#ToxicMasculinity

"Dress the way you want to be addressed." This is presently the male response and reaction to women's requests to be regarded as human, vs a series of holes that exist just for men to penetrate.
It would appear that, in our case as black women, black men fully recognize their right to exist and not be deemed thugs or dangerous based on their clothing choices. However, when we make requests of them to show the same courtesy, they are unable to hear us and proceed to suggest "logical" reasons why their refusal to listen is valid. Among these "logical reasons" are "don't dangle meat in front of dogs and be mad when they bite" or "don't wear a Ho's attire" or "you must have wanted the attention" and other such "pearls of wisdom." These men believe, unfoundedly, that they are noble in telling us to "cover up." Louis Farrakhan was recently heralded as a "real man" for offering "protection from the NOI" to Beyonce, after Florida police refused to do detail work for her concerts. However, he had also just recently given an edict to Jay-Z to "tell his wife to cover up!" Interesting intersection there.

Science has proven that males are incapable of actually hearing the female voice and taking her seriously.

Men apparently would rather "listen" to the "energy" our outfits emit than the energy of our voices saying no, I'm not interested.

What I find to be most intriguing; our foremothers and forefathers were well dressed, yet made to suffer gross indignities in this nation. Martin Luther King was wearing a suit and tie when he was murdered/lynched. Malcolm X was wearing a suit and tie when he was murdered/lynched. Countless black women and men in suits and looong dresses were turned into strange fruit all around this nation.

Therefore, I posit, that in addition to a genetic inability to hear and process the far more complex feminine voice, male culture itself is desirous of stagnation. The Diminished Masculine's perpetual and cross racial inability to review history and adapt/reform, means we are doomed to remain trapped in a never ending story of collusion with oppression and citation of attire and other presentations as "the reason" it has happened.

(Sidebar: I'm not surprised by Farrakhan! The man still rocks Brooks Brothers suits and Stacey Addams shoes! He still got that conc, he will never change lol)


It is an unfortunate reality that far too many of these toxic and diminished masculine are out there. We need to learn how to recognize them, what are the signs and symptoms of the Diminished Masculine. Only then can we begin to alleviate this sickness, that seeks to keep the Divine Feminine wounded, in our interpersonal lives. Unfortunately, I do not believe that men en masse can or will be changing this of their own volition any time soon.

Hilary Banks from "The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air" may not have been known as a fierce advocate for education. But the actress who played her sure is.

Last year, Karyn Parsons -- actress, mother, author and amateur historian -- founded Sweet Blackberry, a nonprofit devoted to teaching kids about some of the lesser-known figures of black history. The organization publishes books and videos on people like Henry "Box" Brown and Garrett Morgan, and facilitates school visits and children's workshops centered around promoting "creativity, literacy skills and social responsibility."

Sweet Blackberry recently launched a Kickstarter for its latest project, a short film that will tell the story of Janet Collins, the first African-American prima ballerina in the Metropolitan Ballet. Collins, who died in 2003 at age 86, rose to fame despite being shut out of dance theaters that refused to let her perform unless it was in whiteface.

On the eve of Wednesday's 50th anniversary of the signing of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, The Huffington Post spoke with Parsons about Sweet Blackberry's history and its mission. As the Sweet Blackberry website proclaims: "This culture is American culture; this history is American History."

Why did you found Sweet Blackberry?

My mother was a librarian and she worked at the Black Resource Center in South Central Los Angeles, and would call me to tell me stories that she read about that were interesting to her. She told me this story of Henry "Box" Brown, the slave who literally mailed himself to freedom in a box, and I hadn't heard of it before. I thought, "This is an amazing story." I couldn't believe it was real. I talked to my friends and they had never heard of it.

So I really wanted to turn it into a kids' story, but this was during "Fresh Prince," so I'd think about it and then forget about it and go back to playing and having a fabulous time. I kept going back to make notes, and then I'd find other stories and realized I wanted to do a series of books. But it wasn't until I was pregnant with my daughter that I started talking about it. It was my husband who said, "You need to stop talking about this, it's really important, you need to do it." He's an independent filmmaker, so he just does stuff. He doesn't wait.

I had to shift gears. I had no idea how to do it, and [I] started asking around and telling people, "This is what I want to do." And people were generous, they'd say "Oh, I have a friend who does this," or "I have a friend who's in animation, you should meet them." So I started meeting people and finally came up with a way to make it happen. There wasn't so much self-publishing at the time, but it was easy to make your own film, except for the cost of it. That's how it started -- that one story was really the impetus for the whole thing.

Do you think there's a lack of black history in education for children in general?

Definitely. The problem with relegating black history to one really short month, the shortest month, is not only are we telling the same stories over and over again -- which are amazing, George Washington Carver is incredible, there's nobody like Frederick Douglass -- but there are so many. You don't want it to become a boutique history. Black history isn't a separate history. This is all of our history, this is American history, and we need to understand that. It has such an impact on kids and their values and how they view black people. If they know about these stories, they're empowered and think "Oh, this is who I come from, this is who I am."

When you only hear about a handful of stories, the message is "Every once in a while, a special black person comes along." And that's a dangerous message to send to everyone. It does nothing but harm black children, it does nothing but harm the idea of black people. I think it's really important to tell these stories, because there are lessons to be learned -- incredible lessons about perseverance and determination and opportunity to do something great.

It's also about image. The story that we're doing with Janet Collins, for instance, is about showing a real black prima ballerina. Our main audience are kids 3 to 7 years old, in whom we're trying to plant seeds. Little girls want to play princess and ballerina, but they don't have anyone to emulate that looks like them.

How did you choose Janet Collins?

That's a story that I learned about early. I came across her obituary in The New York Times and thought it was so amazing that she was asked by the Ballet Russe to dance in whiteface and she turned them down, but still went on to such great heights. I think that's a great story for kids. She was a celebrated prima ballerina ... But I didn't know who she was. When I say her name, no one knows who the heck I'm talking about. Not that she was trying to make history for everyone, but she broke down barriers and paved the way for Misty Copeland. That's why I think it's important to celebrate her and bring this image of beauty and strength to little girls.

There are so many stories to tell. Getting them to resonate with kids is tricky. When I sat down to write Henry "Box" Brown after years and years of wanting to do it, I found it incredibly challenging. All of a sudden everything I wrote was so dry and serious, like history in school -- and I hated history in school. It was like castor oil. I didn't want that, I wanted fairy tales. I wanted to tell kids stories that were engaging and fun, but [that] happened to be about historical figures. The same way you know everything about Little Red Riding Hood like the back of your hand. So it was really difficult to write it until I started bringing animals into it, because when Henry Brown talked to animals, they didn't understand why he would go to such lengths to mail himself in a box. They didn't understand what this 'freedom' thing meant ... How do you explain that to a little kid? So you have to tell them what you can't do, and how your life is limited. It was through his way of talking to animals that I found a way to talk to kids.

Do you want to expand engagement of these stories to other ages?

I'd love to appeal to a wider audience and an older audience. I've found that older siblings sit and watch with the videos. Parents do, too, because of the content. They're not familiar with the stories, and that's really great to know. Regardless of our aiming the style and animation -- it's like a picture book come to life -- at little kids, everyone is listening.

Is this project also attached in any way to the history of storytelling?

That's a really important part of it. It wasn't so much of an intent at the very beginning, but it is something important that we're losing and this is definitely attached to that.

Have you been surprised by support shown for Sweet Blackberry?

The support has been incredible. When I first started Sweet Blackberry, I was focused on getting the stories out but I hadn't fully conceived the business model. We were a for-profit back then -- not by intent, but by default. After living with it for a little bit, I noticed educators, parents and librarians wanting more, and that made me think of turning it into a nonprofit through which I could develop programs. I realized we could harness all the support and goodwill to make these things happen.

There are so many stories. Every day I come across a new one. And I find it hard not to overload my Facebook with "this day in history" posts, because I've been told it's too much. There's lot of information to absorb, and I want to make sure people really soak in the stories they read and be inspired to share them [with] someone else.

Since we started the Kickstarter, I've been really touched by people reaching out to their friends. You get to hear, in their own words, what they love about what we're doing and how they are moved about what we're doing -- why they're excited about Sweet Blackberry.

The encouragement has been great. We do need it to translate into financial support. That's a little hard for people to get around sometimes. I love the outpouring of support, especially to friends. We need to all rally together and know these stories are for all of us. That's why Kickstarter is perfect for Sweet Blackberry, and all nonprofits.

I've seen, through the response to Sweet Blackberry, that people are hungry for this information. I think that people that follow the campaign and then realize their own readiness to pay attention -- they care more about it. Things are relevant to them. We try and make it so the figures we talk about are less abstract. You can't avoid that sometimes, but the more it feels relevant, the more receptive people are to black history.

You can learn more about Sweet Blackberry in the video below, or by visiting the group's website, its Twitter or its Facebook page.

Listen... I won't write a friggin dissertation like some. Promise!

This is no different than the Zoe Saldana bs as Nina Simone. And as long as we, Black Wombn, dont own our image? They will continue to use mixed race women as the sole representation of blackness. Light skinned women are privileged over dark or even brown women. Always have been. Always will be so long as those women are allowed to don the faces of True Black Wombn.

I decided to delve DEEP into #controversy here. A***trigger warning*** to the racially sensitive, this is a piece that is meant to be a shocker and to provoke analytic thought. This is a call to the Black Womb to divest from that which is NOT in her best interest. This is a call to the Black Womb to realize her great power as a Woman and to NOT deny her greatness to appease the wounded hyper-masculines within our cohort.  I wrote this in generalizations because it was easier, not because I am unaware or too stupid to understand what a generalization is and that they do not always apply to the all.  It is NOT your average piece of writing on race by the black woman. It is designed to piss you off and get you to thinking. I anticipate your angry gossip, angry comments and complete denials. I know who you are and what your go to knee-jerk reactions are when it comes to black accountability for what is in our scope of power and access to control and change. I decided to view you as CAPABLE and SOVEREIGN and not as the slave-class we been encouraged to be.



With that said I firmly believe that the Black Womb is the God of the universe! Science has proven that the entire human species originates out of Africa and the Mitochondrial DNA Genome has been here on the planet for thousands of years before the Y-Chromosomal pattern was created by, you guessed it, the Black Womb. Via Channeling I was able to gather that we Dawta's (the galaxy) didn't always utilize sexual alchemy (or fuck) on our suns to create them. I am thankful to Spirit for that message... The GALAXY or the DAWTA gives birth to/creates the SUN or SON. Let those that have an ear hear! 

As such, and with all of this in mind:

If black people are the ORIGINAL creators of life. and if there be NOTHING new under the sun... all we do has already been done...

then MISOGYNY, RACISM, CLASSISM AND MORE are BLACK INVENTIONS gone rogue and wild (because we no longer control them en masse). If the Black man is the father of civilization, and many of you hold this to be the truth, and the black woman is its mother, WE CREATED THIS SHIT!

ALLLLLLLL OF IT! even and especially that shit we HATE is in existence. 

I remember... being one of those race women who blame ALL black harms, horrors and issues on white folks. I thank Goddess for growing up. We can cite slavery, apartheid, global disenfranchisement ALL THE LIVE LONG DAY for all the ills of black society. and RIGHTEOUSLY SO! We can say that black men are abusive, black woman hating deadbeats on account of picking up the euro man all the live long day. 

But I ask you: what about those 56 women raped hourly in the congo, that they know of there's only 56 per hr, who are not black american with the black american slave legacy? and they will say that it is colonialism that did it. 

and I will ask: what about the FACT that africans SOLD THEIR OWN to the white man? as proof that WE CREATED THE SAME SYSTEM WE HATE and abhor, and they will say that slavery in africa was different than what white people did. you will hear about chattle slavery and other regurgitated soundbites on race relations.

And I will ask them about the 3 black/brown men who RAPED and murdered Quiana Jenkins, the WIFE of Marine Jan Pawel Pietrzak eventually killing him after making him watch them rape his wife, for being married to a white man? The same of which, after raping that woman, killing her husband via one shot to the head and then killing her with a double shot to the back of the head, wrote "nigger lover" on their bedroom wall. And they will use denial, excuses, the media, statistical tampering and more to say that those violent rapist murder's of OUR sister and her husband were innocent. (A jury sentenced 2 of them to death and one to life in jail without parole in June.) We will say it was that the man did something to them.. not that this couple was PUNISHED for their choice to LOVE one another.

and the blame will keep going BACK to white folks. This leaves no room for us to examine the ways in which we DO have the power to make choices that serve our highest good and best interest. which says, to me, that black people collectively when it is convenient for us, endorse the willful enslaving of our Divine Will, individual/collective Choice Power and Birth Rite to global white supremacy. How so? 

ANY SOVEREIGN PERSON OR GROUP will be seeking to HEAL and harmonize their cohort. not find JUSTIFICATION, based on historics, economics and virtual access, for their dysfunctional, self defeating behaviors, attitudes, practices, beliefs and cultural adaptations. 

                                                                   ********************

When I was a child, my cohort and I were accused of "thinking we were white." For me, it was on account of my vernacular, diction and the articulation of my thoughts. Even though, then, I was the most RADICAL MILITANT PRO-BLACK SISTA EVER, rockin the fro and all lol, I was too white for them. I read books, I didn't fuck around and I was serious about my studies. (serious about my studies meaning, i liked to learn. school sucked majorly and taught us nothing so BOOKS and writing became my best friends). I was NOT the best student in grade school, i was bored out of my mind and didn't see an end of that until College. But that, reading and enjoying learning, is what "white" kids do. My own cousins would say "auntie's kids think they white" because of how we carried ourselves. When my sisters and I made it through our teen years without being "knocked up" by black men (focus on black men here because we are black women) we REALLY thought we were white and too good and better than everyone else who had fallen victim to the okey-doke. 

These are just a few of the ways that the dysfunctional black cohort attempts to police those trying to do better into acceptance of sub-par bullshit.   I would enter debates and disputes all the time with people, attempting to help them see how they have taken every gross white supremacist ideal of blackness and applied it as the very embodiment of black. so black women can't read and be black... we gotta be tryina be white. black women cannot speak the "kings english," we tryina be white. black WOMEN cannot decide to reserve their sexual enjoyment for worthy partners... we tryina be white and what chu tryina say about the brothers? and it goes on and on this horrible denigration of Black Sovereignty and Black Will Power BY and AGAINST black women. 

Historically, and presently, black people are oppressed. Yep, "black dude" in the white house and all, our lives (as a collective) are NOT anything like those of the blacks over on Pennsylvania ave. Our oppression's as black women (and I am addressing black women primarily in my writings as I believe in the Sisterhood) are multi-faceted and intersecting. The legacy of slavery, the implications and IMPACT that has had on the collective black psyche will NEVER be explored, honored or even considered by the dominant narrative. We have wasted centuries of effort, energy and capital trying to get the dominant narrative to change. And in 2013 people, BLACK PEOPLE even, are STILL espousing horrifically racist views of African's in the Diaspora. I saw a black woman say that Alek Wek had GORILLA features and as such was NOT as beautiful as european featured Beyonce, just 2 days ago. It didn't shock me or surprise me. I expected to hear that from a black woman about her own reflection. THAT is whats disgusting... the EXPECTATION that black women espouse and embody the same racist sexism they LAMENT, is disgusting and a clear sign of someone who has been around too long and seen too much. 

In July 2013 an Italian Senate VP (a white male named Roberto Caldroni) came under fire for likening the nations FIRST Black Female Cabinet Minister to an orangutan. 

These anti black female attitudes have swept our planet and been fueled by and large by our own brothers. Our disconnect from our Black Origins and Black Godis power has borked our concept of community. We were NEVER a viral people the way that the dominant culture has become. On the contrary, we were always communal. We see the great issue with trying to be communal within a virus. Colonization itself was, I have seen, the result of our collective inability or disinterest at organization within a collective. We either saw no merit to a collective, or failed to successfully establish an hegemony that SERVES the interest of blacks throughout the diaspora. As it stands, our own brothers themselves see no value in the community or the Womb's who birth it. I identify their divorce from the yin/feminine/Godis as the endorsement of yang/hyper-masculine/patri-male-god usurpation of our position. They, as the fathers of civilization and creation, have created this anti-black female sentiment and have since endorsed it for their own financial gain and ends, black females be damned!

and so my POINT here is... when is the excuse and blame going to be done with? when are we going to INTROSPECT and get to the ROOT of the problem, vs all this fraudulent cord cutting we have been doing around racialized sexism and sexualized racism? 

Because, as it stands, the blaming of the white man for all the ills of black people, the ills of black men against black women, has gotten us no where. It has gotten us into a dis-empowered state within collective global disenfranchisement. It has gotten us programs designed to keep us dependent on the dominant culture and narrative. It has NOT gotten us greater harmony nor community. Black males still run rampant in crime based activities in our communities with no regard to the mothers and children there. Black males are still shooting up our neighborhoods and sending our sons, and dawtas, to early graves with impunity. and Black women are permitting them to do so and enabling the maintenance of "thug" culture as the identity of black maleness at large with impunity. 

The consistent blaming of the white man has not done thing ONE to improve our lot, change our circumstances, improve the way our sons view our daughters and improve relations between our God's and her Suns. so again, when is the excuse and blame going to be enough to exact the necessary changes within our community and family? WHEN?