访谈录 2010-04-29&05-02 解读剩女现象-2

-Hello, Atlanta, and welcome to the Nightline Face-off. Tonight we are going to find out "why a successful black woman can’t find a man?" That's a topic that we talk about amongst ourselves. The guys talk about it with their fellows and the ladies are talking about it at the beauty shops. So, we’ve heard the statistics 1, report that by age 30 only 50% of black women have tied the knot; that black women outnumber black men in college 2:1; and that there are almost 2 million, exactly 1.8 million more black women than black men. So, we are asking, who is to blame? I am gonna start right now with Mr. Jimi Izrael. Why do you think that women can not find the men of their dreams?

-There's nothing wrong with having standards, right? But your standards have to be reasonable. And very often, some of these women, they are looking for a man, you know, what they don't understand is that sometimes you have to be the person that you are looking for. So, you are looking for somebody that you aren’t. Then you’re sad because you can’t find a perfect man while you not a perfect woman. And the only thing that "The Denzel Principle" says is like: look, sometimes you have to be the person you’re looking for. That's it, you know, that’s it.

-What is "The Denzel Principle"? What do you mean?

-Women are looking for men that don't exist. That they are looking for this picture perfect archetype, this Denzel Washington to come, pulling them to their houses, and  new made bagbands with a trunkful of dove 2 chocolates, and a suitcase full of $100,000 bills. And it is not gonna happen, it is not gonna happen!

-Sherri, is that what you are looking for?

-No, and none of my friends are looking for that. I don't know Denzel out of me, but...

-I don't either

-No, I don't think that our standards are too high. We should be looking for what we are. For me, I am going gosh, a man that loves God, a man that loves his family, a man that gets along with his mother, a man that can support me as I will support him, a man that can fix my rotisserie because it broke, you know, a man, here I got a five-year-old little boy, so a man that could come in and add to my son's life, a man that doesn't mind seeing me taking my wig 3 off and help me take the cornrows out of my hair, is that too picky?

-Wait a minute.

-I mean you say it's TMI, but I mean I’m just…

-But a man also, a man also who will, who respects women and actually likes women.

-You wrote in "The Denzel Principle" that too many women tried to turn a man into a cross between their girlfriend and a lap-dog.

-Right!

-Is that sound like what Sherri is explaining?

-Well, yeah, I meant she's been looking for some man to help her take out her wave, really? Seriously?

-Because you know..

-Come on.

-Really! Seriously, because that's the most intimate part of what I do. And I’m not gonna …

-Really?

-Yeah, my girlfriends will help me. Yes, but if I am sitting at home with my man, maybe instead of , you know, playing the X-box out there, I’ll play with you sometimes, I’ll play football with you and you can help me take the cornrows out of my hair, I don't see anything wrong with that kind of partnership 4.

-You should be able to be who you are (For real!)Wave off wave on; I mean you should be able to be real at home. You want that fantasy?

-Oh, you don't want the real, you do want the shallow?

-In my book, I didn’t say me personally, it doesn't get personal against you, Sherri, it's just, you know, me personally, I like a sister with natural, with a nice natural…

-And you will get it if you help me take the cornrows.

-Wait a second, Sherri. Okay, men are visual creatures, men are really visual creatures, we are not that complex, so you want us to be able to switch channels from taking your wave out to being able to thinking of you as the hot woman we married, you know, really, you wanna us to switch that channel, is that reasonable?

-You know what? You'll get that, and you also, I want somebody that I can share the real with. I want somebody that can know that yes, I will give you the glamour 5; yes, you can get a little bit of the freak. And yes, you can get some of the real and yes, when those days are, there is no glamour you still will have a woman in your corner, and baby, I know they had put you down, but I am here, cornrows or wig, I am here for you.

-I want to refocus the conversation just a little bit because there’s a really set context 6. You know, we have this question behind our heads "why can’t a successful black woman find a man?" I loved the fact that we’re having this conversation, but this is a serious issue, what we are talking about here is saving the black family. That’s what we are talking about. And so in 1966, 84% of African-American children being raised in two-parent household, fast falls to 2006 that number was 31%. So we are bearing 7 witness to black men and black women, even more having kids, not being together not staying together.

-If Sherri has the point of she wants a man who is can deal with the real of her, if he is possibly reverie a steady people, we love visual, there has to common understand. I can understand wanting the real, and in the reality of it, in your man's DNA 8, he is not built to take your cornrows out, nor does he want to. The fact that you want him to do it doesn't satisfy the fact that in his DNA, you think his showing his love to you is doing everything you want. Maybe you don't know how men in love. Could that be your problem? Because in our DNA, nothing in our DNA has us taking out your cornrows. Please understand that, if you got a man and he can cornrow your hair and take it out, that ain’t your man!