It has taken me a couple of weeks to gather my thoughts before writing this post.

I have gotten at least fifteen e-mails from young women who have a partner in prison since I posted this blog about how hip hop culture dictates that young women should stand by their men.

I want to be sure to say at the outset that I do not have a partner locked up and so I wrote about this issue from the perspective of an outsider. I was prompted to write about the subject because of what I saw as a confining set of expectations being promoted by a part of hip hop culture.  I believed and still do that hip hop culture was prescribing a restrictive set of expectations for young women who have a partner in prison.

I have been moved by so many of the stories that young women have shared with me since I wrote the blog post.  I have also received a couple of angry e-mails from young women who believe that I was judging their choice to stand by their partners while they were incarcerated.  As I have said in my responses to those e-mails, I was very careful to suggest in the post that I was NOT judging the choices that young women make.  Rather the main point of the post was to suggest that it was exceedingly important that young women be ALLOWED to make their choices without pressure from the culture suggesting that they stay or that they leave.

My initial foray into this topic was actually a response to my sense that many young women that I interact with actually feel that they have NO CHOICE but to stay or risk being labeled as disloyal or worse.  The young women that I have spoken to about this issue talk to me about the emotional and mental stress that they feel once their partners are locked up.  This has to be underscored.  They have spoken of the financial stress that they experience, yes.  However most of the conversations have revolved around their inner conflicts of whether they should stay in the relationship or move on.

I am going to share the response that I wrote to one of the young woman who wrote me the angriest e-mail.  We have now struck up an e-mail relationship and I asked her this weekend if I could share the response that I wrote to her initial e-mail here. I promised her that I would not share her initial e-mail which prompted the response that I will share. She feels that it no longer reflects her view of the initial blog that I posted on this topic.  I am also removing any identifying information including her name in my response.

Dear Lisa (pseudonym),

Thank you very much for sending me your e-mail in response to my post about “Hip Hop’s Stand By Your Man in Prison Problem.”  I have to apologize for not responding to you right away.  I needed to take a couple of days to think carefully about what I wanted to say to you.    First, I really do appreciate the fact that you took the time to reach out to me at all.   Many people take issue with something and do not go the extra step of engaging with the topic or in this case with the author of the piece that they took issue with.

Second, I want to say that I think that you are misunderstanding the main point of the post.  My point was actually that young women who have a partner in prison should be afforded the space to make an actual CHOICE about whether they want to stay or leave the relationship.  My point is that societal pressure, whether it comes from hip hop culture or somewhere else, should not constrain young women’s ability to decide for themselves what is right for them.

You suggested rather heatedly that I had no idea what it was like to have a boyfriend in prison.  You happen to be right about that.  Though you couldn’t have known that when you wrote your response to me.  So, you are correct that I do not have a boyfriend in prison.  You next suggested that because you were sure that I did not have a boyfriend in prison I should not write about the topic. I am paraphrasing because you used much more descriptive language.  Well I disagree with that.  Anyone can write about anything and should.  Experience gives one special purchase but not an exclusive claim on writing about particular issues.  What I mean is that I have supported and worked with many young women over the years who do have partners in prison and so I am writing about an observed experience rather than a lived one.  I hope that you too will find a public space to write about your lived experience if you haven’t already done that.  I would love to read about that.  There is room for both in the world.

I used to absolutely hate it when grown folks would do this to me when I was a teenager…  But I find that I am going to do it to you now.   I feel that I want to claim a role that I haven’t earned from you.  That of a big sister.  I am actually old enough to be your mother but I won’t go there.  I want to tell you that I do not think that all of the anger that you expressed in your e-mail is directed at me.  I am happy to be a container for your rage if that will help you to let go of  your anger.  But my point is that you cannot be this angry with a stranger who wrote something that you didn’t like.   I do know something about pain and about hardship.  I do know something about feeling alone and isolated.  I do know something about feeling disempowered and angry.  Your e-mail resonated with your pain and something more.  It echoed with your fear.  You wrote to me about how difficult it was for your boyfriend in prison and that you were his lifeline to the outside.  I know that this must be true and yet I also wondered out loud if you had any lifelines for yourself.  It seems like you are taking on a lot for someone so young.  It is likely that I am being super presumptuous and certainly that you may interpret this whole e-mail from me as being patronizing.  I want you to know that it actually comes from a place of empathy and a desire to make certain that I am not yet another person who you see as oppressive.

I would never tell you what to do in your life.  That was definitely not what the post was intended to do.  It has touched a chord though based on the responses that I have been receiving from young women across the country.  So Lisa, I want you to know that I am open to being a pen pal with you if you are interested.  I would be so happy to hear back from you if you are interested in continuing our exchange of ideas.

Take good care.

So that’s it for now.