Have You Met My Finance?

Okay:

I was talking to Gill earlier tonight about marriage in the new millennium. My epiphany at the height of the conversation: "If you don't make at least six figures, you shouldn't marry an American Black woman."

"Preach, nigga," he said.

Well, let me qualify that. Of course there are successful marriages in Black America where the man makes a modest salary. My theory is that they are a minority within a minority within a minority. That is, Black people still only make up around 12 percent of the population, they are the least likely ethnic group in the country to get married, disagreements over money is cited as the number one source of turmoil in marriages, and most marriages in this country still end in divorce.

That's a pretty shitty poker hand.

And, no, American Black women are not all, as is commonly and crudely depicted in the ubiquitous urban sitcoms and straight-to-video romantic comedies, shallow goldiggers. Quite the contrary. But I do think that many, many, many of them have been trained, taught, conditioned to equate a man's worth with his wealth.

I'm sure that this is not unique to Black women per se, but as I date Black women pretty much exclusively, (yes, I have dibble dabbled in some cream with my coffee) I am hard-pressed to ignore the obvious. If you ask a Black woman over 25 what she wants in a man, many will mention financial stability. Of course, "financial stability", I have come to realize, is simply a euphemism for "at least six figures."

The result, however you want to call it, is a lot of little black bastards running around reeking havoc. Because regardless of marriage or no marriage, people are going to screw and make babies. Especially, and ironically, poor people.

I've been teaching these poor little black bastards for most of my adult life. When I used to teach at an open-space middle school in southeast (and it was worse than it sounds) I taught these two crazy young ladies, let's call them Janet and Chrissy. They were nice enough girls, but shit nuts.

One day Janet asked me, "Mr. Nadir, is you married to your daughter's mother?"

"No," I said flatly, anticipating that this conversation was going to be tricky.

"Y'all got divorced?" asked Chrissy.

"No," I said, pausing, "We were never married."

"Oooh," said Janet, "That means your daughters a...mm...uh...what they call it, Chrissy?"

"Bastard?" said Chrissy.

"Yeah, a bastard. That's right. Mr. Nadir your daughter's a bastard!" said Janet.

"Wait. I think I'm a bastard too," said Chrissy.

"Yep. Me too," said Janet. "We some real bastards. Mr. Nadir, is you a bastard?"

"Well, actually, my parents were---"

"Matter of fact, just about everybody I know is a bastard. It's like bastard city up in this motherfucker," said Janet, rudely cutting me off.

As it turns out, and I only discovered this recently, my parents had their marriage annulled. Which technically makes me a bastard. But I believe that if my father were making the equivalent of six figures 25 years ago, they'd still be married today.

If there were more than six American black men in New York City who make over one hundred thousand dollars a year and don't need someone light, bright or damn near white to complete their success package, my sister would be married and knocked up by now. Lord knows she has plenty to offer.

But alas, she's single. And when I think about all of the shallow, waif-thin, quadroons out there waking up next to their wealthy American Black husbands this morning, it kind of pisses me off.

It is unclear to me, as of now, whether the onus is on the Black woman or the Black man to modify his/her position. Are there far too many Black men out there who have not figured out how to operate and succeed in the work world? Yes. The same could be said, however, for most black women. Although, statistics show that they are far more successful than their counterparts.

Is it completely unreasonable for a woman to want a man who is "financially stable". No? Are most American Black women pretty flexible on this prerequisite? Absolutely. The point is, however, not that an American Black woman won't marry an American Black man who is not financially stable, the point is that after she does, if he's not on the fast track to becoming financially stable she will lose respect for him every day his net worth does not increase. Eventually they will have to go their separate ways before someone gets killed. Ergo my theory: "You shouldn't marry an American Black woman unless you make at least six figures."


Thanks for reading.

GO OBAMA!

GO GIANTS! BRING IT BACK HOME TO THE NFC!

Correction: In last week's blog, "Computer Love", I mistakenly said that my sister was thinking about signing up on match.com. She has since informed me that she would never do such a thing and that she was only considering using a professional match maker. Her suggestion was that match.com might be a good idea for me. So I promised her I would write a retraction. Sorry, sis.

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