| Are Rihanna and Chris Brown still in love? |
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| Written by C.B. Forde |
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I am not trying to trivialize what happened. But I will make a bold statement and will chalk it up to the tragedy of young love. We have all been there, we made mistakes, and we have hurt people. Fortunately most of us don’t have such a traumatic situation occur, but sadly far too many young women have to suffer such abuse in silence. Violence perpetrated against women by men is a serious issue. It pervades the human experience, and something we will truly suffer from until we evolve as a species. But this violence often has more than one victim. Human beings are animals, and human children akin to other animals learn from observation. Tragically young boys learn to express their anger by watching their fathers, and young women learn what to expect from a man by watching their mothers. This perpetual cycle of violence is something that we are going to really have to look at and find new ways of addressing. Both Chris Brown and Rihanna grew up in abusive households. They were both victims as young children, and grew into victim and victimizer as adults. But love is love and love is pure, and nothing is purer than the words of these two hot summer singles. I think Chris Brown should have done jail time, it might have been good for him to really deal with his emotions, but he is an ambitious young man, and will grow and mature and do what he needs to do to continue his career. He was and still is a child. It is easy to cast Chris Brown as the mad raging Black man and then just dismiss him. In the words of the immortal Tupac “America eats its babies” and Chris Brown is an American baby pushed into stardom at 14. That is a lot of pressure a young child, who is growing up in an abusive household. Can we evoke the memories of Michael Jackson? We need to remember the beauty of this child and the beauty of his music. Although his song “She Ain’t You” on the surface is a beautiful tribute to Michael Jackson, if you listen to the words he is really singing to Rihanna. Rihanna for her end has handled her tragedy in true superstar fashion. Her first single released after the incident “Russian Roulette” bravely deals with the issue of a woman trapped in an abusive love. I was quite impressed with her artistic courage and strength to use her music to deal with her pain. It is a trait of a true artist to find inspiration in their pain, and Rihanna is a true artist. Sad enough she began to receive criticism for using her tragedy to further her fame. Life is what it is, and Rihanna has shown that she is a new breed of strong independent woman that will not allow others to dictate her emotions or agenda. Rihanna being from Barbados, tapped her Caribbean roots to create the Reggae song “Man Down” which is an obvious homage to Chris Brown. "Cause I didn't mean to hurt him Love is love and she didn’t mean to shot him down. However, if you watch the video she is making a strong point about violence against women, and men beware because there are consequences for every action.
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Are Rihanna and Chris Brown still in love?