We Are the Hardest on Ourselves

A few weeks back, Beyonce revealed that she was pregnant. In an instant the topic of black women came right back up. Apparently we had a reason to celebrate because Beyonce had done it "the right way" since she's married and what not. This actually pissed me off a great deal the moment I read these articles because I viewed this as another attack on women of color, and we were the ones doing the attacking. And then I thought some more and realized we are usually the ones doing the attacking. 


Think about it. With the whole Beyonce pregnancy, conversations continued about being married and then having children being the proper way to do things. A woman having a child without marrying the father is still taboo--even though many do it. I don't personally idolize single parenthood but that's just me not wanting to raise a human being by myself, which I imagine a lot of folks don't want to do. Even without a mate, I find that raising a child with a family--whether it be cousins, aunts, uncles and chosen-fam (which I will do anyway if I procreate) is not single parenthood and it's nothing to be ashamed of. Or, even being raised with a partner without marrying them whether it's same-sex or not. A child will not be doomed if raised by gay or unmarried parents who love the crap out of them. But still (heterosexual) marriage is like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for our communities even for those of us who are seen as rebels. The shame and guilt is not coming from the mainstream (read: white majority) because they don't tend to focus on us (unless we sing, dance, commit a crime or do something crazy like be successful). We are making most of the noise about ourselves and handing over our stories for others to tell, and then statistics are reported and meetings are made about the state of our lives when some of us are living the best way we know how and making it work for us.

This is not to say everyone else just loves us. I know that there is a double standard and people of color have to work harder to get somewhere because of how we're viewed. Which in a way, I understand why we are hard on one another; we still struggle to be seen as equals. I know we can't pull a Brad and Angelina without being slut-shamed or seen as irresponsible breeders. I know that we are still paid less and overlooked for jobs because we're scary spooks with crazy names. We try so hard to fit in so that no one will think less of our entire race--because after all minorities are not seen as individuals but a monolithic group where what one person does reflects on everyone. It's like when I saw White children throwing tantrums or acting a fool in the store, a person will say that child is bad. But if I or my sisters were to act the same way, not only would we be stomped when we got home, but people would say black  kids are bad. It may be shocking to comprehend but that's what it is in America.

That being said, I feel like as people of color (or non-whites) we need to really teach each other to have confidence within ourselves collectively so that we don't have to deal with these constant attacks. Yes, we are attacking each other because of the society we live in but we need to take accountability for ourselves and stop. Wear our hair the way we want to, have an "unconventional family" if need be because damn it, we are human beings and do not need to measure, compare of prove ourselves to any one else. We need to tell our racist, classist and homophobic society that we are not "trend pieces" or dinner table discussion for their amusement. I don't know how we could go about doing this but focusing on uplifting ourselves without the shame and guilt really needs to be the focus to advance, not the imitation of what we think we are supposed to be like.