Has Feminism Hurt Black Men and Our Relationships With Them?
Even in medical studies, few before the 1980s even included women. It is only within the last 12 years that scientists have done studies on women’s heart attacks and realized (surprise!) that women’s heart attack symptoms are vastly different from the default human, which is male.
For 20+ years men in power prevented widespread use of the Pap Smear for fear that it would impact their cancer treatment income. They had no concern for the fact that this simple screening, available as far back as 1929, would have saved thousands of women’s lives every year.
Feminists were also instrumental in changing laws which made it a crime for men to beat their wives. Many women, stripped of financial resources by controlling husbands that refused to let them work or have their own money, were forced to stay in abusive situations because they had nowhere to go. It was not until 1964 that California led the way in making this change, establishing the first battered woman’s shelter in the country.
In 1866 the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals is formed. It predates the founding of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, established in 1875. Both predate any organization aimed at preventing cruelty to women. Maryland is the first state to pass a law that makes wife-beating a crime, punishable by 40 lashes, or a year in jail.
And it wasn’t until 1965 that the U.S. Congress passed laws prohibiting discrimination against women in employment and requiring equal pay for equal work.
Without feminism, women would still have to screw whoever was in power to keep a job and feed their children. Women were at the mercy of men, their bodies not viewed as their own even in marriage. In most states it was not a crime for a man to rape his wife until the late 1970s; at this juncture such acts by a husband are a crime punishable with a prison sentence in all 50 st
ates.
No, feminism has not hurt men in the least. What feminism has done is help women. Women have always been capable of being great and greater than men, and men knew it. Which is why they created religion and laws to keep women down.
Feminism forced men to share power, to treat women fairly under the law, and given women some of the rights that men kept for themselves to maintain control. Feminism has given women access to careers, educational and business opportunities, solo travel, social autonomy without the requirement of marriage or children, and freedom of choice.
That is the key benefit we have now… choice! We can choose to be whoever and whatever we want to be, because women before you fought for your rights to have those choices.
Women that enjoy the lifestyle and opportunities they have in 2011 all benefited from the feminist fight of the 1960s/1970s.
Because an act, a law or a movement is PRO WOMAN does not mean it is ANTI-MALE, and that is the one aspect of feminism that I think Black women have the hardest time comprehending. Black women unfortunately are so used to sacrificing themselves and their needs for Black men, they don’t question their behavior. Putting men first in every way is so common, so deeply ingrained in the psyche of the Black woman, that when something comes along that seeks to put women’s interests first, Black women see it as evil. It’s sad.
Some anti-feminists point to studies that declare women as being more unhappy in 2011 than they were in 1951. It’s not that women are more unhappy at all, its that men never asked women if they were happy before women found their voice to DECLARE their unhappiness! Men don’t want to hear about women’s problems, disappointments or concerns. They didn’t want to hear them in 1950, and they don’t want to hear them in 2011 either.
I remember seeing my aunts and my own mother walk around like zombies as I was growing up. Their lives an endless sea of laundry, shopping, cooking, cleaning, and taking care of children. Few options were available if you were married – your husband had to give his “permission” for you to go to school, have a job, even to do volunteer work if it took you outside the house. If your husband believed that your absence from the home would in any way inconvenience him, his denial of your goals and dreams was a given. And if a husband said “no!” that was it – a woman was a prisoner. Depression levels were high amongst women as they became secret alcoholics and prescription pill poppers.
The issue is not that feminism has failed, but that men, without absolute power over women, are lost. And their feeling of loss and confusion has them spinning in circles. Well while they spin, children and households still need to be taken care of! Bills still need to be paid! So women stepped up and filled in the blanks and kept things moving. Now that men have, by their own laziness and ineffectiveness made themselves dangerously close to obsolete, the fault is being laid at the feet of women.
But it is not women’s fault that men have not advanced their thinking and embraced a new paradigm of manhood – it is MEN’S FAULT.
Do something with yourself and stop depending on women to “make you” do or be or say the things you need to. Stop thinking you will look big and tall by standing on women’s heads. Women are out in front and leading the charge for change. Men need to get it together and keep pace.
Deborrah
Veteran social researcher, relationship advice columnist, author and radio host. Author of hundreds of articles on American and black culture, gender issues, singles, dating and relationships. Author of "Sucka Free Love!" , "The 24 Types of Suckas to Avoid," "The Black Church - Where Women Pray and Men Pray," and "Why Vegan is the New Black" all available on Amazon.Com. Her unique voice and insightful commentary have delighted fans and riled haters for 20 years. Read her stuff on SurvivingDating.Com and AskHeartBeat.Com.
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Category: Women's Issues
I commented on FB earlier and just wanted to add that I am tired of the posts this past year that seem to pop up that feminism has hurt black relationships and is keeping black women from marrying etc…Women suffer from a large amount of problems other than relationships up until 1970 a woman could not have credit in her name her father or husband had to sign for it. A lot of women black or white do not want to admit that if men were not forced to do certain things then they would not do them at all and women could not benefit some woman had to speak up and make a damn nuisance of herself to get the right things done. Men were happy as long as they benefitted only.
This article resounds with me. It is so true. As a black woman that has dated both black men and non-black men, I’ve found that the black men had the biggest issues with an independent thinking woman. They could do anything that they wanted to do, but I was supposed to be the committed woman. Are you kidding me?
I get so tired of black men trying to control black women by saying we need to be more submissive and white women just know how to listen more. Well, this is no slight to a white woman, but this black woman just refused to listen to a fool on a soapbox. Thank goodness for feminism. This has balanced the scales and allowed more black women to “just say no” to controlling, abusive men in their lives.
Thanks Deborrah for calling this out. You are so insightful.
(posted by BrooklynBluBird on FB)
I am well aware of the gender expectations, power plays and cultural dynamics that come into play in interpersonal relationships. And I am well aware of WHY black men, like all men, seek to dominate their women, be it directly or submliminally. I understand the male need to feel in control and i have my ideas about where that comes from. I am also well aware, of the position that reality, places women like me in, with regards to the mating game, both inside and outside, the black community. And i am aware, of what I am up against, when it comes to the mindsets of the average black male, I will come across, both casually and romantically.
Each woman had to decide for herself, how much she is willing to compromise, in order to fit the measure of acceptable standard of femininity, in a world that does everything it can, to box her into a very small space, which for the most part, forces her to play a game that places her at a great disadvantage. I have played that game at times. We all have.
Not one woman on this thread can say, she has never, in effort to play to the expectations of black men, compromised her self, her dignity or her full humanity. We have ALL played the game. Some of us have simply decided that we are no longer intersted in playing. And those of us who are not there, yet, are atleast beginning to question the status quo, and are asking ourselves very important questions that will direct our behavior and decision making practices, in the future.
I brought up the issue of white women, ONLY to point out, how, culturally, males expect women to forgive the transgressions of collective male behavior, against the female collective, when they themselves will not forgive other collective male behavior, against themselves. Any time ANYTHING goes down thats even remotely tied to race, the black man is the FIRST one hurling accusations of ‘racism’ and ‘white supremacy’ at the nearest white person he can find. But when it comes to black women, we arent sposed to speak to what ails us, cuz, as you put it, black men simply dont give a fuck. What kind of position do you think that puts black women in?
When it all comes down to it, for black men, their gender trumps their race, each and every time. And their individual needs as men will always trump their quams with racism. The same black men who will call the white man, the ‘devil’, will bed the ‘devil’s daughter, spreading his seed to her and passing on his genetic legacy to the daughter of the “demon”. Yet, that very same brotha, will expect a sista, to forgive all that has been done to her BY black men, and remain sweet, tender and gentle, smiling happily as she plays submissive woman to his ‘manly ego’ and leverage the threat of choosing the ‘devil’s daughter’ over his OWN woman, if she refuses to comply with his EGOIC needs.
That right there is some shit to witness and we sistas with some intelligence and insight, understand EXACTLY whats going on. Oftimes, those same brothas, are the first one to call a sista a ‘sell out’ and remind her of all the atrocities done to her by the ‘white man’, in years gone by, should SHE choose to exercise HER options. Black men expect us to put race first, when for them, its gender (and thus, dick) first. And yall will ABANDON your own race of women, to go have your ego and dick stroked by women who are willing to play the ‘game’ of manipulation, wherein she allows him to ‘feel’ like man, all the while, manipulating him from behind the scenes. The ROLE she is willing to play, is not out of love and respect for him or his manhood. its out of a desire to get her needs met, at any cost. Yet, it is women who choose NOT to play the game, who are called selfish. This is some backward ass shit, if you ask me.
Now, im not saying that other races of men dont do the same thing. Yall ALL do it. But black men, because of the powerlessness felt in the outside world, try ESPECIALLY hard, to reinforce these patriarchal notions of male supremacy, within their romantic relationships. Black women, are often made to choose, between their humanity, and their womanhood. And for either choice, theirs a price to pay.
Some of us are deciding which price is greater. For some, the desire to have a man is worth any and all costs. For others…well, we will either opt out, remain non-committal, forgo men altogether and opt for lesbianism, or, find men of OTHER groups, who, altho still in need of domination, do not need their egos and dicks stroked as much, because their positions are already in place in the world.
But the fact that ANY of this is what goes on between the genders is some bullshit, and I am REALLY beginning to think there is something seriously wrong with the male of our species, that makes him defectual in some very crucial ways. And you may be right…we may not be able to change it right now. But eventually, somethings gonna give. Even if its simply, yall kill every single human being clear off this planet. Cuz at the rate we’re headed, thats exactly whats gonna happen.
The EGO of the human male, will be the downfall of all of humanity. I believe this with all of my being. Your unwillingness to rise above your basic primal instincts, to be a being of a higher frequency, not only keeps you wallowing in the muck, but forces us women to wallow with you.
Its really a damned shame.
Good FB comment. I wish this could be broadcasted out to… everywhere. You knocked another one out the park with this one Ms. Deborrah!