“Someone asked me the other day, “What does it feel like now to have a hood pass?” And by the way, it’s sort of a contradiction in terms, because if you really had a hood pass, you could call it a n****r pass. Why are you pulling a punch and calling it a hood pass if you really have a hood pass? But I said, “I can’t really have a hood pass. I’ve never walked into a restaurant, asked for a table and been told, ‘We’re full.'” He went on further to state that his lack of attraction to Black women was due to his “David Duke c**k.” -John Mayer
It’s always been my fear, aside from the fact that I am just not attracted to any man that is not Black, that if I were to ever get close to someone of another race, particularly a White man, that they would slip up at that inevitable social gathering and call me out of my name. I have seen it happen time and time again, I get chummy with a colleague of mine where we swap intimate details about our respective communities and they misconstrue that to think they can say something totally inappropriate and, at times, downright offensive. We attend one of the many social gatherings sponsored by various attorney organizations, and yep, they toss back one too many and there they go. Just recently, a had a White guy ask me for “something to keep him awake” while we were attending a professional training. I slipped up and let my guard down, and sure enough he took advantage of that opportunity and asked me twice to get him some illicit drugs. Now I know better than to think that every White man is a John Mayer or my White colleague, but I just can’t imagine my significant other getting that familiar to the point where he slips up like this.
On the other hand, I do have a different set of issues when I deal with the Black man but I feel like I can empathize with their plight, am much more familiar with them, and definitely have more an interest in “keeping it in the family”. Believe it or not I held onto my conviction despite the fact that, up until recently, I was single with no potentials for a solid mate anywhere in sight. I was determined to hold out for someone who looks like me, share the same history with me and has common interests with me. After all, I was Black before I was a woman and that’s where my loyalty lies.
My single female friends, however, see it differently even the “pro-Black” or Afrocentric ones. When it comes to dating and/or love, they say that takes precedence over their cultural beliefs. One of my friends even went as far as to say that “if I have a child by a White man, the child is still Black because I am.” I love all of my friends and respect their decisions, but that one still baffles me because she is the one that is the revolutionary (but for the timing of her birth she would have been a Black Panther). Grant it, today there are more mixed race adults who are willing to identify with more than one racial group than years past, especially since our president is of mixed race. (In fact the census has changed over the years, allowing an individual to choose more than one race as an option.) However, for me it is more about the purity of our race, the Black race, than finding someone to fill that position.
Even though I respect my friends’ decisions, I do think a lot of their willingness to date outside of their race is perspective and not actual attraction or genuine interest. When I probe them further, not one of them ever mention that they are actually attracted to these men, they can only state that they are fed up with Black men. I mention this because I think it makes a difference when someone opens their pool as a matter of being practical, as opposed to what they feel in their hearts. The way I see it, if they change their perspective, meaning the way they view Black men and how they feel about themselves, then I believe they would learn to appreciate everything that comes along with dating intra-racially.
Reclaim Black Family-An Intra-racial Approach 