Don’t Question My Love, I Didn’t Have a Choice

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The interracial dating debate is alive and well. Can you be pro-Black and in an interracial relationship? I’ve seen so many pieces on the matter and to be honest, they all make me cringe a little. Some less than others, but there isn’t one post I’ve seen that I could get 100% on board with.

Related: Can Someone Be Pro-Black and Date Someone Who is Not Black? 

You see, I’m a Black woman who is married to a European White guy (I distinguish the difference because he makes it a point to do so, but that’s an article for another day). I was raised by a strong Black mother and father who supplied me with the same “you have to be twice as good as your White counterpart to be considered equal” speech that just about all Pro-Black parents give their kids. For college, I only considered going to an HBCU because after seeing my sister’s experience at Spelman, I knew I needed something similar to really understand who I am as a Black woman in America. I say all of that to say that I’ve been conscious my whole life.

Eventually, I met my husband. We were co-workers and friends. I always thought he was such a cool guy and we had so much in common. But never once did I consider the possibility of dating him simply because he wasn’t wrapped in the same brown skin that I have. After two years of knowing each other and him occasionally asking me out and getting turned down, I finally agreed to a date. I figured I’d go watch this movie with him to prove that there could be nothing beyond friendship between us. Now, it’s 10 years later and we’ve been happily married almost 5 years.

After that date, there really wasn’t a choice for me. I knew then that I loved him. I mean, we had already grown a really strong friendship to this point. Getting the opportunity to spend quality time with him alone really showed me that I was cheating myself out of an opportunity. And for what? Because this amazingly caring, funny, handsome, charming man wasn’t born a Black man?

So back to my issue with the think pieces on interracial dating. Of course, there are people who choose to date outside of their race because that’s just their preference. Or maybe they just don’t want to limit themselves to one race and prefer to keep their options open. But for most of us, just like same race couples, we didn’t have a choice about who we fell in love with and that’s what’s missing from so many of these articles I’ve seen. I’m glad so many people were able to contextualize the conversation so well; but honestly, it’s not that deep. The heart wants what the heart wants. When you meet someone and start falling in love with them, race doesn’t matter. I simply followed my heart to happiness and I highly recommend that everyone do the same!

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“Woke” Dating 101

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In response to Can Someone Be Pro-Black and Date Someone Who is Not Black? 

I pondered over the writer’s initial question, “Can someone be Pro-Black and date someone who is not Black?” In the long and short of it, yes, if you identify as Pro-Black you can date anyone you want. However, the second question, “SHOULD you?,” posed by the author at the end of the article really peaked my interest. In the age of “wokeness” this question of SHOULD a Pro-Black person date someone who is not Black has been raised many times and has led to numerous heated debates. When dating someone with the intent of finding a life partner, one would hope the person you pick is able to understand things about your culture and empathize with your struggles, both past and present. You would hope you can bring them to family and cultural events without them turning up their nose or not understanding the complexities behind why some things just are the way they are (i.e. Black people having a higher level of anxiety around law enforcement).

The majority of human beings are capable of expressing empathy. “Woke” Black people can empathize with descendants of the Holocaust; while, “woke” Jewish people can empathize with descendants of Japanese concentration camps. But in loving your Black heritage in all of your “wokeness,” wouldn’t it be an oxymoron if you preach all things Black but practice all things non-Black in your home? How can you preach about keeping the Black dollar within the Black community when you yourself are fattening non-Black pockets through familial relationships? How can you stress to others the importance of preserving the Black family, when your family is 1/2 Black through your choice of partner or spouse? How can you scream I’m Black and I’m proud but come home and teach your kids I’m mixed and I’m proud? These questions can go on forever. 

I will say the environment in which you are raised plays a major factor in how simple, or not so simple, it would be for a pro-Black person to find a suitable Black person to date. For example, I was born and raised in a predominately Black inner city (and by Black I mean Caribbean, African, and Southern transplants). Here it was easy to find someone to relate to and whom I didn’t have to explain why my friends and family did things certain ways, fought certain fights, or were angered/excited by certain events. However, when I was 15 my parents decided to “move on up” out the hood to a predominately White suburb where I was the only person of color in 95% of my classes. Relating to my new suburban White neighbors and classmates was hard – culture shock even. If I wanted to maintain my dating preferences, I would have to travel at minimum 30 minutes to find a town where the Black to non-Black ratio was more even.

Overall, I think the answer is complicated. Yes, you can be Pro-Black and date someone who is not Black, but you should not want to. With that being said, if a non-Black person is who you fall in love with, as long as they are able to empathize with the Black struggle and help you facilitate Black success then that’s fine; because at the end of the day, to be pro-something does not equate to being anti-something else. 

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The Best Part of Waking Up

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In response to Can Someone Be Pro-Black and Date Someone Who is Not Black? 

How can someone who is on the forefront of fighting racial injustices in America choose to date a white person?

Back in the day, the Folgers Coffee Company became popular due to a very catchy commercial jingle. The famous “the best part of waking up is Folgers in your cup” jingle became synonymous with having a cup of morning joe. If younger readership is wondering what I’m talking about, Starbucks effectively took over the morning coffee fix with no jingle, but that’s another article entirely. 

I brought up the Folgers jingle to reference the newest racially oriented hot topic, which is “can someone who is woke date a white person.” Specifically, white, the emphasis on white because white people in this country have done the lion share of oppressive acts against nonwhite people – in other words, history. Knowing this factoid, some wonder if a black person can call themselves “woke” and still wake up to a white lover (by now you should get the Folgers reference). 

This all comes off the heels of Donald Glover aka Childish Gambino’s This is America video which in an artistic and cerebral way displays the many racial problems throughout American history that still persist today. Many people gave huge nods to the video’s representation of racial issues; however, some walked away questioning the authenticity of Glover’s passion for the cause considering he dates a white woman.

On the onset – the notion that a “woke” black person, meaning someone who is not only aware but also actively engages in the fight against racial disparities, chooses to date a white person can be dismissive. I understand it; however, I just don’t agree. It’s easy for us in America to view everything through a racial lens, and rightfully so, given our history of racism and discrimination. And for that reason, I understand those questioning Glover’s authenticity; but I don’t agree, because in my opinion there’s simply no way with true validity to judge another persons passion to fight racial disparities based on who they decide to love. Impossible.

No two people would be together if they allowed the outside world to give their two cents on their relationship.  I also understand “this is America,” pun intended, and everything can be construed as a racial issue. But there are different levels of debate when discussing issues that involve race, and there’s nothing with more in-depth layers and elements than romance. For that reason, I side with love.

Lastly, there are many people checking off black on their census card and don’t have a clue or interest about racial disparities in this nation. That is a more of a concern or problem than someone who has dedicated parts of their life for the cause and decides to date outside their race. 

Do you agree?

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Can Someone Be Pro-Black and Date Someone Who Is Not Black?

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In the midst of the wild events that are unfolding domestically and abroad, I’ve seen the same debate being had on various platforms: Can someone be pro-black and date someone who is not black?

The origin of human beings has long been debated between science and faith groups. Faith-based schools of thought believe that human beings were created by a higher being thousands of years ago. Science-based schools of thought believe that we have evolved over millions of years. I believe that both faith and science would agree that we are human beings, the only surviving species of the genus Homo.

Since human beings began mass populating the planet to the point where we could recognize distinction, we have divided ourselves by tribe, by nation, by wealth, by religion, by culture, by pigmentation, etc. The evolution of this division led to groups believing that they were superior to other groups (even within their own grouping!). This social system took a nefarious turn when humans began the wholesale selling, trafficking, and enslavement of other human beings. It’s evil to enslave your own people but it’s a greater form of evil to purchase and enslave someone else’s people without war. So in order to execute these human transactions, human beings convinced themselves that the group that was being sold was less than human. Most even believed that they were not even the same species altogether. These slaves were not homo sapiens (i.e. human), they were homo naledi (i.e. gorillas).

Fast forward to the 21st century where most human beings still haven’t cognitively evolved their thinking to fully embrace the complexity and nuance of our species while overlaying the impacts of our history and culture as it is applied to our existence. If we did, human beings across the planet would understand that we are more alike than we are different. If we did, we would understand that man-made concepts of “whiteness” and “blackness” are distinctions created to empower one group over another. If we did, we would better understand how the human brain, the nervous system, emotions, and personality all intertwine. If we did, we would better understand that culture impacts who we are but does not change the composition of who we are as a species. If we did, we would ultimately understand that debates around groups of human beings procreating with other human beings based on pigmentation are cognitively beneath us as a species.

Like any other species on this planet, life is all about survival. The empirical evidence shows us that in order to continue the species, we need to eat, sleep, and procreate. The mating process is critical to the preservation of the species. Over time we have increased the complexity of this process by including man-made social constructs into the procreating consideration set. Cynically, I believe that these social systems were developed to divide, control, and oppress us. Therefore, to whittle down my experience as a human being to just being black is a futile attempt to rob me of my ability to think, to create, to build, to feel, to love, to emote, to stand erect and walk, to use my thumbs, and to act in a manner that is not in line with the evolution of our species. When we continue to breathe life into these social divisions we give life to the same ideologies that empowered one group to enslave another.

Man-made social constructs like “blackness” or “whiteness” or “dating” are still relatively new to concepts for our brains to grasp. As a member of this culture, I participate in understanding these classifications but my primal being wrestles to reject them. Specifically, around ideas that I should not “date” and/or mate with another human being that is not also a member of my ethnic grouping. I would be foolish to dismiss the psychological impacts of the systematic oppression of darker pigmented human beings at the hands of lighter pigmented human beings. While I do not dismiss this altogether as it relates to love, mating and procreating; I do not leverage that man-made ideology into the consideration set of whom I choose to be with. So to answer the much-debated question, yes one can be pro black AND date someone who is not black. However, I believe the more evolved question that we should be asking one another is can one be against the oppression of a group of human beings and be with someone who is in favor of the oppression of a group of human beings?