LeBron James has a high efficiency rating on and off the court. Wade and Bosh are not pictured because this article is about their omissions.
On this blog, I have registered strong support for the actions taken three years ago by LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh. What the Miami Heat’s success represents is so big: black athletes challenging the unwritten rule that they should never be the architects of their own careers by making business moves without the approval of white folks. That’s my only interest in the Miami Heat or anything that occurs on a basketball court. However, the family court outcomes of Mr. Bosh and Mr. Wade are so infected with “Anti-Black Woman Rabies” (ABWR) that my support for them has the flu.
My support for Mr. James is immune from this flu right now. Mr. James will be marrying Savannah Brinson, his black high school sweetheart and the mother of his two sons, this September in this sunny city in which I reside (San Diego.) Sigh—-no invite for me.
Until yesterday, when I read the six-month-old headline , “NBA’s Chris Bosh Wins BIG Against Baby Mama,” affixed to an article about a child support battle between Mr. Bosh and Allison Mathis posted on NewsOne, I was all in. I knew of the highly contentious divorce and custody battle between Mr. Wade and his former wife, Siohvaughn Funches-Wade. I knew that Mr. Wade had been awarded full custody of their two sons and recall thinking that there was likely no justification for stripping this woman of even joint custody. But, at that time, Mr. Wade’s symbolism of black attempted manhood loomed so large for me that my concern about the outcome of that family court proceeding was tabled from my mental docket. And, anyway, I reasoned, his relationship with the very-brown-skinned Gabrielle Union was a demonstration of his high regard for his mirror-image counterpart. I have painfully reconsidered.
First, about Mr. Bosh: I was doused with the venom of the Anti-Black Female Rabies (ABFR) that was on display in the comments of the story about how an Orlando judge denied the petition of Allison Mathis, a black woman, to increase the child support payments Chris Bosh pays from $2,600/month to $30,000/month. The annual salary of Mr. Bosh is $17.5 million. That Mr. Bosh would contest such a request is heart-sickening to me. That his victory in that contest was met with the bleacher-shaking enthusiasm of so many black people is evidence to me of a virulent epidemic of ABFR that will render black people more disabled than we have ever been.
I know no one personally whose means are as great as that being discussed here. But, I do understand proportionality. I do understand that non-black women who marry and/or have babies with black men of such means are subject to little or no comment by the public that they do not “deserve” the sums they seek and that are almost always awarded.
There was no acrimonious contest by Russell Simmons or public outcry against the child support of $20,000/month that he pays for EACH of his two daughters with his former Asian-Black hybrid wife.
Football star, Tiki Barber, was faced with paying $150,000/mo in spousal and child support of four children with the Asian ex. This non-black mother of his children was not criticized for seeking it. It was Mr. Barber who was criticized for trying to low-ball his income in order to avoid paying it.
His Royal Arrogance, Kobe Bryant, found the mecca of humility to beg his Latina wife to take him back as the public shook its head in unison resignation that he would have to pay $365,000/mo in child support for his two daughters in addition to the $1 million/month in spousal support and half of their community property. There was a similar reaction, of course, to Tiger Woods’ pay-outs to the white nannie-turned-millionaire. Everyone knew Bryant and Woods would have to pay.
The focus was on the carelessness and misdeeds of the black men not the (non-black) mothers of their children.
A synopsis of how the Bosh case is the opposite:
In Florida, it is held by the courts that child support payments should be used to bring as much parity as possible in the living standard of both parents: “Children should share in the standard of living of both parents. Child support may therefore appropriately improve the standard of living of the custodial household to improve the lives of the children.” Fam.C. § 4053(f). Had the judge not ruled that Texas law applied rather than Florida law, this would have been the outcome for Mr. Bosh’s beautiful little girl with two black parents. There was enough evidence to establish Mr. Bosh’s residence in Florida but white folks have everything to gain in seeing to it that children born of two black parents are undervalued. And, many black people are so infected with ABFR that they enthusiastically support this agenda. Comments on the NewsOne story about Bosh v Mathis and elsewhere were typically, “What does the little girl need $30,000/month for?” and ” there is nooooooooooo way a woman would spend every cent of that $30,000 on her child every month.” I have no problem thinking of ways to constructively spend that monthly sum on a child. Black people have been caged so long that many of us cannot stop thinking small. But then, is a black mother supposed to stand in the corner with cinder smudged on her face as a mere maid to her child? Few black people demand this standard of similarly situated non-black women.
As for wealthy white men paying child support to the white mothers of their children? They bite their tongues and pay up— usually through settlement that is kept private. When the judge orders it, he curses under his breath and pays. Grasping the system of White/Light Domination is all about beholding contrasts.
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While downing some sparkling water to settle my stomach, my attention turned to the other member of the Big Three who has been under-performing in the playoffs this year, DWade. Perhaps, I thought, there’s a connection. Perhaps the universe is demanding that the best black men do right by black women. There’s no use in upbraiding those terminally afflicted with ABFR. But, Mr. Wade and Mr. Bosh, I think, are made of more principle and character than most. Whom our God loves, s/he corrects. Mr. Wade, I believe, has some correcting to do with his former black wife, Siohvaughn Funches-Wade. Wealthy white men and white judges rarely, in the end, deprive white women of even shared custody. There is nothing that I have read that Siohvaughn Funches-Wade is alleged to have done that equals what white Kim Mathers or white Britney Spears did or that was not also done by white Katie Holmes, white Nicole Kidman, or, for that matter, the black Mr. Wade himself. None of these people are behaving with complete virtue in these matters. Yet, all but this black woman have retained at least shared custody of their children while everybody is quick to label black Siohvaughn Funches-Wade as a “wacko” who was rightfully stripped of hers.
“Anti-black woman rabies” is a virulent, highly infectious, reason-resistant social contagion. I’m old enough to remember when everybody thought that Mike Tyson’s first wife, Robin Givens, was a conniving nut when she revealed that Tyson’s mood-swings often crystallized into swings at her face. And, then, he bit Evander Holyfield’s ear off. Givens was quietly acquitted of lying about Tyson’s behavior. But, no one ever apologized publicly to the woman.
The presumption of evil is always on black women. Everybody justifies our mistreatment as deserved. Sound familiar? Black people, male and female, often recognize that fact when it is directed at black people generally and black men particularly–but not when it is particularized toward black women.
Mr. Wade, your book about black fatherhood notwithstanding, white folks tricked you. Your children did not win when you were awarded sole custody of them. I hope you and Mr. Bosh will resolve to do better by these black women and, by extension, your black children. Then, just maybe, your basketball gifts will be restored to you during your current series with the Spurs. I’m looking for Mr. Wade to lead on this one as I expect that Mr. Bosh’s current non-black wife compromises his logic. However, I’m rooting for you both to triumph as men in all of your affairs.
