A War Within a Race (Repost)

The House Negro and the Field Negro – Malcolm X

“…He ate the same food his master ate and wore his same clothes. And he could talk just like his master - good diction…”

  -Malcolm X 

I've always experienced questioning and inquiries about the way I speak; how I choose to deliver myself. The overarching belief that it sounded too white, my white friends thought I sounded fine; because I sounded like them. And I couldn't sound any other way or else I wouldn't have friends.

That is where it began; between the House Negro and the Field Negro, as Malcolm X puts so eloquently in the speech he delivered at Michigan State University in 1963. Black kids who perhaps tend to speak intelligently are immediately labeled as trying or acting white. Or get made fun of for sounding “white” particularly by black counterparts. (Something I've experienced on multiple occasions) But this was the slave master’s original plan: to put the House Negro and Field Negro at odds with each other. It immediately pins people that by all understanding should be united in a fight against white oppression. Instead they end up fighting each other, on the belief that the House Negro has become too much like their master, and that was the master’s plan all along: to start a war within a race. A plan that has worked for centuries, a plan that still works today...

The Chase

You expect me to chase you?

Just a quick blurb for thought but lately I've come across this issue: Men, grown men expecting me to chase after them. In this ever evolving, modern society we live in many things have changed from the definitions of family and marriage to the ever increasing technologies we have at our fingertips; that being said there seems to be this new wave of thought on how courting should take place in this modern world. And it seems as though role reversal is the mantra of this generation…where women need to take the reins and seek men out. And I have no issue with a woman who knows what she wants and is confident enough to go after it, but personally speaking I usually let it come to me, and recently I noticed once it comes to be and I begin conversing with the individual I’m apparently supposed to keep the lines of communication open at all times…call him first, text him first, suggest this and that, as if I’m trying to start a relationship on my own. Pish Posh!! Give me a break, I don’t care if it’s 2014, common courtesy does not go out the window, I’m not saying you have to run me down on a constant basis but at least give me an idea that you actually want to hear from me, that you give two craps about my well-being…it’s a two street. Neither party should continually have to reach out; if there’s a mutual attraction shouldn't it come from both ends? And then male friends and counterparts always make the argument that their tired of chasing after women, and yeah you have some run of the mill girls who just want to be showered with compliments by any means necessary but that doesn't negate the population of women who desire the respect of a man taking the first step…idk a man being a man perhaps? In this evolving society it seems that the definition of a man has been lost in translation…the principals and weight carried along with the title of being a man has been all but removed. And the argument can be made that we live in a society that emasculate the man but that doesn't mean you have to fall victim, being stripped of any masculinity you have. Perhaps somewhere, someone doesn't even find this to be an issue, but as a woman it makes my stomach churn and I just needed to get that off my chest.  I will never chase down a man, it’s completely unorthodox and unbecoming; and here comes the importance of realizing your own worth as an individual, I know some females who will jump before a guy even says “how high” and that is the result of a failure to see yourself and what you deserve as a woman, as a human being.

*waving my white flag*

#blurbforthought

Thoughts?