Quote:
Originally posted by Ania
Please help me.
Let me begin by saying, even though I not against most interracial dating, I am against a black man dating a white woman.
Why do I make two different statements that don't match? Because, to me a white woman dating a black man reinforces all of the negative stereotypes of why black men don't date black woman(fat, lazy, loud, ignorant, ghetto glued in weave with bright orange nails.) Basically, that black woman are not wanted, not even by their own race. Ok, I just put myself out in the spotlight to get hammered from all sides.
Now, let me make things more complicated. My uncle will be bringing over his fiance' for Christmas and yes she is white. Unfortunetly, my uncle was one of those men that went to college loving a black woman and leaning on a black woman for support but now, is making lots of money and you know the rest. He claims that he loves this woman and he is worried about how our family is going to act.
Let's just say, I know I am going to be the mediator but I don't want to be. I wish I could talk to my family before they show up. I know this is weird, but please help me keep my family from stepping out of line and hurting their feelings.
This is actually bothering me. Regardless of my personal feelings, I don't want my family to act ignorant. Was anyone in a similiar situation? What did you do? Even if not, what do you suggest?
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I'm going allll the way back to the original post, but after I read the rests of the posts and CRACKED up, I almost felt like I didn't need to repond. But, I still wanted to speak directly to the thread starter.
To be honest, I understand exactly where you are coming from. People are quick to jump and say that you or those who feel the way you do (including myself) create a double standard when we say that there is a difference between the implications of a black man dating a white woman and a black woman dating a white man. I really feel that there is a difference. The main reason I feel this way is simply because of history. There is sort of a social stigma attached to being black in America. Not sort of, there IS. Black women are more often than not overlooked and put down by all the other cultures in this country. This is substantially corroborated even through the U.S. Census and other academically respectable studies which have shown that high rates of interracial marriages and coupling exist between, of course, black men-white women, white men-asian women, white men-latina women, black men-latina women. Out of all the groupings in our society, white man'white woman remains the highest rate of occurence, obviously because each see the other as the most desireable sex out of all other possible groups in our society, which is also based on social status, power, and what the mainstream dictates is the epitome of aesthetic superiority. The two groups that do not have a "record" or dating outside their respective races are black women and asian men. One study I read pointed out (strangly to me) that the logical thing would be for black women and asian men to get together. That doesn't seem to ackowledge the social factors behind why the coupling trends happen, though. Its not that the groups are just playing match up and the last two groups who are left out should just shrug shoulders and match up, its that these two groups somehow fall out the mainstream view of what is "desireable". Now, please don't think I am saying that black women are NOT desireble in reality, I am instead trying to express what society says because other studies have shown, specifically one conducted by Essence Magazine, that black women surprisingly have not allowed the social mischaracterizations to negatively impact their self esteem. (although I would argue that whether or not many black women realize it or even want to admit it, it does). So, its really what society says that I am focusing on. So, in such a society, I think it makes sense that black men would fall victim to that social trend. They seem to seek out what society says is the desireable just like everyone else and except for the ones who steadfastly refuse to abandon us, they pretty much see themselves as "escaping" something when they go and get themselves a white woman. I think this is another one of those areas that we don't want to talk about because to admit these things would mean either accepting some of these generalizations as truth or acknowledging that someones particular group is less favorable than another. Again, I am not promoting any of these ideas, I am just speaking on what seems to be the social background and trends relating to this discussion because I, too, have wondered about why I feel the way I do about these things and have read a lot about it. No, as has been pointed out by a few posters, there are exceptions and among black women who date outside the race, I have known many who are clueless and are seeking to fill some void rather than truly loving the individual they happened to have met for who they are. I just find that more inner conflicts exist amond black men who date white women because it is true, and often they come to realize that they are dealing with deep internal problems having to do with being a black MAN in America. That affects black men on so many levels and I think this is just one way they consciously or subconsciously express that. I remember watching Hannit & Combs on Fox News and they brought a black female radio hostess from New York, I believe, on their show to talk about comments she had made about black men dating white women and she was trying to explain why a lot of black women felt the sting and most often don't like it. They, as they always do, would not let her get a word in edgewise and kept berrating her, calling her a racist and saying that she was wrong and basically no different from the white men who used to castrate and murder black men when they even THOUGHT they were looking at a white woman. I thought that was terrible of them not to even listen. But I realized that it is hard to explain how we feel about this. Black woman who feel rejected by even black men in light of the history of this country always depicting us as less than desireable and less attractive due to our natural features and all that are NOT the same as some power hungry white man OR woman who feels that dating or marrying a black person somehow ruins their race because they feel we are less than human or inferior which is the root of the laws and history against "race-mixing". As with everything else in this country related to race, history and reality do not function the same way on both sides so our feelings and motivations on this issue are definitely different than those of others.
Sorry for the long post.