The myth of the black woman-over-chooser

Monique Rodrigues do Prado

Silvia Souza

Sometimes I make that exercise of imagining a world without racism where we'd feel exhausted as a black people.

I occasionally heard a conversation at a shared house where I am spending time nowadays.

We could realize that there is an effective social pyramid where people who look most like the "ideal of beauty and humanity" will be chosen first. There are a few layers we can mention: how patriarchal rules work to harm women's autonomy, how masculinity controls them, what kind of femininity is expected of black women and finally what is the concept of beauty and healthy love and who defined them .

Here we are going point why. Is there any possibility of being an over-chooser when society doesn't really give you this as an opportunity

In Brazil there are many studies speaking about “the black women loneliness” a circumstance that racism puts black women in. Usually men, especially whites, do not have black women as an option or at least they won’t publicly assume them to their family, friends and other social groups. In other words, generally, men hide black women.

But lately, this point started to bother me because it’s so unfair you give men the shot to pick up women on their “shelf” whenever they want. It’s a Cinderella idea that masculinity has the power of choosing because this ocidental love was designed from and to serve them. Besides, Cinderella also tells us how whiteness articulates themselves to access love because, generally, when they have the chance they will choose each other . We call this phenomenon “Narcissist Pact” according to Cida Bento.

This neglect shows up when being single becomes black women’s fault, meaning that society makes you feel like you're unable to getting into a relationship. The problem started at this point, because only a highly patriarchal society faces singleness as assue. That happens because they want to control women’s bodies in terms of procreating, career and structural power.

Additionally, after you turning 30, it will become a moral issue because “of course your inability to have a consistent relationship is your fault”. Which means patriarchy doen't really care about intellectual or successful women. Instead, they want to take you away from your condition of a thinker, only classifying you as a mother, wife and caregiver, nothing more.

It’s pretty delicate because a society organized by race reverses the logic of oppression creating a circumstance where you, as a black woman, is responsible for don’t playing a full human being since you don’t have a relationship. They will try to convince you that it's happen because you aren't that attractive, beautiful, smart or interesting enough to join “the relationship party”.

The “relationship party” is a whiteness packet used to sell the ideal model of a relationship building symbols only available to themselves such as fairytale, adolescenthood, novels, movies and university time. If we analyze these exemples we will see how society still shows whites as a symbol of success, including in terms of love. On the other hand, usually blacks are represented as the bad guys with their humanity broken awaiting the kindness of the white savior.

We could realize that there is an effective social pyramid where people who appear more with the “ideal beauty and humanity” will be chosen first. There are a few layers we can mention: how patriarchal rules work to harm women's autonomy, how masculinity controls them, what kind of femininity is expected of black women and finally what is the concept of beauty and healthy love and who defined them .

Lately this white super power chooser has been challenged since then we are frequently bringing to the table how problematic it is for other people who donnot fit this stereotype excluding others from their full subjectivity as a human being.

Then, we could understand how traumatic it could be asking a black woman about her “inability of being in a stable relationship” because when they put the "over-chooser" on her shoulders, that's what happens. It could bring literally phychol and emotional damages because black women face a different reality in terms of affection especially when we analyses their subject where black women use to experience only crumbs of love boxing them into an object condition or an uncomfortable place where affection never deepens

Usually, they will experience effection only during sex or they will be boxed as a servant. In other words: the duality among disgusting and desire of whiteness where they hypesexualizes black women but they’ll never include them in their social world. It’s like inviting them to a pool party but never letting them know that. So the guests had never brought swimming clothes because nobody told them. Certally they won’t feel like they belong at that place.

The neglect also appears when the womanhood of black women aren't respected, comparing them to a white womencially about their bodies. Likewise, when a black woman is not seen as a woman because they are masculinized by men who treat them as a “brother” confidencing their emotions using black women as an adviser or even as a step to get access to their white friends.

We cannot ignore that it causes psychological scars. This “relationship party” just is concerned about giving masculinity pleasure or whatever they want to. So, they don’t care about the violences provoked by them.

Thus, boxing black women as an over-choosers is pretty cruel because it ignores how racism operetes to isolate them using their subjectivity against themselves. Besides, this is a white comfortable strategy to make jokes about black woman's face having no concerns about their feelings and/or emotions.

In this scenario, the "possibility of choice" or "choose too much" is a lie since black women do not live the plenitude of choice in their affections. On the other hand, they use to experience the precariousness of options. However, it's so important to preserve their humanity as women because they are not willing to have relationships with mediocre people.

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