Robert T. Gardner Jr. is the author of The Choices We Make, a book about how our choices can foster or impede healthy loving. Robert has been a FLOW Harlem Book Fair panelist and a guest on Heart of the Matter, The FLOW’s internet radio magazine. In The FLOW we have often stated that it is not uncommon for individuals to be in a relationship that have nothing really to do with their partners. It’s all about need fulfillment. And, most importantly, the beginning of any relationship begins with your relationship with yourself. What folks call love often has nothing to do with giving and receiving healthy, self affirming love, again it’s all about need fulfillment.

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So, check out Robert's posting and share your comments with The FLOW family.

Relationship Sins:

A relationship sin is the thing you do with or for another person that you know is not good for you. It is when you know to do better and you do something to make somebody else happy, but you hurt yourself in the process. There is a list of relationship sins listed below. Be mindful that there are many relationship sins that we commit. However, I thought the list below was appropriate for this book. If you know of other relationship sins, please add them to this list.

Terrence Dean is an openly gay man and author of Hiding in Hip Hop: On the Down Low in the Entertainment Industry--from Music to Hollywood. Terrance, along with Lisa Durden, producer of the documentary film Project Wow: A Look Into The Lives Of Men On The Down Low were guests on Heart of the Matter, The FLOW's internet radio relatationship magazine. The topic was the Down Low, see posting below "What is the Down Low or listen to the show at www.blogtalkradio.com/the-flow. Terrance has written a follwup to our internet radio conversation. The FLOW wants to hear your opinions. This conversation will continue.

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The term “down low” has been surfacing throughout the black community for almost ten years. It has come to define black men who are married or have girlfriends and secretly have sex with other men. Actually, down low is a term that describes any man, or woman, who secretly steps out on their partner to engage in a relationship with another person, be it male or female. But, why is it the term down low seems to only apply to black men who secretly have sex with other black men?

Unfortunately, the term has permeated the black community due to its slang terminology and images that were strewn across the media. From the New York Times to Oprah the images and discussions of down low men only seem to relate to black men. Then the warnings came that black women should be afraid, frightened, and on guard when it came to black men. They are not to be trusted. Black men are evil, vile, and prey on the naiveté of black women. That image has stuck in the minds of black women and has continued to play in the negative attribution and psyche of all Americans.

Sex and its relationship to a meaningful spiritual life is a topic largely ignored, greatly disparaged by organized religion, and largely misrepresented in the media and society. Nonetheless, this disconnection is a burning issue that exists just below the surface of our consciousness, confronting us all, whether religious, spiritual, or unbeliever.

We live in a society where we are bombarded by sex and, unfortunately, religion has failed to put sexuality in any useful context (outside of marriage and procreation), while our communities and societies are ravaged by AIDS, unwanted pregnancies and widespread sexual abuse and dysfunction. The media has taken the sexual disconnect created by religion and has made it a psychologically loaded abstraction and absurdity. Sexuality has been reduced to body parts and sexual acts.

The tragedy of this is that many apply these media induced frames of reference to their lives and relationships which has resulted in the sexual pathology that surrounds us. We are living in the eye of a storm! Can we talk about it? As quiet as it's kept, sex fails to drive relationships, it is the meaning that we bring to the sex and sexuality that does not affirm and honor our highest selves that currently dominate our relationships.

When we hear the term the Downlow it most likely conjures up an image of a black man loving heterosexually by day and lusting homosexually by night. But is it realistic to characterize this as an exclusively black phenomenon? What is The Downlow really? First of all, when you get past the sensationalism, it's basically infidelity and a lack of regard for the well being of your partner. We all know that this may occurs in any relationship. Secondly, it's not new and it's not just men!

It has also been implied that the Downlow is a major risk factor in the transmission of HIV/AIDS to black women. Is this the real HIV/AIDS transmission story? Pat Hill Collins, in her seminal book Black Sexual Politics states that:

Because sexual contact constitutes one major trajectory of HIV contraction, the HIV/AIDS crisis reveals how the failure to criticise prevailing Black sexual politics places all African Americans at risk. Many Africian Americans fail to question dominant Black gender ideology and thus help replicate America's sexually repressive culture that takes special form within African American communities. For example, black men who confuse masculinity with dominance and take these beliefs into their romantic relationships place their partners at risk. Whether straight, gay, or bisexual, Black men who make "booty calls" without condoms foster the spread of HIV. Black women who confuse feminity with submission and weakness fare no better. When partnered with these same men, heterosexual African American women who try to be the "strong" Black woman can end up being sexually exploited, economically used, and abandoned when they can no longer compete sexually in the marketplace."

The American Psychiatic Association describes Domestic violence as "control by one partner over another in a dating, marital or live-in relationship." Abuse is not an accident. It does not happen because someone was stressed-out, drinking, using drugs, repressed or discriminated against.  It is not an example of love gone amuck, as often characterized, but the absence of love and respect.  The abuser has constructed a reality where their needs dominate relationships.  Abusers have learned to satisfy this distorted sense of self through their abuse and feel justified in it's use whether physical, sexual, emotional, or psychological.

 

In the book "Why Does He Do That? Inside the Mind of Angry and Controlling Men, the author, Lundy Bancoft says that there is a "degree of consciousness that goes into [an abusers] cruel and controlling actions," as opposed to the common perception that abusers are out of control.  Mr. Bancroft goes on to say that most times the abusers "value system is unhealthy, not their psychology."  It is their values that inform their behavior.

 

On October, 18th 2000 at 6pm, The FLOW will explore love and intimacy vs. power and control in abusive relationships and how extreme definitions of love become nails in the coffin of healthy relationships. Please join The Flow,  guests and callers on Heart of the Matter, an Internet Radio Relationship Magazine.

 

Guests: 

 

Brenda Thomas, author of Laying Down My Burdens, a deeply moving depiction of the author's struggle with domestic violence

 

Quentin Walcott, Director of CONNECT Training Institute& Community Empowerment Program.  CONNECT is an organization dedicated to ending family and gender violence.

 

 

Love Should Not Hurt: Violence in Relationships

Love & Intimacy vs. Power & Control

Are you looking for "love" and can never seem to find it? Do you find your self in relationships where you don't receive the "love" you give. Are you or have you been in relationhsips where you fear being left alone? Do you feel that you "need" to be in a relationship? Do you lose your sense of self when you are in a relationship? You may be a Love Addict. Pia Mellody, in her book "Facing Love Addiction" characterizes the behavioral symptoms of a Love Addict:

1. Love Addicts assign a disproportionate amount of time, attention and
"value above themselves" to the person to Whom they are addicted,
and this focus often has an obsessive quality about it.

2. Love Addicts have unealistic expectations for unconditional positive regard
from the other person in the relationship.

3. Love Addicts neglect to care for or value themselves while they are in a
relationship.