(ThyBlackMan.com) There is a huge problem these days within our community with this thing called respectability politics, that’s harmful and counterproductive to our community as a whole.
Intro: Here are several types of respectability politics that currently exists in our community.
1. Colorism – Many people in the “conscious” community often play respectability politics and one of those is continuously perpetuating the very divisive tactic of colorism in which they greatly promote 
this false narrative that dark brown is the “only shade of melanin” when in truth, melanin comes in many shades of brown.
2. Being Told That You’re “Acting White” When You Wanna Educate Yourself – Whenever you wanna educate yourself about colonialism and its symptoms and the history of parasitic capitalism around the world, you’re often told by negropeans who don’t truly understand you that you’re “acting white” and that’s one of the most ignorant and disrespectful things that negropeans would say to you.
3. The Liberal Bootlickers In BLM – Last year, BLM basically revealed themselves to have been truly part of the “All Lives Matter” crowd and also played respectability politics when they publicly denounced Micah Johnson’s hero by saying they stand for “peace, justice, and freedom, not murder”. I’ve written several articles in the past about my personal disdain for BLM and why they’re basically toxic to our community as a whole. They clearly have NO agenda or solutions to overturn the social conditions that affect us everyday, but instead to mislead the masses into a political wasteland. And they also take money from and being controlled by these paternalistic white liberals that I personally despise very much.
4. Being Told To Pursue A Neocolonial Dream By Chasing The Parasitic Capitalistic Pie That’ll Never Truly Liberate Us – We are often told this huge lie by our parents that if we go to school, work hard, and get a piece of paper that doesn’t automatically guarantee you a job only causes you to listen to people who constantly tell you chase the neocolonial dream of getting that parasitic capitalistic pie which is very counterproductive to the struggle and will never truly liberate us as a collective.
5. Sisters Being Told To Look A Certain Way – One of the biggest issues that I personally have with a lot of these urban guys is that they often tell the sisters to look in a certain way that’s not very beneficial to them at all.
Example: A lot of urban guys tell their sisters not to wear clothing that they themselves deem “too provocative” or to wear a wig to hide their natural hairstyle. And I’m not a huge fan of that because I personally believe that sisters can wear whatever they wanna wear clothing wise and wear their natural hairstyle unapologetically without being restricted by respectability politics.
6. Victim Blaming – Whenever a brother or sister gets killed by race soldiers or urban zombies, the mainstream media will deliberately launch an all out slander campaign by blaming the victim for his or her own circumstances that led to his or her death.
The Conclusion – I personally think that we can be our true self without having to pandering and conforming to the harmful practice of respectability politics.
Staff Writer; Kwame Shakir (aka Joe D.)