I think one of the saddest statistics within the black community is the number of women who aren’t married, and in some cases will never get married.

According to stats, more than two out of every three black women are unmarried, and they are more than twice as likely as white women never to marry.

Linda Young from Psychology Today writes:

“We have been hearing for several years that about 70% of black women are unmarried (including never-married, divorced and widowed). According to the 2009 Current Population Survey (CPS) of the U.S. Census1 nearly twice the percentage of black women (44.5%) as white women (24%) and Asian women (23%) have never been married. They also significantly outnumber never-married Latinas2 (32%).”

Young also writes:

“She was a 40 year old black woman with a Ph.D., ready to find a mate in a city that is only 5% black. One day a tall good-looking black man about her age approached her in the gym. He hadn’t finished college but was smart, funny and interesting and she was happy to go out with him. At the end of what she thought was a fun, easygoing dinner he said he was really attracted to her and tried to get her to stay at his place. She refused, telling him it was too fast for her but that she would love to see him again. His response? “Just because you have a Ph.D. you think you’re too good for me?” She was so taken aback by his comment she’s never forgotten it. That woman was me.”

Ralph Richard Banks, author of Is Marriage For White People, seems to agree with young’s implication that educated black women have a harder time finding a mate:

“One reason that marriage has declined is that as black women have advanced economically and educationally, black men have fallen behind. Nearly twice as many black women as black men graduate from college each year.Thus, not only are many college-educated black women unmarried, they are more likely than any other group of women to marry less educated and lower earning men. Half of college-educated black wives are more educated than their husbands.”

This ABC report touches on the issue, and is very interesting:

In my real life, I see the above reflected in the black women around me.

I have a particular friend who’s university educated, has a good job, and she’s unmarried. She’s attractive with a good figure, good sense of humour, and I think probably has all the desirable traits that a man would want in a woman. Unfortunately for her, the pickings are slim.

Also, my friend has a preference for black guys. This makes things even harder, because as far as I can tell, the only decent black guy in our little town is my brother:) And he’s married.

I bet you guys are thinking that she’s probably too choosy, but to be fair, all she wants is a guy who’s educated, ambitious, has a good sense of humour, doesn’t have any prior baggage (i.e. kids) and isn’t physically aggressive. Sounds pretty reasonable to me, but you’d be surprised by how hard it is to find such a black man, in our corner of the world. If she took away the lack-of-baggage prerequisite, then she might have a few more men to choose from, but that’s a deal breaker for her. It probably would be for me too, in all honesty.

Of course I’ve tried opening up her mind to dating outside our race, but she’s a little stuck in her ways with regards to thinking beyond the black man. Don’t get me wrong, she’s met the odd decent black guy, but the problem has been that none of those guys have wanted to commit. Of course as a woman, she thinks that the problem might be her, so she’s tried changing in order to attract the black man that will put a ring on her finger. As far as I can tell, unless she widens her dating pool, she’s onto a loser. Whilst black men in our corner of the world don’t have a problem impregnating black women, marrying them seems to present an impossible challenge.

Funnily enough, the married black men that we do know, are married to white women, and the black women who dared to date outside their race, are married to their white men. I’ve never really managed to figure out why IR couples don’t seem to have the same problem committing to each other.

I really hope this state of affairs changes soon for the majority of black women, it’s bad enough being considered to be beneath the notice of black men, but being considered not good enough to marry just adds insult to injury.

Anyway, what do you guys think? Are there any black guys out there who would like to weigh in and give their opinion on this subject?