THE PASSPORT BROS PROVES JUST HOW HYPOCRITICAL MODERN FEMINISTS REALLY ARE

4:48 AM 10/24/2023 Tue

NOTE: This is in direct response to the YouTube video, "Let the #PassportBros Have It and Other Thoughts on Leftover Black Men", Jan 9, 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSb1fUErJDE&t=3724s

Ever since going viral at the end of last year(1), the Passport Bros have become a topic of fierce debate throughout the online Black community - and, unlike many issues obtaining in the 21st century Black community, this one doesn't quite break neatly along gendered lines for reasons I will make clear in this post. The argument as articulated by my opponent above, is that the Passport Bros, being part and parcel with the Black Manosphere, are dumping on Black women writ large in order to justify their reasoning for leaving the country in search for love - but that too, is disingenuous you see - because the "real deal" is that these brothers are merely going over there to have cheap sex with poor women in third world countries who can't say no. My opponent makes these and other claims in her outrageous video above; and while she makes a big deal about her relative youth, as I've said before, she's an old story. The talking points of Modern Black Feminists are at least a half century old.

Based on both my opponent's ramblings per her YouTube video earlier this year as well as the rancor from other Black men and women across YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X AND Clubhouse, I've isolated and narrowed down three major recurring "arguments" against the Passport Bros:

1. That they are scapegoating, putting down and kicking dirt on Black women to justify their going overseas - unlike "Passport Stellas", who one, quietly go about their business, two don't put down Black men while doing it, and three aren't going overseas merely for sex

2. That they are lying about their pursuit of love and marriage, but in truth are merely going "over there" for "cheap sex" with "prostitutes" and in any event, destitute and often non-Black women in "third world countries" - many of them who are unlettered, uneducated and barely can speak English. By the way, most of the Passport Bros can barely speak the language in-country, too - more "proof" of this assertion (Of course, since "Passport Stellas" mainly head off to Jamaica, a former subject of the British Crown, the King's English is the official language in-country, but everyone knows about that Patais, which the lovely ladies are fluent in, don't you know)

3. That the Passport Bros are little more than de facto "sex traffickers" - even going so far as to engage in relations with underaged girls(!) - and taking advantage of much younger women overseas who have few to no options (even as we will soon see, the "Stellas" have done and continue to do the exact same thing to this very day) - my interlocutor here even went so far as to suggest the truly insane idea of getting the U.S. federal government involved to "pass some legislation" to reign the Passport Bros in.

You just cannot make this stuff up.

Speaking of age, one wonders what exactly informs Little Ms. Modern Black Feminist on this issue; in my observation and research on her, she doesn't strike me as particularly well read, and I don't get that sense from her in direct written communication either. I shouldn't then be too surprised if she isn't familiar with the excellent book, "Don't Blame it on Rio: The Real Deal Why Men go to Brazil for Sex"(2), which came out the same year Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. became President of the United States and leader of the free world. Written by a Black Male Feminist in Jewel Woods and based on an article "expose'" that was published in Essence magazine(3), Woods makes the same case that my interlocutor does - filled with condemnation, recrimination and the kind of SIGN language one comes to expect of high-handed Modern Black Feminism. I found the book well written, though it was light on citations and sources, and like the vast majority of Black research, is light on numbers & data and heavy on narrative (The author relies in the main on interviews he did with middle aged and middle class educated, professional Black men and their travels to Brazil and the Dominican Republic). Nevertheless, the overall arc and tone of the book is that Black men - particularly the best of them in educational and financial terms - owe it to the race to stay home and work it out with Black women, come what may. In any event, what I really appreciated about Woods' book was that it focused on the lives of "High Value Black Men" and was a refreshing depature from yet the umpteenth book on the Pookies and Ray-Rays of Black America. You know what I mean: There is an entire cottage industry in the academy and media that seems fixated on the ghetto and the inner city, and its Black men there get a disproportionate amount of coverage, study and investigation, despite the fact that most Black men are in fact middle class, and 2.5 million are in the upper class. While I disagreed with many of Woods' points in the book, especially after comparing and contrasting that to Williams' book, I nevertheless was thankful that he took a look at successful brothers for a change.

If my guess about my opponent not being aware of "Don't Blame it on Rio", both in magazine article and in full-blown book form is accurate, should I be surprised that she isn't likely to have read the 2018 book, "The Pursuit of Happiness: Black Wome, Disaporic Dreams & the Politics of Transnationalism" by City University of New York's Bianca C. Williams, either?(4) My opponent's rants about the Black Manosphere across three social media platforms certainly doesn't hint at it. Williams' book, like Woods' book before it, is based on her interviews with middle aged and lower-middle class Black women going to Jamaica from the years 2003 to 2007 - but she does one better than Woods by actually being "embedded" with "Girlfriend Tours International" - an outfit that organizes regular trips for the lovely ladies so they can reenact their "Stella" fantasies. You see, this whole thing got started with the bestselling novel and later Hollywood film adaptation of "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" and is closely based on its author, one Ms. Terri McMillan(5). Reading both books really puts the current Passport Bros debate into proper perspective and raises many questions, at least it did for me. One of them was, why wasn't that same finger-wagging energy kept for the "Girlfriends" that was showered on the Brothers in Brazil? The utter absense of shaming, replaced with heaping helpings of "context", "empathy" and "understanding" all of the "intersectional complexities" of these lovely ladies going down yonder to get some Bamboo had me scratching my head.

Indeed, many of the very same arguments being levied against the Passport Bros back then in 2008 and today in 2023, can be made of the "Passport Stellas", or "Girlfriends" as Williams calls them in "The Pursuit of Happiness" - something that becomes even more damning when just looking at the titles of these books alone. "Don't Blame it on Rio" tells you that the author and the many Black women who agree with him, see Black men going to Brazil and the D.R. as scapegoating Black women stateside for why they're tipping on out, while "The Pursuit of Happiness" paints a narrative of Black women escaping "racism, sexism and ageism" to go where they can be loved on by men who don't see any of that, and in a society where they don't have to think about things such as "colorism". Of course, "The Pursuit of Happiness", no matter how much ideological salad dressing is poured onto all of the Modern Black Feminist word salad, covers up the blatant hypocrisy both these books side by side reveals.

For example, "Don't Blame it on Rio" is 320 pages in print form, while "The Pursuit of Happiness" is 225 pages long (I own both print and ebook versions) - yet, and thanks to the wonders of 21st century tech, we find that the word "sex" by itself shines a light onto exactly what I'm talking about. It shouldn't come as any surprise that "sex" is mentioned 286 times in Woods' book - after all, that IS the premise of the book, and we ARE talking about Black men here; fair enough. But how are we to account for the fact that the same word - "sex" - is mentioned ONE HUNDRED AND NINETEEN TIMES in Williams' book? Especially given the deceptive sub-title of her book? Put another way, the word "sex" appears on every other page of Williams' book - revealing a major reason why "Girlfriend Tours International" was formed in the first place, years after "Stella" the book and the movie dropped.

That fact alone is enough to torpedo the first if not all three principal claims made against the Passport Bros above; but if you don't think so, then consider "Vera", who is described by Williams as being a fifty-something Southern woman" who was supposedly in a "long term relationship with a fisherman" and who was all too keen on sharing her "sexual escapades with her boyfriendand" and giving all the details about "her man's victories in bed", suddenly turning to Williams and telling her to "put this in your book" and to "write this down: Jamaica is for FUCKING!", to the raunchy laughter and approval of her "Girlfriends" (Vera would be dumped several months later after returning home to the States by her fisherman "boyfriend").

Critics of the Passport Bros are right to observe that "Passport Stellas" aren't publicly talking about Black men here at home or what they do with Black men abroad, and part of the reason might be that if the word got out about what they're keeping on the downlow, it might not cast the lovely ladies in a favorable light. This is how and why sex tourism doesn't appear on the lovely ladies' jackets; instead, as Williams describes it in her book, "Romance Tourism"(6) does. You see, the ladies can't bear to be so forward with their TRICKING, and needs to see it more along a relational, romantic line - and make no mistake about it, the very young Jamaican men are all too willing to play along. But, as the real life Terri McMillan found out the hard way(7), and as "Vera" in "The Pursuit of Happiness" had to learn too, the fantasy at some point, ends. Even Black Love guru fixture Tony Gaskins had to confess that Black women were delusional.

"The Pursuit of Happiness" also details what the "Girlfriends" thinks of the brothers back home, and it is not pretty; they refer to Black men as "pussies", even going so far as to accuse Oprah Winfrey's longtime partner Steadman Graham, of being the standard bearer in this regard. Other "Girlfriends" say that Black men "think they're the prize", and on it goes. So to the claim that the Passport Bros are somehow kicking dirt on the lovely ladies on their way out the door, we can say that they got it honest - as per usual, those same lovely ladies are telling Black Feminist academics exactly what they think of American Black men and why they're going to Jamaica instead. Hrrrmph.

Going to the second claim against the Passport Bros, maybe one reason why their "Stella" counterparts aren't crowing about getting a hubbie overseas is because it rarely works out. As Vera and several other "Girlfriends" would find out in Williams' book, rounder, older and louder Black women aren't in high demand as wives or long term mates in Jamaica - they're seen as being good for a good time, not for a long time - and make no mistake about it, that's because of the MONEY these lovely ladies have to offer to some of that young Jamaican "bamboo". The real life McMillan isn't the only one who was got for a Green Card, either; earlier this summer there was a viral video of a Black lady doctor who tried to live the Stella life and she too, was got - not only for a green card, but for other cash and prizes, since they were married(8). (And I note that Williams curiously left out that detail of McMillan's life out of her book. Hmm!)

On the other hand, it is not at all unusual to see Black men getting wives or failing that, significant others of considerable duration, from overseas - and might I point out right here and now, that in most cases, these brothers are in search of Black women? Brazil boasts the most amount of people of African ancestry anywhere on the planet outside of the continent of Africa itself. The Dominican Republic, which is literally right next door to Haiti, has a Black population of nearly eight percent and over seventy percent of the population are classified as "mixed" - which is to say, that they too have at least some African ancestry. In Colombia, home to one of the biggest Afro-Latin festivals in South America, cities like Cartagena and Cali boast large Black populations - 36% and 70% respectively(9). Like the domestic situation, the obsession with far too many Black women and some Black men on interracial mating is way too overblown.

Finally, let's put the third claim against the Passport Bros to bed, while highlighting the hypocrisy that the "Stellas" make painfully obvious, shall we? To the claim that the Passport Bros are engaging in de facto sex trafficking by taking advantage of poor, young and impoverished women in third world countries, a big part of Williams' book is an entertaining exercise in just how many ways one can tie themselves into knots in trying to justify the "Girlfriends" taking advatange - not just of the young Jamaican men for their "romance" and their "bamboo" - but of also taking advantage of the Jamaican ladies themselves, many of whom serve these American Sistas at the luxury resorts they reside in on their trips. "The Pursuit of Happiness" is honest enough to lay bare just how the Jamaican ladies feels about their American counterparts - and they are NOT impressed. Jamaica has long been considered to be a third world country, with nearly 20% of its population living below the poverty line as of 2020(10), and according to the World Bank, Jamaica's tourism sector accounts for over 30% of its Gross Domestic Product(11) - and that would include the "informal romance tourism industry" too, I might add.

In short, the lovely ladies - including and especially my erstwhile interlocutor here - are in no position whatsoever to attempt to upbraid the Passport Bros on any account whatsoever. They simply do not have a leg to stand on.

What "Don't Blame it on Rio" and "The Pursuit of Happiness" both proves, and what I've long known and even articulated in my own "The Book of Obsidian: A Manual for the 21st Century Black American Gentleman"(12) is that a major reason why middle class Black men and women don't see eye to eye, is because, to paraphrase Bane in "The Dark Knight Rises", "Victory has defeated us" - the success of the various "freedom movements" of the past half a century have truly freed Black men and Black women up from the long shadow of Jim Crow and chattel slavery before that. For the first time, in a new century, Black men and Black women are free to pursue life outside of that construct - and we are increasingly finding that we want different things out of life.

Personally, I honestly couldn't care less what Big Mama does on her dime and her time - as far as I am concerned, so long as the young buck in question is of the legal age to consent and the parties involved both agree to the terms of their engagement, I say more power to em. Black men barely batted an eye when "Stella", the book and the movie, came out. We simply just do not care.

But I think I can speak for Black men everywhere when the very people who have no qualms about living that "Stella" life want to turn around and attempts to lambaste Black men for giving themselves the permission to see what's out there - now that's a bridge too far. Then again, Modern Black Feminists are old hands at throwing bricks and hiding their hands from glass houses, aren't they?

I think we're done here. For more on the truth about the Passport Bros, I urge the reader to checkout the excellent YouTube channel "Andre & Andrea Love Crossing Borders" channel(13), as well as the excellent documentary, "Frustrated: Black American Men in Brazil" by self-made filmmaker(!) Al Greeze(14). I happen to know both brothers personally, and can vouch for their excellent work.

My name is Mumia Obsidian Ali, and I approved this message!

ENDNOTES:
1. "Why Some Black Women Aren’t Happy With The #PassportBros Movement" https://news.yahoo.com/why-black-women-aren-t-121500982.html

2. "Don't Blame It on Rio: The Real Deal Behind Why Men Go to Brazil for Sex" https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Blame-Rio-Behind-Brazil/dp/0446178063

3. "Don't Even Try to Blame It on Rio" https://www.theroot.com/dont-even-try-to-blame-it-on-rio-1790899983

4. "The Pursuit of Happiness: Black Women, Diasporic Dreams, and the Politics of Emotional Transnationalism" https://www.amazon.com/Pursuit-Happiness-Diasporic-Emotional-Transnationalism/dp/0822370360/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1CCP2Q16H0UZZ&keywords=the+pursuit+of+happiness+williams&qid=1698144526&s=books&sprefix=the+pursuit+of+happiness+williams%2Cstripbooks%2C83&sr=1-1

5. "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Stella_Got_Her_Groove_Back

6. "Female Sex Tourism" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_sex_tourism

7. "Waiting To Explode" https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2005/07/05/waiting-to-explode/2aac9087-7e5b-4466-8541-2461c20779d1/

8. "90 Day Fiance’s Chantel Everett and Pedro Jimeno’s Relationship Timeline: Inside Their Contentious Divorce" https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/pictures/90-day-fiances-chantel-everett-and-pedro-jimeno-divorce-timeline/

9. "These Are The 8 Blackest Cities In Latin America You Should Have On Your Bucket List" https://travelnoire.com/these-are-the-8-blackest-cities-in-latin-america-you-should-have-on-your-bucket-list

10. "Jamaica commits to improving social protection" https://www.unaids.org/en/resources/presscentre/featurestories/2022/may/20220505_Jamaica_social_protection#:~:text=the%20Jamaican%20economy.-,COVID%2D19%20is%20having%20a%20devastating%20impact%20on%20the%20Jamaican,to%20about%2023%25%20in%202020.

11. "World Bank Jamaica Report" https://pubdocs.worldbank.org/en/725891582655267359/mpo-jam.pdf

12. "The Book of Obsidian: A Manual for the 21st Century Black American Gentleman" https://www.amazon.com/Book-Obsidian-Century-American-Gentleman/dp/109836435X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=GFR37X4IX5GC&keywords=the+book+of+obsidian&qid=1698146174&s=books&sprefix=the+book+of+obsidian+%2Cstripbooks%2C87&sr=1-1

13. "Andre & Andrea Love Crossing Borders" YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@andreandandrealovecrossing5557

14. "Frustrated: Black American Men in Brazil" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oGMQ4IJDSg&t=614s