Sean Combs is a terrible human being. That was established years ago and no one worth listening to is defending him or his behavior. But the recent Diddy documentary forces us to wrestle with a question that has no easy answers: Why did so many Black women let him get away with his behavior for so long?
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Historically, Black women have been at the bottom of America’s social totem pole. That started to change in the 90s as they began to get higher levels of education and achieved more upward mobility. Due to these gains, the way Black women were viewed began to change.
When the #MeToo movement exploded in 2017, millions of women called out the bad behavior of men, but there was a group that was noticeably quiet. Tarana Burke, a Black woman may have started the movement, but many Black women were hesitant to publicly name problematic black men. The reasons for that are varied but there is one that stands out.
Many felt the movement was co-opted by white women’s narratives. That is, white women became the face of it, and the stories of Black women were ghettoized.
As a result, some Black men were taken down (looking at you R. Kelly and Russell Simmons) but while there were whispers about other bad actors, few Black women stood up and publicly called them out. And this brings us back to Diddy.
In the Diddy documentary, several people, many of them Black women, talk about the abuse they either survived or witnessed. Joi Dickerson-Neal, Capricorn Clark even Aubrey O’Day of Danity Kane all tell their stories in sometimes graphic ways about what they either endured or witnessed. A question unasked but needing an answer was ‘why did so many Black women stay silent so long?’
Black women are the strongest creatures on Earth. Many have no problem speaking their minds and letting the chips fall where they may. So how did Diddy get sway with abusing so many Black women for so long?
Some Black women are hesitant to speak negatively about Black men publicly. There is this protective instinct that some Black women feel when it comes to the men of our community. So many have been socially conditioned to support and protect Black men at all costs. The only problem is that oftentimes this protective instinct comes at the expense of Black women’s own well being, wether it be their safety or their own job.
The Diddy docuseries does more than expose Sean Combs’s misdeeds. It shows how Black women sometimes hurt themselves in their attempt to protect Black men.
Too many Black men prey on Black women and are protected by their silence. It’s time to break that pattern.
Straight From 
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