Today I was browsing target.com and I ran across a pair of gold toned, chunky, bamboo earrings.  I was kind of floored to see them.  I remember that style of earring being popular in the late 80s and early 90s.  Big, bold, gold hoops were once only popular among Black and Hispanic women in urban areas.  They were lampooned for it.  Big hoops were thought of as ghetto, uncouth and too flashy to be chic.  So are they still ghetto now that suburban soccer moms and hipsters will be wearing them?

I’ve seen this before.  I grew up in the 80s and 90s outside of Detroit.  The fashion industry has promoted styles within the last ten years that I remember inner city women and men wearing thirty years prior.  Back then that style of dress would have made a person unemployable.  So it’s interesting to see urban styles marketed as chic and trendy when the fashion industry is actually decades behind the trend.

I ran across this article a few years ago in Lucky magazine a few years ago.

Sorry but Zooey Deschanel is the last person I think of when I think of nail art.  No celebrity comes to mind when I think about nail designs.  The popularity of nail art has grass roots.  Grass that sprung up in between slabs of concrete.  Nail art has been a fashion staple across America’s big cities for decades.  It was hood until Zooey Deschanel and Lucky magazine said it wasn’t.

I’m not one to get angry about cultural appropriation because I live in a multi cultural society and cultures rub off on each other.  But it’s unfair the way that anything that is associated with Black Americans is looked down on but a White stylists or buyer copies an urban fashion, brings it to the White masses who think that it is something new and all of a sudden it’s a new trend and it’s origins are forgotten.  Then people tell African Americans that we have no culture and some African Americas seem to agree and wait for the White mainstream stamp of approval.

We have culture but we often turn our noses down at it in order to assimilate into the dominant culture.  Instead of Blacks passing it down to our own children another ethnic group ends up selling our culture back to a different generation of Black Americans.  It’s honestly our own fault and we should know better by now.  But we keep falling for the okey doke.  This cycle also happens in music and the restaurant industry.

 

Black people need to appreciate their own creativity and originality.  Stop joining in the chorus of folks labeling something as ghetto in order to fit in to polite society.  Something is either tacky and uncouth across the board or it isn’t.  The marketing is the difference.  Black people should protect their culture and proudly claim it.  Don’t wait for a White reality star to make you chic.  Learn to market your own culture instead of complaining when someone else figures out a way to make a buck off of it.

I’m sure glad that I saved my gigantic Turkish link gold hoop earrings from the 90s.

 

 

 

 

 

I enjoy social media because you learn the truth about people. Often times the truth is not pretty but it is the truth and there is always value in that.  I’ve run across social media outlets that are geared towards men.  The most common topic in these male spaces is women.  They talk about their desires, complaints and preferences when it comes to the opposite sex.  I will refer to them as The Complainers.

After eavesdropping on The Complainers and sometimes participating in some of these conversations I’ve found it very hard to follow the thought pattern of these men.  I can’t figure out the end game.  I feel like there is no real desire to come to an understanding with women and have respectful relationships.  The on line commentary mostly expresses frustration and disdain for women.  Love and partnership is rarely if ever mentioned.

These on line chats are under the guise of them being for men but I really think they exist to send messages to women while excluding them from the conversation.  I think the goal is to manipulate women and to control them through criticism because it seems that women can’t do anything to satisfy these men.  It’s rare that one of the complainers mentions a wife or girlfriend.

These are just a few of the contradictions that I’ve seen on The Complainers’ social media chats.

Women should stop wearing weave.  ->  Your hair is nappy and too short.

Women need to get off of welfare ->  A college degree doesn’t make you more valuable to men.

Single mothers are undateable. ->   Men shouldn’t get married.

All women are promiscuous. ->  I would use her for a pump and dump but that’s it.

Women without fathers are damaged goods. ->  Women are responsible for raising children.

Women are choosing careers over families. ->  Women should be willing to split finances 50/50.

Women always pick the wrong guys. ->  Women have unrealistic standards.

It’s OK for men to have preferences. ->  Women that date outside of their race are bedwenches.

Women should commit young. ->  Men should marry no sooner that their late thirties.

Women shouldn’t pressure men to commit. ->  Women hit “The Wall” at thirty five.

Women seek out attention too much ->  Women should welcome male attention in public.

Women focus on their looks too much ->  Everyone wants to date someone attractive.

What conclusion can women come to after taking in this information?  The only conclusion that I can reach is that there is some serious confusion out there along with disdain for women.  Women’s humanity and intellect is completely overlooked and women are talked about as if they are inanimate objects.

I’ve never seen anyone go into detail about what perfection looks like and how to achieve it.  The standards that The Complainers have is not sustainable or realistic because they want old fashioned, traditional womanhood without offering old fashioned traditional manhood.  They complain about feminism but they fail to see how feminism benefits men.  I think that men are the real benefactors of feminism because they don’t bear the same amount of responsibility as they once did.  There aren’t very many expectations for men anymore.

If any man wanted an old fashioned relationship he just needs to decide that he wants to be an old fashioned man and then he needs to find a woman to go along with those ideals.  I can see how that would be a challenge but I don’t think it’s impossible if a man is taking the lead, is realistic about his end of the bargain and expresses his intentions.  Simply don’t date feminists if they bother you so much.

I think The Complainers know that they are not being completely honest in what they say but they aren’t willing to speak their truth.  The truth is that they want to the best of both worlds.  They like the lack of responsibility and easy sex that feminism provides but when they are ready to settle down in their later years they want a submissive housewife.

Actually The Complainer just a submissive woman because they don’t believe in legal marriage because if the relationship doesn’t work out he doesn’t want to give her any of the household finances.  But he doesn’t want her to be educated and career oriented.  And he wants her to be focused on the household and family.

It’s a never ending circle of contradictions that only completely benefits men.  The Complainers simply want to use women as tools to validate their ego, breed their children, cook and clean.  Meanwhile he doesn’t want to have any responsibility to his wife equivalent.  The Complainers like to say that career women end up lonely and they use examples like forty something singles like Tiffany Haddish and Charlize Theron.

I believe there is a price to pay for women being career focused.  I believe that a woman that puts her career first probably does miss out on some opportunities to marry and have children.  But The Complainers all seem like douchebags anyway.  They have no respect for women and they don’t discuss love or even raising children much.  When they discuss childbearing they talk about women as if they are prized pit bulls or thoroughbred horses.  I don’t think The Complainers offer much as far as a lifetime of love and devotion.

I’ve learned to disregard everything that The Complainers say.  Even when they make valid points they say something mean which lets me know their true intentions and unsaid feelings.  I hope the women make decisions that benefit themselves and honor God.  Prepare yourself to be a good wife to a deserving man.  But trying to satisfy the desires of men that want women to exist simply for the pleasure and convenience of men seems like a lost cause.