Chris Brown & Rihanna (my two cents)

We have all seen and heard the mountain of news stories, radio talk shows, blog posts etc concerning the incident between Rihanna and Chris Brown. Media outlets such as TMZ  and Access Hollywood have had day to day coverage on the story. For a while I stopped paying attention because it was becoming too much of a media circus. The truth has become too far and beyond and the here say and exaggeration overpowered the real issues of the case.

For those of you who know me personally you know that I take domestic violence very seriously. I in no way support abusers and I take a strong stand against violence against women.

With that being said, I would like to first address  the fact that I along with everyone except Chris Brown and Rihanna were not present the night of the incident. We are only partakers of what the news media chooses to report. What has been reported ranges from allegations of Rihanna giving Chris Brown herpes, to Rihanna attacking Chris Brown in the car because Leona Lewis text him. Then there was the story that it wasn’t Leona Lewis, but another woman that text Chris Brown that sent Rihanna into a frenzy that led her to hit Chris Brown with her shoe. The stories have been never-ending and recently it was reported that Rihanna has decided to tell the police the true story about the night’s events. This story includes a woman texting Chris Brown, Rihanna becoming enraged and attacking him as he drove. Chris tried to get control of her while remaining in control of the car and the fight ensued. This led to both parties throwing blows in the moving vehicle and outside of the vehicle.  

The many comments I have heard and seen concerning Rihanna’s decision to remain in a relationship with someone who allegedly  beat her have been for the most part negative and ignorant. When a woman stays with an abusive partner there are underlying issues and that issue is not just the fact that she loves him. If you allow someone to physically abuse you it is guaranteed that you have some emotional issues going on as well. Physical abuse and emotional abuse go hand in hand. Even if the abuser isn’t saying things that have you emotionally distressed the victim’s own self esteem issues feelings of worthlessness are .  Many people wonder why and how a woman can continue to love and stay with a man that abuses her, but if you are an emotional wreck and don’t really know where to turn or how to get out of the situation, you will remain in the situation. Many times women are embarrassed to seek help. So many times women hear all of the negative remarks about women remaining in these situations being stupid and deserving what they get, they are afraid to speak up and seek help for themselves.

The news has also reported that Brown is now seeking a plea deal in which he would not have to serve any jail time. This could only happen if the federal charges he is facing are dropped to misdemeanors. How could the courts allow that to happen, well if the recent reports are true and Rihanna is going to admit to initiating the fight by slapping Chris Brown first, then proceeding to hit him in the face with her shoe the felony charges have a great chance of being reduced to misdemeanors because of Rihanna’s actions. For many people the news of the plea deal is shocking, but as I stat4ed before, we don’t know the whole or true story, so in the end we have two adults who have decided that regardless of what happened that night they want to be together….that is their choice.

Diddy who is friend to both Rihanna and Brown recently caught flack for allowing the pair to reconcile at his Miami home. While on the  Ellen DeGeneres Show Diddy talked about his decision to allow the couple to spend time together at his home.

Here is the video of Diddy explaining his reasoning behind his decision

In my opinion the media’s attack of Diddy over this is ridiculous. Rihanna and Chris Brown are adults. If they come to a friend and ask a favor, why wouldn’t he grant that favor. How many of us in our everyday lives have known that our friends relationships had major problems and we allowed them time to talk it out. Not because we approved of any negative behavior, but because we were their friend.

Then there is the entire show that Oprah dedicated to the topic of Dating Violence & Battered Women. Oprah is beginning to pluck my last nerve. I know that many of you are strong supporters of Oprah Winfrey but I am not for many reasons. I won’t go into detail here because that would be an entire blog entry in itself, but I will say that sometimes we need to realize that everything isn’t our business. Everything isn’t an opportunity for us to speak up and speak out on, especially if we are going to make accusations and pass judgments when we don’t know the facts.

Along with Oprah was Tyra Banks, who recounted on the show her own personal battle with and abusive boyfriend. Banks stated that the boyfriend was not physically abusive, but was very jealous, controlling and emotionally abusive.

Banks and Winfrey’s message was that Love Doesn’t Hurt and that if a man hits you once he will hit you again. Winfrey went on to say that regardless of if Rihanna hit Brown first, he had no right to hit her.

I know I may get ridiculed for this, but I don’t agree with that statement. I in no way approve of men battering women, but human nature does not always allow the first reaction of walking away. It is 100% wrong for a man to hit a woman, just as it is 100% wrong for a woman to hit a man. We should all live by the golden rule we learned way back in kindergarten which is “everyone keep their hands to their self’. This action will keep everyone out of trouble. Now in the event that a woman does hit a man he should walk away. But how many times can you walk away from someone hitting you? How many times have the people who are passing judgment just sucked it up and walked away when someone/anyone hit them? So just as Chris Brown is being verbally pounded and chastised for laying hands on Rihanna if she started the attack, she also needs to be counseled and talked to profusely about keeping her hands to herself.

I know that many people who are watching the news coverage of the Chris and Rihanna ordeal was swayed to believe everything the news reports. It is hard not to look at Chris Brown as a monster who deserves to be thrown underneath the jail. But I can personally speak on behalf of abused women and I can also speak on behalf of one of the many people who witness on a regular basis women who cannot control their anger when it comes to their man. Just as I have a personal account of being a battered woman I also know many women who will throw blows and start fights with men and live this dramified life every day.

To end this I would like to say that Domestic Violence is wrong…end of story.

But for those of us who were not there we can’t say how it happened, who started it and what the outcome should be. For our own lives are oftentimes not as much of a clean slate as we would like them to be. If we can throw stones at Chris Brown for hitting a woman and we can ridicule Rihanna for reconciling with him, we should also throw stones at our self for the bad relationship we remained in for way too long. We should ridicule our self for slapping our ex boyfriend because we found out he was cheating. We should reminisce on each time we started drama and lived to tell about it because each one of those incidents could have been one where someone took our drama serious and ended our life.

John 8:7

He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.

Teen Pregnancy-Post 1

Teen pregnancy is on the rise….

I am pretty sure everyone is aware that teen pregnancy is on the rise. Everywhere you look there are babies having babies. I can speak personally on the topic because I was a teen mother. I got pregnant with my oldest son my senior year in high school.

One of the biggest disagreements I have when it comes to views of why most teen girls get pregnant is that they were somehow influenced by the media…I do agree that the media; including videos, television and the music industry play a major role in how teenage girls and boys view sex and their personal identities, but I disagree when it comes down to media influence and the actual act of having unprotected sex resulting in pregnancy.

For the most part I believe that teen pregnancy is the  result of carelessness and being irresponsible.  Unprotected sex is not the main result of media influence, unprotected sex is the main result of being irresponsible due to lack of knowledge or lack of putting the knowledge into play.

When teenagers are acting irresponsibly and having unprotected sex I can guarantee that images like the one below is not what is going through their head at that very moment.

In the heat of the moment they aren’t concerned with how hot Britney Spears looked with her big belly or how fierce Halle Berry looked soon after she gave birth. No, they are concerned with having sex, nothing more, nothing less. 

True their paths before making the dangerous and immature decision of having unprotected sex may have beenfilled with consumption of half naked young ladies gyrating in music videos, or watching television shows and reading countless magazines that publish articles on hot pregnant celebrities, but that alone is not why teens are having unprotected sex and having babies.

Many of these teens who are having unprotected sex are not facing reality when it comes to what the act of not using protection can cause. Sure they know about sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies, but they still don’t always use protection for numerous reasons.

• One reason being that they really don’t take protection that seriously.  They know that it is important but for them using protection each and every time they have sex is not a mandatory or necessary step.
• Another reason is that many of them are putting ill fated trust in their partners and in their self. They are under the pretense that their partner is clean and that they both know how to not get pregnant even when not using protection. That may sound ridiculous, but it is reality. Many teens are using the “pull out” method also known as the highest baby making method to date. They are under the false assumption that a young man can pull out of the vagina before he ejaculates. This method is being used by countless numbers of teens, most of whom have or will soon come face to face with teen pregnancy. 
• Others are not using protection because they really don’t feel comfortable buying condoms or talking to their parents or other adults about birth control because that means they are admitting that they are having sex. Instead of facing facts and getting the information and guidance that they need they sneak around and have unprotected sex putting their self at risk for STDs and unwanted pregnancies, along with tons of emotional stress.

The statistics show that teen  mothers are 40% more likely to

*drop out of school

 *end up single mothers

I wholly agree. I was a teen mother who had to drop out of college after the first semester, forfeiting a full scholarship. I also fell into the category of single parent by the age of 24.

An article published with stats from the CDC  on teen pregnancy rates states that  Mississippi has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the nation, followed by Texas and New Mexico. All three states have high numbers of teen births with the majority of the pregnancies being African American or Hispanics.  The article also states that; “Some conservative organizations have argued that contraceptive-focused sex education is still common, and that the new teen birth numbers reflect it is failing.”

I agree. The sex education classes offered in schools are a complete mockery.  Most teens are unfortunately learning about sex from their peers and from personal experience. They are not being informed in their schooling the hard hitting facts about sex, sexually transmitted diseases and teen pregnancy. They don’t take the classes seriously and the information provided in the classes is just the basic, these are your reproductive organs and information on body image. This information is informative, but not practical for teens that know what sex is, want to have it and know that they like it.

I was surprised to read that in some states two types of sex ed are classes being offered in schools depending on  what the state or local school district mandates. Both seem much more effective than the general Lifetime Wellness classes that many of us took and never thought twice about.

Even with these classes and some schools offering condoms, the rate of teen pregnancies is still on the rise, even more so for the Southern region of the United States. Personally I don’t know what can be done, when the information is readily available, there are countless forms of birth control and the evidence of the effects of  unprotected sex is in plain view for those who are taking the risk. Yet, teens everywhere are still neglecting to use protection.

This video really touched me. It reminds me so much of when I was a young mother and faced the reality that my baby depended upon me for everything that he needed. I knew that I had made a mistake that could not be changed, but the love I had for that little boy filled my heart enough that I could get over my mistake and try to be more for him and for myself.

Teen Pregnancy Post 2 to include the topics of 
(peer pressure, baby fascination 
parental involvement and generational teen pregnancy)

The Beauty of BLACK

When asked who was more beautiful, Beyonce or India Arie, 90% of the people polled from the radio station said that India Arie was more beautiful.

I heard this on the Michael Baisden Show and as I recall he was only asking the younger people who they considered more beautiful. According to the results, the young people said that in their opinion it was India Arie.

Here is my problem with that, of the 90% that voted that India Arie was more beautiful, 40% of them were only saying India Arie to fit in with the blackness of the poll and topic at hand. Of the remaining 50% assuming half of them were males, if put in a real life situation and neither Beyonce nor India Arie were celebrities, they would approach Beyonce before they would India Arie.

One young lady called and stated that she thought that Beyonce was more attractive than India Arie. She said that if she didn’t know anything about either woman, hadn’t heard their music or anything about them, her choice would be Beyonce. Then a male caller stated that India Arie was more beautiful and that when people say that Beyonce is more beautiful it has something to do with how they were raised and that he was raised not to automatically think that a lighter skinned person was more attractive than a darker skinned person.

((but does a person stating that Beyonce is more beautiful automatically mean they chose her because she is lighter skinned??))

….  thoughts on this very topic have been rolling around in my head over this for a while. 

Black is beautiful. There are many shades of black and none outshine the other. The shades range from shades of tan to deep browns, each beautiful and black. However there are some black people who have gotten on a black power kick and suddenly feel that anyone who has relaxed hair, wears a weave, fake nails or doesn’t burn incense and plan rallies are somehow faking the funk. Somehow if you do any of the things listed above you are not embracing your African American culture.

I truly don’t believe that just because you relax your hair or wear hair extensions that you are any less black than a sista who wears her hair natural. And I also don’t believe that just because a person thinks Beyonce is more attractive than India Arie that they are somehow racially blindfolded and have issues with being black. True, some of those people would only say Beyonce because she is lighter skinned, but some would say she is more beautiful to them than India Arie because they prefer a Beyonce type sista over an India Arie type sista. Is that wrong? NO, it isn’t.  Just as some men would prefer India Arie because they love her look, some would choose Beyonce because they are more attracted to her.

African Americans have enough historical baggage surrounding skin color and self love, so why is that centuries later, now instead of house nigga versus field nigga, we are now battling over skin color, what is actually beautiful and what is actually real when it comes to our physical appearances? 

Black is Beautiful PERIOD so why are we trying to define which aspects of a black person is beautiful?

Why should a person have to choose to wear their hair in the natural form to be considered real? Is the realness of black beauty defined by a person’s hair?

Why should a person have to say that darker skin is more beautiful than lighter skin in order to be embracing their roots? Is the realness in the shade of black?

No, it isn’t.

Black is beautiful let that be the end of the sentence. There should be no conforming or need to conform to what certain people have concluded to be the beauty of blackness….