So, why is it that every time I talk about black women’s lived experiences feeble-minded always on the black woman’s titty black man hollers in his best tonka truck voice, “We got it hard not black women?” Wow. My first immediate response is, “Did I say anything negative about the black man?” No. My second response is, “Did I even use the male pronoun in any part of my statement?” No. So, how is it that you, Mr. Beans and Rice eating barefoot and pregnant needy black man, are offended, wounded, and betrayed by my acknowledgement of black women’s stories? You see, Beyonce calls it your big ego. I simply refer to it as your broke-down Napoleonic black male privilege having @$s. I know the tone of this blog seems reminiscent of Erykah Badu’s Tyrone and Beyonce’s Irreplaceable, but my intent is not to lyrically serenade you with all the ills black men have visited upon black women, but to say that I am sick and I am tired of the, “I am black man and the world is on my shoulder boo who who” whine every time I mention anything about black women.

I mean, I can say, “I as a black woman sneezed today,” and the black man would counter, “I have a sinus infection.” I as a black woman could slip and fall and the black man would argue for dear life that he invented the slip then fall movement. I can say, “As black woman I love my vagina,” and the black man would say, “Not as much as I do (hearty John Coffy from the Green Mile’s laugh).” I can say, “I scraped my knee,” and the black man would moan like an old southern Baptist minister, “I am quadriplegic . . . I am so oppressed.” Really, is it that important that you, Mr. I am an Endangered Species, be the center of attention all the damn time?  When I go to the bathroom, I have to seriously think about how my brown poop will oppress you. When I sleep at night, I have to think about how my dreams will challenge your manhood and rival your oppression. I am so over, “The world is against me” black man’s dirge. Go sing that song to a group of people who care, people like Tiger Wood’s wife and even they are tired of your big ego.

Well, initially, this week, I had intended to write a scathing critique of Oprah’s show, Half the Sky, where she talked about global oppression of women. And of course for Oprah and her white soccer mom’s audience global oppression of women can only occur in non-westernized countries like India, Burundi, Tanzania, and China. Therefore, the idea that violence can happen to women of color like Jamiesha Corner in her own Chicagoan’s backyard seems to escape hermulti-billion mogul’s mind. In another post, perhaps next week, I will return to what I call Oprah-ism which entails a hearty dose of captain-save-a-negro-and-third world woman-syndrome. However, if you want to read a great commentary about the captain-save-a-negro’s syndrome, please read summer’s Captain Save-a-Negro: A Primer.

So, I was going to write about the Oprah’s show, but then a group of black men on the education for liberation’s list-serve decided that they would challenge the premise of a study guide we created for the movie Precious by saying how the movie oppressed them as black men. Then they proceeded to bombard my personal email account with their foolishness and black man’s dirge. For many days we resisted the desire to respond because these particular groups of black men are fundamentalist in their black male dirge’s beliefs and plus I had more important things to do like eating cereal and tying my shoe.

Well, we eventually responded with a black feminist analysis of the situation and that seems to have ended the assault of emails into my personal email account.  However, I am still appalled by the fact that this group of black men felt victimized because we were talking about a movie that features the faces and lived experiences of black women. It’s kind of like Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun where Ruth Younger tells Walter Lee, “Eat your eggs, Walter Lee.” And of course, Walter Lee is offended and begins this black man dirge, “I got me a dream and the woman says eat your eggs . . . Help me now to take a hold in this world somehow . . . I tell you I got to change my life because I’m choking to death and all you say to me is eat these eggs.” Yes, black male stroking his third arm melodrama. What Walter Lee fails to see and what the black men on the list-serve do not understand is that eating your eggs and the Precious’ study guide is not about them. It is about the black woman. It is about her-story.

I know there are many interpretations of Ruth’s words, “Eat your eggs,” but I think she was also saying that I have dreams too, but as a black mother and wife I have to get up every morning and fix the eggs. Ruth was telling her-story when she told Walter Lee to eat his eggs and we were telling our story when we created and sent out the study guide for the movie Precious.

Beyonce sings:

It’s too big, it’s too wide
It’s too strong, it won’t fit
It’s too much, it’s too tough
He talk like this ’cause he can back it up

Yeah right, sounds like more black man complaining to me. So, to all the black men out there who have a problem with black women telling their stories, you all can kiss the backside because we will continue to tell our, her, stories. Now what.