Hey Black People! Black Lives Have to Matter to Us First!

Let me start out by saying I think that it’s sad when we have to remind people that our lives matter, but the harsh reality is that this is the world we live in. No one is born with hate in their heart; it is taught! The Black Live Matter Movement is being used as a vehicle to remind the world that #BlackLivesMatter! This is all well and good but the most important part in that statement is that Black lives should matter to us first! Let me break this down for you:

REAL LOVE STARTS WITH SELF LOVE:

Black people…Please don’t think that anyone else is going to love you if you don’t love yourself! Yeah I said it! We walk around demanding other people to put some RESPEK on our name when we as a people don’t even respect ourselves and our own people. Black men out here calling black women bitches and hoes and Black women allowing it to be done! If you hate what you see in the mirror, what do you think other people will see?

As a Black woman, let me just tell you how much it hurts me to see other black women tear each other down. We come in all different shades, shapes, and economic backgrounds. What gives you the right to put another Black woman down? It took me a long time to learn how to love myself because from a small child through my teenage years, I was picked on and put down by my OWN people. I was made fun of for the way I looked, “you so skinny and boney you look like Olive Oil”, the way I carried myself “you think you better than me cause you brown skinned with long hair”, or even the way I spoke “you talk like a white girl”. The memories of those hateful statements still bother me sometimes. As a people we are so busy hating and competing with each other that we miss the fact that we are stronger TOGETHER! Stop with the crab mentality!!! We all have a unique set of skills and traits that God has blessed us with and it is our job as women to be strong for one another. This is something as simple as telling another Black Queen that she is beautiful. Just because someone may be a different shade of black than you are, doesn’t mean they don’t have obstacles to overcome, or that they can’t understand your struggle. At the end of the day you are still a Black person, no matter what end of the spectrum you fall on. It is imperative that we love one another, and if you see someone going down the wrong path, don’t let them crash and burn and laugh about it. Help them out if you can. We as a people need to understand and value OUR worth. Think about it…everyone else in the world knows how powerful Black people are, but we don’t see it ourselves. Why do you think they are out here killing our Black men?

Black men, it saddens me that I even have to say this but, please stop killing each other! What are you trying to prove? Being a daughter, wife, mother and sister of strong Black men it scares me too much to look at the news and see what Black men are doing to each other! It’s bad enough to see a white policeman or woman for that matter kill one of our Black Kings, but when we do it to each other….that’s a different kind of hurt! If our Black Kings use half the energy they use plotting the next drive by or gang bang on improving our neighborhood, do you know how powerful that that would be? Take a minute to think about the type of impact the Black man can have on Black boys if you are a positive example of what it is to live like the Black royalty you are. Channel that hate you have for someone who runs with a different circle in to coming together to build a bigger more powerful circle to in turn build bigger and stronger Black communities.

It makes me sick to my stomach to see us tear up our OWN neighborhoods whenever an outcome from a judicial system that wasn’t designed to protect us in the first place doesn’t provide justice. Think about this! Looting and tearing up the neighborhood that you live in doesn’t change the verdict. In turn it forces you to have to shop outside of your own neighborhood. All it does is inconvenience those in the area that may not have the means to get to the other areas to shop; therefore causing unnecessary stress to our own people. Again, channel that anger into voting and educating our youth about their roles in helping to promote change.

I can go on and on about what the justice system is doing to our people, especially our Black Men, but if we don’t change within our own communities nothing will ever change. There is power in numbers and we are stronger as a unit when we stick together! BLACK LIVES MATTER and until they MATTER to US, nothing we say or do will be heard!

Live BLOUNT-ly