Response To 'If She Can' T Use Your Comb

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A Get Out Response: “If She Can’t Use Your Comb…” I want to start this by saying I do believe in interracial couples. I see the beauty in loving someone past what others see them as. I think it important to note that any kind of love can beautiful and that any love can be imperfect. So when I begin to tear Rose and Chris, I want it to be known that I am not attacking or pretending to homogenize interracial relationships. I remember my little brother had this “special friend” when he was like 3. He came home one day talking about his friend. My very heteronormative mother asked about his girlfriend. Her name was Stella Jordan thought she was “cute. I’m not sure if he started with that word but my parents ran with it. These are also the same parents who …show more content…

She talked about how dangerous it could be for him to date white girls as he got older. How Stella could never understand Jordan fully. She then said “if she can’t use your comb don’t bring her home.” I, 11-year-old Whitney, was furious. How could my mother be so biased? How could she not see that there was so cute? It wasn’t until I was about 15 when it all made sense. I was learning about Emmet Till in school and I remarked how he looked like Jordan. Chubby cheeks and broad shoulders. So when I came home I knew a piece of what my mother was saying. IT can be unsafe for black boys to love white girls in public. It can be unsafe for us to love those who have never had a great track record for loving us back. That’s the scary of it all. It can be unsafe for us to love white folks on purpose. I think about how Chris really loved Rose. And maybe she loved him in some way but it wasn’t enough to keep him safe. Of course white folks loved their slaves. They had to in some way right? It benefitted them to love us. It benefitted the Armitage family to bring these men into their home and show them some type of love. So that they could

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