As much as I love the show in recent episodes I've noticed something very distinct that the sisters have in common, even Tamar the only one in a half-decent marriage has it. They have all picked atrociously in regards to the men in their lives, even their father was a bad pick for their mother. Their mother, Evelyn, had never dated anyone but their father as she said 'he was my first everything' which is a tad scary. Their father was a minister and while he was very religious he was not very Christian and had a nine year affair while married to their mother at the end of their almost 30 year marriage and when he divorced her within a month was married to the other woman. Now tomorrow night is the finale and Dad will finally make an appearance after standing all the girls up when they went to Maryland, their birthplace, in the last episode. That being said, it occurred to me that their mother not having a clue how to pick a man has passed that on to Toni and her sisters. Toni and her ex are now separated and she is going through a bankruptcy, he seems less than supportive of her and their two boys. Trina's husband is a bit of philander and she's having issues with alcohol. Towanda and her husband are separated but still living in the same house 'for the children's sake' but he's dating other people and she's the only one working and paying bills. I really must say this is the most egregious of them all, I wonder what she thinks she's teaching her children about marriage and fathers and mothers. They have a little boy and girl, they are passing on the sad lesson that even in misery you need to stay together. Children are very aware of how miserable their parents are, they are sensitive to that and really the best thing a father can do for his children is love their mother. That situation is lunacy on another level. Traci is stuck in Maryland still and wants to be closer to her family but her husband resents her family relationships. He also does what he likes, takes excellent care of himself while he doesn't do that so much with Traci. Tamar is married to a record executive and although he seems to love her, she's a lot to bear and I'm thinking he only wanted her as a trophy wife and she's not wanting to fulfill that role.
While I noticed this and I wonder if any of them have noticed that their mother had no wisdom about picking men, so they each had no wisdom about picking men. They are each beautiful women who I think like many black women are convinced that only a black man will do instead of only a good man will do. As much as I love the show and Tamar's .com quotes every few minutes it saddens me that their many black women who are getting this same information in our society. Instead of telling their girls they are worthy of the best man, black girls are being told that no one will ever get you but a black man and black men are the only men who appreciate and love black women. And as young and old black women, we take any man because their is no wisdom behind the decision and in a lot of cases like some of the Braxton sisters we are stuck and can't figure out how to get out a bad marriage or we're picking up the pieces of the bad decision we made along with our kids. And although Trina's husband is Hispanic, she still picked poorly and the disaster shows. This is not about not picking black men and picking other men, this is about not picking bad men and picking good men. If there is no one there to show you the difference you can end up in trouble. Now people end up trouble even with the best advice from mothers by not listening, I was one of those people. But if you have five girls and all of them have chosen fairly poorly, somebody missed a lesson and it was probably mom.
Hey! Great post!
ReplyDeleteYou need to take yourself over to Evia's SLICE site a spit this knowledge. This is similar to the discussion we were having about black women in Hollywood whose romantic choices mirror Quandisha from the hood.
Both groups (in general) don't know their worth, both don't bother to venture out of their black circles, and cheat themselves of better opportunities.
BWLivingWell, I'm thinking the same thing. These women have never in their lives been exposed to anything but the blk community, so now they get out here in the world of entertainment but they are uncomfortable around a diverse community. So they stick with romantically what they know, Tyrone from down the street, he's keepin' it real or he's thug love or whateva the hell LOL! I'm always thankful my mother and father introduced me to things and ppl outside the bc. That helped me not feel uncomfortable around diverse ppl and different thoughts and ways of living. We're not doing our girls any good by keeping them sheltered, they are unprepared for what's out there and although we want them to be successful, when they become successful they are freaked out b/c being successful means you must be exposed to things outside your comfort zone.
ReplyDeleteWatched the show for the first time yesterday and it was truly sad. I think mom did miss the boat when she sat there hollering at her ex husband in front of everyone. I understand her anger but I think she put him on a pedastal like most bw do with bm and when he came up short and did what he did her anger over came her. Sad.
ReplyDeleteIt is a sad situation. Playing devil's advocate. we do not know the full view of the mother and father's relationship. What if they had a great relationship and it just changed down the road. Some good people make bad decisions. Who is to say the mother was the perfect wife. Again not excusing the father's behavior. Television does not provide the whole story.
ReplyDeleteAlso bad relationships happens in every race and not just in the black community. Just speaking from experience.
Great article.