Forgive me, but many people think that Black men haven’t stood up for anything since the days of the Black Panthers.
And come to think of it, I’m not really sure I can disagree with that.
Please do not get me wrong, but a lot of brothers have seemingly stepped out of the forefront of politics, community leadership, family, and in general, giving their voice to various social, ethical, and moral issues.
Let’s be real, most of our leaders today are all senior citizens. Old Black men aren’t risking going to jail to fight for a cause. They’ve slowed down and aren’t up for that–naturally, they’ve become conservative and complacent.
Liberation is a young man’s game.
The images of the Black male has gotten innocent Black men killed. The insidious nature of this was created by the white media. And the sad part, many Black men in positions to speak boldly, choose to cower, and often play into these media perceptions.
You have to earn respect and with that, this means that you have to be willing to give something up in order to achieve a certain goal.
Black men have an image of profiling and “frontin'” but not many today have records of actively standing up for anything. You can abuse them, hate them, even kill them, then some pastor will pray, insisting Black people to get on our knees, and ask God to redeem the offenders, then, back to the same ole’ same ole’. Cowardice. Plain and simple.
You don’t pray for leaders YOU RAISE LEADERS!
Look at the state of our communities across this nation. Black males walk around with their pants hanging off of their behinds, refusing to read books, but want to drive expensive cars, while living with a girlfriend on food stamps. How many Black children have been spawned by the irresponsible Black male? What is this doing to our community as a whole? Young Black men need strong male role models so that they can be STRONG MALES. It takes men to raise men.
What are Black men building? What will be the legacy of this generation?
No. I’m not a man-hater, nor do I make it a habit to criticize Black males, but honestly, the work that I’ve put in trying to stand up for, defend verbally (literally writing a book to young brothers) to empower them, but to continually have to rebuke the apathy that comes from many Black males, sometimes just frustrates me. I’m just a woman, and can never understand what it means to be a Black man, but I am a double-minority, and all Black women have experienced sexism and racism. We get no brakes, but we get up every day and choose to fight.
All I’m saying is that with the current state of racial bias being directed at many Black males, it’s high time for many to stop hiding behind facades and face their enemies head on–with the gun if necessary. Do something. Real men prepare themselves for confrontation.
Kings build nations and empires. Being a king requires that a man take the lead, be strong, wise, and raise his people up, as he is raised up, being the human equivalent of the divine force that created him.
We’ve got your back, but we can’t continue to carry you.
Being a man means taking control. And that’s what Black men must do if they want to be empowered in this world.
***For years, I’ve interacted and had discussions with Black men–-at times, they can become hostile when a woman, particularly a Black woman, tells them what the real issues are that provoke them and make them act negatively toward them. Because of these conversations in years past, I was motivated to write a book to Black men in 2011, entitled, A Journey Into The Mind of a Black Woman: In Search of Black Men Who Live With Purpose. I think it was ahead of it’s time–all these years later, what I talked about is very relevant to young brothers like yourself. Get a copy–and READ IT! The narrative is a letter to young Black men–-a conversation that needs to be had. Here’s the link: http://www.amazon.com/Journey-Into-Mind-Black-Woman/dp/1468025228/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1406208944&sr=8-1&keywords=A+Journey+Into+The+Mind+of+a+Black+Woman
From The Mind of Truthangel 
[…] Truth Angel 107 delivers a strong message to black men in her article, “Black Men: What Will It Take to Make You STAND UP?” Here’s just some of what she had to say: […]
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The Constructors…Black Male Pride On Display
In order for a blackman to be a positive resource for our race, he has to be free in mind, body, and soul. A lot of us are still slaves…others tell us what to think, how to think, who to like, who not to like, and so forth. Essentially, we’re human piñatas that get knocked around by everybody else on the planet. The violence and overall hatred that we see stems from us not having power to pilot our lives in a meaningful way. The sad part about all of this, is that, no one can make us hate who we are, that’s a life choice that some brothas use as a crutch. No, i’m not picking up a gun and killing another black person, selling drugs on the block, raping blackwomen, abusing my girlfriend, supporting external ideologies that enslave us…Hell No! Whether the home life was chaotic or not, promoting failure is bulls**t…No Excuses Indeed!
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Again, you hit the nail right on the head.
*Thumbs up*
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@ Truth, Originalwoman, and Shahidah: Ladies I want to thank you each individually for your words. The truth can definitely be a tough pill to swallow. In the immortal words of James Brown people are talking loud but not saying nothing. I agree that how we relate to one another as black men and women is the foundation of our community. I believe we must start on a micro level to precipitate the change we are in search of. If individuals such you three ladies and myself are willing to do our part it can spread and be passed along. Their are many things we can do as black people that may seemingly be small but have an impact. For example, I have a shirt that says I Love Black Women and the response that it evokes is overwhelming. Thank you ladies for your words and if I am not the first let me not be the last to say I LOVE EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU!!!!!!
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And that’s all Black men have to do: Just DO IT. Like the Nike commercial says. All Black women want is some respect and recognition. Why in the hell would I seek that out in Hispanic men, white men, Asian men, etc. These men have invested nothing in our communities. Why would any intelligent Black woman defer to them as mates?
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good post, and its true, only being Pro Active will change anything anytime soon!
on a collective level I don’t think AA men know what standing up really looks like, at least not the last 2 generations. AA men were conditioned to behind their women, white masters made sure black men were humiliated and cuckolded in front of their women to enforce that the black man has no real control over his own life, his family his woman and no means to protect them. I know some of them they can and do do this on an individual basis, but as a whole, I haven’t seen it in a looong time. As a matter of fact, it seems like more of our m en have aligned themselves to the same beliefs as white men regarding their communities, that they were not worth cultivating, and that his image. his black woman is not worth loving.
why do i say that? just lurking and watching BM in the media, their choices in mates, their anti-black woman sentiment, i see alot of mud slinging etc, ( online at least) have we forgotten how to dialog with each other? SAD but true. Of course, any brothers do love us, and their communities . their children but I don’t thinik they see the urgency of now. We have lost that ancient African mindset of thinking as a collective and now we think as the West does ” individuality” ” what makes ME happy” etc. In the meantime , AA communities are in such a state. I hope we get it together before its too late
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[…] Source: Black Men: What Will It Take To Make You STAND UP? […]
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This article is right on time. I’m starting to see a spike the consciousness of Black men. It’s growing slowly but you can feel it. Yeah, we were enslaved, lynched, oppressed, our women raped, so on and so on. But the time is now to move forward. We have to step up and be a power on the world stage just like all the rest of the men of the world. Take control of our destiny and our community.
One of the biggest problems that I have observed with Black men is that for many of us, we don’t grow out of the “cool” phase. We remain child like, well into physical adulthood. Where other groups of males go out into the world with the intentions of conquering it, Black men in their 40’s many times are talking about swag and how much their shoes cost or how many hoes they have. Time for us to grow up.
Let’s keep these serious types of discussions going.
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Hi, Jay…I’m so glad you approve, and I most definitely will keep up the conversation on my blog.
I’m not making statements that are reactive to what society thinks, but I’m being proactive, and just telling the truth.
For years, I’ve interacted and had discussions with Black men–at times, they can become hostile when a woman, particularly a Black woman tell them what the real issues are that make them act negatively to them. Because of these conversations in years past, I was motivated to write a book to Black men in 2011, entitled, A Journey Into The Mind of a Black Woman: In Search of Black Men Who Live With Purpose. I think it was ahead of it’s time–all these years later, what I talked about is very relevant to young brothers like yourself. Get a copy–and READ IT! The narrative is like a letter to young Black men–a conversation that needs to be had. Here’s the link: http://www.amazon.com/Journey-Into-Mind-Black-Woman/dp/1468025228/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1406208944&sr=8-1&keywords=A+Journey+Into+The+Mind+of+a+Black+Woman
And thank you for supporting the blog.
🙂
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[…] I think we can all recognize the issues in the black commuity and although we can’t seem to agree with how to fix them one of the answers, probably the biggest of them all is for our men to be leaders in the families again. […]
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(continued from last post)….
I look at how a black man got choke to death by police in NY including the countless other deaths and assaults of black people at the hands of white people, but we remain dis unified and black men continue to seek out the oppressors’ daughters as companions and mates over their own women. We can’t overlook the possibility that if this trend of insanity continues many black women will find themselves with non-black men. Many black women are NOT going to continue to fend and support anti-black woman so-called black men and be alone while Negros keep rejecting them for Becky. I’m telling ya, if many of these Negroes choose to remain in this white supremacy induced coma many black men are going to find themselves without their natural ally the black woman and fending for themselves against the beast.
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“If many of these Negroes choose to remain in this white supremacy induced coma many black men are going to find themselves without their natural ally the black woman and fending for themselves against the beast.”
I’ve said this many times, girl.
Amen! Amen! Amen!
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Originalwoman: You said a mouthful.
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Black men really need to start standing up and fighting, especially for black womanhood. I am saddened at how a lot of black women are now becoming increasingly disappointed in black men. The attack on black womanhood has stepped up in the last several years and many black men remain completely silent while others join in with our enemies to attacking black beauty and black womanhood. I was just on another blog in which the author just posted a commentary about how the media constantly push non-black women on black men as the ideal woman while these same “brothas” attack everything about black women. Too many “brothas” are falling for the trick and black women are not going to continue to sit back and watch. Some black women are abandoning all hope for the black man and the black community cause they feel that neither one gives a damn about the black woman/girls.
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Black men need to get off their asses! We need to protect our children in our community! This madness has been going on for far too long. Brothers have got to get it together! This is serious!
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Every Black man in America needs to assert leadership in their communities and organize brothers. We have real enemies and they are letting us know this every single day.
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I agree with 75% of this, but I don’t think that it would be shrewd for us to turn our backs on our men, given, that the tactics of our enemy are motivated to prompt just that type of response.
Black women are the glue that holds the Black community together. And it is high time to remind our enemies that Black women were the first to rule the earth; many of our queens were warrior like, intelligent, and lead successful campaigns to protect their people.
Lions come from Africa. Female lions protect the pride–and will kill any intruders that threaten the pride if necessary.
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Make no mistake, I will never believe that black women dating/marrying non-black men is a solution to black women’s dating/marrying woes. I’m just saying with the seemingly growing frustration among too many black women about the self-hatred and anti-blackness of these Negros toward black women this is how we believe many sistas will respond. A lot of these men REFUSE to realize that black women DO face the triple demons of racism, sexism, and colorism and to look inside themselves and examine their self-hatred and anti-blackness, especially when it comes to empathizing with black women/girls about the two extra demons we face and pedestal placing non-black women.
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OW, sometimes, only the TRUTH can expose what needs to be faced.
Black men are not facing the truth about themselves, thus, they can’t understand our reality.
However, God always finds a way to wake folks up.
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I don’t believe that we should turn our backs on black men, but sadly some sistas are doing so because they believe that black men don’t care about the triple demons of racism, sexism, and color-ism that black women go through, not to mention too much pedestal placing of non-black women. These women are asking “why should we have your back when you don’t have ours?” Malcolm X said that the worst treated person in America (I would say the world) is the black woman; many black men who say they love and respect Brother Malcolm overlook this very important statement he made.
Continued in next post……
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Note: I meant for this last post to come before my previous one
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I think we can all recognize the issues in the black commuity and although we can’t seem to agree with how to fix them one of the answers, probably the biggest of them all is for our men to be leaders in the families again.
We have so much division amongst ourselves and so many women disappointed in the black men and so many black men feeling like they can get that reverence from other women…it just is diabolical how our families are destroyed and our perception of each other. I guess what I’m thinking is that we have to find a common ground of respect to each other then maybe love one another before we can really fight for one another.
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You hit the nail on the head: We must RESPECT one other and acknowledge how what we do impacts the other. This has been the crux of the problem.
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