Chris & Rihanna--Don't be so quick to judge!

I hadn't realized how much of a Chris Brown fan I was until this fiasco between him and Rihanna jumped off two weeks ago. To me, their's is not the usual cut and dry domestic abuse case, though I do not, under any circumstances, condone the excessive force Chris obviously used against Rihanna, who I'm also a big fan of.

Why isn't this case "cut and dry", you may be asking? Well, a few things come to mind. Usually when we think of domestic violence, it's automatically assumed that it's a stuation of a man beating up on a helpless woman. While that is often the case, it's not always. There are some relationships where the man AND the woman have extremely aggressive and volatile personalities and they just get down like that. Not that I'm saying that's the case for Chris and Rihanna. That part, we'll never know.

What we do know, however, are about the reports of Rihanna trying to control what women Chris had in his company, when she was around or not. Don't get me wrong, that still doesn't excuse his role in the matter. However, a person is only going to allow you to be ALL up his mix when you get good and ready--snatching his phone, slamming his phone or throwing it against something, getting up in his face when you feel he's done something wrong, or smacking him upside the head, etc--before he's had enough.

I can speak on this subject because I've been on both sides of the fence. I've been the victim of a jealous, insecure, first, verbally, then physically abusive boyfriend. I've also been that insecure, controlling, hotheaded woman. In the first situation, for reasons of his own, and maybe some unintentional behavior on my part, the guy just didn't trust me. When I'd tell him I spent the day at my mother's house, he didn't believe it. The nights I didn't let him come over my house, he swore it was because I had someone else over. Whenever my phone rang in his presence, he assumed it was another guy. While that may have been true in some cases, he didn't believe that the relationship was just platonic. As time went on, he started doing crazy stuff like waiting at the corner of my mom's block to see if I was really where I said I was. One night he even broke a key off in my house door so I couldn't get in my house after I refused to tell him my whereabouts, but he pretended he didn't know anything about it. In our arguments he would cuss me out, calling me obscene names, like he never had before. I won't get into the physical incident, only noting that it was unprovoked by me. He just couldn't except that he couldn't have things the way he wanted. Now, what he should have done, if he was mature and rational, was end our relationship. The basic rule is, if you don't trust your mate, for whatever reason, end the relationship for both of your sakes. Both people suffer if you don't.

In the latter situation, I was married and from day one, my husband received phone calls at inappropriate times of night from females. He received text messages, too, that made it very clear to me that he was pretending to be single on the outside of our home. Rather than following the above mentioned rule, I could make him behave. I went through his phone when he slept. I checked his truck and the pockets of his clothes for evidence of wrongdoing. And guess what? Yep, I found it. Like the saying goes, if you look for trouble, you'll find it. Believe me when I say, I cut up like a fool with each incident. He had to at least buy three new phones. And I did worse than that, when my temper really flared. Cussed him out, threw something dangerously close to his head, pushed on him on everything. I was out of control. But that's how it is when you're trying to control someone else and losing control of yourself.

Granted, he never retaliated. But he did come close on one occasion. After he warned and warned me to back up off him, and I kept pushing and pushing and pushing, he finally put his hands around my neck, forcing me down on the bed. "Now, how you like it?" he asked me. Of course, I was freaked out. I didn't that. For one, I'd known him since we were teenagers and we had a previous relationship where I tested his patience and he never lost his cool. This time, he'd had enough. Tell you the truth, I don't think I acted in that manner again after that incident. Luckily for both of us, I realized I was fighting a losing battle and we eventually split.

Now if I would've called the police on him, he may have been arrested. And I don't think it would've mattered if he'd reported all the things I done to him in the past. The property I damaged. The times I'd put my hands on him. After all, I hadn't done anything to bruise him. Domestic violence is all about who puts in that call and the incident at hand.

With that said, yes, Chris Brown is guilty of beating Rihanna up. He beat her up bad. But it is my belief that there have been a string of events in their relationship that has led up to this. The lessons to be learned are: 1) Sometimes you gotta love yourself more than you love another and leave before problems escalate to this magnitude. 2) The only person you can control in any given situation is yourself.

May Chris and Rihanna go on to have successfull careers and lives.

Copyright @ 2009 LA Jefferson