Black love used to be heads held high and raised black fists. Now, where is the love that black manifests?
Things have changed since the Black Love Movement, the original Black Panther Party and the Civil Rights Era, namely, integration.
In a society where individuality, love for self and the hustle of “gettin’ yours” is a mantra, collectivity, unification and black love has fallen to the wayside.
This is because a black man and woman sitting side by side in segregated restaurant sit-ins, waiting in voter registration lines, sifting through classified ads for jobs and marching together is no longer needed or necessary.
Now the tables are set when some blacks arrive at restaurants, the need to vote is yesterday’s news and multi-million dollar jobs are available to us. We have achieved and the cause has been lost; so has black love. Those hard times, the struggle, the period when we had no choice, is when black love was at its finest hour.
Black love used to be heads held high and raised black fists. Now, where is the love that black manifests?
How did black love, what James Brown sang about and what symbolized strength in black families, dwindle into five minutes of gyration during a rhythm and blues ballad between a male and a female in the heat of the club or in the bedroom? The sad thing is that heat is only a spark in what used to be a flame in the past. That’s what we’re missing.
However, black love is not entirely lost. The small spark can be ignited again. When collectivity and unification symbolize success and when “getting ours” becomes the mantra of all blacks, black love will then become alive.
Until then we will long for the love that kept our great-grandmothers and fathers together and ask:
Black love used to be heads held high and raised black fists. Now, where is the love that black manifests?
Gabrielle Finely is a senior newspaper journalism student from Kansas City, Mo. Contact her at Gabrielle_finley@hotmail.com