(Akiit.com) Poor Chris Brown.
Poor Rihanna.
The only people who know what really happened between them are those two people, yet, the entire nation is spinning a multitude of tales and using each of them to represent whatever story they want told.
For those against domestic violence, Chris Brown now represents the violent abuser of women.
Only time will tell if he will be able to rise above that label. We’ve seen others who never represented anything else.
Tina Turner told one side of a story to the world and to his dying day, no matter what poor Ike Turner ever said, he remained the universal icon for woman beating, crossing all racial lines.
Who in the hell ever wanted to hear his story anyway? Damn the statistics that point to white Americans as the most prolific woman beaters–an African American is the face of woman beating.
And, to this day, no one but two dead people, God and O.J. Simpson can be certain of his status as a murderer, yet he has become the universal icon for wife murdering.
Dead-brained morons will argue to the teeth that he is guilty and the phrase “He OJ-ed her†has become a part of the worldwide lexicon for murdering wives even though he was found “Not Guilty.” No one is using the phrase “He Robert Blake-d her,” even though that man was on the scene of his wife’s murder with a gun in his possession.
Quick—name five more Black men who have even been accused of murdering their wives. Perhaps you can, perhaps you can not, but the point is that there are very few, yet, O.J.’s name comes up first when people speak of murdering wives.
To add to the silliness, his trial was somehow dubbed the “Trial of the Century,†even though other higher profile white men were tried for spousal abuse or murder.
Michael Jackson has as many people who think he is a child molester as people who think he is innocent. But even though he was found “Not Guilty†in a court of law, his reputation was so decimated that he moved out of the country and now lives across the globe.
For all the average white fathers, uncles and depraved child stalkers who have committed crimes against children proven with hard core evidence, how did a Black man become the universal representation for child molestation with flimsy evidence? And do I need to mention the priests who should be the real universal representation for child abusers?
Everyone and his mother claims to have seen the infamous R. Kelly sex video, and so claim that they are convinced that he is guilty of statutory rape. Many want to convict him even though his dance within the legal system is pretty much over. And, now when people speak of a man dating underage girls, the man is referred to as “R. Kelly.â€
Director Roman Polanski (Rosemary’s Baby) admitted to unlawful sexual intercourse with a 13-year-old girl and fled to his native home of France to avoid prosecution. Neither that, nor the fact that director Woody Allen dated his own adopted daughter and then eventually married her, never incited the masses to refer to men dating underage girls as “Roman Planski,†or “Woody Allen.†A Black man is the universal representation for such behavior.
Statistics prove that there are actually more white women on Welfare than Black women. And, anyone who has looked at the real numbers understands clearly that the true Welfare Queens–those abusing the system–are mostly white women. Yet, when people speak of those who abuse Welfare, the image of a Black woman is conjured up.
Suge Knight is alleged to have cheated recording artists out of their royalties. Some say he even beat and intimidated many of them. He has become the physical manifestation of the cheating of music artists, even though there is a long laundry list of non-Blacks throughout the music industry’s history who have been accused of doing so.
Al Capone is the actual founder of the drive-by shooting. He and his notorious gang drove by their enemies’ homes, churches and businesses, shooting out of car windows or while hanging off of the car’s running boards.
In addition, whites are statistically the greater offenders where violent crimes are concerned and Blacks are most often the victims of violent crimes at the hands of whites. Yet, when people speak of the drive-by and gang violence, they speak of Black gangsters as though Blacks created both gangs and the drive-by.
AIDS began as a disease associated with white gay men, but today, ask many of us in the Black community and sadly, most of us will point to Black men as the purveyors of the deadly disease as though Black men are carrying the disease and spreading it to Black women with reckless abandon. Only conjecture, not science, can support such a reputation, yet, many talk about the “Down Low,†and the Black man as the harbinger of the disease as though the two go together like a hand in a glove.
How many of us can name a white butcher who places his thumb on the scale to cheat you when you buy meat, or a Korean store owner who sells substandard groceries, or a non-Black employer who talks to his employees like dogs? Yet, we ourselves run around talking about how horrible Black business owners are and their wretched business practices as though Blacks have cornered the market on cheating in business.
The point is that reputations for all things bad eventually seem to come to rest at the feet of Black people. The sad part is that many of us assist in bringing those reputations home, thinking the worst of ourselves and imagining that we are the worst of all bad things assigned to human behavior.
Of course, some of us are doing things that are despicable. But we are neither the sole offenders in any category nor the majority of the people who commit offenses in any area, yet we become the physical manifestation of those things.
We shouldn’t represent all things bad.
Written By Darryl James