To claim the space of healthy erotic agency black males (and those of us who truly love the black male body) must envision together a new kind of sex, a non-patriarchal sexual identity. We must envision a liberatory sexuality that refuses to ground sexual acts in narratives of domination and submission, and lay claim to uninhibited erotic agency that prioritizes connection and mutuality.

Like all profound repression, my rage unleashed made me afraid. It forced me to turn my back on forgetfulness, called me out of my denial. It changed my relationship with home - with the South - made it so I could not return there. Inwardly, I felt as though I were a marked woman. A black person unashamed of her rage, using it as a catalyst to develop critical consciousness, to come to full decolonized self-actualization, had no real place in the existing social structure. I felt like an exile. Friends and professors wondered what had come over me. They shared their fear that this new militancy might consume me. When I journeyed home to see my family I felt estranged from them. They were suspicious of the new me. The “good” southern white folks who had always given me a helping hand began to worry that college was ruining me. I seemed alone in understanding that I was undergoing a process of radical politicization and self-recovery.

[currently watching:]

Why is it so difficult for many white folks to understand that racism is oppressive not because white folks have prejudicial feelings about blacks, but because it is a system that promotes domination and subjugation? The prejudicial feelings some blacks may express about whites are in no way linked to a system of domination that affords us any power to coercively control the lives and well-being of white folks. That needs to be understood

When we see love as the will to nurture one’s own or another’s spiritual growth, revealed through acts of care, respect, knowing, and assuming responsibility, the foundation of all love in our life is the same. There is no special love exclusively reserved for romantic partners. Genuine love is the foundation of our engagement with ourselves, with family, with friends, with partners, with everyone we choose to love.

To claim the space of healthy erotic agency black males (and those of us who truly love the black male body) must envision together a new kind of sex, a non-patriarchal sexual identity. We must envision a liberatory sexuality that refuses to ground sexual acts in narratives of domination and submission, and lay claim to uninhibited erotic agency that prioritizes connection and mutuality.

Dialogue is a powerful gesture of love. Caring talk is a sweet communion that deepens our bonds. We can show the depths of our care by the way we speak in all areas of our lives, both public and private. Our words can evoke the sense of respect and profound acknowledgment of how precious we are to one another. Language can convey a sense of the sacred.

Bell Hooks on Fear, Love, and Relationships

“Usually, when people talk about the “strength” of the Black woman….they ignore the reality that to be strong in the face of oppression is not the same as overcoming oppression; that endurance is not to be confused with transformation.” —Bell Hooks

“Relationships are treated like Dixie cups. They are the same. They are disposable. If it does not work, drop it, throw it away, get another.
Committed bonds (including marriage) cannot last when this is the prevailing logic. Most of us are unclear about what to do to protect and strengthen caring bonds when our self-centered needs are not being met.”
— Bell Hooks (All About Love: New Visions)

“Individuals who want to believe that there is no fulfillment in love, that true love does not exist, cling to these assumptions because this despair is actually easier to face than the reality that love is a real fact of life but is absent from their lives.” Bell Hooks

“We fear that evaluating our needs and then carefully choosing partners will reveal that there is no one for us to love. Most of us prefer to have a partner who is lacking than no partner at all. What becomes apparent is that we may be more interested in finding a partner than in knowing love.” —Bell Hooks

“When we drop fear, we can draw nearer to people, we can draw nearer to the earth, we can draw nearer to all the heavenly creatures that surround us.” —Bell Hooks

“As females in a patriarchal culture, we were not slaves of love; most of us were and are slaves of longing, yearning for a master who will set us free and claim us because we cannot claim ourselves.” —Bell Hooks