing her to her limits. In the next set of her cardio moves, we see the Grammy-winning artist jumping rope and moving on to a combination of mountain climbers and lateral jumps over a speed hurdle.
“Right here, that’s when I realized: I’ve been saying my trainer’s crazy but I know he’s really, really crazy because he must think that I’m trying out for the Houston Texans or something,” she joked.
To finish her workout, Meg hit two more barbell exercises, one being a set of cleans with 10-pound weight plates on the barbell. She then closed out by doing lunges with the barbell racked on her shoulders.
Of course, the best way to close out a workout is to nourish yourself with a balanced meal. Meg showed off her delicious post-workout plate with salmon, a sweet potato, and assorted veggies.
With so much of her public life being shared on the internet, it’s nice to see her letting us in on her progress in a fun and motivating way. “I just want to be transparent with y'all. Working out hurts, but it’s really a mental thang, so go do it!”
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Featured image by Taylor Hill/Getty Images
