Why Black Love is Eternal

I see a lot of weird stuff going on these days. Especially in the Black community. When I moved from the town of Boston, Massachusetts, to the city of Ottawa, Ontario, I was in for a shock. I knew Canada was different from the U.S. but I never thought the strangest folks in Canada would be my fellow Blacks. The name is Stephen Saint Preux and I approve this message. I'm a young Black man of Haitian descent currently living in Ottawa, Ontario. I attend Carleton University. I was born in Boston and I consider myself a proud Son of Bean Town. I miss it dearly these days, especially since Ottawa is turning out to be far less peaceful than I imagined.

Black folks in Canada mystify me, folks. They really do. The ones I meet in Ottawa are a weird bunch. And they don't like each other. Most Black Canadians I meet come from Continental Africa. Lots of Somalians, Djibouti, South Africans, Ghanaians, Ethiopians, Zimbabweans, Sudanese and so on. And they don't get along with Black folks from the Caribbean islands like the Jamaicans, Haitians and Trinidadians. I wish Black Canadians would get over their differences. There is a lot of racism at work in the capital region of Canada. Black Canadians should unite against the perils of discrimination rather than focus on their petty differences. Especially since they're seen as all the same in the eyes of the Powers That Be.

In Ottawa, I've lost count of how many Black men and Black women I've met with degrees from fine schools like Carleton University, the University of Ottawa and Algonquin College...who find themselves unemployed. They've got no criminal history for the most part. They've got good references. Why can't they get jobs? It's because of systemic discrimination. This is where Black Canadians and African-Americans differ. Black Canadians refuse to unite against those who wish their communities harm. Black lawyers in Canada don't support other Black lawyers. Black police officers don't band together. Neither do Black firefighters or Black teachers. So when the bigots come calling, each Black person in Canada is alone against the dark side. That's not right. That's not fair. Something should be done about this.

I think I know the source of Black Canadians lack of progress. They don't love themselves, or each other. Black ladies in America wear T-shirts that say "My Black is Beautiful". I've yet to see a single Black lady in the city of Ottawa with such a T-shirt on. Black women in Ottawa don't read positive Black magazines like Black Enterprise, Essence or Ebony. But they read magazines that cater to White women like Chatelaine. Wow. I like Black Canadian women. I just wish they loved themselves more. Black Canadian men seem programmed to chase only non-Black women. What the heck? I've seen Black men in America date interracially but in the city of Ottawa, Black men seem to only date women of other races, never Black women. What's wrong with these brothers? I don't get it. Black Canadian women are uniquely beautiful. I respect their strength, their beauty and their kindness. I wish Canadian society, and Black men, appreciated them more.

I have a deep abiding respect for Black women. I cannot thank them enough for standing by us Black men as we went through hell. And we still go through hell. For those Black guys out there who are obsessed with blonde-haired White chicks, they should really ask themselves who has had their back from day one. Seriously. Now, I'm not against interracial dating. I see both sides of it. I see a lot of Black men with White women. I also see quite a few Black women with White men. My only issue with Blacks who like to date interracially is that they often do it for all the wrong reasons. Lots of young Black men tell me they date White women because they find Black girls too hard to deal with. And lots of Black women who date White men tell me they think Black men are all a bunch of losers and they are dating up by going out with a White male. Wow. Hatred of your own race cannot be a good reason to date interracially. People with hatred in their heart often make lousy partners for men and women of any race.

I really wish more Black men saw Black women in the same light I do. Seriously. I was once wet at a bus stop in the city of Ottawa ( it was raining heavily ) and it's a young Black woman who offered to share her umbrella with me. I fell off a subway platform in New York City and a Black woman and her husband pulled me through. A Black female teacher named Miss Claire saved me from the waters of a raging river during a school field trip gone horribly wrong when I was much younger. And the list goes on. Black women do all kinds of things for Black men. My brothers, no one can love us more. Black women are the only human beings on the planet who don't switch sidewalks when they see Black men coming at night. You could be the thug brother, the college student or the hard-working brother in the business suit. White folks along with Asians, Arabs and Indians will look at you funny. And they will switch sidewalks. Or brace themselves for trouble. Black women don't see us as monsters. They see us as their brothers, fathers, grandfathers, cousins, friends and lovers. We should love them for this. Abandoning them for women of other races isn't right.

Black men's habit of exclusively chasing women of other races has gotten so extreme that Black women are starting to chase men of other races as if to prove a point. Now, I know lots of Black men genuinely fall in love with White women. And some Black women genuinely fall in love with White men. However, most of the others seem to date interracially out of frustration with members of the Black race. Newsflash to my Black men and Black women who date interracially out of anger at the Black race, you can't escape being Black just by having someone White as your girlfriend or boyfriend. Sorry to shatter your damn illusions. Someone's got to tell you the awful truth.

I recently sat on a bus and this pretty Black lady came in with this okay-looking White male. She was dressed professionally, and the White guy looked like a construction worker. I've got nothing against construction workers but let's just say they seemed mismatched. I thought all that but I kept it to myself. Three young White women sitting on the bus kept looking at the rugged White male construction worker holding hands with the pretty Black lady in the business suit. They started giggling and talking among themselves. I overheard the phrases "another case of jungle fever" and "damn that ghetto whore". That got me pissed. Now, as a Black man who loves Black women, I'm never exactly thrilled to see a pretty Black lady with some White guy. Especially since these Black women usually treat their White boyfriends like princes but treat well-meaning and caring Black men like dirt. However, I'm not going to stand by and let some racist White women insult a Black female. Even if she is one of those Black women who desert Black men for men of other races. She's still technically family.

The Black lady looked sad and angry that these racist young White women didn't approve of her relationship with the White guy. For his part, the White guy said nothing. If the racist remarks made by the White women bothered him, he didn't show it. He just kept smiling. Apparently, his Black girlfriend getting insulted by racist White women isn't something that gets him riled up as a White male. Oh, well. What kind of man is he? I stood up and told the racist White women where to stuff their bigotry. Someplace where the sun doesn't shine. They seemed surprised. Racist White folks in Canada are used to docile Black Canadians, not tough-talking Black Americans like me. The White chicks called me something I won't repeat here and left the bus. I sat down and smiled. Everybody on the bus looked at me silently. The White male with the Black girlfriend shot me a disgusted look. The Black woman looked at me with surprise in her eyes. I just smiled and got off at the next stop. Canadians are funny, man. They love to call the cops on a Black man when he stands up to racists. And the cops never side with him. I switched buses because I wanted to get home safe.

What did I learn from this interlude? What I've always known. I love Black women. Even those Black women who think all Black men are useless and worship White men as Knights in Shining Armour. Folks, I wish Black men loved Black women more. And I wish Black women could see that most Black men are trying hard to be the good men we know we can be. Not all of us are into White chicks. Most of us love Black women. Not all of us are thugs. Most of us are law-abiding individuals. We get a collective bum rap because of the mistakes made by a few brothers, that's all. I know many Black men will continue to chase White women like their lives depend on it. And it saddens me. Just like many Black women, fed up with Black men, are chasing White men like moths chase the proverbial flames. That's a sad state of the affairs. Seriously.

While clashes over interracial dating plague the Black communities of North America, what Black folks fought many centuries to achieve is threatened. In Europe, there is an anti-immigrant sentiment. Africans along with Arabs and Asians are the targets of populist hatred and xenophobia in many European countries. In the United States of America, anyone who isn't White is targeted by the anti-illegal immigration raids. In Canada, they're tightening the rules on immigration. Wow. It seems Caucasians worldwide feel threatened by people of color, especially Blacks, and they're trying to make life hard for all of us. In the State of Arizona, they're taking away Black History Month along with Martin Luther King Day. Maybe that doesn't bother Black women with White boyfriends/husbands or Black men with White wives/girlfriends but it bothers me.

I don't want to see Black History Month become a thing of the past. I don't want to see Martin Luther King Day taken away as a national holiday. I want what Black folks of past generations achieved to be celebrated. I want the Black community to survive. Sadly, Black men are deserting Black women to be with White women. Black women are dealing Black men a backlash by chasing White men like their lives depend on it. Meanwhile, civil rights of all Black folks in North America and abroad are threatened. Xenophobia is on the rise in Europe. Maybe Europeans and Americans will start rounding up immigrants who don't look White and herd them into camps like they did the Jews during the 1940s. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if those terrible things came to pass. Yet ordinary Black folks living in North America can't see that their very lives are in peril. They buy into the anti-Black propaganda that the White media is spreading. Black men shouldn't desert Black women. I didn't notice any White women dying at the hands of racist rednecks in America during footage shown of clashes between civil rights activists and racist White folks. Maybe because they don't love Black men enough to stand with them against racist White folks? Black men, let's not desert our sisters. Let's love them instead. Black women, remember that us Black men, though not perfect, suffered with you in the darkest of times. The Black goddess is the average Black man's standard of beauty, whether he acknowledges it or not. Case in point? Black men who date outside seek women with curvy bodies, large breasts and big butts. Special features commonly found in the Black community! See? Even when a Black man claims he isn't into Black women, he's seeking their equivalent but can't find it!

Folks, it's not secret that I have my doubts about the veracity of interracial love whether it's Black male/White female or Black female/White male. However, I know many of my brothers and sisters won't stop doing it. So, I've got a proposition for them. Test your White partner. Take him or her in a place where you will be confronted by racist White folks. Let them verbally or physically threaten you. Watch your White partner's reaction. Only then will know you if the White male or White female who claims to love you means it or not. Also, Black guys with White girlfriends who tolerate these White women's disparaging remarks about Black females should be ashamed of themselves. A White female with a Black boyfriend or Black husband who makes racist remarks about Black women isn't worth it. Likewise, Black women with White boyfriends or White husbands shouldn't tolerate them if they make racist remarks about Black men. Bigotry is bigotry. If they hate members of your race, then someday they will turn against you. You can't count on being the exception in a racist's book. Sorry.

Yeah, all the things I saw in Canada made me sick. And I was disgusted with the hatred Black folks had for their own race. I decided to fly solo and focus on school. I aced my classes at Carleton University. As a tall, good-looking Black man with an American accent, I stood out on campus. The Canadians were mystified by me. I kept my own company. I wasn't interested in anyone. I nurtured friendships with several Black men and Black women I thought were cool. To meet my criterion of coolness, they had to be smart, self-confident, and in relationships with Black individuals of the opposite sex. Otherwise they weren't worth knowing. Thus I befriended Lamar O'Neill, a tall Black man of Jamaican and Irish descent. He's an engineering student at Carleton University. And he's dating a gorgeous Ethiopian lady named Mara Mohammed, a business student at the University of Ottawa. Through them I met Eric Donkor, a young Black man from Ghana studying medicine at Carleton University and his lovely girlfriend Sierra Jones, a Black female student at York University hailing from North London, England. I loved my new friends. To me they represented the future of the Black communities of North America. Black men and Black women who were University-educated, ambitious and driven. And above all else, they loved their own. I respected and admired them. They had what I always wanted. What Barack Obama and Michelle have. What Will Smith and Jada have. Black Love.

Yeah, I loved hanging out with my new friends. They took me to the city of Toronto and I learned that I might have misjudged Black Canadians. Black folks in the city of Toronto hold their heads high. They're not meek or docile like Black folks in the city of Ottawa. And they remind me of my fellow African-Americans. Toronto is home to about two hundred thousand Black folks. Ottawa only has a few thousands. Black Torontonians work as police officers, firefighters, corporate executives and lawyers. Black residents of Ottawa wait tables and mop floors. What a difference in these two cities! It's in the city of Toronto that I met my future bride. The answer to my prayers. A tall, gorgeous and absolutely brilliant young Black woman named Magdalene Armand. Daughter of Haitian immigrants who've been in Toronto since the late 1970s. This sexy Black Canadian woman is one of the brightest students in the civil engineering program at the University of Toronto.

When I first laid eyes on Magdalene, she took my breath away. I had only dreamed of such a possibility. A Black whose beauty, poise, grace and intelligence made her seem like a goddess to me. What am I saying? She was a goddess! The daughter of Toronto Police Service officer James Armand and renowned psychiatrist and author Elisabeth Samson Armand. Two proud Canadians of Haitian origin. Wow. I was amazed. Folks, it was love at first sight. Luckily, Magdalene was smitten with me too. We fell in love. I worship the ground she walks on. She's so smart, beautiful and kind. A worldly young woman who's traveled to the Caribbean, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Brazil. Wow.

my Black goddess has seen much of the world, folks. And she is wise beyond her years because of it. That's who I began dating. And she was the love of my life. Six months after meeting Magdalene, I said goodbye to Ottawa forever and moved to the city of Toronto. I'm now a student of the University of Toronto, on the same campus as my darling Magdalene. We're engaged and we're getting hitched as soon as we both graduate. See what I told you? Black Love is possible. And it's very real. My message to Black men and Black women everywhere is to never give up hope. We came into this world together, the most unique group among all human beings. We belong together. Black Love rocks! Let's love our own. Let's celebrate ourselves. And to hell with everyone else!