"Yo, my legs are tired, can you give me a ride across the bridge?"
I heard a voice from behind me while I was about to pump my gas. I had my head on a swivel because there had been a shooting there recently and I wasn't sure what was going on. I turned around and it was a young Black man, holding two bags. Let's call him Zaire. Zaire was asking me if I could give him a ride to this spot he was building up. I say building up, because he was homeless. I then asked him: "Why did you ask me for help?" I asked because I wasn't the only one at the gas station. Zaire replied: "I don't know, God."
As we talked and I listened to him I learned that Zaire was an intelligent brother. He said that he was trying to hook something up so he could have some lights at the spot he was building up. I didn't know when was the last time Zaire was able to shower, or the last time he ate. It seemed he had everything he owned in the two bags he was carrying. I did as much as possible to take care of my manz because, like I told him, I was in that same position.
I knew there was something about this that was bigger than just a homeless young Black man asking for help.
Earlier that day, my students did an amazing presentation that reminded me of the horrors of slavery. They showed parts of this video in their presentation on Olaudah Equiano. What stood out to me most was how gruesome the ships were that brought our ancestors over.
Slavery was horrific, disgusting, dehumanizing, and outright filthy. After experiencing their presentation, I was reminded of how bad it was for our ancestors.
Running into this young Black man made explicitly clear to me how Black people have been dealing with some form of degrading systemic oppression for 500 years, from enslavement in the past to the large number of us who are homeless today. In light of this oppression, multiple solutions have been offered, with one of them being to “dismantle patriarchy.” But here is my problem with this solution: those who argue for “dismantling patriarchy” believe that Black men are just as patriarchal and play just as much of a role in patriarchy as White men do. The primary reason Black people should not use dismantling patriarchy as a tool is because as John Henrik Clarke stated: "There is no European solution for African problems."
It is extremely difficult for me to think of Black men like Zaire as patriarchal. The issue is that many of these conversations are held in the classroom, within academic literature and online on social media. There's a huge gap between what is being discussed in these spaces and what is happening outside. I was tempted to grab academic articles and highlight direct quotes from scholarly works or social media for this essay but I decided not to for several reasons.
One, there will always be another scholar who doesn't agree with the specific quote that I am sharing, and will claim that I am misrepresenting their perspective on Black men and patriarchy. This leads to the second, most important reason: going back and forth over academic theory and different ideas of patriarchy and feminism will keep us away from the real point, which is that there are millions of Zaires. Any claim to place Black men in a patriarchal position will have to be done in the streets and the real world, not online.
This leads to another story.
One of my mentees was outside during the George Floyd uprisings in Richmond, VA, where I'm from. It just so happened that two Black queer women were in front of this rally that my lil homie was attending and they were making the usual talking points about “cis-heteronormativity,” “privilege,” “patriarchy” and so on. There were two Black homeless men at this rally. My lil homie shared that they were confused by what the two women were saying.
Think about this. Two “patriarchs” were sleeping outside on park benches while those women with the bullhorns were fully clothed, nicely dressed, and probably caught an Uber to the rally. Based on the way the two women with the bullhorn were talking, those being oppressed were them, and those playing a role in their oppression were the ones who were homeless. Why? How? Because they were Black men.
This is why I had to write this article. Black men aren't patriarchal, we are struggling. If anyone has a problem with this article, that is completely fine. If you want to argue, don't argue with me online, meet me outside next to that homeless Black man that you either ignore or turn your nose up at everyday. I would love to hear you explain how he's actively playing a role in patriarchy and oppressing you.
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