🚨BLACK MEN CALL TO ACTION! After releasing my thoughts on Shannon Sharpe, I received more backlash than I expected—mostly from brothers. They accused me of policing Black men’s relationships, called me a simp, and questioned why I placed the weight of Sharpe’s choices solely on him. It wasn’t just disagreement; it was deflection. But when I look at who society labels as “simps,” men who choose to publicly honor and protect Black women, men who build instead of break—it tells me we’ve lost our standard. This piece isn’t a defense. It’s a necessary follow-up. Because I realize now, we need to zoom out. Sharpe is just a mirror. What I wrote wasn’t just about him—it was about all of us. About what we praise, what we protect, and what we’ve allowed ourselves to become. So no, I’m not backing down. Not when too many of our brothers use access to destroy more than they build. Not when leadership is mistaken for control, and disrespect is paraded as masculinity. Not when our women are unprotected and our children unfathered—not just biologically, but spiritually, emotionally, and communally. This isn't about control. It’s about correction. About returning to something deeper than performance. About legacy. History has never been gentle with men. The role of protector, provider, and preserver has always carried with it weight. But for Black men in America, that weight is not just heavy—it’s bone-crushing. Our story didn’t begin in slavery, but that’s where this nation met us. We were captured, sold, shipped, stripped, renamed, and redefined. We were made to watch as our wives and daughters were violated, our sons beaten, our manhood mocked and mangled. And yet, even in that darkness, there was resistance. We talk about Nat Turner’s rebellion of 1831, but too often forget the 1811 German Coast Uprising—the largest slave revolt in U.S. history. Charles Deslondes, a free Black man working as an overseer, used his position—not to dominate his own—but to organize a revolution. He used access, mobility, and knowledge to try and burn the system down. That, my brothers, is what it means to be a man of principle. Before that, in 1816, we were at war with the American Government at the Battle of Negro Fort in Spanish Florida. Hundreds of free and escaped Africans, allied with the Seminole Nation, built a fortress on the Apalachicola River. When U.S. forces came to re-enslave them, they chose death over bondage. Over 250 Black defenders were killed when a cannon ignited the fort’s gunpowder. But they died standing. And they died free. This is our legacy. We were warriors. Strategists. Builders. Visionaries. So the question must be asked—what have we become? Too many of us today confuse bravado for bravery, visibility for value. Some of us who’ve made it to rooms of power use that access to shame rather than shepherd, to dominate rather than deliver. When you are close to power, your role is to make room for others—not to stand in the doorway flexing. Our brothers are busy trading legacy for likes, and turning access into arrogance. And it’s not just the shaming of one another. It’s the celebration of chains—chains with designer labels from companies that spit in our face. Gucci released blackface sweaters. Prada flaunted Sambo imagery. Moncler designed with golliwogs. And what did we do? Bought more. Flaunted it more. Wore it louder. We let disrespect drape our necks like gold, rather than buying our own luxury brands and promoting our own designers so that other can purchase our shit the way we purchase others. At the end of the day, a slave in silk is still a slave. We can and will create our own to compete with others, rather that ourselves. And while we’re talking about misplaced allegiance—our wealthiest brothers do performative stunts like planes to Iseral and overseas to support foreign causes where they have absolutely no connection, while their hometowns drown in poverty and neglect. No one’s policing their pockets, but we must ask: who do we have if our men seek praise from everywhere but home? Seek love from everyone but their own? White men have historically oppressed their women—burning them as witches, denying them the right to work, vote, or hold office. Yet, even through that oppression, they maintained a cultural instinct to protect and prioritize them within their systems. Today, those same systems continue to hold space for white women. Asian men protect their women. Jewish men protect their women. Across the world, every culture either reveres its women as sacred or at the very least claims them with possessiveness and pride. But when it comes to Black women, it’s as if there are no boundaries—no shield, no sanctuary. It's a cultural free-for-all. And that must change. Black men? We’ve let our women become a battlefield—and that is a disgrace. No more. Protecting our women isn’t just standing in front of danger—it’s standing behind them with support, beside them in struggle, and in front of them to defend. Because if we don’t protect our women, we are inviting them to be conquered. And that is cultural suicide. That is at core of how we define ourselves as men for all the brothers who think we can have a conversation of manhood and leave out our women. That’s an impossibility. But this isn’t just about protecting. This is about providing. About creating. About building tangible legacy. We cannot keep calling ourselves kings with no kingdom. And family—yes, family—must become the north star of our manhood again. Even if you’re single. Even if you have no biological children. Even if you don’t have a wife. Because fatherhood is often communal. It’s the coach who stays after practice. The older cousin who offers a young man his first job. The mentor who helps a boy navigate his emotions. These are the unseen fathers of our community—men who chose responsibility, even when it wasn’t theirs by blood. In Jewish culture, men are commanded in the Torah to care for the widow and the fatherless—not as an act of charity, but as a sacred duty. In these communities, no child grows up unmentored, and no woman is left uncovered. This isn’t viewed as going above and beyond—it is the cultural baseline. Across many global traditions, men are expected to be the protectors of the entire village, not just their nuclear household. We must embrace that same principle. Whether you have children or not, if you are a Black man, the weight of our people rests on your shoulders too. Our children are all our children. Our women, all our responsibility. That means shielding them in times of need, using our resources to uplift them, and leveraging our access to shape policies that protect and provide for us collectively. This responsibility doesn’t erase the vital role of our women. In fact, it requires it. In the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, one of the oldest Christian traditions in the world and rooted in African theology, the Black woman is regarded as the heart of the family, the spiritual compass of the household. She is not lesser—she is essential. But her power is different. She is called to support, to nurture, to guide—not in subjugation, but in sacred partnership. It's not about double standards. It’s about divine design. The man carries more physical and spiritual weight as protector and provider, but the woman must still participate—in the building, the teaching, and the generational shaping of the family. If we are to restore ourselves, then both must rise. The man must lead with love, vision, and sacrifice. The woman must join with wisdom, strength, and purpose. Anything else is dysfunction parading as independence or control. Together, we create legacy. Divided, we inherit chaos. It also means ensuring our brothers see one another as allies, not adversaries. And that our younger brothers know they are not alone—that true kings walk among them, building spaces where they can grow, learn, and thrive, even when the world meets them with nothing but accusation, suspicion, and pain. This is our shared burden. And it must become our shared pride. Not fragile masculinity that screams and bullies, but sacred masculinity that builds and protects. A masculinity that doesn’t fear accountability, but embraces it. A masculinity that doesn’t seek applause, but produces legacy. To the influencers, the athletes, the entertainers—our young brothers are watching you. And what are they learning? That success is in the drip? In the conquest? In the applause? Let us stop dressing trauma up as personality. Stop mistaking distraction for freedom. Stop mistaking rebellion for recklessness. Charles Deslondes didn’t play the game to stay comfortable. He was hunted, mutilated, and displayed as a warning. And yet, his name still echoes. So does the smoke from Negro Fort. So do the shackles shattered by Turner. The drumbeats of the Maroons. The pen of Douglass. The dream of Garvey. The march of King. They all left us the same question: What will you do with your access? Will you build platforms or prisons? Will you speak life or sow chaos? Will you father our future—or fail it? This is our call. Not to return to outdated patriarchy—but to revive righteous masculinity: one rooted in protection, provision, creation, and community. Our women deserve it. Our children need it. Our legacy demands it. And our ancestors are watching. The time for performance is over. The time for purpose is now. As you’ve probably gathered, this had little to do with his messy situation and more to do with sparking a conversation among my brothers about a path forward. Otherwise, would you have finished it? Have a blessed one.