A sista on You tube spoke about an apology letter she wrote to Black men. She apologizes for not being supportive to the Black man, for “downing” Him, for belittling Him and allowing herself to think that she didn’t really need Him. She mentions the “Willie Lynch” letter and how the letter truly exemplifies the Black woman. Willie Lynch talks about putting the Black woman in front of the Black man, consequently the Black woman no longer depends on the Black man; she therefore becomes “Independent”. Lynch calls this “reversing the roles”. The sista states this is what has happened to us, we have bought into this Willie Lynch mentality and we feel we do not need our men. She states that some Black women who get degrees, feel that they are a couple degrees above Black men. At first I wanted to refute and argue her down and scream “No, we are not like that!” but something humbled me and after watching the you tube video I realized she was right. She states we (Black women) need to work on our accountability, instead of blaming the Black man for what he did wrong, let’s examine ourselves and hold ourselves responsible for being with a man that wasn’t up to par. She states we also need to work on humility, and this is true. Many Black women, including myself have a lot of ego. T.C. Carrier in his book, The Secret Science of Black Male and Female Sex states that the reason for our massive egos is due to the fact that we have had to be independent and we had no one in slavery to rely on other than ourselves. Couple that with the fact that there has been many outside forces that have lead to the destruction of the Black man and consequently the Black family (prison industrial complex, “war on drugs”, education system in which Black boys “check out” by the 5th grade, welfare systems, slavery, etc.). Today we are proud to be an “I-N-D-E-P-E-N-D-E-N-T” woman; but in fact we are many times only independent of our men and dependent on everything else (our job, our car, our degrees, etc.). Slavery really did a number on us as a people and it’s hard to admit that but there are so many parts of African American culture that is deeply rooted in slavery. The mentality of, “I don’t need a man” is directly a result of what happened to the Black woman and the Black family in slavery.” I do need a man” and I need men in my life. To think they we can do this thing called life without real men in our lives is insanity, we need you Black men. At the same time I want to emphasize the word, “men”; not boys who are chronologically old as hell but do not share in raising their children, who have sex with women for their ego’s sake and/or “men” who look for women to take care of them or look for a woman to “take the lead” nor “men” who do not have a solid relationship with the Creator. Real Black men do exist and real Black women do exist. To be fair we women cannot continually involve ourselves with “men” who treat us with no worth; if we are constantly attracting these “men” then we must examine ourselves and stop blaming Black men because they are not the problem, we are! I too suffer from the “Strong Black woman Syndrome” sometimes, but I’m working on undoing what Willie Lynch did to me and I hope you are doing the same. Yes I need to be more humble and yes I need to continue to be accountable for my actions because I choose that Black man and yes I need to relinquish my ego and embrace more of my higher self and more of my God… don’t we all. Black men I am sorry too, and with that said I have to first apologize to myself for not being the best me, therefore I could not bring to you my highest, most worthy self. Peace.
With humility, Miss D.
