BARACK AND MICHELLE FOREVER

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ALL ABOUT LOVE FROM bell hooks ON HER BIRTHDAY

“Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape...




“We fear that evaluating our needs 

and then carefully choosing partners will reveal that
there is no one for us to love. 

Most of us prefer to have
a partner who is lacking
than no partner at all.

What becomes apparent is
that we may be more interested in
finding a partner
than in knowing love.”

"To love well is the task
in all meaningful relationships,
not just romantic bonds.”

― bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions

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THE INTERRACIAL DATING REALITY CHECK FOR BLACK WOMEN

If 51% of all men are f*ckbois and another 25% enable them with their silence, how would it make sense for black women in the United States to limit themselves to dating black men ONLY? 

--- especially when black newspapers and white newspapers both will tell you a lot of black men are dead, in jail, etc and just plain missing? 

From 2015: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missing-black-men.html

The book I just read by Brittany Cooper, ELOQUENT RAGE, suggests the gap between available black men and available black women might be closer to double that 17% in the NY Times article...if black women are to marry using the same criteria other women use to marry. 

And other women marry people (mostly men) who are comparable in values, class, income, education level, etc. Studies suggest when these things do not match, marriages are much less likely to last.



Even if remaining black men weren't

• AT LEAST 75% f*ck-boy + f*ck-boy-enablers
• PLUS colorism perpetuating 
• PLUS extra arrogant because they know stable black women far out number them as rarefied stable black men

...it would STILL make all the sense in the world to date outside the race too 

Dating in a patriarchal society is a numbers game. 

And black men understand the numbers game if they don't understand a doggone thing about the patriarchal society they benefit from.

That is, annecdotal evidence suggests that at least half of black men understand that they can bounce without really having made the slightest effort to do half of the emotional work required in a relationship. Apparently a lot of them can sit around like princesses waiting to be pleased. And a lot of black women report that a large percentage of them do just that. 

So black women need to understand the numbers game too. 

This means a black woman should always keep the number of choices she has high so she never even thinks about settling for less when worthwhile black men are not available to date. 

Furthermore, she should make sure every black man she dates KNOWS she has plenty of choices, that he is not "rare" enough for her to be bending over backward to keep him.  

I'm not blaming the victim here. I'm really not. Or maybe I should say, I'm trying not to.

But I really do think that if we stop treating black men with a job like purple unicorns, they'll stop acting like we ought to be clapping and barking like happy seals when they do the basics --only to have them cheat when they get slightly bored.

For too many black men, the knowledge that we are desperate for them to love us is a source of power that they have over us. And we're training young girls to believe in desperation and struggle-love and that betrayal is just part of love.  

This is why one of the most talented, powerful, and beautiful women in the world is doing handstands celebrating the love of a man that was damn near 50 before he got bored of betraying her every 10 seconds. 

That's her choice. But I say she's setting a bad example for young women everywhere -- unless she's had toy-boy on the side herself regularly. And that would still leave her as a bad example of how to conduct yourself when you truly know your self-worth.

Dating is a numbers game.

Black men can be a black woman's preference. And if I were queen of the world with a magic wand, I'd give everyone a psychological tune up and erase old wounds and make sure every black man had a chance of catching a black woman. 

But when the black man who understands what it's like to be black in America and also makes an effort to understand how much more difficult it is to be both black and a woman in America IS NOT AVAILABLE, I want my sisters to give other men a shot at making them happy.

If black men can learn to respect women's issues, then non-black men can learn to respect race issues and women's issues both. It's really a matter of finding someone that's open to learning about your group identity as well as your individual identity. 

A black man has less quantity to learn, since he's already black too. Then again, some black men act like black women aren't really suffering the same racism they are. So I'm going to go back to my bottom line:

Love someone who had things in common with you who is willing to do the work to learn you.

DATING IN 2018 - HOW MEN COMMUNICATE

I'm thinking the young black women who wrote and created this cartoon nano-movie must have been born in 2000. 

I mean, she's got to be 18 right now, and not much older, if she thinks this is "DATING IN 2018" because this nano-movie represents dating in 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010, and likely 2020 too. 

I swear I've actually considered standing up, planting my hands on the table at the restaurant, leaning forward, and opening my mouth to let out a primal scream loud enough to blow his hair straight. 

But, I'm black and I'd get put in prison or "accidentally shot" instead of getting away with being seen as way-quirky or extremely weird, so...

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CHECK OUT MORE VIDEOS AT JUNT LAND

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmfR7non8Lb_DQcHx4j50lw

Michelle Obama Creates Romantic Valentine's Day Playlist For Her 'One and Only' Barack

Feeling Rebloggy

Barack and Michelle Obama are arguably the most musically aware couple that has ever graced the White House: They called on Beyonce to sing on Inauguration day, they consistently support Chance the Rapper in any and all of his endeavors, and apparentlythey’ve fed Frank Ocean raviolis.

Music and its culture seem to have been a solid thread in the 25-year relationship between the former president and first lady, and Michelle took the time to highlight that with a Spotify playlist especially curated for her man -- "my one and only," as she called him in an adorable tweet with the playlist -- this Valentine’s Day.

~BILLBOARD.COM

https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/8099709/michelle-obama-valentines-day-playlist-for-barack-spotify

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GOD, INTENTION, AND GETTING MIND OFF SELF

I don't know anything about Russell Brand other than he's white or white-passing and a comedian, both of which means he's probably said something I don't like that I haven't seen yet.

But I really like what he said in the video below. 

Generally speaking, I find that the people who believe in God --however they choose to worship him -- are most often genuine and likeable and engage-able when they have let themselves down and aren't just giving lipservice to the idea that "I'm a sinner too" just because they have impure thoughts or something. People who have picked themselves back up after a real stumble have the OPPORTUNITY to grab hold of real humility.

I'm guessing that Russell Brand was an addict of some sort. The only snippets of movies and television shows I've seen him in have him playing somebody stoned. So his attitudes toward God and getting through the day are part of his "recovery" as he describes here. 

So his recovery may be a whole life change for him or a temporary attitude to get his feet under him good again so he can go back to being however he was before. Who knows? But for now, his words on living life with intention may forever give life to someone else who is struggling.

I like what he said here. 

MICHELLE'S TRIBUTE TO BARACK ON THEIR 25th ANNIVERSARY

On Instagram, beneath a wedding photo she wrote:  "Happy 25th anniversary @barackobama. A quarter of a century later, you're still my best friend & the most extraordinary man I know. I 💕 you." 

To Michelle's Instagram You Go --> https://www.instagram.com/p/BZyd6fngoTA/

FASTING AWAY THE GLOBALIZATION OF INDIFFERENCE FOR LENT

FEELING REBLOGGY
FROM 2015

Describing this phenomenon he calls the globalization of indifference, Francis writes that "whenever our interior life becomes caught up in its own interests and concerns, there is no longer room for others, no place for the poor. God's voice is no longer heard, the quiet joy of his love is no longer felt, and the desire to do good fades." He continues that, "We end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our own."

But when we fast from this indifference, 

we can began to feast on love. 

In fact, Lent is the perfect time to learn how to love again. Jesus—the great protagonist of this holy season—certainly showed us the way. In him, God descends all the way down to bring everyone up. In his life and his ministry, no one is excluded.

"What are you giving up for Lent?"

It's a question a lot of people will get these next few days. If you want to change your body, perhaps alcohol and candy is the way to go. But if you want to change your heart, a harder fast is needed. This narrow road is gritty, but it isn't sterile. It will make room in ourselves to experience a love that can make us whole and set us free.

http://time.com/3714056/pope-francis-lent-2015-fasting/

MORE Pope to New Cardinals: Practice Compassion, Be Open to All

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BARACK AND MICHELLE'S 2017 VALENTINE'S DAY TWEETS

Barack Tweeted First

MICHELLE ANSWERED

ON BEING BLACK, FEMALE, LOVING, AND FREE ON VALENTINE'S DAY

1. ON BEING BLACK IN AMERICA

“The only reason you say that race was not an issue is because you wish it was not. We all wish it was not. But it’s a lie. I came from a country where race was not an issue; I did not think of myself as black and I only became black when I came to America.

When you are black in America and you fall in love with a white person, race doesn’t matter when you’re alone together because it’s just you and your love. But the minute you step outside, race matters.

But we don’t talk about it.

We don’t even tell our white partners the small things that piss us off and the things we wish they understood better, because we’re worried they will say we’re overreacting, or we’re being too sensitive. And we don’t want them to say, Look how far we’ve come, just forty years ago it would have been illegal for us to even be a couple blah blah blah, because you know what we’re thinking when they say that? We’re thinking why the fuck should it ever have been illegal anyway?

But we don’t say any of this stuff.

We let it pile up inside our heads and when we come to nice liberal dinners like this, we say that race doesn’t matter because that’s what we’re supposed to say, to keep our nice liberal friends comfortable.

It’s true. I speak from experience.” 

― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

Art: Pierre Jean-Louis

2. ON BEING A WOMAN IN AMERICA

“The only reason you say that [gender] was not an issue is because you wish it was not. We all wish it was not. But it’s a lie. ...

When you are [a woman] in America and you fall in love with a [man, gender] doesn’t matter when you’re alone together because it’s just you and your love. But the minute you step outside, gender matters.

But we don’t talk about it.

We don’t even tell our [male] partners the small things that piss us off and the things we wish they understood better, because we’re worried they will say we’re overreacting, or we’re being too sensitive. And we don’t want them to say, Look how far we’ve come, just forty years ago it would have been illegal for [you] to even [have a credit card on your own] blah blah blah, because you know what we’re thinking when they say that? We’re thinking why the fuck should it ever have been illegal anyway?

But we don’t say any of this stuff.

We let it pile up inside our heads and when we come to nice [little dinner parties at a friends house] like this, we say that gender doesn’t matter because that’s what we’re supposed to say, to keep our nice liberal friends comfortable. 

It’s true. I speak from experience.  

― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie as rewritten by Deb Lynn

3. ON BEING A BLACK WOMAN IN AMERICA

I rewrote this dialogue as spoken by an Adichie character, substituting gender for race. I did not do so in order to say that race and gender oppressions are exactly the same. I won't address how they are the same and different here. I made the changes to Adichie's excerpt in order to highlight the fact that for black women* there is a double barrier in interracial relationships with white men. 

First there is the barrier of unacknowledged gender oppression that most men of any race will deny exists in any real way. 

The way this manifests itself in the black community is via black men thinking they are the only ones being oppressed due to race while also denying that black women suffer just as much from sexism too. When white people are 90% of the CEOs  and Hollywood image makers, racism is obvious. When men (of all races) are 80% of the CEOs and image makers in Hollywood sexism is, somehow, not obvious .   

Second there is the barrier of unacknowledged racial oppression that most whites will deny in any real way. 

White men willfully refuse to see the oppression of women just as often as black and brown men. But then there's the additional barrier of race too. 

Point 3: Whether there is one barrier or two, I think the man that is worthy to be called "partner" is the one that

1) admits the barriers to knowing one another deeply exist and
2) is willing to do whatever it takes to see over those barriers.

A fourth thing to consider is that if 1.5 million black men are missing from the black community, then there are 1.5 million black women missing them. 

And if, due to numbers, black men can afford to see black women as disposable as dixie cups, then a fair percentage are going to be encouraged to dispose of women like dixie cups in a patriarchal society -- because they can.

Each ugly to average looking white rock star and baseball player have tons of  pretty white women looking to trade beauty for money.  And they treat these white men treat white women like disposable dixie cups too.

Too much choice makes a non-woke, ethically(?) weak man behave badly while separating women into "good girls" and "bad girls"

And  white rich man shortage, a black-man shortage, or an X-man shortage sets up a competition between women who want to make a trade or want to feel sexy or want to feel loved. 

So, in order for black women to NOT reap the whirlwind created by a black man shortage, I think black women should diversify their dating portfolio. 

If I could put numbers on love, companionship, and the likelihood of long lasting commitment, I'd have my sisters date 3 black and brown men for every 1 white man. I'd have them be equal opportunity daters leaning toward black men due to common life experiences in a white supremacist country. And, I'd have my sisters looking for "intersectional feminists" first as an indicator that that man is woke on all matters.

A feminist man is a man that's trying to think outside the box he was born in.

Similarities in life experiences do matter. Similarities in education; class; income; politics; respect for children, dogs, and old people; are all things we all look for in a partner in addition to race whether we are aware we are looking for these things or not. So if I had a magic wand I give every black woman in the country an intersecional feminist black man as partner (only one barrier to jump = one man and one woman respecting their differences).

But they say there's 1.5 million black men. And even if "they" are wrong, I can say black feminist men are as rare as hen's teeth. So there's probably more like 4.5 million missing black men for the woke black woman.

Therefore, whether a black woman is looking for a permanent partner or to be a relaxed serial dater, it might behoove a black woman to look for "woke" first and same (racial) life experience second.

I'd see heterosexual black women date more and divorce less.

And I think making sure black men know
they may be the preferred fish in the ocean
but hardly
the only fish in the ocean is the key
to a healthier black community.