If you are African American and live in Cleveland, OH, you are generally expected to speak when you pass another person of color.  It is a common sign of courtesy and  respect.  African American culture is not homogeneous, but differs by region, socioeconomic status, and history.  For instance, when I visit my brother who lives near New York City, no one speaks unless they know you or want you to  purchase something.  Respect is understood by my willingness to avoid eye contact in the context.  It reminds me of how more primitive animals will avert eye contact when they are being submissive to a dominant leader.  In Columbia, SC, speaking is not enough.  It is courtesy to stop, have a conversation and you need to be sure to ask about parents, children, and work.  I learned that the hard way when I once rented a car from a Hertz there.  I learned about the Hertz worker's family, church, and his political philosophy.

I am writing because there is a more insidious problem that has gone unspoken within the African American culture that I think actually is more important than whether we speak, nod, ignore or fist-bump each other.  At first, this may seem strange, but I want you to think about this.  In the African American community, there is a tendency to oversexualize gender relationships.  You may not agree, but I want to share an experiment that I have done over the past week in Rochester, NY.

I have been convicted over the past several months that one of the ways of ministering to others is simply to recognize them.  Many people feel invisible.  They feel that nothing they do matters.  Their feelings and ultimately, their person has no influence or impact.  So I decided that I would look people in the eyes as I passed and speak if they returned a glance.  I found that this experiment had two different effects when I spoke to African American women.  Either, the women quickly looked away and avoided me or they began to flirt.  My theorum is that my glances were almost always read as sexual, even though I was intention to make my glance brief, and to keep my body language neutral.

This may because  many times African American men speak to African American women in a flirtatious and provocative way.  Its sort of the chicken and the egg.  I know of African American men who feel that unless they are flirtatious and provocative, women tend to ignore them.  This is why all the male African American intellectuals wonder why all of the "smart" African American women still love the "bad boys".  In other words, do men speak to women this way because it is effective or are women simply reacting to the overwhelming sexual behavior that is directed towards them.

Whatever the reason, I feel sad that potential opportunities to recognize and honor one another is twisted by our tendency to oversexualize.  I know that some will disagree with the assumption in this post, but I can not explain high rates of early sexual participation found in the African American culture (which is significantly higher than whites) without recognizing that the adolescents are seeking to establish an adult identity, and that identity in our culture and community, is defined sexually.

Leave some comments on this topic and your experiences