Toya Graham should be ashamed of herself.
The Baltimore mother of six is being touted by news media, the general public, and the “Single Mothers Competitive Slap-boxing League” (SMCSL) as “Mother of the Year,” after a video of her beating her teenage son away from a group of rock-hurling protesters went “viral.”
The footage shows Graham “poppin'” her son against his head, and pulling his sweatshirt hood and a mask from his face, as she demonstrated the “Get’cho @ss in this house!” technique–though the two were nowhere near their residence.
Graham’s son quickly employed the “But Ma, I didn’t do nothing” defense, as he attempted (unsuccessfully) to dodge the assault.
Media outlets ran the footage on a loop, as the scene played out like a ‘Bobby Shmurda’ video shoot gone wrong. (Moms had homie doing the “Shmoney Dance.”)
Hath no one pity for this young man?
Imagine hanging with friends, throwing a few rocks for “kicks,” and your mother shows up wearing a canary-yellow blouse and a pair of “ripped” jeans from an old ‘Salt N Pepa’ music video, to pull you away from the action.
The shame that young man will feel when he returns to school and faces that one sarcastic friend (everyone has), who greets him with, “Yo, you i-ight?”
The cold sweats he’ll experience from flashbacks of his mother beating him across two different parking lots, only for her to remember she didn’t drive to the scene.
The restraint he must show when hecklers and provocateurs taunt him with, “Yo, your moms is kinda thick … she got a nice lil ‘phatty’.”
And the patience he must have when every black person in the city over the age of 50 tells him, “You know your mama did that ’cause she love you, right?” or “Be glad you got a mother that loves you that much,” when I’m sure he wishes his mother wouldn’t have loved him so passionately, so publicly, and so many times upside his head.
As someone who has experienced the public wrath of his mother (though not as vehemently), I extend my sympathy to this young man. I was embarrassed in front of an audience of “mixed company” in a department store when my mother threatened to “bust me in my mouth,” as opposed to actually being “busted in the mouth” on national television.
Several celebrities weighed in on Toya Graham’s onslaught–I mean, parental diligence. Former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice released a statement after viewing the footage. “Damn!” his statement read.
The city of Baltimore also released a statement saying they will return the “black” that was beaten off the young man’s @ss, as soon as city workers recover it from the rubble.
I understand Toya Graham’s eagerness to pull her son away from that melee, and the passion with which she did it. Her rationale came from a place of fear and angst that single mothers (or mothers in general) experience when raising young black men—the desire to preserve their well-being long enough for them to realize that their well-being was in need of preserving.
But with that said, I haven’t seen a parental “@ss-dragging” like that since I told my mother she “lied” about buying me a toy from that aforementioned department store.
Lesson learned: “Mama snatched a body ’bout a week ago!”
