What does pro mean?
Pro is a Latin word which means FOR. So to be pro anything, it means you stand for something, you are for something and you support something…what ever something is.
What does it mean to be pro black? It can mean a number of things because almost everyone has a different definition of what pro black means. Is there a specific meaning to the term? Well, all I can say is as far as everyone is concerned, the base meaning is supporting the betterment of the black race.
Now the reason why I think it doesn’t have a watered down meaning is because every three person you ask has a different definition.
A lot of black people are so judgmental on who another black person decides to be with especially when they choose someone of another race. And I believe this to be totally unfair because you are basically generalizing with your closed minded opinion on why this person chose to date outside their race. And there are a thousand and one reasons why but a lot of black folks have this mentality that black women marry caucasian men because they hate being black.
I watched this video of a group of young black people discussing the matter and the mature debate was helluva impressive. Everyone aired their opinion with respect and it did shine a light for me on the other side of the argument.
Uchechi made a statement about having to teach black men about being a woman and teaching Caucasian men and their families about being a black woman but this is what I say: I’m not teaching you nothing. You have to learn it from my character as a person, from the things I do and believe as we are together. I take pride in being who I am and if you and your family can’t see that, then why am I still with you?
The MIL was excited about us getting married and went home to her family to show them photos of us and in not so many words, her mother said she didn’t care about a black woman and biracial kids in her family. Should we go visit his family and try to teach them about blackness?
After watching the video, I kept thinking, when you say you are not particular about who you date but must marry a black woman, isn’t that bothering on sad? We all want to marry for love and have kids in a loving union but lets say this black man dates all the white and Asian women he comes across and wants to settle down but can’t find the right black woman for him. So will he marry a black woman he does not love to prove to people that he is pro black?
Isn’t that unfair to the woman? No sane woman wants to be a second choice with a man she actually loves because this can leave space for a lot of crazy things to happen. He doesn’t love his black wife so he goes cheating with a woman who isn’t black and who he just might actually be in love with. Or he doesn’t actually cheat but remains in a loveless marriage because God forbid strangers classify him as a black man who isn’t pro black.
I don’t actually find it offensive anymore when people say I’m not pro black because of the man I chose to say yes to. I find it offensive that you look at me, a black woman and have the audacity to say that to me.
As you will hear in the video and I do believe it too, a lot of black people married to black people and have black kids are anything but pro black.
I am a black woman with black parents and siblings, I was raised in a black community and had contact with more black people than I did other races so for a total stranger to see my husband and point a finger at me and declare I am not pro black is very insulting.
Of course it wasn’t a shocker to my family when the Mr and I got married because everyone knew I was attracted to caucasian men. That didn’t mean I wasn’t attracted to black men. My first boyfriend was a light skinned black man, an amazing human being. But I laid my eyes on this very dark skin boy and I knew I was not ever going to be attracted to light skinned men. You either had to be a dark black man or a caucasian man. It was that simple with me. I can tell you about all the sexy Chiwetel Ejiofor dreams I had or the threesome with Idris Elba and Morgan Freeman back in the days.
But all that kinky stuff aside, why should I prove my blackness to any stranger just to make them see me as pro black? Rhetorical of course but here is the truth; while fighting other black people about their blackness or lack of it, ask yourself if it’s really about their blackness or your need to be anti white and have more black people join your cause for black supremacy.
When the news about the white Zimbabwean farmers being ostracized was aired, it rubbed me the wrong way and I remember thinking how angry and helpless I would have been if someone came to our family home in Cross River and chased us out because we weren’t natives of Calabar but choose that city to build a family home.
The people were all about kicking non black locals out of the country for the growth of pure blackness without stopping to think of repercussions based on the Mugabe land reform policy that involved seizing farm lands from white locals and distributing to black locals.
Now if you think about it for a second, it isn’t actually a terrible idea. This is an African country that has long since been in control by European descendants. The future in Zimbabwe had to be black because you know, it’s an African country colonized by Europe and the descendants of those colonizers still held powerful positions. But on the other hand, if black people in say Germany beispielsweise who had worked hard to make a name for themselves get everything stripped away from them just because the government was on a path to keep only Germans rich, it gets a little troubling when you think about it.
But the reform had so many holes in it and is a threat to humanity because you should not have the right to just wake up and take someone’s land based on his skin color. This isn’t the past. We can’t be going back to what our ancestors and colonizers did because we want to preserve a pure rich black Zimbabwe.
Of course the outcome of that reform was grave. The black locals were not able to manage farming and this I actually find sad and one of the terrible consequences of colonization.
The active president is now trying to change all that because he himself has said that the commercial agricultural growth of Zimbabwe needs the help of the white locals. Ironic isn’t it?
The recent episode of Chicago P.D (Night In Chicago) tackled one of the despicable acts of the police force and I was at first angry at Hank for not having any feelings at all for the shooting of a black man because he is all about riding the earth of scum and this victim of police killing was the poster child for scum, but I had to agree that one less perpatrator was good for the earth. But then, what Atwater said was spot on. He said something along the lines of : “at the time of his shooting he wasn’t dealing drugs.” He was shot after being stopped for driving while black which we all know how that always turns out.
What Altwater did at the end of the episode had me smiling and nodding my head. What Ruzek said to him was also a powerful sign of solidarity.
Now if you watch the episode, take a look at the scene with Ray Price(by the way, Mr Wendell is such an incredible actor!!!). He asked Altwater to lie about the shooting because sadly it was a good shoot even though the idiot cop was a racist bigot. Price didn’t care anything about the black boy shot. He just wanted to fire up his political ambition. Does that make him problack? Wanting justice for a black kid as a means to an end?
Why should any particular race be superior? Who died and made you lord of the universe?
Can we not all just get along and attempt world peace? Yes I get that the black community and every other minority has faced countless terror and still fear for the future of the black race especially in America and this inequality has forced people to have opinions and do things that are both dangerous and threatening to the future. But you telling me that I am not for the greatness of black people just because I married a caucasian man and will have biracial kids is just your opinion and I get it now, it”S OK to think so.
Have y”all heard of people like Frederick Douglass, Alice Walker whose marriage by the way was recorded as one of the first legal interracial marriages in America, Chescaleigh, Josephine Baker?
I do understand the struggle the black community in America has now as an adult whose childhood was knitted away from all that ugliness of inequality and injustice. Mostly because I am a black woman but also because I am human and injustice to anyone is hurtful and if you don’t see that, then you truly are not paying attention at all.
