The Is This Ni66a Serious Chronicles – Part I

Perusing the pages of facebook as I often do, I came across an opinion piece by a black gentleman named Steven Palmer, who, so eloquently entitled his editorial, “THE REAL REASON Successful Black Women Don’t Have A Pookey At The Altar. -Part 1.”

Now normally I would have just dismissed this foolery at the name alone. I mean, what successful, intelligent, worldly bad ass sista would want a ni66a named “Pookey” anyway? “Not I,” said the lady drinking muscato to the fly. Yet I wondered for a split second…maybe he put the name Pookey in the title to draw attention to his position? Maybe he had something meaningful to say? If you can find the article on facebook, feel free to locate, read, reflect, return and retort. Go ahead, I'll wait. (I tried to link it, but the link did not work **sad sets in**!)

There have been several mentionings going around television and the Internet in the past few weeks about black women being single and unable to find a good black man. Broken record you say? I concur. I see and hear it all the time, but for the moment the propaganda is being ramped up. Perhaps the media read the article I wrote recently, which suggested that Sistas should try Asian dudes? In any regard, our friend the Pookey promoter, provides in his article several reasons why this phenomenon is occurring so frequently. Guess what black women of America, the author of “Pookey” says that is it our own fault that we are: Single! Alone! Unhappy! Unmarried! Discontent! My God bitches…dare I even say…Bitter!

Some of the rationale our author suggests for black women being single is that we are “depressed, victims of sexual abuse, secretly gay or bisexual, jealous, we suffer from mental disorders, we’re arrogant, selfish, and that we have sexual intimacy issues.” List not exhaustive mind you. He further goes on to say that we may even be delusional. Kapow! Take THAT you sorry ho’s! To quote our friend Mr. Palmer, he says – “ITS ALL ABOUT YOU…BOO!” Well, guess what? He might be on to something, but from his subjective and self-indulgent pontifications of us by him, he doesn’t even know what he has stumbled upon.

Now, I will say this, Mr. Palmer is correct when he surmises that it is “all about you,” but not in the context that it’s our own fucking fault that we are single. He actually rings the right bell when he says that our first relationship begins with self, so hold that thought – I will have more on this in part II. Now, for shucks and giggles, let’s take a step back for a second and put ourselves in his shoes - (something he clearly did not do in his idiom). Let’s just say that it is our fault that according to ABC news, 42% of us are single. (That does mean that 58% of us are not single right? But whatever, let’s go!) We make these black men go to jail, lay up on the couch smoking weed while we go to work and deal with dumb ass co-workers, bosses and customers. The fact that we breed, rear, clothe, bathe and do homework with their children but then are too tired to suck a di*k on command makes us the bad guy instead of the bad girl his loins yearn for at that moment? Oh I’m sorry, I’m not feeling very sexy when I know the motherfucking lights are gonna get turned off if we don’t get some more money in this house. Enjoy all that Madden you played today…all day? Yes! We cause, aggravate and provoke black men to seek out and snuggle up with non-black women because our weaves and wigs just don’t compare to their silky straight, luxurious hair even though it IS their silky straight luxurious hair. So to clarify, when I wear my hair natural and a black man asks me, “When you gonna get your hair done,” I’ll be damned like James Evans on Good Times - his ignorance is my fault?

Basically as this article suggests, we are supposed to get over our issues, but Mr. Palmer does not identify any substantive issues that black men suffer from. As a matter of fact, he advocates that the reason many black men invite us to be their “side pieces, sexual conquests, plan B or C [women] or fu*k buddies” instead of marrying us and treating us humanely even is because we have not looked deep enough within ourselves to resolve all of the issues we have that would attract such a man. Can we see a show of hands from all the women who don’t have any of the issues mentioned in paragraph 4, yet still know a majority of men who treat women as described above? That’s what I thought!

So just when you think he is going to wrap things up and never even mention the black man’s role in this shitty situation that is ultimately ‘our fault,’ ol’ Steven throws us a bone. That’s right, near the end of his tale, Pookey’s best friend eludes to the fact that there is a possibility that the reason these black men end up treating the way they most often do is because of their own “limited awareness and inability to go deeper themselves.” Ahhh! Now I see! Black men are treating black women like shit because they aren’t aware? For real? Well doesn’t that suggest that these men are just as fu*ked up as Mr. Palmer says we are?

All that glitters ain’t gold girls says Steven Palmer! All of our “things…” e.g. (clothes, shoes, nice cars and homes) won’t guarantee that we will net the one thing that seems to elude us – a healthy relationship with a black man. Basically we are causing our own sadness, madness and confusion by wanting more instead of less, by daring to demand that we be treated like queens and so forth. A close male friend of mine told me the other day that black women are “unrealistic!” He said that we should be open to things like settling down with a guy that has been convicted of a felony or two. Really? Is that what it comes down to? What the fu*k did I go to college for then?

Now, I might be able to overlook a DUI or a county stint that lasted a few days because you wanted to work off your parking tickets. But ni66a if you’ve been assigned to a tier, have a job working in the prison kitchen and have been set up with an account so people can put money on your books; no stress, be blessed, but I’m not going to be able to work with that. I need you to not have been a prisoner. Hell, for that matter, I need you to not even have been a suspect. Furthermore, I need you to have a passport or at least have a vision of getting one in the foreseeable future.

I wonder if this whole “expose” was really the author's way of crying out for help and attention. Why else would a black man sit down and write a diatribe about black women, blaming us for our own experiences as if he is one of us and has some form of internal insight? How would he even be able to speak on our experiences with any amount of non-subjective value? His rhetoric is akin to Fiddler and Toby (Kunta) sitting on the floor of the slave cabin, when all of a sudden, the master opens the creaky wooden door. Once inside, the master says, “Hey ol’ boys (hey niggers), I’ve written an article on what you slaves problem is. Well, I guess I gotta read it to you so here it goes: “Dear slaves! Look at yourself you coons! Toby, you know it’s your own fault you got your foot chopped off don’t you?”

For reasons I cannot quite articulate, I bemoan this piece of literary brilliance that Mr. Palmer has compiled. I give him credit for making one good point about us (beautiful) black women looking internally. He came close here I must admit. In all honestly, he is correct that this action need to happen immediately. But, not in order to find some nigga named Pookey. You see, we don’t need to look deep within ourselves to get a man, keep a man or marry a man. We must look within ourselves to learn to thrive without one.

WASET © 2010