Gary L. Lemons (English, Univ. of South Florida) has published his new book, Womanist Forefathers: Frederick Douglass and W.E.B. Du Bois, with SUNY Press. Professor Lemons traces the origins of contemporary African-American male feminist thought to the “pro-womanist” stances of Douglass and DuBois.
Lemons also is the author of Black Male Outsider: Teaching As a Pro-Feminist Man, A Memoir (SUNY Press 2008). In the Introduction to that book, one sentence stopped me flat: “I have learned that it is better to love justice than to love manhood.”
-Bridget Crawford
It would seem that justice should always be the supreme love of our souls. The trouble is the varying meanings of words to different souls used to apply force. After all, laws are just tools of force. It is encouraging when someone speaks of it this way but I wonder what meaning is ultimate in someone’s mind. If, in fact, the justice is universal in scope and wisdom then the statement is great. If not, then a false or limited outcome occurs. The way most laws (force) are designed and/or used is to compel behavior so it is no surprise that oppression of something is evident. Our problems stem from being subjective (eg. religious, economic, political, etc.) in our choices and therefore our laws. To me, IMHO, that is the take away from that statement. Nothing to do with manhood, womanhood or anyhood as individual existences, rather that all things have a place in true justice.