Searching for the New Black Man: Black Masculinity and Women's Bodies

Chapter Four: Breakin’ the Rules: Socrates Fortlow, Ethics, and Walter Mosley’s Constructions of Progressive Black Masculinities

127 Chapter Four Breakin’ the Rules Socrates Fortlow, ethics, and Walter Mosley’s Constructions of Progressive Black Masculinities in฀an฀interview฀with฀charlotte฀watson฀sherMan,฀walter฀Mosley฀articUlates฀ his vision of Socrates Fortlow, the main character of Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned (1998) and Walkin’ the Dog (1999): I’m writing a new series of stories, “The Socrates Stories,” to do a few things. I’m using Socrates, my character, to address the racial problems the community faces, to deal directly with the double nature of everyday life, where you have a system of laws and rules and morals and ethics and a concept of right and wrong that is basically a template laid on all of society. But in Socrates’particular part of society, the template doesn’t fit. And so what he’s doing is trying to understand how to deal with the world according to his analysis, in opposition to other people and other analysis. (quoted in Sherman 35) Mosley develops a conception of everyday reality applicable to the urban, socioeconomically depressed community Socrates lives in. Throughout both collections, Mosley constructs Socrates as a character who comes to his own understandings of the world: what is right and how to put it into practice. However, Socrates does not develop these understandings in a vacuum. Throughout the two texts, Socrates’s conceptions of right and wrong develop in relation to his Watts community.An examination of these ethical considerations is at the heart of Socrates’s character, most obviously in his name. 128฀ ฀ Mosley’s฀constrUctions฀of฀Progressive฀black฀MascUlinities When Mosley names the main character Socrates, he is not only invoking the traditional,Western history, teachings, and ethics of the philosopher Socrates, but signifying on this tradition as well. Hence, we can read Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned and Walkin’ the Dog as texts that instruct us in the possibilities for redemption and the development of ethical practices in relation to black masculinities that we usually dismiss as “bad,” disruptive, destructive, and hopeless. By naming a black rapist, murderer, and ex-convict Socrates, Mosley dares us not to judge Socrates Fortlow as American society, culture, and juridical systems encourage us to. The importance of Socrates’s ethical practices are revealed when contextualized within what Athena Mutua calls “progressive black masculinities.” Mutua situates what it means to be male in relation to issues of dominance and black humanity: I propose a definition of progressive black masculinities as the unique and innovative performances of the masculine self that on the one hand personally eschew and ethically and actively stand against social structures of domination. On the other hand, they validate and empower black humanity, in all its variety, as part of the diverse and multicultural humanity of others in the global family. I argue that this definition is grounded in the twin concepts of progressive blackness and progressive masculinities. I suggest that both of these are political projects committed to eradicating relations of domination that constrain and reduce human potential. (4–5) Mutua articulates the importance of challenging dominance in expressions of black masculinity.Further,she connects the pursuit of progressive masculinities to progressive blackness, broadening the terms of black progressivism to move beyond race as it relates to black male bodies, which are usually interpreted and discussed only in racialized terms. Conceiving black masculinity in this way highlights the importance of gender to black masculine formations of identity. Mutua makes clear that in the second decade of the twenty-first century,we are still dealing not only with the complexities of the color line, but also with the ways racism, sexism, patriarchy, and heterosexism continue to deform formations of revolutionary black identities. Mutua’s articulations of progressive masculinities and progressive blackness inform my understanding of the redemptive and hopeful nature of Socrates’s character and his personal system of ethics. Expressed in seven Mosley’s฀constrUctions฀of฀Progressive฀black฀MascUlinities฀ ฀ 129 key principles, Socrates’s philosophies and performances of progressive black manhood include (1) restraint,(2) compassion,(3) a practice of justice that is not circumscribed by juridical and penal systems infected with racism and other forms of corruption, (4) the exercise of wise judgment that moves beyond personal interest to consider what is best for the community, (5) redemption through continuous atonement and facing the consequences of one’s actions, (6) commitment to community and family both personally and publically, and (7) dispensations of grace toward one...