I’m not a Facebook person. Not anymore.

 

But I remember when it first hit. I was late to the party—very. Still tangled in the last threads of MySpace, thinking Facebook was just a place for older folks wasting time. Funny, right? Imagine that.

But when I finally got in, it was a wonder. From the jump, it felt like folks were just ready to feel. Unsolicited, unfiltered, open to thought, energy, expression. I remember telling my wife—back when we were staying at my mother’s house during a remodel—“Babe, these people feeling me. I don’t know what it is, but they are.” She nodded. I was lit off likes, drunk on comments.

It was the likes, B. Mesmerizing. Addictive.

One sista told me she liked how I wrote. She said it felt like I was talking to her direct.

Peace. I hope so.

 

And that was it. Headfirst into the Facebook nose-dive—groups, debates, exchanges with strangers. Beautiful, really…

Except it came at the cost of what matters most to me: words.

Not that I ever ran out, but what they meant started to shift.

How they landed. What they carried. What they revealed when eyes—two and a third—saw them.

Facebook’s forever.

And I left some gems there, too.

I hope you caught them. They were for you. Not the feed.

These days, I’m back writing heavy. And sometimes, I’ll still drop a piece in a group—not for attention, but for clarity. Sometimes one or two thinking folk show up with something I didn’t consider, or a reply that builds my next bar. I need that. We all do.

And then—the scroll. Shame on me. Nothing good can come of it...

Boom, that's when I saw her.

A woman. Ass out. Whole, entire.

Big. Like, ummm. dumb big.

But she was also saying something—about life, about blessings, hair flipped, neck rolled, “yeah boo, okay”-type energy. It was just a pic, but it said plenty. Thousand words...whatev. Feel me...

I paused. I watched.

And then—some dude commented:

“I bet them backshots is crazy.”

Whole Big Gulp, fully mixed/lemonade base.

Gasp. Pause. Bruh.

I mean… I feel you. I do, but you said that out loud?

Sista went off—as she should. Talking about respect for Black women, boundaries, misogyny. And she’s right.  She’s absolutely right.

The comment stream was on his ass. You know the comment stream, you've been there.

I felt for him, kinda, but I wasn’t ready to jump in. I was double-dutching, catching the rhythm, listening first.

Then here comes fam again:

“You got your whole ass out. How you expect niggas to respond?”

And that was the moment, the inflection point.

Not because he was “right,” but because he said a truth nobody can dodge:

What exactly are we all expecting of each other in this digital, sexual, culture-fed space?

Look, I had thoughts too. I saw the ass. I thought about the angles, the wildness, my daughter (thank God she's not online like that), and yeah—I even thought about backshots. But I didn’t say it. I never would.

Because I’m married, got damn it. Ha!

I remember being with my homie Bar-Rue at a Richie Rich show back in the day. We saw Ice Cube in the hotel lobby. Cube had that signature mean mug, strolling through like a villain. And out of nowhere, loud as hell, he barks:

“Bitch, you know I’m married!”

Man… wild. It was disrespectful. But it was funny as shit. And I was laughing completely. She didn’t seem offended, either. Then again… maybe if it was Ice Cube talking about the backshots… Wait—lemme stop.

Point is, I’m not doing any of that, not just because I'm married, but because I was raised a certain way. I had my pops, some OGs, a sense of discernment.

Even the raunchiest Too $hort line raised me with game and restraint.

He didn’t tell me to act a fool—he just told stories. I chose what to take from it.

But what if dude didn’t have that same rearing?

What if “ass out online” means something different to him?

What if his only cultural compass was the music, the memes, and a world that taught him that a woman’s body is always an invitation?

I mean, let's be clear, the sista deserves the utmost respect regardless of what she posts, but I'm sure he wasn't thinking, upon gazing, that the woman of his dreams or the one he wants to spend the rest of his life with is online smiling at him from the back right now.

He's likely wondering what he has to do to get behind that for a second time.

So, we can critique his comment. We should.

But if he never typed a word, that ass is still out.

Then what?

Do you judge him for the words, or her for the image?

Do you examine your own reaction? Dude's comments created a great rallying point, something sistas could coalesce around, instead of the fact that an entire ass was before them, all do to their decision to scroll. Damn.

Though, in fairness, maybe there was a few who were double-dutching like me.

Truth:

A lot of us see things we never say.

A lot of women post things they’d never want their father to see.

We all know better—because somebody raised us better.

Which leads me to this:

This is all Too $hort’s fault.

Ha!

Nah, but for real… kinda.

Not blaming him as in “guilty,” but recognizing the cultural role he played in shaping the man/woman thang.

I think this just became a piece on the intersection of hip hop, Too $hort in particular—because we’re from the same place—and the emotional residue his words left in us. Left on us. Left between us.

That Oakland game, that raunchy clarity, that pimp-preach blend. It influenced how a generation of boys saw women—and how a generation of women saw themselves in relation to us.

I wasn't raised wrong. I was just raised on $hort.

Too $hort—Todd Shaw—wasn’t just a rapper in Oakland. He was law. He was background music, foreground talk, hallway legend. His verses floated from Cutlasses, out of 6x9s that knocked. I can still remember vividly chilling with my brother, sneaking to hear what Play Boy Too had to say.  And what he said...

It shaped us.

Not because we were dumb. Not because we lacked fathers (though many of us did). But because game recognizes voice—and $hort’s voice carried. Low, slow, and surgical. He wasn’t yelling. He was telling. And if you were young, Black, male, and growing up in Oakland? You were listening.

He influenced me to no end. Especially in how I saw women—and how I approached them. Not with disrespect. But with… hesitancy.

Like maybe she was a setup. Maybe she was a gold digger. Maybe she was just like all the others he warned me about.

That ain't healthy. But it felt smart at the time. That was the trap: the game taught as gospel. The "bitch" anthem doubling as a cautionary tale. And if you’re honest—like I’m being now—you might admit you internalized that too.

Now, don’t get me wrong: This ain't about laying blame at Todd’s feet. I love him. He's one of Hip Hop's teachers. He’s worked with Pac to Biggie to Jay to Scarface. He told me about what happened just a week ago and what her 'Fuck Faces' look like.  He taught me how to say bitch and somehow still had women love him.

But still…

When women speak on Oakland men, there's a tone. Not anger. Not bitterness. But… exhaustion. Confusion. This feeling like:

“Y’all scared of love out here.” “Y’all don’t trust us.” “Y’all just want to fuck.”

And I get it. Because I was that. I am that. I’m a walking testimony to the skewed views that come from soaking in a sound too long without questioning it.

And when I zoom out, I see the pattern.

From the streets to the threads to the therapy chairs, I’ve had too many conversations—real ones—with real women, and real men, about how hard it is to connect in this town. There’s a wedge between us, and some of it sounds a lot like Too $hort verses.

He didn’t put the wedge there. But maybe… just maybe… he carved the groove.

That’s what I’m sitting with now.

I don’t want to disrespect the man. I want to honor the impact. Honor how art and life mix until you can’t tell which came first. Honor how a whole generation of boys learned what to expect—and fear—from women based on game that was half-joke, half-warning.

I don’t know how many love stories we lost because of that soundtrack. How many hesitations turned into heartbreaks. How many men kept their guards up long after the war was over.

But I know this:

We all got a verse we can rap word for word. We all had a moment where we saw a woman, and the first thought that popped up… wasn’t really ours. It was borrowed. It was inherited. It was embedded in the beat.

From “Make It Hot” (Where the hip hop swordsmen at?) to “Call Me.” Word to Lil Kim and that poster.

That’s Todd Shaw. He raised me. Raised a generation.

And then some.

And now?

We’re just trying to unlearn enough to love.

I did it. Though she is from Oakland, so I'm sure she understood intimately the struggle.

We still vibing. Still listening. Still figuring out where the beat ends… and we begin. Playlist just went from Too Short to India Arie. Easy, effortless, helpful.

Music; as useful as anything in our growth and understanding process. And sometimes, that growth and understanding leads you to not only question the chorus but change it. One love.

-Smirk