If a boyfriend and girlfriend are in a verbal dispute that leads to punches, spitting in the other one’s face, lashing out to hit and getting hit back and thus being knocked out, and then in the end it leads to marriage, who are we to judge? Or is the latter non-optional?
In the controversy over the Ray Rice video, should the “victim” speak up vehemently about what happened that day? Reason being; she forgave him so where should we in the general public be in regards to her decision?
Should we be supporting her right to make that decision? Or as many sit on the throne of being judgmental, is the public correct in denigrating her for making a 2014 decision that woman now have the right to do?
I heard a man who called into WVON claiming to be a marriage counselor. He said that the Ray and Janay Rice situation wasn’t “domestic violence” but rather a case of “couples who fight.” Listening to the man I had to agree.
They were both going for each other and Janay Rice wasn’t cowering in the corner afraid of her “big bad football playing boyfriend.” She went at him and got hit. I can’t tell if the hit knocked her out or her hitting her head knocked her out. But the video of the incident has been released and now the entire social media world is involved in the #whyIstayed or #whyIleft movement.
Well I am in the #whyIdon’tcare corner. Now it is not that “domestic violence” isn’t a serious subject. But unfortunately in my humble opinion, “domestic violence” involves one who brutalizes the other. It involves power and dominance over a weaker one. And looking at the tape of those two, they appear to be a couple who like to fight.
So women who aren’t cowering or are willing to start an altercation knowing full well the physical response that they can get back, is it fair to paint them as simply “the victim” as opposed to the “co-contributor” to the fight? Especially when it ends in marriage.
I mean in days of old, the cavemen knocked his woman out and dragged her home and he had a wife. I don’t know if Janay Palmer Rice subscribes to that mindset, but if she did, then is the general public getting their undies in a knot over nothing?
None of us knows the aftermath of the situation that those two found themselves in. Nor do we know the context. Were they drunk? Were they playing a sick game of sexual foreplay? Is it fair that after the issue was resolved with Ray Rice allegedly having told the entire truth to the NFL about what happened, is it right that someone invaded their privacy by releasing the tape so that everyone other than the primary players are throwing their two cents into the ring of public expression?
And as I asked on social media, what if it was a one-time occurrence where both have reconciled to their mutual stupidity and now we have media web news sites whose primary goal is to stick their heads into what was in the past those individuals’ private matters and personal business?
For me, I am more interested in wondering how come the entire country didn’t go ballistic over the other “elevator video.” You know the one where the four people get into the elevator and one begins hitting and kicking at the other person viciously.
It was a violent attack that Solange Knowles perpetrated on Jay Z and yet where is the outrage there? Where is the call to ban her from the public? Where is the arrest and anger over an innocent man being attacked by a karate kicking female? Well, we all know the answer there.
Let us respect the right of people who have resolved their “issue” to their satisfaction and not play after-the-fact quarterback to their privacy. If anything, make it a teachable moment and not a moment to just peer into someone else’s situation.
Let us teach our girls to stop throwing punches. Women are now on the police force and in the military. We have girls playing on the boys football team. We have fought for the rights of women to do everything they want.
So when it doesn’t work out in the woman’s favor, we then cannot go backwards and claim that the female status now gives us special rules. In other words, don’t throw punches unless you are prepared to get punched back!
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