Monday, August 06, 2007
Playing Both Sides
This article on how more Black women are dating White men is quite interesting. I have no problem with interracial dating whatsoever, but in the Black community there has been noticeable tension from Black women that successful Black men are marrying White women. Black women, by contrast, have faced a variety of internal and external pressures to stay within the race. This asymmetry was deeply unfair, and I approve of social barriers being lifted so that our dating standards are equitably distributed among the sexes.
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3 comments:
Did you go to the Chili Night talk on interracial relationships? I remember Love sharing something of a proverb, to the effect of "If she can't use your comb, don't bring her home" - advice his auntie gave him that I guess reflects some of the worries about marrying "outside the race." I'm sure you've had similar experience (I pre-emptively refuse to believe your parents have never "nice Jewish girl"-ed you).
Though on thing that emerged during the conversation was the fact that people should not expect to see a lot of interracial dating so long as the social circles where we meet our significant others remain segregated. So maybe this article also signifies a greater extent of everyday social interaction between black women and white men, which is surely a good thing.
As long as black women are choosing non-black partners simply because those are the ones with whom they click, I think this is a great trend -- I consider interracial couples and especially miscegenation to be vital to reducing racism in America. However, the article does note that part of the reason more black women, particularly those of the socioeconomic classes most likely to be married rather than to be unwed mothers, are marrying white men is that there is a shortage of middle and upper class, college-educated black men for them to choose. Not only are the successful black men often dating outside the race, but there are fewer of them than of their female counterparts. (This is aggravated by the not-yet-dead assumption that women should "marry up," to a man who is more educated, makes more money, can support her when she has children and stays home to raise them, etc.)
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