What Can We Learn?

Yesterday's $11.6 million verdict for Ms. Anucha Browne Sanders reminds us of the little progress we have made in reconciling the treatment of black women by black men. While we are busy pulling out the race card for every perceived instance of racism, we ignore the abusive nature of black men. Now, if you are a race baiter you will probably believe that Isiah Thomas' come-uppance was the work of "the man" hiding behind the angry black woman "hatin on a brotha." But if you have some kind of brain matter and actually know how to use it you will agree that it's something more insidious.



In 1968, in Memphis, picketers at a sanitation strike held signs that read, "I Am A Man." The signs came to signify the struggle of blacks working in horrible conditions but it also came to signify black masculinity as part of the civil rights movement. The I Am A Man idea help to blend race, gender and sexuality into the civil rights movement. Many years later the Million Man March in Washington DC struck a similar cord when thousands of black men descended on DC to forge a bond of brotherhood and to denounce evil whites. The March was also an opportunity to speak directly to black men and have them pledge to get their house in order by cleaning up their lives and rebuilding their neighborhoods. It was a day of unity, atonement and brotherhood. There were no women present. Twelve years later the latest figures show that 70 percent of black babies are born to single mothers.



What does any of this have to do with yesterday's verdict? Plenty, the verdict proves not only that Thomas was guilty of harassment but guilty of relegating black women to subservient roll. When Thomas did the double standard boogie claiming that its ok for black men to call black women bitch and ho he was guilty. When he was told not to hug Ms. Browne Sanders and stated, "Ok, cool," he was guilty. The moment he walked from the court to waiting reporters with that smirk on his face you knew the jury made the right decision. The moment he said, "I want to say as loud as I possibly can, I'm innocent, I'm very innocent," you knew he was guilty.



We did not hear from Louis Farrakhan today nor did we hear from other "black leaders" regarding the verdict because they are complicit in the treatment of black women. It is easier to blame the white man for the "lost lives of black men" but its about looking the other way when black women are left holding the bag. The ability to say in direct and honest words that black men need to start taking responsibility for their behavior is somehow lost because there is no march to attend. Yesterday's verdict should have sent a strong message to every black man who considers the hard working respectable woman in the next room who you have deemed a bitch and ho will make you wish you had indeed listened to your mother.