A while ago my writing partner, Janice Rhoshalle Littlejohn, was invited to discuss the black woman’s dating shortage “problem” with a Cincinnati talk show host for a popular R&B station. I won’t rehash, because by now, undiscovered tribes in the Amazon have heard the stats that black women outnumber black men by two million.
One caller, opposed to Janice’s suggestion that black women expand their options and date a rainbow–black, white, yellow, red, purple polka dots–INSTEAD suggested that black women seek an in-mate. (Forgive the following grammar vomit; I’m quoting verbatim):
“I just wanted to make a comment on what Ms. Littlejohn was saying about these numbers and these statistics she’s coming up with…She’s running to the very individuals [white people] that…caused those numbers to be like that in the first place!…I mean, think about it. In the time of Pharaoh. Kill all boy babies, save and spare the female…I mean, if there’s a million and five brothas in prison, then you might have to visit a brotha in prison!”
To said caller, I’d say: first of all, Pharaoh, wasn’t white, he was an Egyptian, as in…from Africa.
Next, there are plenty of women across the melanin spectrum that are already running to jailbird love. But for the life of me I can’t figure out why an educated woman with means could EVER possibly find these guys ‘boyfriend, husband and daddy’ material. Yet it happens, and in some cases, encouraged.
“Being smart at work does not equate to being smart at love,” says LislieBeth (LB) Wish, Ed.D., MSS., MA, a psychologist and licensed clinical social worker. Emotional vulnerabilities make women susceptible to all kinds of unwise romantic choices. Here are her top ten reasons why a woman would go for a guy waiting in Cellblock 9 (and ladies, make sure she’s not you):
- Intense feelings of loneliness
- Childhood experiences of loss, abuse, hurt emotions, neglect, abandonment and criticism
- Too many or too intense and important experience in adulthood of love gone wrong
- Too few experiences in adult intimate relationships
- A belief that you are unlovable
- A strong willingness to “not judge” and to be very accepting
- Don’t feel attractive
- Don’t feel that you really know how to be in and manage on-going intimacy so long-distance contact works well
- Feeling of importance, feeling like “The One who loves, understands and accepts Her Man”
- Gets lost and high in the fantasy, idea and intensity of these kinds of relationships
Christelyn D. Karazin is the co-author of Swirling: How to Date, Mate and Relate Mixing Race Culture and Creed and runs a blog, www.beyondblackwhite.com, dedicated to women of color who are interested and or involved in interracial and intercultural relationships.
