Black Love

February. This month carries two big labels of significance, three of you count my birthday. This is the month of love due to Valentine’s Day and it’s also Black History Month. Be that as it is I felt like both occasions made this as good a time as any to talk about something that I as an African American feel my community could definitely use a little more of during this time: love.

Are you Black? Maybe, maybe not. If not, there’s a good chance that you have some friends or acquaintances that are Black, so it’s a high probability that you’ve scrolled through your social media and has seen someone speak on “Black Love”. What exactly is Black Love? The answer is fairly simple: it is the love that we as Black people have for each other, or at least should have for each other.

As a young Black male I understand that Black love has always been around, but I also understand that Black has always been in jeopardy because of the internal strife that plagues our community. What exactly are the factors that have been hindering the growth of Black love? Honestly that’ll take forever to break down, so let’s just highlight the biggies.

Going all the way back to the time of ancient Africa the tribes of our ancestry warred with each other and fast forward to the centuries of our captivity during slavery we were taught to hate each other and were conditioned to aim at one another’s throats ever since we got off the plantation.

How does this in fighting play out? We see each other on the street and we automatically exude energy of hostility. It’s like our first instinct is to throw animosity at one another. In the professional world we’re always throwing two faced, back biting work place melodrama towards our fellow Black peers. The unfortunate crowning jewel on this mountain of blood diamonds is our broken relationships.

I wouldn’t be lying if I said that the relationship drama is one of the main issues that strikes the biggest nerves with me. Every day on social media I always see a lot of Black men going on about how Black women are the worse thing ever. This is accompanied by a lot Black women going on about how Black men are the worse thing ever. The truth is neither one of us are the worse things ever. We just keep picking the wrong bad eggs of the bunch and as a result, we blame the whole bunch.

The truth is both Black men and women need each other. The progression of our community is dependent on our healthy co-existence. At heart, Black women and men both are amazing. We gotta stop labeling our respective genders as damaged goods because we keeping the wrong partners. Yes, everyone isn’t a good catch, but everyone of us isn’t a bad catch either. The sooner we figure this and stop punishing our undeserving brothers and sisters, the chance of a better future we will have got our children.

Back in January of 2020 I started my semester at the University of North Carolina in Greensboro where I began my first semester in media studies. On my first day I got lost looking for the building my class was in. While I was running around like chicken with his head cut off trying to find the right place I ran into this other young Black male like myself, his name was John and he too was struggling to find his class. After he acknowledged me and the fact that we were both lost trying to make it to the right place he went in the opposite direction then turned back to ask me my name.

When I told him my name was Joe he said “what’s up Joe, my name is John” after I told him it was good to meet him he wished me good luck on my first semester. Now while anyone would just consider this a common courtesy good farewell, I personally saw something in his eyes from one Black male to another. What I saw was one of my brothers whom I had never met telling me that he was rooting for me to do good. We both understood that we were standing on the doorstep of a great opportunity and we were determined to make the best of it by supporting each other.

This kind of unconditional love was once prominent, but has started to dwindle in our community and the only way we can fix it is if we put aside our pride and our egos. We need to restore a healthy sense of love in the Black community.

Black love means we root for each other. Black love means we won’t be afraid to let each other fly. Black love means we care about each other unconditionally. Black love means we make peace with our relational discord so that we can build a healthy future for our children. Last but not least, Black love means we look into the mirror and we love ourselves first and foremost because loving ourselves means we will have the capacity to love everyone else equally when we do.

This Black History Month we have to work on healing Black love.