New Black Women's Front Porch

Common Sense: "Growing up in a world without fathers" creates Tons of Boy-Men

Felicia,  thanks for another article that should help some bw to connect the dots.  Lawdy! Those old black folks, relatives of mine, who used to sit on the front  porch and get into everybody's business--LOL!-- would not have needed to use 99 zillion words  (as I do on this site) to get it across to bw to stay away from men who cannot lift you up!!  My relatives simply said to me: "Stay away from no-good men." PERIOD. FULL STOP!

 

And I was not allowed to associate with any girls my age who associated with "no-good" males.  I certainly wanted to hang out with those girls because it sure looked like they were having a lot of fun with guys around them all the time.  However,  I shudder to think what would have happened to me if I had disobeyed my family members!! For sure, I wouldn't have been in condition to write this article. LOL!  My family members did NOT play!  I was very openly and blatantly told that those girls were "low-class," and that I'd better not be caught on the same side of the country road as them. 

 

Oops! I realize that we're not ever suppose to recognize that there are different classes of AA people, but I'm so happy that those  relatives of mine didn't give a blip about what idiotic black folks thought and they didn't care whose feelings got hurt. There was WAY too much at stake--like my future, my life and the generations that they hoped would come through me.  I'm the same way with my children, and they're doing  just fine.

 

 As much as I've written on this topic online and as much as I talk about it offline, I constantly encounter bw  with goo-goo eyes towards these inadequate males  and who go chasing after males of this type--who are clearly unable to meet the challenges of life as MEN.  And these women seem to be perpetually surprised when these men SHOW what they're really all about. 

 

 I totally agree that some of the folks in this article are trying to arouse sympathy for these males. SMH  Okay,  I'll take a softer tone.  Let's say the males do deserve sympathy, but no black girl or bw can afford to be sympathetic towards these males!!  And since some bw are upset that  bm are "leaving home," maybe ww and various other non-bw ***can*** afford to be sympathetic towards these males.  LET THEM!   BUT you cannot afford to be sympathetic.

 

 Girls and women cannot teach males how to be men!!!  Bw CANNOT become male role models for these boys!! Bw, please don't try to become a male role model for your sons.  It is not going to work. Your sons ***know*** that you are a female and they don't want to grow up to be like Mom. They are not going to listen to you beyond a certain point because you are a female in a patriarchially ruled world. They ARE going to copy their behavior from the males in their social enviroment.

 

You and your daughters are not responsible for the chaos in the bc. Don't let ANYBODY make you believe that!  Tell your daughters and other black women you care about to just be polite and cross the street when they see these males coming!  And do your utmost to get out of these chaos ridden places as soon as possible.  Do not raise your children there!   I repeat:  Let women from other groups give these males sympathy for a change if they choose to do so--since we now live in an open society.  ENCOURAGE these males to "leave home." 

 

BW: if you want to be sympathetic towards males of this type and "give them a chance," that's the same as having sympathy for a bullet that's headed towards you. 

 

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Many poverty-stricken households are run by single mothers. Where are the fathers? That's a question many ask, from mothers and children to social workers and academics.

"Where are the fathers? I wish I knew the answer," said Pedro Velez- Lopez, a youth court advocate with Hispanics United. He handled 94 cases this year through Oct. 1; all 94 involved single-mother families.

"That void - the absence of fathers - is truly detrimental," said Ron Stewart, a Buffalo State College sociology professor who specializes in the African-American family, and black males in particular.While single-parent homes are more prevalent among low-income families, they're most pronounced among African-Americans. Some 65 percent of black households were led by a single parent as of December 2006, according to the U.S. Census Supplemental Survey and American Community Survey.

Stewart said the absence of fathers is a major factor in sons turning to a tough street culture in search of acceptance and identity, and in daughters seeking surrogate fathers in gang members and drug dealers, and getting pregnant without being in a committed relationship. But he worries all black males are being unfairly painted by the same brush.

"We do have young black males attending college and living up to expectations of society. Not all black men are gangbangers and drug dealers and criminals," Stewart said.

A legacy of poverty

Some observers, like the late New York Sen. Daniel Moynihan, have blamed the large number of single-parent households on a "culture of poverty" that is passed on generationally.

"There is one unmistakable lesson in American history," Moynihan wrote in 1965. "A community that allows a large number of young men to grow up in broken families, dominated by women, never acquiring any stable relationship to male authority, never acquiring any set of rational expectations about the future - that community asks for and gets chaos."

But Wendell Wild, a social worker for the Buffalo Public Schools, counters that. "The 'culture of poverty' has a premise that somehow the poor are different, like there is something wrong with them. They are poor, they don't have enough support and their lives are difficult and chaotic because of it.

"But they are trying no more or less than the rest of us, and they are no more or less responsible than the rest of us."

Wild said he sees "a ton of disorganization" in children's lives during home visits. Blaming the individual, he said, ignores the loss of good-paying jobs, inferior education, lack of job training, affordable child care and health insurance, substandard housing and predatory landlords, and lack of investment in poor and often segregated neighborhoods.

"The problem of poverty has been individualized and psychologized, when it's a structural economic problem that requires structural economic solutions," Wild said.

West Side resident David Rodriguez, who helps support two children but does not live with them, understands that desperation.

"Sometimes poverty makes you do some strange things. I have found myself dumpster-diving for food," said Rodriguez, a driver for La Nova pizzeria. He worries that if something happens to his car, he could become unemployed again.

"Poverty drives some people into crime. And I don't say it's a good thing, but people have to take care of their child no matter what."

Money flows up

Aaron Bartley, director of PUSH Buffalo, a grass-roots group working to rebuild the West Side, calls the 'culture of poverty' a "distraction from the culture of greed," as wealth in the U.S. becomes increasingly concentrated at the top.

"I know it may sound crazy to someone in Amherst," he said, "but the only way these young men can reach [society's expectations] - unless they are exceptionally gifted or exceptional in some way - is to seek it through primarily illicit opportunities."

One of PUSH Buffalo's goals is to extend the mayor's summer jobs program for youth year-round. A larger vision is a citywide public works program that could employ people to rebuild struggling neighborhoods.

"We wouldn't catch all of the people caught up in [drugs and other illicit activities], but you'd see most turning to the culture of work almost overnight," Bartley predicted.

Henry Louis Taylor, a University at Buffalo planning expert, says the alienation, sense of hopelessness, anger and the economic conditions that help drive this despair, have gotten worse.

"The marriageable pool of black and Latino men who have the jobs and income that would allow them to take care of a family is small. We don't have programs set up to support them," Taylor said.

He sees the same problems encircling another generation of children.

"We saw these problems emerging 17 years ago. It's just become deeper and more complicated with the passage of time. We didn't solve those problems, or really try.

"It takes a village," Taylor added, "but we don't have a village."

http://www.buffalonews.com/341/story/399893.html

AND thanks for this 2nd article that was written in 1993 (16 yrs ago) predicting all of this that has now come to pass or it's even worse than predicted.  Still people are expecting that someone else  or THE GOVERNMENT/Obama is going to save them.

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/1993/11/03/09child.h13.html

Common Sense: Some Slicing and Dicing 1

Sistrunkqueen’s entire comment: (The part I didn't post on the Ezine today is in red)

"on bwwdi.com the question of the day was Will America see black women in a better light now that Michelle is the First Lady of the White House now?  [I think bw are hoping that bm will change. They won't. They will get more arrogant . Also I am hearing young bm in Atlantasaying we run this mofo now. They are the boss now. I don't think we really get it. Because a bm is prez now] we must be more diligent and professional in our efforts. We must be discreet too."

I brought this comment here to do some slice and dice commonsense teaching and to show what I mean about this fixation on DBRbm or on how some bw are still watching other bw fixate on DBRbm. Sistrunkqueen,  I realize that this fixation that you're observing disturbs many of you, but the end result of this is that DBRbm are still front and center on the stage! LOL! So, indirectly, they still have YOU thinking about them, which is using up your mental and emotional resources.  I firmly believe that bw MUST stop this. If these men are not doing anything to uplift or protect  you, they do NOT deserve your mental or emotional energy--directly or indirectly.

A major point is here that these bm are NOT anything close to being like Barack Obama, a loving husband and devoted father. They embrace him because of the similarities in complexion but conveniently don't embrace and live his philosophy re how to treat bw and black children.  This is so typical in that many black folks are too undisciplined and like to pick and choose the easy, fluffy stuff to emulate, but refuse to touch the other parts that require discipline.

 Another key point is that there are some bm who may not be outright DBRs or predators, BUT they are of  **No Value** or low value to the betterment of any bw aside from perhaps their mothers.  For the sake of a bit of brevity, let's call this category of bm: NV-bm.  These men may be of value to certain women, but they're not of value to BLACK women  or only insignificantly so, and since we're black women, we must look at bm carefully and any others from OUR viewpoint and assess whether they are of value to US (bw) or a detriment to US (bw) or just dead weight to US (bw).

This is an important point too because if you look at where the resources--of a lot bw--are going, these NV and DBR men are sucking up a lot of time, energy, including mental and emotional energy, along with a big chunk of the financial resources of bw. (Will post an NPR piece that Felicia sent me about that.)  Even if these bw are not giving the men the resources directly, they're still overly-contributing to the bc to make up for the fact that the men are not contributing or under-contributing. Same thing.  Yet the men still draw from the bc.  Yes, there are people now who are actually trying to track where these resources are going in the bc because there is so much money that goes in there, but still the problems are so severe.

Okay, let's slice and dice this a bit more. Some bm may contribute to bw just a tad in various ways, and for that reason, many bw will magnify that tad to GREAT proportions--LOL! but true RECIPROCITY involves contributing **in kind** or in a similar amount if or when it's needed or desired.  In order for you, as an individual, not to get shortchanged,  this means that the amount received in return MUST be on a par with the amount given to either an individual or a group.  Otherwise, you're being shortchanged.  For ex., just because a bm gives your car battery a boost doesn't mean that you should co-sign for him to buy a car when he needs a new car. BIG difference.

DBRbm, bm predators, & NV-bm are ALL in the same category to me because none of them are DOING anything to UPLIFT or protect  me and other bw who are trying to safely 'Live Well.'  In all **normal** male-female situations, a man is valued based on what he contributes or does, not based simply on his gender. This is the sensible way all groups of women view men.

Remember that many bm have thrown away "The CONTRACT," and there is role reversal among AAs. So instead of bm being valued based on what they DO, as other men are, many bw value bm  for their gender alone and these men instead now judge women based on what a woman DOES for them. Sheer role reversal to the point where even bm are talking about how feminized black men have become.  For ex,  I read the other day where a bm said he likes ww more because a ww will DO things for him that a bw won't do--sexually, financially,  and otherwise.  However, this same bm would get furious at me or any other bw if we were to say that we like wm more because they do more for us sexually, financially, etc. than a bm does. LOL!  Anyway, he VALUES ww more for what she'll do whereas all other groups of men appreciate a female just for being a female--not based on what she'll necessarily DO for them, practically speaking.  Another bm on TV 1 said he doesn't date bw because they won't pay for dinner. LOL!

 You **should** value people who will be there for you when you need help.  ALL human beings need support sometimes, including bw, and most bw ARE there to the max for folks when help is needed. Likewise, you should NOT value people who are not there for you when you need help or support.

I always get surprised when I hear bw talking about what bm are thinking or saying because what they say almost never helps bw. Their focus is on themselves.  Thus, I'm indifferent to bm in general and am not interested in what they think since in general, they don't uplift me or promote/protect my interests in any way. I've **chosen** to view what they think and say in that way. I view them as individuals, just as I do wm.  If individual bm does something good for me, I show my appreciation, but I don't ever give them a blank check as so many bw foolishly do.

The point here is that you should NEVER allow DBRs, NVs or ANYONE else to use up your mental, emotional or other resources when they're doing nothing to replenish you in any way.  You'll end up empty with them standing on you. This is Common Sense.

Common Sense--Employment and Having Your OWN

I think that  many more AA women need to STRONGLY focus on CREATING our own employment. There's nothing wrong with **SOME** of us working for others or working for others for a period of time, but a large segment of us should also never stop trying to set up our own "jobs," work opportunities or businesses. And we absolutely MUST support each other. This is NOT a choice; it's an OBLIGATION. It's called self-help. Since most humans are viewed as a part of a group, you are partially helping yourself when you help the group to rise.  RULE: You should only and MUST distance yourself from INDIVIDUALS in your group when they negatively impact you. Most people do this.  However, there are also many INDIVIDUALS in your group who positively impact you. ALWAYS support them. Most people do this too. You cannot put your future welfare into the hands of others unless they have a **vested** interest in your betterment (usually--but not always--a husband or others close to you) because most people and entitities are self-serving and are going to look out for themselves PRIMARILY. And personally, I don't blame them. That's natural.  Self-preservation is the 1st law--that is, for everyone, aside from AA women, apparently. I grew up in a family that emphasized self-reliance, productivity, and having **your own,** so I've always been productive and entrepreneurial. As I've gotten older, I've seen that having your own is just "common sense."  Aside from the pure necessity of being entrepreneurial, I love entrepreneurialism.  Most of this economy is made up of small businesses and the tax system gives various breaks to entrepreneurs and businesses of all sizes. Those are "handouts," but entrepreneurs also provide goods, services, and jobs for others. Why is it that so many AA women expect for others to look out for them or to save them? Has this ever been the case for a typical African American women--for someone to ride to our rescue? I meet some AA women who have NOTHING saved. They don't even have $10 put aside for a rainy day or even to buy medicine for a cold. Isn't that the scariest thing that you ever heard? And these women work everyday in some capacity--spending countless hours DOING FOR OTHERS and sharing any money or whatever else they get with others. IMO, this is an ESPECIALLY terrifying situation for an AA woman--to be penniless.  Does anyone remember Katrina? Last year, I gave a local AA woman money to buy her diabetes medication and apparatus.  It was mindboggling to me that she actually didn't have money to get her medication!  Yet this woman, who was already sickly, was constantly running around doing all kinds of things for others in the local black neighborhood, even into the wee hours of the morning.  Yet when she needed medication, I didn't see anyone rushing to  reach into their pocket to give her the $100+ she needed. Now maybe someone would have given it to her, but they hadn't done it, and I knew she needed her medication because my grandmother died from diabetes. In a fair world, this would NOT happen to this good-hearted woman, but in a hostile world, MANY people will just "USE" a good-hearted woman. The world has never been fair.   Realizing this, this is why some people in the world are willing to do anything and everything to get on top--to make sure that they and their own have what they need. More to the point and since my focus is on black women's betterment, it would just be common sense for black women in the USA to start TODAY to organize themselves in a no-nonsense way in every community to take care of each other, just like the black folks who sat on my grandmother's front porch did and would do now.  Black women: This CAN be done, and starting TODAY, some of you should be thinking of ways to do this with bw who would welcome being a part of this. This would help you and them.  Don't think about all of the reasons why it can't work. Think about ways to MAKE it work. No, this would not work for ALL bw who need it, but it would work for some and some of them would welcome it. Other than this, many black women and their children will continue to be prey--in lawless urban areas and other sections of this country, and make no mistake about it, they ARE being preyed on. Here's an article that site researcher, KR, sent re employment among AAs. ___________________________________ Employment job No. 1 for African Americans By Linda S. Wallace | Published  Yesterday | News | Unrated Long before the U.S. economy sputtered and stalled, the African-American community had suffered a rather alarming reversal of fortune, a new briefing paper from the Economic Policy Institute reports. With the economy now in peril, the future for African Americans rests even more heavily upon one critical issue: jobs. “On all major economic indicators – income, wages, employment and poverty – African Americans were worse off in 2007 than they were in 2000,” Algernon Austin states in the EPI briefing paper. “The current economic downturn and the subprime mortgage crisis bode ill for the immediate future for African Americans.   The overall social well-being of African-American communities depends upon strong job growth. The historical evidence shows clearly that strong job and wage growth are keys to reducing black poverty.” Among the paper’s other key findings:   The African-American median family income declined by $404, or 1 percent, between 2000 and 2007. Worker productivity grew 19.2 percent between 2000 and 2007, but wage growth for American workers generally, and African-American workers specifically,has stagnated. The African-American unemployment rate increased by .07 percentage points between 2000 and 2007 while the rate of African-American employment declined 2.4 percentage points. (Individuals who have dropped out of the labor market and are no longer looking for jobs are not counted amount the unemployed.)   Crime and criminal justice policies are shaping the economic future for the African- American community, as ex-offenders have a more difficult time of finding work.   A tale of two decades   In the 1990s, prosperous times on Wall Street led to better days on Main Street. The labor market was tight, producing higher employment levels for African Americans. Crime dropped, as did the African-American poverty rate. Homeownership, which was and is the major source of wealth-building for Africans, was on the rise. That has changed, in part, because the subprime mortgage crisis hit the African- American community harder than others. The African-American homeownership rate fell from its peak of 49.1 percent in 2004 to 47.2 percent in 2007. Home values in some African-American neighborhoods declined at a faster pace as foreclosed properties sat empty, becoming havens for the homeless and for drug users. “High level of foreclosures lead to increased vandalism and crime and declining tax revenues for communities,” Austin said. Moving forward   The economic research and indicators make a compelling argument: Jobs are the key issue, Austin argues. When the employment rate rises in the African-American community, he notes, other challenges are more easily resolved. “Black America needs a national strategy for black full employment,” Austin concluded. “In other words, our national goal should be to have the black unemployment rate sustained below 5 percent. When the American economy experiences strong job growth and full-employment like we saw in the late 1990s, average Americans of all races benefit with higher rates of employment, higher wages, and lower poverty rates. But even in the peak year of 200, when the total unemployment rate was at 4 percent, the black unemployment rate was at 7.6 percent. The total unemployment rate masks substantial racial disparities.   “If we were to reduce the black unemployment rate to below 5 percent, there would be amazing progress for black America.” (Linda S. Wallace is The Cultural Coach. Her Web site is www.theculturalcoach.com. Her blog, Cultural IQ, is featured at www.tristatedefender.com) source:  http://tri-statedefenderonline.com/articlelive/articles/3168/1/Employment-job-No-1-for-African-Americans/Page1.html

Common Sense: Self Preservation is Rule #1

Thanks Nikki  D. for this very enlightening Article.

This is MUST reading!!  It provokes a lot of thought because the amount of money you have often determines the quality of your life, especially if you live in the USA. And as Dr. King said, "It's not how long you live, it's how WELL you live," that counts. When I first heard that at a young age, I was floored by the simplistic truth of that statement because even I, at my young age, could understand exactly what he meant.

It's common sense that if you keep giving away lots more of your time, energy, and money than you receive in return, you will end up mostly empty-handed.  Simple arithmetic. Yet AA women continue to supply time, energy, and money to individuals and institutions who are not there for them when they need help. Lack of Reciprocity is a common element in the lives of many AA women. Many AA women in my offline life who I raise this issue with don't seem to believe there's anything odd about it. (Sigh) 

Actually, I got into a "tense moment" with a woman in my women's group  a few weeks ago regarding all of the time, money, and energy that so many impoverished, suffering bw contribute to the black church in the black neighborhood near me.  I pointed out that these women need to keep their meager resources to meet their own needs. She told me that women had always supported the church from thousands of years ago, so this is nothing new that these women are doing now--even when they have pressing needs that the church and community don't consider it a priority to meet.  That's lack of reciprocity right there.

When I left there that night, I felt like never going back to the women's group again because I felt that by participating in the group--that's a part of the church--I was somehow condoning this scheme to rob these women. It was later explained to me by another woman that she understood how I feel, but she pointed out that it's necessary for me to come to the meetings to voice those objections. If not, some of the women in the group would simply follow blindly, without any thought to the contrary. I still have my doubts about continuing.   However, attending those meetings and similar other ones helps me to clearly understand all of the parts of the massive Indoctrination program so many bw receive. This is why it's so necessary for as many bw as possible to escape these dysfunctional neighborhoods.

Anyway, here's the article.

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Groundbreaking ING Foundation Survey Funds: Financial Confidence and Empowerment High Among Black Women but Investment Experience, Accumulated Savings LAG

New York, NY - September 10, 2008

Of Giving and Gucci:

Support of Others – Family, Friends and Church – Complicates Savings:

• 47% of Black Women Say It is Difficult to Have Desired Lifestyle Because of Financial Obligations to Their Immediate Family
• More Than a Third Have Loaned Over $1,000 to Friends or Family in Last Year
• 71% Say It’s “Very Important” to Give Money to Their Place of Worship

...And Spending Doesn’t Help Matters:

• 68% of Black Women Buy What Thy Want in Good or Bad Economy
• 41% Feel Guilty About How Much They Spend on Expensive Brands

Two in Five Report Total Savings of Less than $10,000

But Growing Interest i Saving and Investing Combined with Interest in Influencing Others and Learning New Things Augur Well for the Future

ING Foundation President Says Financial Services Industry Has ”An Opportunity and Obligation” to Help

• Most Black Women Manage the Investments for Their Households
• Black Women Worry More About Their Finances Than Their Health, Appearance, Job or Relationships – But Nearly 70% Don’t Have a Professional Financial Advisor
• Most Are Willing to Pay for Financial Advice
• Nearly Nine in 10 Say Race Doesn’t Matter When Selecting an Advisor

Most Black women are confident in their ability to achieve their financial goals, but obligations to others combined with a tendency to spend are complicating their saving and investing efforts, according to the results of a nationwide survey released today by the ING Foundation.

Nearly half (47%) of the 1,000 Black women surveyed said it is difficult to have their desired lifestyle because of financial obligations to their immediate family, and 68% say that they buy what they want — in a good or bad economy.

Among the Black women surveyed who said they were not saving as much as they like, spending too much/too much debt and financial obligations to their families were the leading reasons why they were not saving more.

“What we have here is a financial perfect storm. An inclination to spend combined with an extraordinary desire to help others financially has left many Black women behind the curve in terms of savings,” said Rhonda Mims, president of the ING Foundation and senior vice president of ING’s Office of Corporate Citizenship & Responsibility. “The good news is that Black women care deeply about their financial future, have a strong desire to learn more, and manifest many of the qualities critical to investment success."

“The research points to a ‘Preparedness Paradox,’” Mims said. “Black women have high confidence in their ability to achieve their financial goals, and consider themselves knowledgeable about investing, yet they are behind where they thought they’d be financially.”

Sponsored by the ING Foundation and developed in conjunction with the editors of Essence, the largest circulation magazine for women of color, the national telephone survey of 1,000 pre-retired Black women and 454 non-Black women was conducted between May 1 and May 18, 2008, by the firm of Clark Martire & Bartolomeo (CM&B). Respondents were at least 18 years of age and had annual household income of at least $25,000. The country was stratified geographically, targeting the desired sample to increase the likelihood of finding eligible respondents. They were then called on a Random Digit Dial basis within the state. The results for the 1,000 Black women surveyed have a margin of error of +/- 3.5% at the 95^th percentile of confidence; the results for the other 454 women surveyed have a margin of error of +/- 4.6% at the 95^th percentile of confidence.

The Big Give

The survey evidenced an extraordinary commitment among Black women to helping others.

More than half of the Black women surveyed have loaned $500 or more to friends or family in the last year and one-third have loaned in excess of $1,000.

Nearly half (47%) of the Black women surveyed said that financial obligations to their immediate family have made it difficult to have the lifestyle they desire. Moreover, better than eight in 10 say that leaving money to their children is an important financial goal, indicating that striking a balance between their personal needs and those of others may be a lifelong challenge for many Black women.

And the obligation to others does not stop with family and friends. Better than seven out of 10 say that giving money to their place of worship is very important; that compares with 42% of all other women.

“Black women’s sense of obligation to community and family is both extraordinary and commendable,” Mims said. “But when you are pulled in so many directions financially, something or someone has to pay the price. For many Black women, it appears their financial well-being suffers. Black women need to make their own financial security a higher priority.”

To Buy or Not to Buy? That Is the Question

At the same time, the orientation to helping others is combined with a strong disposition to consumption — some of it conspicuous.

Almost seven in 10 (68%) Black women say that they buy what they really want — in good times or bad. And many Black women face the temptation of unplanned spending when they are feeling stressed — nearly 40% report that they shop to cheer themselves up.

Two in five Black women feel guilty about how much they spend on expensive brands.

“For some Black women, excessive spending makes the road to long-term financial security even longer,” Mims said. “To an extraordinary degree, Black women consider themselves trendsetters and centers of influence. Opinion-leading has its price.”

Black women with credit cards are more likely than other women to carry a balance on their cards. That said, credit card usage was less prevalent among the Black women surveyed than it was among other women, and 93% of Black women who consider paying off their debts to be an important goal said they were confident in their ability to do so.

Giving, Spending Patterns Depress Saving and Investing

The survey found that financial support of others in combination with spending patterns and lower income levels result in depressed savings for many Black women.

One quarter of those Black women surveyed say they are not saving any of their household income on a monthly basis and 43% report total savings of less than $10,000. Over half of Black women say that they live “paycheck to paycheck.”

Not surprisingly, therefore, Black women’s ownership of financial products lags that of other women.

Two-thirds of the Black women surveyed said they own a retirement account like a 401(k), 403(b) or IRA (compared with 79% of all other women) and 28% said they own individual stocks or bonds (compared with 52% of all other women), and 23% own mutual funds (compared with 39% of other women).

One of the reasons Black women may under-own investment products is relatively late exposure to investing. Seventy-two percent of the Black women surveyed strongly agreed with the statement, “I wish I had learned more about money and investing growing up;” that compares with 49% of the other women surveyed.

Among Black women who don’t own core, building-block investments such as stocks and mutual funds, the number one reason cited was the sense that they don’t know enough to pick the best investment option. The second most-cited reason was the belief that they don’t have enough money to warrant owning them.

“Too many Black women are missing out on the opportunity to own crucial wealth-building vehicles because they have not had adequate exposure to them,” said Valerie Brown, president, ING Retail Annuities Market Segment, ING U.S. Wealth Management. “That’s why we conducted this survey — to elevate and enhance the discussion around saving and investing for Black women and in Black households generally.”

Growing Interest: Black Women Eager to Save

While Black women may lack savings, they possess basic confidence in their ability to invest and a strong desire to learn more.

Seventy-one percent of the Black women surveyed said they are at least fairly knowledgeable about investing, and 76% said they were confident in their ability to choose the right investments for retirement. Nearly nine in 10 say they are more interested in saving their money now than they were five years ago; 73% say the same of investing.

Asked about financial products that they don’t currently own, over a third (34%) said they would like to learn more about retirement products such as 401(k) or 403(b) plans or IRAs and more than a quarter (29%) wanted to know more about stocks or bonds.

“An expressed interest in investing coupled with a high level of confidence point to the potential for an upsurge in saving and investing among Black women,” said Brown. “Now we must translate this confidence into opportunity and action. The ability is there as is the self-confidence. The challenge is moving financial security up Black women’s to-do list, and letting them know there are places to go for help.”

Money and Relationships

Money matters appear to be a source of contention in the relationships of many Black women, but are much less of a factor in their dissolution.

Forty-three percent of the married or cohabiting Black women surveyed said they argued about money with their spouse/partners at least occasionally — that compares with 29% of all other women who are married or cohabiting.

Reflecting that propensity for conflict — or perhaps precipitating it — 37% of the Black women surveyed said that they had “a secret stash of money” and 39% said they occasionally or regularly under-reported the cost of an actual purchase to their spouse.

Of the married or cohabiting Black women surveyed, 35% said they would rather do a month’s worth of laundry than discuss their finances with their partner and 15% would rather have a root canal.

But when divorced women were asked about the role money matters played in the dissolution of their relationships, only 9% of Black women said it was the major consideration — compared with 18% of all other women.

“Money is an unavoidable, day-to-day issue in many Black households,” Mims said. “At the same time, the survey suggests that as a household priority, money takes a backseat to faith and family.”

The poll revealed that the more money a household has, the less money is an issue in the relationship. Black women with household incomes in excess of $75,000 were one-third less likely than average to argue with their spouse or partner about money matters.

When asked what qualities they are looking for in an ideal partner, 79% of single Black women said a prospective spouse’s ability to manage money was very important — 47% of all other women responded that way. Forty-five percent of single Black women said a potential partner’s credit score was very important; 19% of all other women said so.

Interestingly, 60% of Black women said religious background was a very important factor in an ideal partner; only 16% of other women felt that way.

The Road to Financial Security Starts with a Financial Plan

Analysis of the survey results done by CM&B showed that the act of financial planning has a strong impact on feelings of financial security and savings behaviors, even after controlling for income and assets, particularly among Black women.

“There is no question that there are powerful benefits to financial planning — and not just to one’s portfolio,” said Doug Parent, who directed the study for CM&B. “The mere act of planning leads to greater knowledge and empowerment, which gives women the confidence they need to take action.”

Black women are less likely than other women to have a financial plan (56% vs. 66%), but Black women are more likely to have a will (43% vs. 32%).

When asked why they don’t have a financial plan, 73% of the Black women without a plan said they just hadn’t gotten around to it. Other reasons cited by at least half the respondents included they didn’t think they had enough money to warrant it (55%), didn’t know how to go about it (53%) and were reluctant to disclose all their financial information (51%). Only 23% didn’t think it was important to have a financial plan.

“The journey to financial security begins with a road map,” said Brown. “Creating a financial plan focuses you on where you want to go and, just as importantly, what you need to do to get there.”

Financial Services Industry Has Opportunity and Obligation to Help

Survey data point to a large opportunity for the investment management industry, financial advisors in particular.

For starters, financial security is top of mind for many Black women. In fact, Black women worry more about their finances than their health, appearance, job or personal relationships.

And while this concern combined with a desire to learn more make Black women logical consumers of financial advice, nearly 70% don’t have a financial advisor. That said, most are willing to pay for financial advice. Even more encouragingly, when it comes to selecting an advisor, 80% of Black women say gender is not a consideration and 88% say race does not matter.

“We think there is a tailor-made opportunity for financial advisors to step in and to help women to take their first steps down the path to financial security,” Brown said.

“At the end of the day, the financial goal for most Black women is a secure financial future,” said Brown. “As our data indicate, Black women don’t want special treatment; they want respectful treatment. A competent, caring, communicative financial advisor has all the qualities required to win business in this market.”

“Black women are goal-oriented, smart, motivated, and influential, and they have made extraordinary contributions to their families and to their communities,” Brown said. “This is also a market with growing financial resources. It’s been estimated that within five years, Black households will control in excess of $1 trillion in annual spending. We think it’s time that the investment management industry realizes both the obligation and opportunity to help them with their finances.”

Press inquiries:

Audria (Aud) Belton Benn, ING,         770-980-5715        or         404-934-8743       , or audria.benn@us.ing.com

Arielle Densen, Tiller, LLC,         212.358.8515       , ext. 7, or adensen@tillerllc.com

Heather Emerson, Tiller LLC,         212.358.8515       , ext. 4, or hemerson@tillerllc.com

About ING:

ING is a global financial institution of Dutch origin offering banking, investments, life insurance and retirement services to over 85 million private, corporate and institutional clients in more than 50 countries. With a diverse workforce of over 130,000 people, ING comprises a broad spectrum of prominent companies that increasingly serve their clients under the ING brand

In the U.S., the ING (NYSE: ING) family of companies offer a comprehensive array of financial services to retail and institutional clients, which includes life insurance, retirement plans, mutual funds, managed accounts, alternative investments, direct banking, institutional investment management, annuities, employee benefits, financial planning, and reinsurance. ING holds top-tier rankings in key U.S. markets and serves over 17 million customers across the nation.

ING’s diversity management philosophy and commitment to workforce diversity, diversity marketing, corporate citizenship and supplier diversity fosters an inclusive environment for employees that supports a distinctive product and service experience for the financial services consumer.

For more information, visit www.ing.com.

About the ING Foundation:

The ING Foundation's mission is to improve the quality of life in the communities where ING operates and its employees and customers live. Through charitable giving and employee volunteerism, the foundation focuses on sustainable programs in the areas of financial literacy, children's education and diversity.

For more information, visit www.ing-usafoundation.com

Common Sense: Emotion vs Logic

The article below was written several years ago, but it's still just as true or it may even be more true today than it was then because many blacks worldwide STILL spend large portions of their money unwisely and then complain constantly that they don't have enough money.

But logic alone is not going to change the behavior of MOST people.

People, in general, are EMOTION-driven.  The current election season in the U.S. clearly reveals that.

People tend to think/feel a certain way, and they then act in accordance with their **feelings**  unless there is a severe penalty attached.  SOME people have more control over their feelings. Many of them look at a larger view and have a longer-range perspective, but this is because some groups of people spend a lot of time "shaping" the thoughts and emotions of their group members. The emotions of their group members are shaped to do what's in the best interest of the group because wiser heads in the group understand that left alone, people are going to act on their emotions.

As an aside:  Among AA's, there tends to be massive confusion about who's in the group and who's not because only whites can decide who's AA or who's black and who's not--and make it stick. This is why Barack Obama is considered an AA or "black"because MOST whites have designated him to be AA or black. Most AAs who I've heard talking about Obama don't know what he is exactly, but since whites have put him in the non-white group, blacks have adopted him with the reasoning that he must be what the rest of us are. This same confusion came up a few years ago when there's was so much hoopla about J-Lo, who many blacks consider to be white.  I asked Darren what she was and he said that MOST whites would never consider her to be white. In other words, to most whites, she would be one of the "others."  And sure enough, I saw it in various newspaper and magazine articles that her engagement to Ben Afleck, at the time, was considered an "interracial relationship."  Case closed.

The people who used to come to sit on my grandmother's front porch didn't have to deal with confusion about who was in the group and who was not. Instead, many of them barely literate, often talked about the value of shaping or 'training a black child while s/he was young.' They knew that children had to be shaped--for their own good.  Many  adults are just large children but many of them these days have not been shaped by any community--for their own good. Thus they have numerous "issues" that either they're addressing or they're constantly trying to get other people to address. And have you noticed how upset people get when you don't address **THEIR** issues?

Anyway, those folks on the porch knew they had to be involved in shaping the thoughts/feelings of others in our small community--for the good of us all in that community.  We do the same in our family. I do the same for others inside my community offline and online, and I welcome it when people who I hold in esteem do the same for me. However, most people online and offline are NOT inside my community.  We're not all inside the same community. There are various communities.

Here's the thing: People have to have enough in common to have a good relationship or inhabit a well-functioning community. If there aren't enough commonalities among the bulk of the people,  there will be constant in-fighting. However, instead of people of too-many dissimilar values recognizing that and going their separate ways, I've noticed offline and online that people tend to want to stay around and fight each other.  I tend to avoid people who I know I can't get along with because I don't want to spend my time fighting.

The below is what happens when large numbers of people are unshaped--in the direction of their best interests--and left on their own to think/feel whatever way they choose--which can be predicted to not be in their best interests. This is common sense.  If I lived in the same community that was dominated by people who have the values reflected below, there would be constant friction between me and them--BECAUSE our **values** are very different. That's all that's different about us--our values.
________________________

Tough Choices for Tough Times
 
By Yolanda Young

These are tough economic times, especially for African-Americans, for whom the unemployment rate is more than 10%. Alarmingly, rather than belt-tightening, the response has been to spend more.

In many poor neighborhoods, one is likely to notice satellite dishes and expensive new cars.

According to Target Market, a company that tracks black consumer spending, blacks spend a significant amount of their income on depreciable products. In 2002, the year the economy nose-dived, we spent $22.9 billion on clothes, $3.2 billion on electronics and $11.6 billion on furniture to put into homes that, in many cases, were rented.

Among our favorite purchases are cars and liquor. Blacks make up only 12% of the U.S. population, yet account for 30% of the country's Scotch consumption. Detroit, which is 80% black, is the world's No. 1 market for Cognac. So impressed was Lincoln with the $46.7 billion that blacks spent on cars that the automaker commissioned Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, the entertainment and fashion mogul, to design a limited-edition Navigator replete with six plasma screens, three DVD players and a Sony PlayStation 2.

The only area where blacks seem to be cutting back on spending is books; total purchases have gone from a high of $356 million in 2000 to $303 million in 2002.

This shortsighted behavior, motivated by a desire for instant gratification and social acceptance, comes at the expense of our future.

The National Urban League's "State of Black America 2004" report found that fewer than 50% of black families owned their homes compared with more than 70% of whites.

According to published reports, the Ariel Mutual Funds/Charles Schwab 2003 Black Investor Survey found that when comparing households where blacks and whites had roughly the same household incomes, whites saved nearly 20% more each month for retirement, and 30% of African-Americans earning $100,000 a year had less than $5,000 in retirement savings. While 79% of whites invest in the stock market, only 61% of African-Americans do.

Certainly, higher rates of unemployment, income disparity and credit discrimination are financial impediments to the economic vitality of blacks, but so are our consumer tastes.

By finding the courage to change our spending habits, we might be surprised at how far the $631 billion we now earn might take us.

Source:  http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2004-04-01-young_x.htm

Yolanda Young's next book is SPADE: A Critical Look at Black America

Common Sense: Economic Indicators--Many Stores Closings

Thanks Lorraine for the lead to this series of articles! You really did your homework!

Do the CEOs and Boards of Directors of these giant chains know something that's not being reported on the 'Evening News?' These store closings are among the Economic Indicators that I'm always talking about. Those old folks on my grandmother's front porch knew that it's critical to keep your eye on the movement of the money or that money trail.

That was Common Sense to them. Why is it that with all of our degrees these days, we are perpetually surprised and mystified about so much?
____________________

STORE CLOSINGS & LAYOFFS, Lane Bryant, Macy's etc...
8/25/2008 3:55 PM >>>

If you have gift cards, hurry up and use them!!

Ann Taylor closing 117 stores nationwide
A company spokeswoman said the company hasn't revealed which stores will be
shuttered. It will let the stores that will close this fiscal year know over
the next month

Eddie Bauer to close more stores
Eddie Bauer has already closed 27 shops in the first quarter and plans to
close up to two more outlet stores by the end of the year.

Cache closing stores
Women's retailer Cache announced that it is closing 20 to 23 stores this
year.

Lane Bryant, Fashion Bug, Catharine's closing 150 stores nationwide The
owner of retailers Lane Bryant , Fashion Bug , Catharine's Plus Sizes will
close about 150 under performing stores this year. The company hasn't
provided a list of specific store closures and can't say when it will offer
that info, spokeswoman Brooke Perry said today.

Talbots, J. Jill closing stores
About a month ago, Talbots announced that it will be shuttering all 78 of
it's kids and men's stores. Now the company says it will close
another 22 under performing stores..The 22 stores will be a mix of
Talbots women's and J. Jill , another chain it owns. The closures will occur
this fiscal year, according to a company press release.

Gap Inc. closing 85 stores
In addition to its namesake chain, Gap also owns Old Navy and Banana
republic . The company said the closures - all planned for fiscal 2008-will
be weighted toward the Gap brand.

Foot Locker to close 140 stores
In the company press release and during its conference call with
analysts today, it did not specify where the future store closures - all
planned in fiscal 2008 - will be. The company could not be immediately
reached for comment

Wicks is going out of business
Wicks Furniture is going out of business and closing all of its stores,
Wicks, a 37-year-old retailer that targets middle-income customers, filed
for bankruptcy protection last month.

Goodbye Levitz / BOMBAY - closed already
The furniture retailer, which is going out of business. Levitz first
announced it was going out of business and closing all 76 of it's stores in
December. The retailer dates back to 1910 when Richard Levitz opened his
first furniture store in Lebanon , PA. In the 1960s, the warehouse/showroom
concept brought Levitz to the forefront of the furniture industry. The local
Levitz closures will follow the shutdown of Bombay .

Zales, Piercing Pagoda closing stores
The owner of Zales and Piercing Pagoda previously said it plans to close 82
stores by July 31. Today, it announced that it is closing another 23 under
performing stores. The company said it's not pro viding a list of specific
store closures. Of the 105 locations planned for closure, 50 are kiosks and
55 are stores.

Disney Store owner has the right to close 98 stores The Walt Disney
Company announced it acquired about 220 Disney Stores from subsidiaries of
The children's Place Retail Stores. The exact number of stores acquired will
depend on negotiations with landlords. Those subsidiaries of Children's
Place filed for bankruptcy protection in late March. Walt Disney in the news
release said it has also obtained the right to close about 98 Disney Stores
in the U.S. The press release didn't list those stores.

Home Depot store closings(E. Brunswick, Rt 18 just put up their closing
sign)
ATLANTA - Nearly 7+ months after its chief executive said there were no
plans to cut the number of its core retail stores, The Home Depot Inc.
announced Thursday that it is shuttering 15 of them amid a slumping U.S.
economy and housing market. The move will affect 1,300 employees. It is the
first time the world's largest home improvement store chain has ever closed
a flagship store for performance reasons. Its shares rose almost 5 percent.
The Atlanta-based company said the underperforming U. S. stores being closed
represent less than 1 percent of its existing stores. They will be shuttered
within the next two months.

CompUSA (CLOSED)clarifies details on store closings Any extended
warranties purchased for products through CompUSA will be honored by a
third-party provider, Assurant Solutions. Gift cards, rain checks, and
rebates purchased prior to December 12 can be redeemed at any time during
the final sale. For those who have a gadget currently in for service with
CompUSA, the repair will be completed and the gadget will be returned to
owners.
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9834177-7html
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8301-10784_3-9834177-7html>
<http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9834177-7.html
<https://mclmail.saic.com/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.news.com/
8301-10784_3-9834177-7.html> >

Macy's - 9 stores
Movie Gallery - 160 stores as part of reorganization plan to exit
bankruptcyThe video rental company plans to close 400 of 3,500 Movie
Gallery and Hollywood Video stores in addition to the 520 locations the
video rental chain closed last fall.

Pacific Sun wear - 153 Demo stores

Pep Boys - 33 stores

Sprint Nextel - 125 retail locations new Sprint Nextel CEO Dan Hesse
appears to have inherited a company bleeding subscribers by the
thousands, and will now officially be dropping the ax on 4,000 employees and
125 retail locations. Amid the loss of 639,000 postpaid customers in the
fourth quarter, Sprint will be cutting a total of 6.7% of it's work force
(following the 5,000 layoffs last year) and 8% of company-owned
brick-and-mortar stores, while remaining mute on other rumors that it will
consolidate its headquarters in Kansas . Sprint Nextel sharesare down $2.89,
or nearly 25%, at the time of this writing.

J. C. Penney, Lowe's and Office Depot are scaling back

Ethan Allen Interiors: The company announced plans to close 12 of 300 +
stores in an effort to cut costs.

Wilsons the Leather Experts - 158 stores

Pacific Sun wear will close its 154 Demo stores after a review of
strategic alternatives for the urban-apparel brand. Seventy-four
underperforming Demo stores closed last May.

Sharper Image: The company recently filed for bankruptcy protection and
announced that 90 of its 184 stores are closing. The retailer will still
operate 94 stores to pay off debts, but 90 of these stores have performed
poorly and also may close.

Bombay Company: (Freehold Mall store closed)The company unveiled plans to
close all 384 U.S.-based Bombay Company stores. The company's online
storefront has discontinued operations.

KB Toys posted a list of 356 stores that it is closing around the United
states as part of its bankruptcy reorganization. To see the list of store
closings, go to the KB Toys Information web site, and click on Press
information

Dillard's to Close More Stores
Dillard's Inc. said it will continue to focus on closing under
performing stores, reducing expenses and improving its merchandise in 2008.
At the company's annual shareholder meeting, CEO William Dillard II said the
company will close another six underperforming stores this year.

SOURCE: http://money.aol.com/special/retail-stores-closing-doors

Hello!

Hey out there!

Common Sense: It's Official--"Everything That Glitters Ain't Gold"

Thanks, Felicia for this article below.

I know many of you have read similar articles to the one below, but I'm sticking it here anyway as more common sense to chew on while we sit on this 'front porch.' It really brings back to me warnings from my childhood on the porch when one of the older folks would tell a story about something and the moral of the story would be a warning about the dangers of picking up glittery things.

This brings me to a topic that comes up sometimes when I talk to my black male cousin about Hip Hop's influence on African American culture. He always points out that obviously, there was something critically missing from black culture prior to Hip Hop because if not, Hip Hop could not have so easily hi-jacked it.

He and I always quickly come to the conclusion that lacking a solid cultural core, the fledgling African American culture devised to resist obliteration by slavery and Jim Crow that African Americans had pieced together was very fragile, and subject to he shaken apart easily. As soon as weary African Americans relaxed a bit--with integration--Hip Hop came along and savaged the culture. If it hadn't been Hip Hop, other forces would have invaded it. There were too many empty spaces in it and it had no solid immunity to invaders.

My cousin who I really consider quite brilliant made the startling point to me about a month ago that though African Americans fought for integration which to many of them meant "equal access" to all that other Americans could access and enjoy in the U.S., they never considered the downside of integration: that they'd lose control over the morals, values, ideals, behaviors, dreams, etc. of their progeny.

Even the solidly-grounded folks who sat on the porch would not have been able to fight off the Hip Hop behemoth that swept through black life in urban areas. So in the case of integration, even the folks on my grandmother's porch embraced the glittery gold of integration that in some critical ways has turned out to be a Trojan horse. Hip Hop was just one of many predators that hid inside of integration's Trojan belly.

Here's the article. Be sure to read many of the insightful comments that follow it.

_____________________________

Black Culture Beyond Hip-Hop
By Thomas Chatterton Williams
Monday, May 28, 2007; A17

Over the past three decades black culture has grown so conflated with hip-hop culture that for most Americans under the age of 45, hip-hop culture is black culture. Except that it's not.

During the controversy over Don Imus's comments this spring, the radio host was pilloried for using the same sexist language that is condoned, if not celebrated, in hip-hop music and culture. As the scandal evolved, some critics, including the Rev. Al Sharpton and the NAACP, shifted their attention to the rap industry. Indeed, every couple of years, it seems, we ask ourselves: Is hip-hop poisonous? Is it misogynistic, violent and nihilistic? What kind of message is it sending? But what critics consistently fail to emphasize in these sporadic storms of opprobrium, as most did during the Imus affair, is that the stakes transcend hip-hop: Black culture itself is in trouble.

Born in the projects of the South Bronx, tweaked to its gangsta form in the 'hoods of South Central Los Angeles and dumbed down unconscionably in the ghettos of the "Dirty South" (the original Confederate states, minus Missouri and Kentucky), there are no two ways about it -- hip-hop culture is not black culture, it's black street culture. Despite 40 years of progress since the civil rights movement, in the hip-hop era -- from the late 1970s onward -- black America, uniquely, began receiving its values, aesthetic sensibility and self-image almost entirely from the street up.

This is a major departure for blacks, who traditionally saw cultivation as a key to equality. Think of the days when W.E.B. Du Bois "[sat] with Shakespeare" and moved "arm in arm with Balzac"; or when Ralph Ellison waxed universal and spoke of the need "to extend one's humanity and one's knowledge of human life."

The historian Paul Fussell notes that for most Americans, it is difficult to "class sink." Try to imagine the Chinese American son of oncologists -- living in, say, a New York suburb such as Westchester, attending private school -- who feels subconsciously compelled to model his life, even if only superficially, on that of a Chinese mafioso dealing heroin on the Lower East Side. The cultural pressure for a middle-class Chinese American to walk, talk and act like a lower-class thug from Chinatown is nil. The same can be said of Jews, or of any other ethnic group. But in black America the folly is so commonplace it fails to attract serious attention. Like neurotics obsessed with amputating their own healthy limbs, middle-class blacks concerned with "keeping it real" are engaging in gratuitously self-destructive and violently masochistic behavior.

Sociologists have a term for this pathological facet of black life. It's called "cool-pose culture." Whatever the nomenclature, "cool pose" or keeping it real or something else entirely, this peculiar aspect of the contemporary black experience -- the inverted-pyramid hierarchy of values stemming from the glorification of lower-class reality in the hip-hop era -- has quietly taken the place of white racism as the most formidable obstacle to success and equality in the black middle classes.

As John H. McWhorter emphasizes in his book "Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America," "forty years after the Civil Rights Act, African-American students on the average are the weakest in the United States, at all ages, in all subjects, and regardless of class level." Reading and math proficiency test results consistently show this. Clearly, this nostalgie de la boue, this longing for the mud, exacts a hefty price.

A 2005 study by Roland G. Fryer of Harvard University crystallizes the point: While there is scarce dissimilarity in popularity levels among low-achieving students, black or white, Fryer finds that "when a student achieves a 2.5 GPA, clear differences start to emerge." At 3.5 and above, black students "tend to have fewer and fewer friends," even as their high-achieving white peers "are at the top of the popularity pyramid." With such pressure to be real, to not "act white," is it any wonder that the African American high school graduation rate has stagnated at 70 percent for the past three decades?

Until black culture as a whole is effectively disentangled from the python-grip of hip-hop, and by extension the street, we are not going to see any real progress.

SOURCE: Washington Post Article

Common Sense: Marrying Well

This Article was sent by Sloane (blog researcher) and I responded to her with the following:

Yes, Sloane and THANK YOU! Interesting. This is a version of women "marrying well." It's particularly interesting because these women are ENCOURAGED to marry well. Their famililes are not concerned about da po Vietanmese men from their village or any kind of group "loyalty." It's just common sense to want to survive AND thrive. In many instances, I'm sure these women grow to care deeply for their foreign husbands who provide for them and their families so well. As I always say, you can love a man of means as easily as a po man, so why not love a man of means? This is definitely common sense, but the way it's presented in some pockets of the bc is as if a man who is a good provider and protector is UNLOVABLE. To hear some black people talk, it's as if a bw should almost be suspicious of a truly good man because you'll hear some folks say, "Well, you know what they say about 'm when they're too good to be true?" LOL!! If you listen to some of them, you'll be thinking that a lovable, loving, suitable, compatible Quality man is somehow hiding something. LOL!!!!!

ALL groups of women try to "marry well" because they are both taught and ENCOURAGED and applauded for marrying well by their group. This occurs in EVERY culture and group aside from AAs.

Well here's the AP Article.
__________________________

Vietnamese women wed foreigners to help family By BEN STOCKING, Associated Press Writer
Sun Aug 10, 1:19 PM ET

Nearly 70 young Vietnamese women swept past in groups of five, twirling and posing like fashion models, all competing for the hand of a Taiwanese man who had paid a matchmaking service about $6,000 for the privilege of marrying one of them.

Sporting jeans and a black T-shirt, 20-year-old Le Thi Ngoc Quyen paraded in front of the stranger, hoping he would select her.

"I felt very nervous," she recalled recently as she described the scene. "But he chose me, and I agreed to marry him right away."

Like many women from the Mekong Delta island of Tan Loc, Quyen had concluded that finding a foreign husband was her best route out of poverty. Six years later, she has a beautiful daughter and no regrets.

From the delta in Vietnam's south to small rural towns in the north, a growing number of young Vietnamese women are marrying foreigners, mostly from Taiwan and South Korea. They seek material comfort and, most important, a way to save their parents from destitution in old age, which many Vietnamese consider their greatest duty.

Quyen has not gotten rich — her husband earns a modest living as a construction worker — but the couple have paid off her father's debts.

Young women have become Tan Loc's most lucrative export. Roughly 1,500 village women from the island of 33,000 people have married foreigners in the past decade, leading some to call it Taiwan Island.

Women in Tan Loc and other delta towns began marrying foreigners in the 1990s, when Vietnam opened up economically and many Taiwanese and South Korean firms set up operations in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam's southern business hub.

Poverty and the close proximity of foreign businessmen seem to be major reasons for the trend. The biggest complaints come from women's groups, who consider it demeaning, and from young village men for whom the pool of potential brides is shrinking.

With money from foreign sons-in-law, many residents in Tan Loc have replaced their thatch-roof shacks with brick homes. They have also opened small restaurants and shops, creating jobs in a place where people have traditionally earned pennies a day picking rice and other crops in the blistering sun.

The luckier families received enough to build ponds for fish farming.

Western Union has opened a branch to handle the money sent by newlyweds.

"At least 20 percent of the families on the island have been lifted out of poverty," said Phan An, a university professor who has done extensive research in Tan Loc. "There has been a significant economic impact."

Not all the marriages work out, of course.

Dam Psi Kin Sa went to Taiwan nine years ago, at the age of 20, and married a Taiwanese car wash owner more than twice her age who had been divorced three times. She met him through a matchmaking service.

Five years later, her husband demanded a divorce and locked her out of the house. Even though she had learned his language, Mandarin Chinese, the couple had trouble communicating. "We were angry at each other in a quiet way," she said in Taipei, where she has remained to be close to her daughter.

Over the past year, one Vietnamese bride was beaten to death by her South Korean husband, another jumped out a 14th-story window and a third hanged herself on Valentine's Day, leaving behind a diary full of misery.

"A marriage that is not based on love often brings problems," said Hoang Thi Thanh Ha of the Vietnam Women's Union. "How can you live happily ever after when you met your husband three weeks before the wedding?"

Nevertheless, most young women in Tan Loc seem eager to marry a foreigner. Le Thanh Lang recently went to the town hall to get papers confirming she is single and eligible to marry.

"Any country will do, I'll take anyone who will accept me," she said, waving the papers. "I need to send money to my parents."

Besides the marriage broker's fee, the groom gives about $300 to his bride's family, Lang said. After that, if all goes well, her husband may send up to several thousand dollars a year to her family — depending on what he can afford.

Many Tan Loc families with married daughters abroad have big homes with color TVs, new furniture and karaoke machines.

Their neighbors live in huts.

Tran Thi Sach's concrete home, with four large rooms and shiny green tile floors, is a mansion by island standards.

"Since my daughters got married, I've retired," said Sach, 59, who used to toil in the rice fields with her husband.

"We lived in a shack," she said. "We had to work no matter how hot it was, no matter how much it rained, from 5 in the morning until 5 in the afternoon. Sometimes we could only afford rice porridge."

When her daughter Tho first said she planned to go to a marriage broker, Sach objected. What if her in-laws abused her? Where would she turn for help?

Tho married six years ago, and her younger sister Loi two years later.

"Their husbands are gentle, handsome and hardworking," Sach said. "They are really fine men."

Next door, Nguyen Thi Chin lives in a two-room shack with the roof so leaky that when it rains she must move from spot to spot to avoid getting wet. Each of her seven children married a Vietnamese, all of them poor. At 70, she is still working, pulling mussels from the muck in the Mekong River.

"I could never have a house like that," Chin said, glancing next door. "It's my destiny to be poor. If I had another daughter, I'd ask her to marry a foreigner."

More than 100,000 Vietnamese women have married Taiwanese men over the last 10 years and the numbers are rising, said Gow Wei Chiou of the Taiwan representative office in Hanoi. In the same period, roughly 28,000 Korean men married Vietnamese, according to the Vietnam Women's Union.

As more Taiwanese and Korean women move to cities to work, many men in those countries, especially those from rural areas, face increasing difficulty finding wives, said Chiou.

"Taiwanese women want to get married when they are much older, and they are also very opinionated," said Lin Wen-jui, 39, who met his Vietnamese wife through a Taiwanese friend in Ho Chi Minh City. She has since taken a Taiwanese name, learned Mandarin and opened a restaurant.

The overseas marriage trend has been boosted by online matchmaking services such as the Singapore-based Mr. Cupid, which offers a "comprehensive Vietnamese marriage package" and five-day matchmaking tours. "No one ever came on our trip without finding their dream bride," the site boasts.

In 2002, not long after Quyen went through her paces for her Taiwanese future husband, the Vietnam government outlawed commercial matchmaking services. Vietnamese media were reporting the phenomenon in vivid detail, and authorities said they were concerned that the business could be a cover for trafficking women into prostitution.

"They take hundreds of women at a time to a hotel and line them up for the men," said Nguyen Thi Ngoc Hanh, vice chairwoman of the Ho Chi Minh City Women's Union, a government agency that supports women. "It's very disrespectful."

But although driven underground, the practice continues, abetted by village matchmakers and secluded meetings with suitors.

Half the brides in such marriages are under 21, half the grooms between 40 and 60.

"Sometimes the men ask them to pose naked," Nguyen said "It's inhumane."

Quyen still has vivid memories of going to the matchmaker's house in Ho Chi Minh City, a 120-mile bus ride and a world away from Tan Loc.

"I was scared," she said.

Quyen made the final five. Speaking through an interpreter, the man asked a few simple questions: How many brothers and sisters do you have? How far did you go in school?

They had dinner and Quyen agreed to marry him on the spot.

"My life in Taiwan is good," she said during a visit to Tan Loc. "My husband and his family treat me well."

Life is not so good, however, for the young men in Tan Loc who watch the exodus of marriage-aged women with despair.

"If all the girls leave," said Nguyen Hoang Mong, 19. "there won't be anyone left for us. Marriage shouldn't be about money. It should be about love."

___

Associated Press writers Vu Tien Hong in Hanoi and Debby Wu in Taipei contributed to this report

___________________________________________

Wow! I've highlighted (in red) the last statement because it's the same argument that so many folks throw out at bw who marry non-bm as if it's just not possible to love a wonderful non-bm.

And as the saying goes: "Money may not always make you happy, but poverty usually causes misery."

This is just why black women must use their COMMON SENSE. I just love it how those Vietnamese women are using theirs and not listening to those naysayers. LOL! But look at how much support they're getting! If AA women were to do that here, many would be called prostitutes! Other groups of women here do it all the time and no one says anything because other groups of women are EXPECTED to 'marry well.'

In the community that I grew up in, women of a certain caliber (those raised with middle-class values--not money) who married well were applauded, and the ones who didn't were considered less than intelligent. If I had married a lower-echelons man, my grandmother, for sure, would have gone into mourning. I know this sounds almost like science fiction to some bw because I've talked with some AA women in my offline life who go ga-ga when I tell them these things. LOL! But there are still pockets of black America who have these values. They just don't talk about it because other AAs will call them snobbish or accuse them of *gasp* "acting white."

Common Sense: Mystification and Magical Thinking--Same Thing

This piece below is from blog researcher KR. Thank YOU!!

Frantz Fanon is one of my all-time favorite authors. He predicted much of what we're seeing now because most of what we see now has happened before. Life is cyclical. History repeats itself. There are no new games; just new players, but many new players have learned the rules from previous players. Have you learned the rules of life from a previous player--one who played and came out on top? If not, you're at a disadvantage. It doesn't mean that you can't learn, but I'm just making that point.

Provocative reading here. Sistas, PLEASE do some critical thinking and think things out in entirety. Don't stop thinking just because your thoughts make you uncomfortable. If you stop thinking about something just because it makes you uncomfortable, that's when you lapse into magical thinking land, mystified. Just because you've stopped thinking does NOT mean that other people have stopped thinking. Don't think that everything that's happening is happening just by chance. Many (not all) things that are happening to you are happening because they're being orchestrated, but YOU are cooperating.

For ex. some of the BW-IR blogs continue to be infiltrated by trolls. Sometimes, it's only one troll and sometimes several. They always have an agenda. They use different tactics, but usually, there's a decoy. I have noticed how the bw who comment on these blogs fuss and fret about these trolls, but they rarely stop talking to them. They talk to the trolls! With the cooperation of these bw, the trolls are able to implement their agenda and spread lots of poisonous progaganda about black women on these blogs that are supposedly supportive of black women. This is the perfect place to drop the poison because these blogs are the least likely place to be expected to be poisoned. Also other people who read the comments will be more likely to accept the "validity" of the trolls comments and numerous "facts" and scads of negative statistical findings about bw because otherwise why would the blog owners allow the troll to put their droppings there.

I don't know why sites that are supposedly bw-friendly allow trolls to poison the atmosphere for bw, except I guess they don't think that the trolls have a malevolent agenda. Many people don't like to think that other people are that evil. This is why serial killers succeed. This is how Pol Pot succeeded in Cambodia with his "Killing Fields." No one could quite grasp until after they saw the gazillion of skulls that such a mild mannered little man was evil.

Anyway, trolls have been trying hard to lay their droppings on my blogs since I've started allowing comments again. They pretend to be all kinds of people--men and women of various races and backgrounds. They have been so successful on other sites until they keep trying. I have a LONG list of comments from trolls just sitting there. Some of them are skillful, but not quite good enough. LOL! They will NOT be posted because as soon as they start sounding like trolls, I know they're trolls. I can easily tell a troll by what s/he writes. So they'll leave me alone for a while and crawl somewhere else, but I know they're always lurking. LOL!!!

Anyway . . . without further adieu, here's the article that KR sent.

____________________________________________________________
7th January 2008
Michael Baisden and The Mystification of the Negro

As Angolan Liberation writer Frantz Fanon teaches in the Wretched of the Earth; Black folk are easily mystified.

One of the definitions of mystified as give by WordNet® 3.0 is: the activity of obscuring people’s understanding, leaving them baffled or bewildered

Socio-cultural mystification:
Mystification is the process of masking or covering up central aspects of society or of social relationships. Conflict or critical theorists are interested in the ways in which forms of social domination based on sex, class or colonialism are camouflaged so that these social structures, and the state which assists in their reproduction, are seen as legitimate.
Mystification allows for domination that is not based on evident coercion or force, but is maintained by a wide variety of social institutions and cultural values.
One of the great examples of mystification in history is how Hitler was able to mentally and emotionally seduce the whole of the German nation with emphatic claims, appeals and challenges to national loyalty, and the use of the “Big Lie”.

I did a post a while back on Michael Baisden’s scurrilous and unscrupulous attack on renowned grassroots organizers Color of Change and it’s founder and President James Rukur; who led the way in the Jena 6 fight long before Baiseden even knew there was a Jena.

After having laid out the evidence of the lie that Baisden had perpetrated against these folks I (and george cook of http://www.letstalkhonestly.com/ said he received many of the same) received comments from Negroes saying things such as the following: that I and the bloggosphere should stop “attacking” Baisden (that’s right, correcting a lie is an attack), and that I should just cut the brotha some slack just because he’s not perfect. As if it requires perfection to not lie on somebody.

Why am I using the word Negro instead of Black; because this is Negroe thinking, i.e. thought that is the result of the MisEdcuation that Carter G. Woodson so eloquently and aptly wrote of 7 decades ago. Its thinking that results from bamboozling the Black man, and turning him into a Negro. A Negro in this lexicon being a Black person who has accepted a white supremist paradigmatic way of thinking, fed to him for the purpose of creating a Black person who will operate in a way that benefits the white power class.
It’s only a diminished thought process that has caused Black people to routinely fall in love with anybody who presents any pretense of being down with us, no matter what their actions show.

It’s not that other groups don’t get mystified; its that Blacks as a group become mystified so easily and so often; and almost without fail this happens repeatedly. So now even if he’s proven to be a lying, cheating, hustling, charlatan, slanderer; we don’t care, because he’s our lying, cheating, hustling, charlatan, slanderer. And because he did one good thing, it automatically absolves him of all bad things he may do; serving as an eternal blank check to do anything detrimental he wants, and we’ll stand beside him as long as he feeds us what we want to hear - the nice and easy.

The mystification though does wear off if one we loves challenges us as opposed to constantly feeding our ego and sense of victim-hood; as can be seen in the case of Bill Cosby. And I don’t use the terminology victim-hood lightly, as to say that blacks have not been clearly targeted for victimization; but some have the notion that we have no control over our own destiny or can make no changes for ourselves, and that our fate lies soley in the hands of the white man saving us.

Cosby being one of the more socially and culturally active artist in the entertainment world, post civil rights era; a man who supported Black colleges relentlessly and worked on to uplift his people through imploring (and funding) education and by working in his field of work to help them develop better images of themselves; is now a sellout for basically saying we can do better. Never mind that his urging is substantively no different than the chiding of the Black community by the likes of Marcus Garvey and Malcolm X against the moral degradation in the Black community, and for our need to rid ourselves of so much vice as part of the struggle; and of our need of self-reliance.

In one of his seminal speeches, The Bullet or The Ballot, Malcolm X says the following:
“I don’t believe in fighting today in any one front, but on all fronts. In fact I’m a Black Nationalist Freedom Fighter. Islam is my religion, but I believe my religion is my personal business…. The economic philosophy of Black Nationalism only means that we should own and operate and control the economy of our community…

“This government has failed us, the government itself has failed us. The white liberals, who have been posing as our friends, have failed us. Once we see that all these other sources to which we’ve turned have failed, we stop turning to them and turn to ourselves. We need a self-help program, a do it yourself philosophy, a do it right now philosophy, an it’s already too late philosophy. This is what you and I need to get with… Black Nationalism is a self-help philosophy… this is a philosophy that eliminates the necessity for division and argument.”
Carter G. Woodson, who along with authoring the seminal MisEducation of the Negro, was also the inventor of Black History week, which would later become Black History Month; in the previously referenced book makes an issue of moral fortitude and the necessity ridding ourselves of such pervasive vice as part of the struggle – that moral character is a part of the struggle. And he didn’t say we need more money from the government to make that happen. While the book as a whole is about the systematic means in which the oppressor has gone about bewildering the Black masses with false knowledge and a false self-image, he still writes of the internal part of the struggle that’s about what we do for ourselves.

But the moment Cosby stepped out of line with the Black ‘perpetual victim police’; he was cast down in an instant and branded a sellout. He focuses too much on personal responsibility, says Michael Erik Dyson and others; funny, he doesn’t focus on it any more than Carter G. Woodson, Marcus Garvey, and Malcolm X routinely did as a matter of course. I guess they’re sellouts too.

My point is not to hail Cosby in some light of perfection, I have some problems with him myself (though I think he’s more right than wrong, just takes too many liberties with language); but my point is to make a comparison.

The comparison being, as long as we are not challenged by someone, we’ll love anyone who pretends to be down for us or our cause for even five seconds, never mind that he/she may prove time and time again that they’re not. Once we have it in our mind, and a flowery feeling in our gut, said person can do no wrong; except challenge us.

Lie to us, cheat us, steal from us, abandon us; fine, just don’t challenge us.

Look at former D.C. Mayor Marion Berry. Crooked as an 80 year olds arthritic finger, but because he gave some black folks some summer jobs way back when; our community decided we didn’t care if he ran the city where we lived into the ground and stood as a poor representation of us. And what’s sad is that this is absolutely typical and played out throughout the United States, from Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatric to your local councilmen where every you live; we’ve got sellouts and criminal negroes who get elected again and again who haven’t done anything positive for our community since before cable television; or for every one positive thing they do to keep us loving them; they have 5 side deals going selling us out, and or are committing crimes to stuff their own pockets at the people’s expense. Hell, as far as I can tell Kwame never did any good; he was just the golden boy and Black folk became mystified just cause.

Jesse Jackson walked beside Martin Luther King 45 years ago and registered a lot of Black folks to vote 25 years ago, so never mind that he’s been robbing Black folks blind ever since and pimping our struggle for his own personal gain. He gave a great speech at the Democratic National Convention, so why worry about the dagger in his left hand.

We chinned and grinned over Bill Clinton for the whole 8 years of his presidency and beyond; but what did he actually do for Black people besides entertain us with his saxophone play on the Arsenio Hall Show and give some good southern Baptist preacher speeches where he spewed some nice empty rhetoric?

As Bill Bradley pointed out while debating Al Gore at the NAACP during the 2000 presidential primaries, if Al wanted to do something about racial profiling on the interstates all he had to do was walk down the hall to his boss.

And what did his boss do about racial profiling for 8 years; he appointed a blue ribbon panel to study the issue for a year (classic stonewalling tactic) then did nothing with the results; when a simple stroke of the president’s pen could have virtually ended the practice on federal interstates – no legislation needed.

So Bill gave some Black people some positions in his cabinet, great, George W. Bush 2-uped him giving Black people even higher positions; so what does that mean?

I mean, it’s not to say that Bill didn’t have any policies beneficial to Black folks as a whole; but this pretense that he went above and beyond the pale, or that he’s so wonderful to us that we owe him some allegiance and wonder as some great benefactor; is ridiculous and completely without merit.

He’s called the ‘first Black president by Black people’ because of all the negative stuff he did (smoke weed, give a pimp-dified pulpit speeches, and get head under a desk) which shows what Black folks who call him that think of their own people — MisEducated
Negroes to the core!

Other interesting reading on Frantz Fanon

SOURCE: http://www.blackperspective.net/index.php/michael-baisden-and-the-mystification-of-the-negro/