Boys Need Not Apply

Guest Commentary by Pamela

Recently, my husband and I went to see one of his couple friends' new baby girl. While she was sleeping, a conversation was struck up about the other children and teenagers in the neighborhood and how mostly the teenage boys were causing the most problems (breaking into neighbor’s home, not going to school etc.). In the middle of his wife's narrative, our friend interrupted her and said, “See, this is why I didn’t want a boy. Aren’t you glad that we didn’t have a boy?”

What is happening to us as a people when even our men do not want to raise men? Is raising a woman that much easier? I have four daughters and I would tell [any parent] that [the way a child turns out] does not depend on whether the child is male or female, but on how you raise them and even that is the luck of the draw every time. Some children will grow up never giving you an ounce of trouble and some will keep you up at night, all night. With so many of our black men in jail, on drugs, and dying at an earlier age than women, it looks as if they have no hope. Wouldn’t it make sense to want to try and raise a new and better group of young men?

It seems that we are trying to take the easy way out, which could cause the destruction of our people. We have listened to all the statistics and television stories that show us the black men who are committing crimes and it is causing us to give up on them. We are constantly bombarded with the mug shot of the black assailant, while the mug shots of suspects of different races are withheld. Less black boys are in college, and even less graduate. Mothers push their daughters to go to college to become doctors, lawyers, and business women, while many of the same mothers push their sons to become football and basketball players, or rappers. We put a ball and a mic in our five year old son’s hand, while we put a book in our five year old daughter’s hand. Our hope grows for our daughters, while we lose hope for our sons. I’ve witnessed this dying hope first hand.

I have two young men that have adopted our family. They graduated from high school the same year as my second daughter. Their parents told them that they would not get any help from them to try to get into college; they said they had to do it on their own. One wants to be an astronaut and the other wants to be a fireman or something to do with mechanical engineering. My husband and I keep an update on how they both are doing. The aspiring astronaut had to leave school for a year so he could work and save money to pay for the next year of tuition. He is set to go back this summer. Meanwhile, his parents are doing all that they can to make sure that their daughter (who will be graduating next year with my third daughter) gets into the best college possible. The boys visit us all the time. One even brought his girlfriend over for us to meet her; he told her our house is his second home. The boys come by just to let us know how they are doing. Why? Because we care to know.

Response by Wanda

Pam your commentary speaks to what I believe is symptomatic to issues of gender inequality. We can remember in it our nursey rhymes "girls are nice made of sugar and spice, boys are made of rats, snails and puppy dog tails." Women are morally superior to men therefore we allow them to get away with everything- because they just can't help themselves. This of course is a falacy - men are not morally inferior.

The issue is that men and women, because of cultural and social contexts, have different needs in human development. And many times, it appears, parents are not willing to make those choices to support his development. Or sometimes he is raised by a single mother who may not know good male roles models to show him the right way. Or as you suggested, good parenting is not a 100% guarantee that the child will not cause sleepless nights.

I always joke with my friends who have boys and say, "please do the world a favor, and raise your son to be a man of integrity, with good Christian values, who knows how to treat a woman and will one day be a great husband and father." Because as a single woman, I am well aware that we have more than enough of the opposite.

Response by Cantice

I have to say that the husband’s comments, taken at face value, broke my heart. I’m thinking though, that he didn’t really mean it. Maybe he was just making the best of what might not have been his ideal. He had all girls. Most men want at least one boy.

I’m the mother of two boys who are soon to be 3 and 5. When my oldest son turned four, it was all I could do to read every book on raising boys that I thought was worth its weight. Not only is my son not female but he has a personality which is the exact opposite of mine. He is sensitive and cautious (while I tend to be a bold risk-taker). He likes to take his time doing things and he loves affection. I bring this up to say no parent should feel too proud to take unconventional advice when it comes to raising a child. And when it comes to raising black boys to be men, it is time to seek out some advice.

Boys of whatever race are usually allowed to explore on their own, unlike girls. Without guided involvement any boy could discover the wrong things. In our efforts to make boys, men, sometimes we prematurely leave them to themselves to discover the harshness of life too early. In the Black community we have to resist what may be our instinct to just let them go because of the sordid paths that have been generationally presented to black men. They need a little more steering than others without a tumultuous road ahead of them. If we keep this in mind, I believe we take a step in the direction of impacting a better future for our young men.

About Guest Commentator:

Pamela was born and raised in Boston Massachusetts where she met and married Dwayne, her husband of 22 years. Pam and Dwayne and their four daughters live in Atlanta, Georgia. Pamela’s motto is Love and Obey God, Love husband, Love and raise four successful
black women.

A Black Bushie

A Special Commentary By Cantice:

A Black Bushie: On Why I Still Support the President

All systems of political power are flawed. At best elected officials try to represent the collective of those who voted for them. At worst, you give a man a little power and watch him abuse it; you watch your congresswoman becoming greedy for gain and lose her connectedness to the average American. Perhaps the best and worst are both always the case.

I was asked several months ago whether I still support the President. Without pausing I said yes. Just like now, my statement silenced the room. The room was full of young (under 30) African Americans, but that statement would silence any room that isn’t a Southern Baptist sanctuary. I went on to name Bush’s initiatives that support marriage—before it became an issue to proclaim that marriage was between a man and a woman, I said that I’ve watched him put Social Security’s demise before the public in a serious way, and begin conversations on the immigration issue. Perhaps it was his beginning the conversation that gave Georgia politicians the guts to pass substantive illegal immigration enforcement laws. I have watched as he declared war against a world citizen who had broken the terms of his probation. Today I watch as he stands behind his actions in Iraq in the face of public disdain and inability to cope with the casualties of war. Bush appointed some of the Supreme Court judges who voted that the ban on an abortion procedure that delivers a full-term baby’s head before putting a whole in it and delivering the body of the dead baby (partial-birth abortion) was not unconstitutional.

My problem is not with this President. My problem is that I don’t see in any of the leading presidential candidates the type of leadership that it takes to run a country when the tide of popular opinion turns against you. People say that leading politically is all about the people. If that is true then that is the fatal flaw of politics. Leadership is about the one leading. It is up to constituents to look at the character and track record of the leader in question and determine if they will stand behind his or her decisions. When I’m stripped down to my core, I’m old school. I don’t run from a fight, you don’t talk about my family, and I call it like I see it. I think those are some of the mottos that the President doesn’t say, but deep down he believes. These are some of the mottos that down to earth folk and especially Black people have naturally lived by for years. It's too bad that they're not accepted when the President is the one living by them. I think many of my family and friends missed their chance to identify with him and to declare Bush the first Black President.