If you go to his Wikipedia page right now, they describe him as a Political Activist. But if you asked Charlie Kirk how he wished to be remembered…he said, “I want to be remembered for courage for my faith.”
I originally titled this, “a brother who had courage to speak the truth” but Charlie Kirk wasn’t my mother’s son. Before 2017, I didn’t know he existed.
And yet…I shed tears for this man. For a lot of us, our unexpected reactions did feel like someone just killed our brother. But why? Allow me to explain.
It was on July 3rd 2005, when I left home to start a new life in Tampa Florida. Since then, July 3rd has always been my own personal Independence Day. And since today marks the 20th anniversary of my leaving the nest…I thought I’d post some reflection.
If I could go back twenty years and talk to my 18-year-old self, what would I tell him? What would I tell that jeri-curled, 310-pound big black guy with no sense of fashion, no experience, barely any knowledge of the world, and yet filled inexplicably with uncanny optimism and determination.
Easy, this is just food for thought. But it relates to relationship follies and even the characters, stories, and scripts that are written by female writers…that quite frankly, either don’t make sense or it’s not realistic.
Plainly put, the definition of Empathy is the Ability to “understand and share the feelings of another”. It’s your awareness of what the other person is feeling and why they have those feelings.
At the age of 38-years-old…I don’t think a lot of people have this ability. Not just women, but people in general. But as per the point of this essay, I think it’s an inaccurate stereotype to associate this ability with Women.
In my opinion…I’ve found that a lot of women from my generation seem to struggle to understand why or how another person is feeling what they’re feeling, unless (and only if) they’ve personally experienced that situation for themselves.
My wife and I went to see the latest Mission Impossible movie…and aside from the convoluted plot and exposition dumps where characters took turns saying one line at a time (making you fully aware that you’re watching a movie)…one thing you’ll notice about the film is the proliferation of women playing roles that were traditionally (realistically) held by men.
Seriously, the US president is Angela Bassett, the Secret Service agent who springs into action and takes down a bad guy is a petite Asian woman, the commander of an aircraft carrier is a Guile-looking white woman, and one of the main female soldiers on the submarine is a cringy tom-boyish lesbian in a tank top who acts more masculine than the men around her.
And these aren’t just background characters. Every time they’re on screen, they play the most prominent role over every other character. It’s in your face. As if, “You’re going to watch me whether you like it or not.”
I’m not saying it’s impossible for women to hold these traditionally male roles. But as I’m going to explain, it does ruin the magic of movies when you constantly have to work to suspend your disbelief.
Long story short, the ones preaching for Tolerance and Acceptances are also the main ones oppressing the opinions and personalities they don’t accept. Which makes them the dictators they keep accusing others of being.
True acceptance is acknowledging that people are different. All of us. Groups of people might have a different opinion, a different way of life, a different culture, religion, perspective, or a different sense or morality, what’s right or what’s wrong.
Letting that person express their opinion without trying to get them in trouble for having those thoughts and opinions…that is acceptance.
I’m not saying there should be no consequences. But who gets to decide what those consequences are? And if the consequences are so arbitrary and based on who’s offended the most, is there equality? Is there acceptance? Or…does that give all the power and authority to the one who’s offended.
Recently, the Daily Rap Up Crew hosted Dr. Umar to discussed culture and relationships within the Black Community. Dr. Umar opines that Black Women have every reason to be angry at Black Men. Let’s talk about it…
Dr. Umar’s Points:
Black Men Should Only Be with Black Women
Black Women Can’t Talk to African Men the same Way the Talk to American Men
Black Men are Responsible for Single Parent Households
Black Men are Responsible for the “Poor Selection”
Black Men Don’t Provide for the Community
My issue with his points boils down to this. If Black Men are responsible for all that, do we also have the power and authority? Can we force others to do things against their will? Can we drag someone by the scruff of their neck or block them from entering a strip club? Can we go into homes and confiscate all the rap music and take it outside to burn them? Are we allowed to kick down doors and stop unmarried people from having sex?
I take this personally because I see what’s going on in the “Black Community”. We see that it’s getting progressively worse. WE KNOW that the main problem is the lack of families and the epidemic of single-parent households where children aren’t being raised with strong fathers in the household and the subsequent lack of Christianity…but exactly do they expect us to do?
This is the first of eight posts explaining how my generation of dating is not our father’s or grandfather’s generation.
Why am I doing this? First off, you should know that there are millennials who are fortunate enough to find their partners and get married. These Millennials are blessed and likely have no idea what’s going on…which also means they probably don’t care and have a “sucks to be you” mentality…until they’re single again and are hit with the same reality rest of us have to deal with.
Secondly, this is for the ladies who are still surprised about things like how men have stopped “making the first move”. Or why we don’t approach like we used to. They’ll say things like, “where have all the good men gone?” or “Whatever happened to chivalry” as if no one’s been watching the news for the past ten-fifteen years.
And lastly, this is for the Older Generation, the Boomers, the Gen-Xers, and even some Millennials who are so far removed from commons folk, like Sen. Josh Hawley here, talking about how Men need to step up and marry these girls. Again, it’s like they have no idea about what’s been going on.
Sometimes when more scholarly Christians toss around words like “Redemption” or “Sanctification” it can be a bit difficult to comprehend or understand what that looks like or what it is. What’s so appealing about it? Why should I care?
Seriously…when I was a kid, my parents used to talk about the “kingdom of heaven.” Then, I looked around the church and thought to myself, “No, Thank You!” That’s because I couldn’t understand what the Kingdom of Heaven was. Back then, they made it seem like “heaven” was this place where there was nothing but a bunch of stiff, pious, monks and nuns who don’t really do anything interesting.
It’s like being back in Advanced Algebra. When I asked when I would ever need to use things like the Quadratic Formula in real life? The teacher didn’t have an answer. And since I saw no benefit, I wasn’t motivated to learn. I didn’t care about getting better beyond that which was required to pass the class because…what’s the point?
I think it’s the same with concepts like “Redemption” or “Sanctification”. Now, to be completely honest. I was prompted to write about Redemption and encouraged by another website called, SigmaFrame. You should check it out, because Jack’s an awesome intellectual and the comments sections are always full of thinkers I’ve come to have a tremendous amount of respect for.
But after much reflection and ample prayer…I asked myself, who do I want to reach? Who’s my audience? Other knowledgeable Christians who are already striving to do what’s good in God’s eyes? I don’t think so.
Instead, my aim has always been on those who call themselves Christians but don’t know what Christ taught. I also target the agnostics who are on the fence, and the Christians who are indifferent towards the Truth because of terrible experiences they may have had with Christianity. If my aim is to help the layman to “embrace” the truth, I believe we have to talk to them at their level. So here goes…
I wasn’t going to make a post about this video I recorded, but after reading one of the responses, I felt I had to dive deeper.
In the Caption, I say “I want to make it clear that I don’t speak for All Black People in this video…at the same time, I hate it when people who have the spotlight…THEY speak for all black people as if we all agree, as if we all feel the same. We don’t.”
As expected, there were a lot of people who saw the title of the video and just jumped to conclusions and posted comments without having actually watched the video. Which is alright. That seems to be the way of things. Not to mention, I think it brings a smirk to the faces of those who did watch the video and know I addressed a point the commenter was trying to make.
The whole point of me doing my videos, or writing my essays with a particular angle is to bring to light an opinion I haven’t seen presented on a greater scale. For instance, I didn’t post anything about the Will Smith slap for months because already I’ve seen it being covered. However, when it comes to the dreaded “N-word” and the controversy surrounding BYU and the Duke Volleyball player…I felt it was time to say something.
We need to talk about what’s happening between Black Men and Black Women. I’m noticing that there seems to be a growing rift between the genders, a great deal of resentment and hostility that’s getting out of control. But don’t worry, I have solutions!
The issues have been going on for years and it’s getting progressively worse. From the “Color Purple” to “What’s Love Got to Do with it” and even in the 2000s with Tyler Perry’s Madea films…it appears we black men are simply not acting right. We’re players. We’re dusty. We hump everything that moves. We’re not making 6 figures. We’re not keeping up with the education and professional careers of women. We shirk out on our responsibilities, making a whole bunch of babies and never sticking around to take care of them. We’re told to do better, do better, do better! And of course, one of the worst things black men do that provokes all kinds of ire…is date and marry women of another race.
Stage In The Sky 