A recent discussion between Real Housewives of New York reality star Eboni K. Williams and self-help coach Iyanla Vanzant has the internet abuzz.
In a webinar that featured the two, Vanzant asked Williams if she would ever date a bus driver.
“If he owns the bus…if he owns it,” Williams quipped. “If he owns the bus, Iyanla.”
The motivational guru then responded, “That’s the problem. The standards and criteria that we use to measure men is off for who we are as women and who they are in this society.”
She continued: “I would date a bus driver if he loved driving the bus, if he was a man of integrity, if he was good to his mama, if he treated me well, I would date a bus driver. But we think that it’s another human being’s responsibility to give us what we need instead of us building together. I’d have a little stash over on the side and my pre-nup, but I can build with a bus driver. So I think some of the criteria that we look for in the reality of today keeps us unhappy, keeps us angry, keeps us imbalanced, and then when the men show up we want to beat them up because they’re not living up to our standard and criteria and it’s not working, beloved. It’s just not working. It’s not that it’s bad or wrong, it’s obsolete. We have to come up with a new way of being.”
When the conversation was posted on Instagram, thousands of commenters weighed in.
“I’m sorry, but I need women to start keeping the same energy that men give us …men would not date a particular woman, so why do we have to settle and date a particular man,” one commenter wrote.
“Stop asking black women to settle for struggle love. We are the ONLY race of women expected to be the primary household providers. Other races of women are NEVER asked to do so and would be offended. Black women deserve provider husband too,” another wrote.
Recent figures reveal that Black women are more likely to obtain degrees than Black men and more Black women were enrolled at 23 of 26 of the nation’s top universities.
“[The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education] has consistently documented the fact that black women hold a large lead over black men in almost every facet of higher education. Black women currently earn about two-thirds of all African-American bachelor’s degree awards, 70 percent of all master’s degrees, and more than 60 percent of all doctorates. Black women also hold a majority of all African-American enrollments in law, medical, and dental schools,” the report concluded.
