By Trish B., Award-Winning Publisher + Cultural Commentator
Lust is easy. Discipline is divine.
In a society that rewards bravado and conquest, too many men—particularly Black men—are sacrificing their futures for fleeting pleasure. The cost is not always immediate. It comes in moments missed, legacies fractured, and potential left unrealized. It comes quietly, in the form of unhealed wounds and patterns that repeat themselves generation after generation.
There was one man—let’s call him Marcus.
He was charismatic, gifted, and raised in the Black church. His mother prayed over him. His father taught him to lead. By his mid-thirties, Marcus had fathered children by three different women, lost his marriage, and watched his once-promising career unravel. He wasn’t violent. He wasn’t careless with words. But he was careless with energy—and lust was his drug of choice.
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Every time life pressed on him, he sought temporary relief in a new body. A new thrill. A new illusion of control. He confused comfort with clarity. Sex with connection. Attraction with worth. And behind every climax was the slow erosion of purpose. He once admitted to a friend, “I feel like I’m always starting over. Every time peace gets close, I ruin it.”
What Marcus didn’t say—but what his life revealed—is this: he had never mastered the art of saying no. His body led. His mind followed. His future waited. And his legacy wept.
But Marcus is not alone.
Across communities, Black men are conditioned to measure manhood by performance—how many women they can attract, how desirable they appear, how dominant they seem. But dominance without discipline is not power. It’s a trap.
In fact, the systemic structures already stacked against Black men—mass incarceration, economic disparity, misrepresentation in media—are only made more dangerous when lust becomes a lifestyle. The same society that hypersexualizes Black men also criminalizes them. It profits off their pleasure and punishes their pain.
According to The Journal of Black Sexuality and Relationships, unresolved trauma—particularly childhood sexualization and adult emotional neglect—can manifest as hypersexual behavior, especially in Black men who were never given language for emotional expression. In the absence of healing, lust becomes a coping mechanism. But unlike healing, lust always asks for more than it gives.
And far too often, it’s women—and sometimes even male partners—who become collateral damage in someone else’s pleasure. It’s sickening. It’s disgusting. And it’s rarely acknowledged.
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We see this on social media, where male validation is tied to how many women they attract, not how many they honor. We see it in reality TV, where toxicity is repackaged as charm. We see it in the barbershop, the locker room, the group chat. And we see it in the countless broken homes where love once lived, but ego moved in.
Let’s be clear—this isn’t about demonizing sexuality. Sex is sacred. Connection is powerful. But anything sacred misused becomes dangerous. The truth is: lust makes men predictable. And in a world built to exploit that predictability, Black men who lack restraint become easy targets—for emotional manipulation, financial drain, and spiritual decline.
Women know this. Some exploit it. Especially in a culture where social capital and monetary gain can be tied to who you sleep with, who you expose, or who you trap. From influencer scandals to entrapment schemes, from OnlyFans to false intimacy—many women have learned how to turn male weakness into leverage. In interracial dating, this dynamic becomes even more complex, as Black men are sometimes lured by aesthetic softness and submission, while unknowingly walking into relationships that do not nurture their full identity—only their fantasies.
But this isn’t just about exploitation from others. It’s about accountability within.
Because the real flex? The real evolution? It’s not in how many women you can sleep with. It’s in how many temptations you can walk away from. It’s in choosing purpose over pleasure. Peace over patterns. Calling over chaos.
Every time a man says no to what doesn’t serve him, he says yes to everything that will.
This isn’t about shame. It’s about awakening. Because every day a man gives in to lust, he abandons a piece of himself. His energy scatters. His focus fades. His destiny delays. But when he chooses discipline, he chooses legacy. And that is a power no system, no stereotype, no seduction can steal.
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It’s time we raise the bar for our men. Not with perfection, but with vision. Not with punishment, but with purpose. The world doesn’t need more men who can charm a room. It needs more men who can conquer themselves.