Skip to main content

The Destruction Of The Black Family Unit



Today, when we look at the black community as a combination of individual family units, it is not hard to see the broken structure. The individual family unit is the foundation and cornerstone of the black community as a whole. The black community cannot even begin to repair itself without first rebuilding the structure of the individual black family unit. It’s the individual families that make up the community. The individual person will base his or her interactions with society on the relationships they’ve developed at home. Some behaviors are learned, and others are developed, like trust issues.

In attempting to build a better community we must attack the root of the problem, which is identifying what’s wrong with the black family unit. 67% of black children live in single-parent homes. 60% of the prison population consists of black men. 12% of black teens aren’t in school or working, with a teen birth rate of 13,000 over the national average. To top it off, rates of homicide and firearm deaths among black teens are enough to bring one to shame. 





Is morality in the black community dying off with the last of the Big Mammas (elderly women with old-fashioned values), who are going extinct? I think there are two distinct causes here.  One starts with slavery; I guess we can call it post-traumatic slave syndrome, a term coined by the author Joy DeGruy Leary. The other cause is plain inequality, marketed by an even broader agenda.




Domesticated Human-Beings

Starting with slavery we’ll explore concepts that can explain the black man and woman’s inability to co-exist in functioning family units. Though black Africans had already been in America since 1619, by way of the Dutch. In 1660 England’s King Charles II established a business called the Royal African Company which captured humans called Black Gold and transported them to the Americas.

In 1807 England outlawed its slave trade leaving America without a consistent supply of new slaves. That’s when America started breeding its own slaves like cattle. Young men and women were kept in stables and forced to breed, just like horses. Fertile slaves were the most favored. The slavers also took pleasure raping the women and girls themselves having mulatto children. The children that were born as a product of these acts were the slave master's branded property and were subject to being sold as well. Many of the young girls were forced to work in brothels. Not even the sanctity of marriage applied to slaves. The white slave masters had no boundaries; raping wives, daughters, and sisters; and breeding with whomever they wanted.

The Logo of The Royal African Company

A man is the Alpha male of his family unit; the leader, protector, and provider. Imagine the psyche of a man who is limited in his abilities and duty to secure his family. If you can sympathize, you see a broken man. A man that has endured the tragedies of seeing his wife, daughters, and sisters raped and taken away from him. Can you imagine the psyche of a man who is forced to live in a small cell in a barnyard for years? The only interaction with others he has is the young girls thrown in his pen like a piece of meat for breeding. Over time it becomes a litany as he grows numb. Psychologically, this man has been reduced to a domesticated animal. Weak and insecure. Uncertain of his own strength and too afraid to test it.

A woman is a comforter and nurturer of her family. Can you imagine a mother having a child that she bore for 9 months snatched out of her womb and taken away? What about the little girls forced to prostitute in brothels? Picture yourself being tossed into a dirty stable like a piece of meat; with a filthy sweaty man limbering over you.

The only salvation these poor women had, was to submit to the will of their white masters. The black woman realized that given the circumstances, she had no other choice but to appeal to the senses of white men to survive. This also put her in direct competition with white women as she would have to imitate them to be more attractive to white men.

Over time the black woman grew tired too. Broken. Belittled to a piece of meat, and desperate. The black man couldn’t protect her or her children; not even himself. She lost respect for him right along with respect for herself. The virtue she once had was lost, as she continuously tries to regain her self-esteem unsuccessfully, through European culture.

Three Young White Men and a Black Woman (1632) by Christian van Couwenbergh.




Post-Traumatic Slave Syndrome

Though, both the modern-day black men and women innately yearn for each other, the psychological domestication of slavery, created obstacles that if not overcome, make functioning relationships between the two almost impossible; except sexual relations. He’s insecure; and afraid to attach out of fear that his inabilities as a man will be tested, proving him insufficient. A man has to feel like a leader, or he’ll detach.

The black woman will play right into his insecurities, verbalizing for the world to hear how much she doesn’t need a man. She has very little respect for him, and that respect is governed by his monetary value. Without it, he’s worthless, because her family model doesn’t include a man anyway. Just mom, kids, and grandma. The Holy Trinity of modern-day black family structure. The harshness of slavery has made her hard and as sharp as a diamond. She’s an opportunist who doesn’t like feeling vulnerable, and she’s always on the defensive. She doesn't value a black man's leadership; or his role as a father, or mentor for her children, and this is solely due to his inability to protect.


A 1989 interview with young black single mothers


The Alpha-Male

The U.S. Government helps push this post-traumatic syndrome further by offering her a world of benefits. She’ll get hired before he does, she has help with housing, utility bills, child support, and food. Statically, 1 of every 3 black men will be imprisoned at some point in life, making it harder to market themselves for jobs. Child support laws have no regard for a man’s living conditions and threaten imprisonment as well.

The government has taken the black man’s position as the leader of the family unit and used the black woman as a tool to execute its agenda. These women are baited with a false sense of independence. Even the women who are not on government assistance can’t see through the illusion of this “strong independent black woman” agenda used to create more bastard kids that will repeat the process.

The men in search of a woman who’ll respect and appreciate their role, bounce from house to house only to find the same attitude, but making babies along the way. Dysfunctional parents create dysfunctional children; dysfunctional families create dysfunctional communities. The slave masters don’t have to breed slaves anymore. The slaves breed themselves.


Breaking The Mold

An angry black woman or an angry black man, it doesn’t matter. You have a right to be angry. To be descendants of slaves, and aware of those facts would make any sane person angry, especially when inequality still exists. The black man and woman must learn to direct that anger away from each other and focus it on their oppressors. They need to remember they are a team.

The man must regain confidence in himself, shake off the fear of oppression, and take back his community by taking back his family. The black woman must look at herself in the mirror and learn to love herself completely and stop judging herself by European standards. When she regains respect and love for her own beauty, it is then she will be able to fully appreciate the efforts of her king, because she will see what he sees in her. The man needs his position as Alpha respected regardless of his financial status and the woman needs to be able to trust and feel secure in him as a leader. 

The woman must not be afraid to empower her king out of fear that she disempowers herself in doing so. The man must treat his queen as his equal, not like she is beneath him. The parents must nurture and build the self-esteem of their children. Teach them to respect themselves, their education, their elders, and their community. Show them the importance of family structure. Functioning families make functioning communities that function as a unit; establishing a system of group economics, which will in time evolve into a global economic presence. 





Statistics