Your essay made me realise something so interesting. Being someone’s who’s always loved novels…the demographics in novels that had love stories were often just white love over and over again. There were barely any books that were well written and placed black love or black women’s experiences at the centre. Deliberately so..our lives as black people most often than not cannot be told without some level of suffering and it is frustrating that black love or blackness as a main character in any novel or piece of literature must always include some suffering. Black women are not afforded the neutrality that comes with whiteness..or rather we aren’t the ‘default’. We cannot experience outside of the bounds set by white supermacy. And this is a reality for black women, not just fiction. It is no wonder then black women aspire towards whiteness because as you said whiteness is afforded the capacity to be gentle..to be multifaceted and individual. But I also understand that black women’s desire for white men at times (well most of the time) is by design. White supremacy’s job was to erode the black family structure and initially it failed by trying to appeal to black women (who are typically racially loyal) but recently it has succeeded more so as black men move from victims to perpetrators of oppression themselves, as you said..a rupture of sorts. I wouldn’t even say South Africa is healing necessarily, it’s just in a different phase of white supremacy and capitalism, but that’s a different conversation. Tying it back to the epiphany I came to earlier this year when I questioned why I was even willing to date white men when asked by a friend..I explained that I would rather date a white man than a black man because living in a country like South Africa, and in general our world, there is a great likelihood I may fall victim to being murdered by a man. I would rather that man be a white man than it be someone who looks like my fathers, my uncles, my brothers..I told her my soul would not be able to handle that level of anguish. But with a white man..I’ll always expect it. Interesting essay and conversation!
Lmaoo what a way to rationalise your fetishistic fixation for white men. As if intraracial harm isn’t the norm.. like black women arent capable of being agents of white hegemony that harm black boys/ men. If a black man said this you’d call him a white supremacist.
This is such a profound and necessary conversation. Your analysis of how apartheid's legacy lives on through the internalized devaluation of Black bodies, especially Black women's bodies, cuts to the heart of something so many of us carry but struggle to name. The connection you draw between colonial structures and contemporary desire patterns is essential - you're right that this goes far beyond individual 'preferences' to deeply embedded psychological colonization.
What strikes me most is your honesty about the 'white gaze' operating even within our own communities, and how that feeds into both fetishization from outside and self-rejection from within. This dual trauma - being both exoticized and devalued - is exhausting in ways that deserve more attention. Thank you for your courage in writing this, especially knowing how vulnerable these truths make you. Stories like these are how we begin the long work of decolonizing our own hearts and minds.
I like the message you highlight throughout the essay— that black women should plant their worth and beauty on the soils of…well, beauty itself and not on the grounds of male whiteness or whiteness in general.
With that being said, how would you respond to the critique that the black women is not necessarily planting her worth on whiteness but rather socioeconomic status and on a murky idea that white men ‘typically have better lives’. Thus if the men with a high socioeconomic status don’t attend to her— she could be ‘lacking in something’
Very good point! I think that links back to the idea that just because we are told that the white man is a certain thing doesn’t mean he actually is. How white men aren’t necessarily inherently gentler or more loving, but that they’ve been coded throughout history to seem that way. It’s about taking off those rose-coloured glasses, by decentering race as the primary axis of attraction.
White men do tend to live better lives, because of their institutional backing and superiority in status quo. But that shouldn’t be the reason why black women engage with them romantically, and I think dating culture and relationship discourse also start to bleed into this conversation at this point, because we can speak about why black women tend to enter relationships in the first place—that’s a very loaded conversation. 🙈
But I guess I’ll end off by saying that if black women ever lacked something, they are rarely going to find that thing in the palms of a white man. Whether it be healing racial insecurity, having their existence validated etc. These are personal journeys of discovery for the black woman. 🤍
2 series I watched that have changed my entire perpespective about 1 somewhat a similar topic & another unrelated, yet related
1. ‘The Long Song’, a story told through the eyes of July, as she works as a lady's maid for her mistress, Caroline. When a new overseer (massa) comes & is “infatuated” by her, your point of sexualisation comes her. His father never approved of dating negros so he married July's mistress & continued seeing her, had a baby with her and when things with didn't work out with the plantation he started resenting the negros including her. He eventually took off for London with the mistress & stole her baby. I have no conclusion for this that isn't already presented.
Somewhat unrelated, is a psychological horror that focus on racism. ‘Them.’ A black family who after moving to a white surbabian area, from their previous home after a white lady killed her baby, suffered not only from the horrid treatment from the neighbors which results in their death but also suffered mentally all the way down to their death.
This all to say, WE as black people are taking ourselves back decades. Not anyone else, we are doing this to ourselves!! Those things used to eat us THIRTY years ago.
Its so complex i am mixed race a blend of many born in Cape Town. But i grew up in London in a multicultral environment. Therefore i dated black white mixed race. But thruth be told i was and still am most attracted to mixed race men. Beyond initial attraction i want intelligence someone who makes me laugh and someone who does not seek to control me. I am a feminist that does not make me a man hater. I think things would jave been totally different if i grew up in SA .I think i may have ended up in Jail for my freedoom to chose not just who i love but all my human rights. Especially thinking of this on his Human rights day.
Let me start this by saying that this comment is completely out of love and the desire to make this world and it's people both to be the best version possible. As a white American man from the rural but what"south" who is and has been attracted to black females all my adult life, I have never dated a black woman. Why you ask... It's not because of my family not approving, or anything to do with my "whiteness" or "privilege". I believe that we are all created equal. But what I have came to realize is that a lot of black females are the most racist people I've met. And it's sad because even as beautiful a woman that they are, this makes them so unattractive. 9 times out of 10 they are the first to bring up the race card and always depicting white males in a negative light. On the contrary there are racist white males, however they are few and far between. At least outwardly. I am constantly around the stereotypical racist southern white men as I am a blue collar worker. And what I see is more comments by far are more of how attractive a black woman is or just positive in general, than I hear of any racist comments. Posts like this that are supposed to empower the black woman, are always degrading towards the white race. Always. This is the definition of racism. Talking about what color we are and not talking about the fact that we are all created equal is the problem. Division created by those who control the narrative and actually enslave us ALL .... We have to undo. We have to unite for the greater purpose of mankind. We're all being systematically targeted and mass depopulation is happening. We must stop the zionist, technocrats, and billionaires from their new world order plan that is already knocking at the door. I love y'all. Peace and happiness to all♥️
You obviously don't have a clue who I am, and you also have filled your belly at the propaganda table. You are a product of the CIA. Division is the goal so they can continue to control the masses. As long as the people are fighting amongst themselves, they don't have time to fight the REAL enemy
Your essay made me realise something so interesting. Being someone’s who’s always loved novels…the demographics in novels that had love stories were often just white love over and over again. There were barely any books that were well written and placed black love or black women’s experiences at the centre. Deliberately so..our lives as black people most often than not cannot be told without some level of suffering and it is frustrating that black love or blackness as a main character in any novel or piece of literature must always include some suffering. Black women are not afforded the neutrality that comes with whiteness..or rather we aren’t the ‘default’. We cannot experience outside of the bounds set by white supermacy. And this is a reality for black women, not just fiction. It is no wonder then black women aspire towards whiteness because as you said whiteness is afforded the capacity to be gentle..to be multifaceted and individual. But I also understand that black women’s desire for white men at times (well most of the time) is by design. White supremacy’s job was to erode the black family structure and initially it failed by trying to appeal to black women (who are typically racially loyal) but recently it has succeeded more so as black men move from victims to perpetrators of oppression themselves, as you said..a rupture of sorts. I wouldn’t even say South Africa is healing necessarily, it’s just in a different phase of white supremacy and capitalism, but that’s a different conversation. Tying it back to the epiphany I came to earlier this year when I questioned why I was even willing to date white men when asked by a friend..I explained that I would rather date a white man than a black man because living in a country like South Africa, and in general our world, there is a great likelihood I may fall victim to being murdered by a man. I would rather that man be a white man than it be someone who looks like my fathers, my uncles, my brothers..I told her my soul would not be able to handle that level of anguish. But with a white man..I’ll always expect it. Interesting essay and conversation!
I wish I could pin this, what a beautiful comment! I agree with you one hundred times over.
Lmaoo what a way to rationalise your fetishistic fixation for white men. As if intraracial harm isn’t the norm.. like black women arent capable of being agents of white hegemony that harm black boys/ men. If a black man said this you’d call him a white supremacist.
This is such a profound and necessary conversation. Your analysis of how apartheid's legacy lives on through the internalized devaluation of Black bodies, especially Black women's bodies, cuts to the heart of something so many of us carry but struggle to name. The connection you draw between colonial structures and contemporary desire patterns is essential - you're right that this goes far beyond individual 'preferences' to deeply embedded psychological colonization.
What strikes me most is your honesty about the 'white gaze' operating even within our own communities, and how that feeds into both fetishization from outside and self-rejection from within. This dual trauma - being both exoticized and devalued - is exhausting in ways that deserve more attention. Thank you for your courage in writing this, especially knowing how vulnerable these truths make you. Stories like these are how we begin the long work of decolonizing our own hearts and minds.
🥰💖 thank you for this beautiful comment!
I like the message you highlight throughout the essay— that black women should plant their worth and beauty on the soils of…well, beauty itself and not on the grounds of male whiteness or whiteness in general.
With that being said, how would you respond to the critique that the black women is not necessarily planting her worth on whiteness but rather socioeconomic status and on a murky idea that white men ‘typically have better lives’. Thus if the men with a high socioeconomic status don’t attend to her— she could be ‘lacking in something’
Very good point! I think that links back to the idea that just because we are told that the white man is a certain thing doesn’t mean he actually is. How white men aren’t necessarily inherently gentler or more loving, but that they’ve been coded throughout history to seem that way. It’s about taking off those rose-coloured glasses, by decentering race as the primary axis of attraction.
White men do tend to live better lives, because of their institutional backing and superiority in status quo. But that shouldn’t be the reason why black women engage with them romantically, and I think dating culture and relationship discourse also start to bleed into this conversation at this point, because we can speak about why black women tend to enter relationships in the first place—that’s a very loaded conversation. 🙈
But I guess I’ll end off by saying that if black women ever lacked something, they are rarely going to find that thing in the palms of a white man. Whether it be healing racial insecurity, having their existence validated etc. These are personal journeys of discovery for the black woman. 🤍
2 series I watched that have changed my entire perpespective about 1 somewhat a similar topic & another unrelated, yet related
1. ‘The Long Song’, a story told through the eyes of July, as she works as a lady's maid for her mistress, Caroline. When a new overseer (massa) comes & is “infatuated” by her, your point of sexualisation comes her. His father never approved of dating negros so he married July's mistress & continued seeing her, had a baby with her and when things with didn't work out with the plantation he started resenting the negros including her. He eventually took off for London with the mistress & stole her baby. I have no conclusion for this that isn't already presented.
Somewhat unrelated, is a psychological horror that focus on racism. ‘Them.’ A black family who after moving to a white surbabian area, from their previous home after a white lady killed her baby, suffered not only from the horrid treatment from the neighbors which results in their death but also suffered mentally all the way down to their death.
This all to say, WE as black people are taking ourselves back decades. Not anyone else, we are doing this to ourselves!! Those things used to eat us THIRTY years ago.
I nodded so many times reading this, you echoed my experiences without ever knowing me. That’s incredible
this was a great read
YOU’RE A FUCKING GOAT
I feel your writeup
Especially the part about white men desiring black women for only their bodies this has translated to black women loving them for validation
this post spoke to the 6 year old in me who had to hear her white crush go “ew” when she told him she liked him :,)
Ouuu I found this on tiktok. Girl, this is so incredible.
Oop!! I enjoyed this read soooo much!
Rarely does one read something they've never thought about.
Very insightful and thought provoking analysis!
Its so complex i am mixed race a blend of many born in Cape Town. But i grew up in London in a multicultral environment. Therefore i dated black white mixed race. But thruth be told i was and still am most attracted to mixed race men. Beyond initial attraction i want intelligence someone who makes me laugh and someone who does not seek to control me. I am a feminist that does not make me a man hater. I think things would jave been totally different if i grew up in SA .I think i may have ended up in Jail for my freedoom to chose not just who i love but all my human rights. Especially thinking of this on his Human rights day.
Let me start this by saying that this comment is completely out of love and the desire to make this world and it's people both to be the best version possible. As a white American man from the rural but what"south" who is and has been attracted to black females all my adult life, I have never dated a black woman. Why you ask... It's not because of my family not approving, or anything to do with my "whiteness" or "privilege". I believe that we are all created equal. But what I have came to realize is that a lot of black females are the most racist people I've met. And it's sad because even as beautiful a woman that they are, this makes them so unattractive. 9 times out of 10 they are the first to bring up the race card and always depicting white males in a negative light. On the contrary there are racist white males, however they are few and far between. At least outwardly. I am constantly around the stereotypical racist southern white men as I am a blue collar worker. And what I see is more comments by far are more of how attractive a black woman is or just positive in general, than I hear of any racist comments. Posts like this that are supposed to empower the black woman, are always degrading towards the white race. Always. This is the definition of racism. Talking about what color we are and not talking about the fact that we are all created equal is the problem. Division created by those who control the narrative and actually enslave us ALL .... We have to undo. We have to unite for the greater purpose of mankind. We're all being systematically targeted and mass depopulation is happening. We must stop the zionist, technocrats, and billionaires from their new world order plan that is already knocking at the door. I love y'all. Peace and happiness to all♥️
I’m going to lovingly redirect you to this book titled Why I’m No Longer Speaking To White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge :)
See what I mean….🤔 Love you too!
You obviously don't have a clue who I am, and you also have filled your belly at the propaganda table. You are a product of the CIA. Division is the goal so they can continue to control the masses. As long as the people are fighting amongst themselves, they don't have time to fight the REAL enemy