The Urban Intellectualist

Black Women are the kryptonite of the establishment.

We aren’t the socially superior. They only want the colorful, creative, Nicki Minaj voice over tik toks, cornrows, and asses minus oppression. Their oppression. We aren’t the femininely fair. Not willowy milky white or sweet, untouchable, and shiny. Our sun swathed skin and strong bodies the manifestation of our ancestors. Our bodies the result of having to fight instead of being loved, to toil instead of being bathed in coconut milk and manuka honey, and to assert in order to win, as it’s not our birthright in America. That was stolen from us. Both our bodies and our wins deemed unfair and unearned.

They will place rules on your
body, say it’s a distraction from
their game,
as if they know better than you
how your bones should wear your own body

Jessica Mans, Serena

Descendants of Maat, Lady Justice. But they don’t know justice. She is disguised by a blindfold and drapes of fabric hiding the body as if it’s femininity cannot coexist with its power and it’s genderless to negate the male gaze. Adorned in purity and holding balance in her hands, she is a source of false imagery not represented in reality. Yet, we live in this feigned utopia, where Black billionaires are bred… but even billionaires are Black. Still nigga. Justice, the epitome of who we are, doesn’t live here.

Your daughter’s face is a small riot, her hands are & civil war, a refugee camp behind each ear,
a body littered with ugly things but God, doesn’t she wear
the world well.

Waran Shire, Ugly

Gods and Goddesses. Queen and Kings. Mermaids and Mermen. The ancestors are of the spirit, swathed in royalty, and some even live under the sea. We are fluid. From our native land to the belly of the boat. Middle Passage. From our living room to our roof. Katrina. From the foamy river to our drinking glasses. The Flint River. The ghost of Queen Makeda walks through the 8th Ward. Oshun withholds and calls back the waters in plagued bodies. Yemaya, mermaid goddess, protects & swims the seven seas. The granddaughter of Poseidon welcomes any who prefer the ocean floor to the plantation.

When they tell the Black girl
She can’t play play mermaid ask them, what their people know
about holding their breath
underwater. About giving their bodies
to the current

Jasmine Mans, The Little Mermaid

We are unicorns. Our horns antennas to the heavens so we can dial into James, Maya, Frederick, and Sojourner. Our bodies stallionesque. Thick like Luke dancers. Legs strong enough to walk the Serengeti. Angel wings and rainbows, myths and legends. But like our music, our art, our minds, even our mythology is covered in the darkness of hatred. Superior yet inferior. Greater but lesser. Not fly despite their wingspan. Not colorful despite Mr. Crayola. Not a unicorn, just Mr. Ed. But we are not defined by their definitions. We determine who we are… our ancestors passed our identity down to us: braids, curls, bodies, color, soul, spirits, and magic.

The black unicorn is restless
the black unicorn is unrelenting
the black unicorn is not
free.

Audre Lorde, The Black Unicorn

We hold the key to our freedom!

Many women have wasted their youth on Diddy, while he ran the streets with his thugs. His hit list is long: Kim Porter, Cassie, Gina Huynh, Jennifer Lopez, Misa Hylton, Lori Harvey, Miracle Watts, and now Caresha, “Yung Miami” of the group The City Girls. He has children with the late Kim Porter, who he didn’t seem to appreciate until after her passing. They had three kids, Christian and twins , D’Lila and Jessie who are the same age as his daughter Chance, by another woman. He later dated Jennifer Lopez for several years; Cassie Ventura, a singer, for over a decade; and Gina Huynh since 2018. He’s simultaneously been dating Caresha since late 2021. Most of these women have been much younger than him, waiting to be chosen. But he remains unmarried. He is perpetually single. Real single.

Listen, everybody ain’t mean to marry. And based on his track record and the fact that he’s 52 years old dating a 28 year old, he likely is one of those men. And really this isn’t about him… it’s about young women not wasting their youth on men who have ZERO desire to marry them and they know the women desire marriage. I mean this woman declared publicly that they were a couple… to his surprise… she clearly is tryna get chose. Sadly he likely won’t keep it a buck and tell her that’s not his desire. If he knows -and you must make sure to tell him, that your purpose in dating is marriage and family- and he isn’t headed there or talking to you about it, it’s time to run. Real fast.

Men interested in commitment will pretty quickly during the dating phase ask you questions and set up experiences you can enjoy together that gear towards that end… to see if you align. They will want at some point to be exclusive, and make plans with you, talk to you like you’ll be a future fixture… if of course you are a woman who has readied herself to be a wife. And while commitment and marriage is nothing to be rushed, men that are interested in that will lead you with intention closer and closer to that until together you decide to take it no further or to meet him at the alter in your white dress. Real shit.

Now how that will look… won’t be textbook. All relationships are different. But be sure it’s a relationship and not a situationship, usership, sexership, or bullshitship. He will show you he is serious because his words and behavior will match. He’ll be consistent and excited to see you, and he’ll make time for you. He’ll also respect that you are choosing to spend your pre-midlife stress-free energy, flat stomach season, and yet to be ruined credit score on him. I mean let’s be honest, you will be fine as frog hair with Meg knees, and he that is worthy will not take of those years then leave you off his life insurance after a 20 year relationship. He’ll appreciate the value of your youth. Men with their shit together, if you are a likeminded woman and share a personality he can appreciate, are gonna scoop you like real Superman ice cream during a Detroit summer. Real hero-like.

Caresha, you are a young tenda and he’s a beyond middle age guy still trying to diddy bop his way into young ladies panties. Make him work to even look at you. The least he can do is treat you like the prize that you are. Ladies, demand what you deserve. He should always make you feel appreciated, desirable, and chosen… especially if he’s an old man you are blessing with the beauty and value of youth. And if he doesn’t, you make sure you do. After ten years of dating Diddy, Cassie was married with a child on the way in less than one year. Don’t waste your time on anyone who isn’t choosing you! You need a new boo. Real bad.

Periodt!

But if he is really gifting you $250,000 a month, carry ….. skkkkkrrrrtttttt!

Yooooooo…. What is ya’lls man doing out here girl?!? Yes, ya’lls cuz Diddy is bopping all up in the streets, if the streets are vaginas.

This guy is making babies and huddling up on street corners with his macaroni and cheese and collard greens Caresha… but you out here going off like you the fried chicken of this shit. I thought the main wife had to agree to having sister wives, I mean that’s how it was on Big Love. But whatever this is dude is giving you is not big love, it’s very selfish love for a man of his age to be stealing your best years from you knowing you are blinded, in part, by name, money, fame, position. Caresha Please, we know you care.

We want you to win sis… seriously, and your internet aunties are concerned. Life is short, waste it on no man or woman. Nothing wrong with dating and nothing wrong with polyamory if that is what you choose, but we see you arguing your worth while this negro is having a midlife hoe crisis. We want better for you. You gotta want better for yourself!

I was rewatching A Handmaid’s Tale and after Serena is beat, with a leather belt, by her husband, Commander Waterford, their handmaid Offred says… “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.” It’s actually a quote by the author of the book the series is based on, Margaret Atwood. I heard it and I had to go back to listen again, it struck me.

Men are socialized to be void of emotion and aggressive, it’s an age old fact. It is the topic of many a book, article, dissertation, and op ed. Likewise, women are socialized not to make men angry. From a young age girls are oogled, touched, commented upon by men in inappropriate ways and with undertones of violence. As young women we are taught to fear strange men, never be alone in certain places, at certain times, and certainly with men we don’t know very well. We are socialized to expect strange men to be verbally aggressive, and sexually interested in us. It seems like men aren’t taught to be the antithesis of this, but we are made responsible for our own victimization. Even as young girls. When your aunt asks you “Why were you smiling and being friendly with Mr. James?” after he touches you in your private body parts, we live much the rest of our lives trying to avoid grown men’s inability to control themselves.

And as times have changed and women have become more independent, fought for equity, exposed the victimization they have suffered at the hands of men, and taken control of their voice… that fear hasn’t disappeared but doesn’t necessarily stop us from expressing ourselves, our wants, needs, disappointments, expectations, feelings, and boundaries. But again the fear doesn’t dissipate. I’d like to think of it as living deeper down in our consciousness, as opposed to at the front of our minds.

It’s not as “simple” as a fear of being killed. It really manifests in more ways than just physical. In light of the aggressive tendencies boy children are inundated with, that results in some men being uninterested and unable to treat women well across the board. When you add to that boys lacking fathers, father figures, and positive male representations and being raised by bitter, angry, mistreated, misinformed, women who might cope with those feels with alcohol, drugs, sex in front of their boys… feelings of being valueless and devaluing women just heighten bad behavior. Women those men encounter often have to endure betrayal, control, emotional void, being hit, beat, raped, and maybe even killed. We see examples of it constantly. We all know a woman who has endured abuse. Most of us know a woman who has been raped.

Just yesterday, comedian Aries Spears, a sorry excuse for a man, who described himself as handsome (insert laugh track), went on a tirade about Lizzo, unprovoked. He went in about her health and body when he is diabetic and has bags under his eyes big enough to pack your luggage for a two week European tour and the antithesis of in shape. It was a very sad display of woman hatred. Kevin Samuels level fuckery. And this fool keeps talking. Who hurt you my guy?!?

And he’s just one of many displaying these types of aggressive and hate filled behaviors toward a woman. In 2019, 406K women were raped or sexually assaulted. In 2020, 7,320 women were killed by intimate partners or male family members, and over 50% of those women were 12-34 and 75% of those women are Native American. 4.8 million physical assaults happen to women by intimate partners per year. Those numbers should upset you. They are staggering.

The number of women who suffer coercive control; psychological and/or emotional abuse; physical abuse; sexual abuse; financial abuse; harassment; stalking; and/or online abuse is often not reported but is typically the predicate of sexual and physical abuse. Aries is an abuser… and he hates women. Frankly, he should be scared women will laugh at him and not because if his bad jokes… but because he’s a certified clown. Aren’t you supposed to laugh at clowns… or are they to be feared?

Note: There are never two sides of the story when you prey on women. Just one fucked up side.

Picture it, Detroit, MI, 2010, I entered the world of social media as we know it today. Yeah I had a MySpace but I rarely used it and really saw no value in it. But Facebook…

Facebook was like this new frontier. I could see pictures and read posts about people’s lives, kids, trips, weddings, birthday parties, bad wigs, weight loss and gain, drunken moments and bad decisions… people I hadn’t seen since elementary and high school. It was fascinating, and daily new people popped up. Some whose hairlines were so, uhhh, absent, it took me a minute to figure out who they were. Others whose glow up was phenomenal. It was the best of times…

Then I got into Instagram, Twitter, and now Tik Tok is like my favorite past-time… mini 90 second movies about everything from dance challenges, to folks cleaning their houses, to stuff that’s one set from only fans but for free. I use social media to keep up with folks, post my thoughts, share inspiration, and promote my business. It’s become part entertainment, networking tool, marketing tool, den of foolishness… a smorgasbord of uses… great and no so great.

One of it’s biggest downsides, second only to promoting unrealistic, unhealthy, and just completely false narratives about the ways people look, live, and behave… is this idea that if it isn’t on social media, it didn’t happen. The manifestation of that voyeuristic approach to people’s personal lives goes beyond social media into real life in ways that puncture relationships. Like stab the shit out of them. Murder, death, kill.

“You never post me” , “You didn’t like my status”, “You didn’t wish me a Happy Birthday on Facebook”, “You didn’t comment on my post”… WHAT!?!?!? I mean I have either heard or heard stories about these very conversations, even when acknowledgement, when necessary, is made person to person. There is a heavy belief among folks in a certain demographic… mostly people who grew up with social media… that it simply didn’t happen if you didn’t broadcast it. It’s the nightly news for foolishness. “Reverse cowgirl on that ass and knocked him out” (with a picture of him asleep), “We twerked on handstand for my girls birthday in the middle of Peachtree Street… city girls for life.”

That energy leads to people having this wild notion about what you should and should not share, either because they overshare, are nosy, or both. Why you never post your bf/gf!? Why you keeping secrets? Why you didn’t post your new house? This idea that somehow people should be privy to whatever sector of your life they deem interesting, juicy, entertaining is mad wild. No one is obligated to share personal shit with you unless, until, and in the forum they deem appropriate. Just because half the world posts themselves doing everything from brushing their teeth, changing their clothes, writing a letter, making a snack, and making their bed… does not mean anyone else must follow that blueprint. Social media got ya’ll so busy taking selfies all day you have forgotten that real human connection leads to vulnerability and openness… not keystrokes.

We live in a time where people would rather text that hear someone voice, inflections, tone; The necessities of effective and meaningful communication. The “don’t call me” faction is mad heavy. So people believe they have real friendships in interactions that are limited, virtual, and void of body language and human to human emotion. Some things cannot be translated via strictly wireless interaction. Someone on your “friends list” doesn’t make them your “friend”… that’s a strong word. An associate, acquaintance, Facebook or Instagram cohort sure… a friend… not necessarily. So those folks surely are not going to give you access to every intimate part of their lives. Stop expecting and asking for it. It’s mad weird. Read the room.

In a not so odd twist, the intensity and level of sharing people do to strangers gives an unrealistic idea to people you might actually have real relationships with about what they are privy to or the amount of equity in your friendship. We all have the right, whether virtually or in person to share what we wish. Sure, friends are open with one another, but everyone has boundaries. We’ve come to believe that our stock in other people is limitless and we have some say in their bounds… we don’t. It is imperative we allow folks to decide what they communicate and to whom… and as long as their communication with us is honest, responsible, kind, and with some semblance of regularity (whatever is regular for those people), then that should be sufficient. Demanding shit from grown people that they don’t owe you is madness. Social media is not a replacement for human connection, and it certainly isn’t the place to tell all your business. Cuz why don’t you post your credit card number and expiration date… I mean if we posting all of our business.

Thank you for attending my TED Talk.