**Author’s note: The quotes contained herein are taken word
for word from the emails I received.
They have not been altered except for the deletion of names and other
potentially identifying factors. I promise you, I could not make this shit up and I'm an author.
The title of
this post is eponymous with Public Enemy’s 1990 classic, but it’s merely a
stylistic choice. Last week, I joined Black Planet, which is a variation of
Match.com or EHarmony, but as the title implies, it’s for black people. This isn’t to say that it’s exclusive to black
folk; there are plenty of other races people on BP looking to
hookup/meet/date/marry a person of color.
But I digress.
I joined BP
out of sheer boredom; I’m spending a great deal of time staring at a bunch of
numbers and statistics have been known to lead people astray. I’d been warned about BP from my bestie, but
I knew I wasn’t looking for anything serious and I thought it would be
okay. I was bored. What I learned from
that six-day experiment was that I have absolutely no patience when it comes to
this sort of thing, which is why I never did it in the first place.
People lie,
especially on the ‘net. You can be
anything or anyone you want to be and no one will ever know the truth. So when doing something like this, be up
front about what you’re looking for and don’t deviate from that, and know that
you don’t have to be polite or courteous, and you shouldn’t respond to
everybody. Having said that, with the
exception of my screen name, I was perfectly honest about everything. I’m grown and I have no reason to lie,
especially to a stranger. I stated in my
profile that I wasn’t looking to get
married or boo’ed up and in spite of this, I kept getting the same
introductory messages. I started to
wonder if BP had a list of conversation starters because each guy literally
asked the exact same thing in the exact same order.
"Ok, for my questions to you. What are some of your goals,
hopes and dreams? Are you really single and why are you single? How long
have you been single? Do you have any brothers or sisters? Do you have any
kids? If yes, How many? cos i love kids and i like to play and be with
them. Would you like to have more Kids? What do you do for a living? How
old are you really? What makes you upset? What makes you happy? What do
you expect from your Partner? How do you handle conflict in a relationship?
What do you look for in a Relationship? If there is something you want to
say but you think you might be rambling or it is not important, it is ok,
to me it is important."
?????????????
As you can
see, the grammar is horrible; everything is smashed together without
indentation or paragraph breaks, and most of them clearly never heard of
periods because the sentences ran on so much I broke out my sneaks. I’m not a grammar Nazi, but this shit was
ridiculous. I don’t expect for everyone
to have the same command of the language as I do, but I need to be able to
carry on some semblance of conversation.
Example:
"Hello Cutie, To
start telling you more about me_i am 6'0" tall with a Brown eyes, i do not
smoke and i do not drink alcohol,i am a very good looking gentle man of 41 and
i will be 42 by Dec 20th years Im into a Construction business for the
Past 10 years and i do travel within the regions to Construct and i
would be willing to married to a wonderful woman whether she has Kids or not or
not willing to have more Kids am still okay just wanna be happy together with
my woman for the rest of our life together...I lost my Dad when i was Ten
(31)...My Religion is Christian.I ’ am Easy Going, Adventurous, Romantic,
Ambitious and have a very good sense of humor."
In spite of
me saying up front that I didn’t want anything serious, I kept getting messages
like this:
"I have been burnt so Bad. My last relationship ended on a
very sad note for me but I do not believe in regrets. I tell you this because I
cannot predict the future. I have never been married, but it would be a very
great thing in my life to get married because i do believe there is
someone special out there for everyone. I don't believe in Divorce, I
only want to get married once and when I do get married, i want it to be
for better for worse... and forever. I would love to know the basics about
you.... Well, I am really serious about you and interested in getting to
know you . I will be waiting for your Calm and Humble reply."
And this:
"What I am looking for is someone who will
get to know me ,who will love me forever and be there for me ,who is willing to
merge her soul with mine to result in what is called fate then later merge her
heart with mine and that will be marriage.And then I get to live with her in
his humble abode for ever and start a family > with.I am single and I am
looking for someone who understands love and know what love is."
Mind you, these
are introductory emails, as in them being the very first sent to me. And
then I got some from men who were from the United States but “in Nigeria on
business taking care of their sick mom”
"Currently i am in Africa on a short visit
for building a company for the federal Governmet of Nigeria i am also here in
Nigeria to come take care of ma sick Mom in a Hospital here as well,But I will
be returning back very soon."
I got about three of these, and the
wording was precise. It was always a building engineer or construction analyst,
it was always Nigeria, and it was always a sick mother. In fact, the phrasing was so specific that my
Spidey senses tingled. Now having been a
caregiver, I begrudge no one who is doing the same. But what I don’t like is someone using an
ailing mother with breast cancer as a ploy for sympathy or pussy points. My best friend, who spent some time
navigating the bullshit-infested waters of Black Planet, told me that it was a
known fact (on BP forums) that these men were actually Nigerian residents
running scams to get an American woman to bring them into the country. That actually explained a lot; especially this
bit of chicanery:
"I always make sure to share the little
that I have with someone and I'm also satisfied with whatever I 've.Also when
it comes to sex/lovemaking,i think both of us should play an equal role.My
woman should be able to satisfy me during love making and am not afraid to give
her all what she want in love making till she is drunk with my love.To add a
few I am not a racist and i am very romantic.I will go to where ever and who
ever i find to be my soul mate.I love always being around my woman and letting
her know how much i love her through my physical touch on her body with my
sensitive parts."
I mean, do women actually fall for shit like this? After I picked myself up off the floor, I gave it a great deal of thought. A lot of
women are desperate for love & companionship. Their self-esteem is so low that they will
fall for stuff like this and embark upon something that will ultimately lead to
disaster. There are reasons sites like BP, Match.com & EHarmony are so damned successful. I know you guys are probably
wondering, “Amaya, what in the hell were you
doing on a site like this anyway?” The
answer is boredom, but it soon turned to annoyance. One dude got mad and called me out of my name
because I wasn’t responding to the IM fast enough, another guy wanted me to
drive to NC so he could “nut all over my breasts,” and another wanted to know
how big my “things” were. One individual
told me that he could tell I was a “beautiful, caring, sensitive ‘Queen’” based
on my profile pic. Note: I was wearing
one of my Mardi Gras masks in said pic.
Needless to
say, I got tired of all of this crap quick, fast and in a hurry and deleted my
account. I simply lack the patience to
deal with such inane infantile chatter—it can’t even be qualified as
conversation. My bestie, in spite of
having dealt with BP drama, encouraged me to keep the account and wade through
the garbage to find someone worthy of conversation (because they do exist), but
it just isn’t worth it to waste the time.
But as with most things that happen to me nowadays, the experience
served to be nothing more than blog fodder.
I certainly hope you get as much amusement out of reading those quotes
as I eventually did.