檳榔嶼

- The patriarchal idea that men should rule over women did not promote gender equity or love between black women and men. All too often heterosexual relationships based on sexist norms in black life were places where men felt satisfied and women dissatisfied.
- Every black woman I knew growing up dreamed of having a black male partner who would give her financial support and allow her to be a housewife.
- The economic realities of black heterosexual life are rarely given proper attention in our society, even though struggles over money are a primary reason couples divorce, irrespective of race.
  - One in three black folks lives in poverty - and half of all black children.
- Patriarchal thinking presents this news to the public as though it is not only natural for men to want to provide economically for the needs of others but equally natural for men to feel castrated and depressed if they are deprived of access to the jobs that would enable them to be providers.
  - While it is true that patriarchal socialization teaches men that their value lies with work and providing for others, it is also true that many men have long resisted this socialization.
  - Masses of men, many of them white, have high-paying jobs yet withhold financial support from wives and children. There men do not seem to feel at all "castrated" because they are failing to assume the provider role.
- Men who provide economically in heterosexual unions are much more likely to use this as a means of exerting power and control over others in the household.
- It was definitely a strategic move for white male patriarchs to scapegoat and blame black woemn, encouraging black males to do the same, because such thinking disrupted the bonds of solidarity that had been forged between black women and men working together to resist racism.
- Most working black women longed for a time when they would be able to rely on their men to be the sole providers. Many white women did not understand this, and when the contemporary feminist movement began, it hailed work as the key to liberation and labelled black women already liberated.
  - Working menial jobs where they were subjected to degradation and sexual harassment by racist  white employers did not enhance black women's self-esteem.
- Clearly, the widespread acceptance of the idea that black women were the "enemy" created more havoc in black life than any other idea.
  - Abbey Lincoln, <Who Will Revere the Black Woman> : "But strange as it is, I've heard it echoed by too many Black full-grown males that Black womanhood is the downfall of the Black man in that she (the Black woman) is 'evil', 'hard to get along with', 'domineering', 'suspicious', and 'narrow-minded'. In short, a black, ugly, evil you-know-what."
  - Lincoln called attention to the way in which this thinking justified sexist black male use of coercion and abuse as a means to subordinate and/or dominate black women. She identified the extent to which domestic violence and rape were becoming a norm in black life.
  - Kay Lindsay : "Those who are exerting their 'manhood' by tell Black women to step back into a domestic, submissive role are assuming a counter-revolutionary position. Black women likewise have been abused by the system and we must begin talking about the elimination of all kinds of oppression."
  - Toni Cade Bambara, <On the Issue of Roles> : "Invariably I hear from some dude that Black women must be supportive and patient so that Black men can regain their manhood. The notion of womanhood, they argue - and only if pressed to address themselves to the notion do they think of it or argue - is dependent on his defining his manhood ... And I wonder if the dudes who keep hollering about their lost balls realized that they probably surrendered them either to Mr. Charlie in the marketplace, trying to get that Eldorado, or to Miss Anne in bed, trying to bang out some sick notion of love and freedom. It seems to me that you find your Self in destroying illusions, smashing myths, laundering the head of whitewash, being responsible to some truth, to the struggle. That entails at the very least cracking through the venner of this sick society's definition of 'masculine' and 'feminine'" (台灣女性正面臨這個問題，當台灣男性控訴台灣女性"難搞" (OK，這同時也代表這些男人整天只想搞女人，而不是愛女人)，他們更多是在哭訴台灣女性的成就讓他們感覺被"去勢"。不知道這樣的想法影響了多少台灣男人，但可以肯定的是，擁抱這種父權思想的男人，即使有了台灣女性成為伴侶，他們或許會覺得自己比不少男人優越，也或許他們在關係裡多少會抱持著報復的心理。盡可能地在關係裡，去貶低、宰制女人。)
- In actuality, large numbers of sexist black women were as willing to embrace the notion that they should be more subordinate or at least act the part as were black men. (台灣女人也是如此)
- None of discussion on TV focused on the issue of love. It was all focused on the question of power; issues like whether black women were matriarchal and castrating, holding the black man back, ruled the day.
- By casting black females as the "enemy", black men were essentially stating that black women were not worthy of their love and regard. And underlying this insistence on black female unworthiness was the assumption that as long as black men could not be patriarchs they could not love themselves. (像那種炫耀別的國家的男人或女人有多好，想要引起別人羨慕、崇拜的，基本上都是持父權的觀點，想要去貶低當地的男女不值得愛。這樣子並沒有尊重自己的伴侶。透過一段關係來炫耀一些事情的，這個關係的出發點很難是為了愛，這裡頭也沒有愛。)
- In our patriarchal home, love for our father always took second place to our fear of him.
- While one can care for someone deeply and dominate them, it is impossible to truly love someone and dominate them. Love and domination are antithetical.
  - Rabbi Harold Kushner, <<When ALl You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough>> : "Love can be generated only between people who see themselves as equals, between people who can be mutually fulfilling to each other. When one commands and the other obeys, there can be loyalty and gratitude but not love."
    - Love and Power are not compatible : "You can love someone and give him the room and the right to be himself, or you can try to control him, to make him do your will whether for his own good or for the enhancement of your own ego. But you cannot do both at the same time."
- Today's popular lyrics express cynicism about love. Lust and struggles for power define the nature of black heterosexual romance.
  - Currently music videos and films created by black artists offer as problematic a vision of romantic heterosexual relationships as any vision created by mainstream white culture. Again and again black female bodies are objectified by a pornographic gaze. Black men are portrayed as desiring a woman solely on the basis of how she looks.
  - Physical appearance is important and no one can deny that it is a factor shaping desire, but when it is the sole or most important factor shaping desire, but when it is the sole or most important factor determining desire or partner choice, problems arise.
- In mass media relationships between black women and men are rarely based on shared communications.
- Can we imagine a charismatic black man never marrying again if his female partner died?
- Many black males share Malcolm X's fear of being controlled by a woman. This fear often stems from childhood experiences where mothers "smothered" their sons, using ties of affection to bind and control them.
- To please Mom, young black males often create a seductive false self which they use to manipulate and work around the domineering, controlling mother.
- Lots of black mothers are often afraid of losing their sons, and espectially of losing their power and influence over them. To protect and keep their bond primary, they may teach the male child from an early childhood to regard all other women negatively, to see them as destroying predators. This is emotional incest - and all incest is abusive.
  - Black males who are infantilized by overbearing mothers to try and meet their every need often expect all other women to do the same. These mama's boys may grow up to desire a woman who is just like "Mama".
- While her actions may represent a resistance to male domination, they are an affirmation of patriarchal lessons which teach everyone that the home must have a "ruler" - and usually that the one who pays the bills rules the roost.
- Black folks must begin to think of home and heterosexual relationships as locations where everyone's needs can be met, where there can be mutual understanding and satisfaction.
- Black men who embrace sexism believe it is the ability to dominate that makes them men; they choose power over love. That sexism continues to lead black males to classify black women as madonnas or whores.
  - The black female madonna is consistently portrayed as one who stands behind her man silently obeying his will or publicly pretending to do so, and satisfying his needs in private.
  - The whore is always portrayed as the woman who talks too much, too loudly, who talks back, a woman who has needs of her own and is not afraid to satisfy those needs.
- Male domination and individual self-hatred make it impossible for most black males and females to know love.
- In reality, patriarchal black households where women are subservient and the male is in charge, providing and protecting, are often loveless. Love cannot prevail when one person must suppress his or her subjectivity, desires, and feelings in order to please another one.
  - And even when this does not happen, patriarchal men often still feel dissatisfied, still feel an emotional lack. They may try to fulfill that lack by seeking relationships outside their primary home, creating an atmosphere of secrecy and mistrust that ultimately erodes intimacy.
- It's often difficult for the powerless to imagine that seemingly powerful men can be damaged by living in a state of emotional lack, but the truth remains that males become psychologically wounded when they embrace patriarchal notions of manhood that render them unable to express feelings. Men and women alike are often depressed in these settings.
- Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, <<This Life Together>> : "It occurred to us, from observation and from reasoning, that extra marital sex was not what really destroyed marriages, but rather the lies and deception that invariably accompanied it."
- Conventional patriarchal assumptions about the nature of masculine sexuality justified male sexual roaming. Within traditional sexist relationships and marriages, men were not expected to be faithful. Real men proved their maleness by not remaining faithful. A faithful man was often seen as "pussy whipped".
  - A real man would not share his feelings and thoughts or explain his actions to a woman.
  - Sexist thinking wanted a woman whose primary reason for living was meeting his needs, particularly sexual needs.
- Expecting open and honest communication - things that should be basic in a loving relationship were seen as unreasonable demands for a male.
- To ensure the future of black heterosexual relationships we need to stop the secrets and lies.
  - We need to talk openly about how black men and women relate, about ways class differences inform our attitudes about love, about the addiction to male domination that is strong among black men of all classes.
  - We need to create the cultural space to talk about the love relationships we have that are fulfilling and satisfying.
  - We can only decolonize our minds, let go of the images of lovelessness that daily bombard our psyches, by erasing those images and putting in their place representations of care and affection, of black women and men bound by everlasting ties of mutual love.