Does skin color matter? pt 2 Confession

Originally I was going to write about what kind of woman I hope to meet or my pentient for romance but, I felt the need to elaborate on this video I posted yesterday on YouTube I'm not going to dwell on this topic and I wanted to go into something I missed in my video.

I made it a point to say that I would date a woman of any skin color and I meant that but, I'm not perfect. In fact, confession time. For years, before my own personal set of epiphanies happened, I could not stand to see a black woman with a white man. My parents, as awesome as they are, were brought up to believe that anyone white was our enemy and they projected that onto me and my siblings. Let me be clear I am NOT blaming my great and wonderful parents for my shortcoming before I conquered it, I'm listing all the factors that helped form it. For a while it stuck. It didn't help that I was listening to overly militant black leaders spouting how black women were trained to love white men over us and how black men were leaving their families to be with white women. Sounds harsh, right? Imagine having that drilled into your head for 16 years then being thrown into the world. Of course I questioned the logic in it, even as a kid, but Mom and Dad were always right before and it wasn't just them. All of my older relatives said the same thing. Combine that with being exposed to Rosewood, Malcolm X and all of the pro-black, anti-white movies of the 80's and 90's and that was a recipe for a very angry person.

I was taught that either of these was wrong.

Then came reality.

When I started making friends of all colors and of all genders I was thrown for a loop. They never cared about my race. The white people I had been taught to fear and hate loved my company. More importantly they didn't hate ANY black person. How could this be? They're my enemies...right? That's not to say I haven't experienced racism from caucasians (I do live in Virginia after all) but it wasn't as bad as I was lead to believe.

The thing is I felt the most hate about my very dark skin color from other black people, black girls especially. You can imagine my inner conflict when I was told "You're too black for me to date," by a girl even darker than me but in the same conversation told that I'm "...not black enough," because of my demeanor and mannerisms. Throughout my teenage years this cycle repeated endlessly. "You're too black" "You ain't black enough." Not to mention I started seeing those same girls getting picked up by white guys. This is where the complex started to develop.

Fast forward a few years and some important firsts happen to me. My first kiss, my very first date, my first time having sex and my first real feelings of affection from a girl. All white women. When I told cousin Rochelle she was happy for me but, other black women I knew called me a traitor. Some of them were the same ones who told me I wasn't "black enough" or "too black." How dare you fix your lips to call me a traitor when you never gave me a shot? I lie to you not this was an honest answer I received. "It's okay if we fuck wit white men but, you can't fuck wit white women. Errbody know that." That was the spark. After that I couldn't stand to see any black woman with a white man. The very sight of it made me furious.

Fast forward to three years ago, having been a Free Lover (aka poly person) for about a year. I notice a lot of what I thought was wrong. Having dated women of all colors except Asian (yet), I found that most times interracial relationships happen, not because of some racial agenda, but out of genuine love. I'm still wary of white men at this time though.

Then my Angel, Elouise says those magic words. "Sweety, you sound like a racist when you say things like that." I replayed some of the things I said in my head and she was right.

I was a racist.

I'm glad I realized this lesson in time.

From that day on I made it my mission to never be that young fool again. It took a long time and a lot of self-discipline but eventually I was free of that curse. As it happens two of my new friends are a mixed couple, a white male and black female, and they are two of the coolest people ever. My parents also gave up their racist views when I told them I was a poly person. They welcomed my lifestyle with open arms and all that came with it.

This was harder to type that I anticipated. I'm confessing this to you, Poly Family, because as long as we've been together you've always been straight with me and I felt you deserved the same courtesy. I'm always open to comments and questions here or on my YouTube channel.

And that's all. Live and love freely, everyone.