News broke earlier today, that Steve Stephens (The Facebook Killer) is dead.

Wrote about this the other day on here, and shared a great discussion with Dr. Boyce Watkins, Shaquita Graham and Nomalanga Mhlauli-Moses.

Now, that was a great talk as they made sure to cover both the male and female perspectives. They took the conversation to a personal level, by addressing mental health issues in the black community. What was pointed out in that last conversation is how when people are not learning coping skills, this can happen. A man who is not raised by a man, is capable of irrational (female) outburst.

What Steve Stephens did was some punk shit. Mental Health aside.

His mother may have abandoned him. The friends he surrounded himself with may not have taken him seriously. It also, sounds like Steve Stephens had economic challenges which, several black men face. However going around killing innocent people is just not the answer. What I felt was so important about the last conversation, Dr. Boyce reinforces in his thoughts now that the facebook killer is dead.

While the responsibility for a black man to cope with his problems ultimately lay with the black man; the black woman plays a pivotal role too.

Check out Dr. Boyce on How We Should Feel Now That Steve Stephens is Dead.

Men Have To Be Built.

Dr. Boyce is really fired up in this video, because he’s being honest. We (black men) know several black men like Steve Stephens. They’re more interested in working for white society than running a business. We’re not rejecting the white man’s system. Even today I saw a Hashtag on Twitter trending, about what women of color writers hear. It’s trending because, our women of color keep looking for approval from white owned publishing companies. That’s crazy, living in an age of self publishing, blogs, and the internet.

But it shows you the mentality that so many people have, especially people of color. We need to realize the white man’s system was created to harm our people.

Understanding that, Steve Stephens of the world are ‘created’ because we (collectively, men and women) are not paying attention. It’s an echo of what Dick Gregory spoke on several years ago, in his talk “Too Few Knew” – there is WORK To do, and too many of us are relaxing right now. Not having strong male role models is a real issue in our community. It’s up to the women of our community to make sure their boys know what a real man is. A lot of that is being challenged now, just as it always has been.

This white society has always worked to take black men out of the house. The making of a Steve Stephens is always under way in our nation. We (black people) need to understand that we are constantly under attack. They have trained us to kill ourselves and each other, and Dr. Boyce feels we need a Man Up Movement.