While spending some leisure time surfing the net, I recently came across an article entitled, “8 Reasons to Date a White Man” by LaShaun Williams, which was clearly directed at Black women, as an alternative choice to dating Black men.
In most cases I would just bypass this type of article, but decided to see what all the hoopla was about. The reasons, quite laughable at first glance, actually had a twinge of truth in many of them. They are as follows:
1. Gay White men tend to be more forthcoming about their sexuality with family and friends. The down-low phenomenon is less prevalent.
Now although I don’t believe this is earth shattering enough to completely throw Black men under the bus, there is a lot of truth in this statement. Studies show that homosexuality is much more openly accepted in White communities than it is in Black communities. Gay-bashing and homosexual abuse exists among all races, but if a flamboyantly gay Black man was walking through the hood, many might say he is definitely putting his safety, maybe even his life at risk.
Many studies have shown that African/African Americans are among the most homophobic ethnicities in the world. In “Violence, Trauma, and Mental Health Disorders: Are They Related to Higher HIV Risk for African Americans?” authors Kennamer, Honnold, Bradford, and Hendricks reported that homophobia appears to be “a major part of the African American culture, driven by both religious and political forces.”
2. A higher percentage of White men come from stronger family structures and more traditional gender roles, where the men seek to care for women. They typically are not looking to be taken care of.
This brings us to the still debated “Oedipus Complex” a theory of renowned psychologist Sigmund Freud, which claims that “boys have a latent desire for their mothers and hatred towards their fathers that manifests between ages three and five. It is later overcome, when the male child starts to identify with his father.”
The problem is, 65 percent of African American children are raised in single-parent homes, which theoretically, could cause many young boys to suffer stunted growth in the oedipal phase, because there is no man present in the home to identify with.
The theory of the Oedipus Complex says that as the boy grows into a man under these circumstances, he may look to be taken care of in his romantic relationships, just as his mother takes care of him at home.
We’ve all seen the movie “Baby Boy” by John Singleton; it was based on this theory.
3. White men have no problem dating educated women with advanced degrees. (They find it) impressive rather than intimidating.
4. White men at least attempt to marry before making babies.
Studies show that far more White men are married at some point in comparison to their African American male counterparts, and therefore have less children out of wedlock. In layman’s terms, more White men are husbands with children, and more Black men are baby daddies.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau more than 77, 000 White men were married with or without children, compared to 11,000 African American men.
5. White men don’t glamorize ignorance and have firmer grasp of what defines manhood.
If we split this statement in half, I can say that the glamorizing ignorance part has some truth to it. Black men, and women too for that matter, have a higher tendency to perpetuate the negative stereotypes of themselves that exist in the media. Some Blacks have been brainwashed into thinking that is it cool to sell drugs, smoke, join gangs, etc. The more ignorant something is, the more they seem to embrace it. You don’t really see that as much in the White community. Not saying that it doesn’t happen … just saying we don’t see it.
6. White men make better decisions than Black men, when it comes to managing money.
7. White men have the ability to look beyond your past. Promiscuous Black men allow past relationships to haunt the present. White men have no problem turning a whore into a housewife.
8. White men don’t take everything as a challenge to their masculinity.
Personally, I don’t believe that these reasons are enough to swear off our Black men, and many of them I decided not to touch because they are purely a matter of opinion and there is no real data to verify them either way. All humans are flawed, and articles like this one seem to only further perpetuate negative stereotypes about African American men, when they are presented as fact rather than opinion.
