Some years ago, Eminem was spotted in a hospital waiting room looking for the real slim shady. Fast forward a few years and I’m looking for the celibate black man.

I’m celibate (as you may  already be aware) and celibacy for the most part has been relatively easy sans the fact that I regularly meet non-celibate black men who are seemingly interested in me whilst my interactions with black men on a similar sexual trajectory as me are few and far between . Although the interest from these men  is usually short-lived, (I tend to shatter the hopes of seeing me naked very early on in a conversation quite similar to this one him: “hey”  me: “I’m a virgin who doesn’t believe in sex before marriage”) I still marvel at the over-representation of non –celibate black men in my life, which ultimately led me to write this article.

For the avoidance of any doubt, the reason for singling out black men is not malicious in any way. I’m  attracted to black men and my amorous experiences have revolved around black, oh and I’m black.

Black men cannot fathom non – sexual intimacy was the resounding opinion that I was confronted with the day I took to Twitter to gather insights on celibacy. Opinions ranged from, “why would I want to endure celibacy” to “it’s a way of manipulation” to “if, we’re not having sex then I’m no different to her ordinary friends” to (the worst of all) “ well if she isn’t giving me sex that’s fine, as long as she is fine with me getting my thrills elsewhere”.   I wasn’t particularly shocked by the sentiments as their opinions were not hugely removed from my reality, however it did reinforce a major concern of mine – what would become of the celibate black female looking to mate with a black male  and then realising that there is a dearth of celibate black men?

One or more of these things could happen:

• Black female becomes disillusioned with the market and decides opening her pool to white men could potentially expose her to more celibate men;
• Black female becomes disillusioned with the market and decides that opening her pool to sexually active men would at least mean she is with someone, even if it does mean compromising the reason why she decided to choose celibacy to begin with; and
• Black female does nothing and just stays single.

From the twitter poll (and also various conversations I have had with black celibate females), it’s obvious that females are more inclined to forsake sexual activity for a purpose greater than themselves which is largely foreign to men.  Potential relationships become hugely problematic because these black celibate females do not have the luxury of picking just any black celibate male because black celibate males are similar to unicorns – they rarely make a feature.

Black women are amenable to celibacy whilst black men are not and there has to be a reason for this. Is it that black men do not understand love outside of sex? Or they’ve not been socialised to see love as something that precedes physical intimacy? Or is it that the connection can’t be real or even worthwhile until they climax? Do we need to start questioning the black man’s perception of love in order to get him to see there is more  beyond the average 7 minutes?

In my haste to get clarity, I was called out on my assumption by a black man I imagine to be celibate.  He had this to say on the subject,

“Celibate black men do exist, it’s just that they are not as vocal.”

He posed a number of reasons for this, one being the stigma associated with male celibacy particularly from women. When a man announces his celibacy, both his manhood and his sexuality are called into question. When a female announces celibacy, it is usually met with a “good for you. It will give you so much clarity.” The disparity in the responses is the reason behind a man’s reluctance to speak on his sexuality. My retort to this is, granted double standards exist but this doesn’t help the celibate black female wondering where the men are.

Celibacy is a massive ask.  Whilst I would never impose it on anyone (or encourage anyone to do so) we really do need more celibate black men and/ or celibate black vocal men so celibate black females know where to strategically position themselves.

So in the half words of Eminem, “could the celibate black men please stand up?”

Or are we clutching at straws?

Love Cris x