Esteemed readers of my humble missive know well my views about *certain types of Sistas*. I don’t go after the Sistahood in toto, because to do so would be unfair; instead, I focus my laser sights on those Sistas who putatively “got it goin’ on”, put em under the searing Light of Truth, and just raise a few Burning Questions. Over the past few weeks in particular, I’ve been doing just that and then some, much to the chagrin of the Hateration Gallery. Alas, as what I have brought to light has been for the most part, unassailable, they really have nothing substantial upon which to mount a counterattack.

Such is life.

But because I try to be a fair Man, I thought it only right to consider the Educated Sista’s counterpart-the so-called Educated Brotha. I say “so-called” because it’s been my considered view-borne of years and years of the closest observation-that many of these Brothas lose essential parts of themselves in the process of their getting “education”, among them being simple commonsense. To say nothing of, balls.

The following example should suffice.

I’ve spoken at length how we’ve all known a Sista or five, who put up with all manner of crappola from (White) people on her job, in fact, it is not unusual for her to put up with it for *years*. The reason for my noting this being, that often these same Sistas are so quick not to take any guff, real or perceived, off any Brotha. But when you point out what I just did, out comes Rodney the Rationalization Hamster, as if on cue, running his poor widdle legs off on that wheel: she can’t choose her job or who she works with (BS), she has to do what she gotta do to survive (BS), she gotta take care of her Aunt May-like mama (BS); on the other hand, she does have complete control over her love life-translation-I CHOOSE to treat my Man like crap.

Coolbeans, I say. Hey, it ain’t the first time someone’s been caught being a rank hypocrite, and it won’t be the last.

But given that we who study Game understand that it is the wont of Women to rationalize their decisions in life, coupled with their desire to partner with whomever is the Grand Pubah at the moment, it’s completely understandable why a sizable number of Sistas in this cohort trade in some much verbal garbage. After all, they’re just as much slaves to their hindbrains as we Men are-the difference being, of course, that for most of us fellas, most of the time, we’re a weebit more honest about it.

This is why it’s so very hard for me to understand how the so-called Educated Brotha can allow himself to be brought lower than many Educated Sistas on the jobs they work. I’ve been giving this whole ball of wax a goodly degree of brainpower and had been considering writing yet another stinging post deconstructing aspects of the Black Mind, but had put it on the shelf until I had all the facts in…when, a very interesting bit of Kismet came into my life, yesterday evening, and suddenly, it all made sense.

I say that because yesterday, Ms. Brown Sugah and I were among a group of interesting people, who or course shall go nameless. Among them was a young Brotha who had only earlier this Summer come out of one of the country’s biggest name unis. He began working in NYC’s mammoth nonprofit sector, as most middle class Negroes do, and had noted that it had been pointed out to him by his presumably White superiors that the attrition rate among BLACK MALES was exceedingly high-that, in fact, within the short time he’d been there, they had already “let go” of at least one such Brotha, for failure to properly roll over and play dead.

Our young hero waxed eloquently about how he was determined to turn around the perception there of Black Men, and so on and so forth. Ms. Brown Sugah looked at me from across the room, and I guess she could note my famed (or infamous, depending on whether you’re on the receiving end of my sniper fire) Chesire Cat grin; I was just waiting for a break in the convo, to make my move.

And boy, did it-as soon as everyone gasped for breath, I hopped in:

“You know, I’m glad you brought that up So-&-So, because that’s been something I’ve been waiting to ask a Brotha like you for a very long time now, and that is simply this…

WHY do Brothas like you seem hellbent on flagellating yourselves? You know good and damned well them White folks, especially White Males, DON’T WANT YOU THERE, and only tolerate you because they have to-but they’re crafty enough to make sure that there’s never anymore than a handful of you there at any one time. Everyone with some commonsense knows that if and when they have to choose, Sistas win.

Moreover, why do you Brothas insist on playing a game that, by definition, you CANNOT WIN? For one thing, if shit goes wrong, who’s got your back? Certainly not any Brothas-usually, you guys are the only Darkie Male in the place, and many of you take that as some badge of honor or something. Yo Bruh, Rambo was a movie, that “Army of One” ish is dead. There’s strength in numbers, always has been, always will be-and if you’re outnumbered and outgunned from the get go, you’re ass is grass.”

Our young hero looked at me with the deer-in-the-headlight look; the other peeps in attendance had no rap either.

The room was silent for a good 15 seconds.

God, how I love it when that happens.

You see, the dirty little secret is, that Brothas-and I’m talking about the so-called “Educated” ones, they put up with a lot of crap, too, and for the aforementioned reasons, I argue that it in many ways is WORSE than what Sistas deal with. At least in the former’s case, they’ve got more in their numbers to work with, can more easily network, and they directly and indirectly benefit from being in essence, a “double minority”. Plus, Women are by nature BSers-don’t believe me? OK then-show of hands, how many Black folk here know a Sista who can turn on the “Ms. Ann” voice at the drop of a hat? And please don’t front. You know exactly what I’m talking about.

Show of hands?

Yea. That’s what I thought.

I close my case.

In the case of Black Men, at least the ones I know, doing such things don’t come easily, if they come at all; I imagine it must be an utterly debased, soul-killing ordeal, and if my theory holds water, it’s true, because you can see it all over the faces of those relative few Brothas who work in high-end nonprofit and especially Corporate America. It’s like what happened to Eddie Griffin’s character in Undercover Brother when he basically became an Oreo. Notice how Sistas can’t wait to talk about their jobs, what happened on the job, who’s doing what, etc-now, take a look at the Brothas. No. Words. Just that soulless, empty look in their eyes.

Damn.

Anyway, taking advantage of the “dead air” in yesterday’s confab, I noted, that while I came from the Blue Collar side of things, that I also realized that it conferred on me many blessings in disguise. One of them was that I still very much worked in the World of Men, and Men by definition, don’t like to front or fake the funk. Moreover, Brothas, when they’re in the workforce, tend to be concentrated in the Blue Collar sections more, which translates into one, more numbers being in my favor, and two, higher chances that those who can actually make decisions looked like me.

Indeed, I told our party yesterday, that I was very fortunate to be able to not only work in an environment where I could see myself all day everyday, but that every shot I got at moving up in the world, came at the hands of someone who looked like me. Even more to the point, if God forbid something went down and I was in the crosshairs, I had people who had my back. That has stood me in good stead a number of times over the course of my work career. If I was UC Brotha out in Corporate America, I’d be bounced quicker than a basketball.

Additionally, I told my party that, unlike our young hero, who has to basically deal with 24/7 supervision from White folks, the numbers of Black superiors over me formed a de facto Buffer Zone of Protection between me and White folk. Also, I was blessed to have a wide degree of latitude where I could pretty much call my own shots-my immediate supers didn’t care how I got the job done, so long as it was done and they didn’t have to hear Mr. Charlie’s mouth.

Finally, the kicker-after giving the whole matter many years of the most intense thought to the matter, another salient feature about my own worklife was that I worked in jobs where PERFORMANCE BASED ON PRODUCTION mattered first and foremost: you either got the account, or you didn’t. You made the sale, or you didn’t. You either produced “x” numbers of widgets, or you didn’t. You either moved “x” numbers of product out the door, or you didn’t. That, I’ve found, proved to be a boon to me, because with jobs like those, the raw numbers cannot be denied, unlike amorphous “performance reviews” which is really code-speak for popularity/bootlicking contests. They are, because so often, many of those pencil pushing jobs have little to do with actual production and a heck of a lot more to do with personality-and we all know where, in the minds of those who matter, Black Men rank on that score.

As the convo shifted onto other planes, as they always do, I couldn’t help but to feel a bit sorry for the young Man to my right. It wasn’t my intention to burst his bubble or anything like that, but better for him to consider all of this now before he winds up another soulless Undercover Brother out there in the hinterlands.

More to come soon. Stay tuned…

The Obsidian’s iPod is now playing: Ya Bad Chubbs, by Chubb Rock

The Obsidian