Tag Archives: Black community

If You Thought the Crack Era was Bad, Watch This Opioid Era That’s About to Kick Off

While cruising the Black social media streets, I’ve seen several folks sniggering over the opioid epidemic that’s currently plaguing White communities throughout America and while I understand the cynicism, some of us need to stop casting stones and look at what’s going on in our own backyards. Because it’s a whole lot of young drug addicts running amok causing chaos and mayhem but no one wants to talk about it. So I will.

Pill addiction in the Black community amongst the younger generation is running rampant and people are either ignoring it or acting shocked when the reality slaps them in the face. Rappers glorify opioid usage and brag about popping Mollies and unfortunately, too many young people have been heavily influenced by these fools and have become addicted.

According to a study conducted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Heath Services Administration, it’s been a 40 percent increase of Black drug overdose deaths between 2015-2016 as compared to the overall population at 21 percent. And between the years of 2011 and 2016, Black folks have had the biggest increase in opioid overdose deaths, particularly for synthetic opioid drugs such as fentanyl.

I wasn’t one of the people who were kee-keeing about the opioid addiction problem in the White community but I do remember how crack addicts were treated back during the War on Drugs. Crack addicts were thrown into prison like trash and given no empathy or treatment whereas today, this opioid drug epidemic has been called a health crisis. Because the face of the addicts are White and suburban, not Black and from the inner city.

So as cynical as I am about this system I live in, I couldn’t help but put a correlation between the reckless crimes being committed in the city I live in which is Chicago and the rise of the opioid addiction in the Black community. I’ve seen mugshots of criminals who are usually between the ages of 18 and 35 and I see absolutely nothing in their eyes. Not a trace of humanity or common sense. A graduate student from the University of Chicago was murdered by one of these monsters and he gave the criminal everything he wanted and he was still shot down like a dog in the streets. The only reason his murderer was caught is because he sold his victim’s laptop and phone at a cellular store and it was on video. Crackheads weren’t that stupid back in the day because at least they waited until night to commit crimes and this murder took place at 1:54pm.

The long term ramifications of the opioid epidemic in the Black community is going to be horrendous. The community has barely recovered from the crack era and its existing on fumes. Imagine how the children born from this era in Black history are going to be affected. So my advice to the Black community is to take those blinders off and really look into the faces of the younger generation. Today I was almost pickpocketed by a young man while shopping in Walmart and if I wasn’t so cognizant of my surroundings at all times, I would have been robbed. He was too close to me for my comfort and I turned around and looked at him dead in the eyes. He scurried off like the piece of shit he was and left me in peace but another woman might not be that lucky.

Continue reading “If You Thought the Crack Era was Bad, Watch This Opioid Era That’s About to Kick Off”

Sunday Musings from Chicago

So it’s 11:34am Chicago time and I am sitting here chilling, listening to the music of my youth with a pot of oxtails cooking and all is right in my universe for now. But I think too much as an ex told me so I am also sitting here thinking about the evolution of the Black social media and how it has not changed in the almost 13 years I have been on it.

I joined Facebook back in October of 2008 when my cousin Lisa sent me an invite. At first I didn’t do too much but talk about my children but I wrote a blog for my now defunct website, “The Black Feminista” that discussed getting sexually molested as a child and boy did it generate some views. I learned that so many Black women had experienced what I had gone through and it made me mad as hell. That it seem to be some type of rite of passage for young Black girls to be molested by the men of the community and how people really don’t give a damn.

So I decided to speak on the issues that affect the lives of Black women and girls and I found a bunch of ladies who agreed with me. From then on, it was on. We spent time dragging dusty ass dudes who could barely write a coherent sentence but believed that because they were born male, they were superior to women and had the right to tell us what to wear, how to think, how to live. Hell some of them thought and still think that they know more about womanhood than actual women who were born female in a patriarchal society. The unmitigated gall of these illiterate fuckers but having a cock gives men the most audacity in the universe.

But almost 13 years later, the Black social media has not evolved and it seems to be devolving if anything. Regardless of what social media platform they use from Facebook to Clubhouse, the only topics discussed by Black folks is relationships, celebrities, weave, sex, and the battle for dominance over women and children. Every couple of months, topics such as who gets fed first, the man or the children, did welfare destroy the Black community, should women go 50/50 on household expenses, and whether women should submit to men even if she works 80 hours per week while he sits on his ass arguing with strange women online are talked about ad nauseam and the shit is ridiculous.

Black women and children are being murdered daily across America, gang violence is out of control, the pandemic has taken a toll on the Black community collectively, and we have no money but the only things some Black folks want to talk about is getting fucked, telling women the best way to jump through hoops of fire to hold on to a man not worth two dead flies, weave, and fucking makeup. It makes me sad how little intellectual discourse is taking place online because the social media is one of the greatest inventions created and it could be of such good use to Black folks but instead of using it to uplift the community, many of us are consumed with satisfying our basic needs to the point that nothing else matters. Not even the children who are born unwanted and unloved and then grow up to be menaces terrorizing the community while these same adults bewailing and clutching their pearls about their behavior pretend like they don’t know what happened. With their trifling asses.

Honestly, what really irks me is that all these discussions revolve around men. How to keep a man, how Black men really feel about women. Everything is centered around them. Even those women who claim they are “divested” from Blackness spend their days whining about Black men and have transferred their worship of maleness from Black men to white men and will still be disappointed and looking stupid because they don’t love themselves. Women who truly love themselves don’t spend their days and nights worrying about how to appeal to men of any race. But I am digressing as usual and that is because I am frustrated.

I live in a city where more than 250 children have been shot and 32 killed this year, according to police data obtained by ABC station WLS. But grown ass people get their asses on the social media and discuss whether a more than likely shiftless man should be fed before the children. The same children who cannot defend themselves and are getting shot down like dogs. I wonder what I can do but I’m just a middle age fat chick.