Commentary: Why Can’t Exes Just Shut Up?
Less than a week after Oscar-winning actress Halle Berry announced that she and her third husband, Olivier Martinez, were getting a divorce, one of her other salty exes would take to social media to comment on her recent relationship demise.
As Chris Rock once said, "That train is never late."
One might think that the shade would come from Gabriel Aubry, the father of her first child. After all, he is the one who got whipped by Martinez a few Thanksgivings ago, has consistently dragged Berry to court to demand spousal support, and was even rumored to have relaxed their biracial daughter’s hair to make her “more white.”
But no, not that winner.
This bout of immaturity came from her first husband, former baseball player David Justice, who was married to Berry from 1992 to 1997. Almost a whopping 20 years ago. Justice put on Twitter, which is now deleted:
“Yup..Me, Eric, Gabriel and Oliver were all her ‘Knight in Shining Armor’ until it ends,” Justice tweeted. “Then we all become the worst guys in history. Just wait, Olivier..It’s coming! She insinuated that her daughter wasn’t safe around Gabriel..look it up and see the reason! Just wrong.”
He also wrote:
"Reading the latest Halle Berry Reports, it wasn't me who hit Halle causing the ear damage. Halle has never said that I hit her. #formerboyfriend."
Then out of nowhere, Berry’s second husband, singer Eric Benet, decided to tag team on Twitter by writing:
“My man at @23davidjustice is tweeting some truth dis' mornin'!”
Talk about kicking a woman when she is down — that, and just being petty as all hell.
Now I understand that Justice, who has three children now with his second wife, doesn’t want to them to think he is an abuser from the reports they read. But low-key, I’m pretty sure his kids have Googled him by now and didn’t need Berry’s recent divorce to know that their pops was once married to Catwoman and all the drama that came along with that. And if he is so concerned about what his children are reading, I am also confident that they can read Twitter and see their father acting like a fifth grader.
All he had to do was say he never abused her and keep it pushing, or just say nothing at all.
Perhaps the real reason Justice is so salty is that he knows that the only time anyone mentions his name in this century will always be linked to Berry — and not his own personal merits. That must s**k, but that happens to women all the time.
The same can be said for the barely remembered R&B singer Benet, who has the most nerve of all, especially given that his alleged sex addiction caused him to cheat on Berry with more than “50 women” during their four-year marriage from 2001 to 2005. I wonder if he was popping all this good ish when he was trying to sue her for spousal support.
It’s sad to see two presumably grown men turn to Twitter to be validated in a court of public opinion that barely even knows who they are. Seriously, your male fragility is showing.
And it’s not like this is the first time we’ve seen male exes looking silly clapping back to embarrass their exes. This summer, rapper Future, who allegedly cheated on Ciara, got caught all up in his feelings because the singer had the audacity to be happy with someone else — Seattle Seahawks QB Russell Wilson. He took to interviews and Twitter complaining about Wilson spending time with his son, how he never waited to have sex with Ciara and how embarrassed he was for Ciara when they broke up.
And then there was Kanye West, who jumped in between a cyber squawk between ex Amber Rose and sister-in-law Khloe Kardashian by hitting way below the belt, saying that he had to take “30 showers after having sex” with her. Um…OK. Dude, you weren’t saying all of that when you were calling Amber your muse.
And in no way am I saying that women haven’t dragged their male exes through the wringer on social media, and that’s not right, either. But let’s just be honest, when relationships end, society often blames the women for their demise. Look at Berry, for example. How many times have we heard: Halle must be crazy! Why can’t she keep a man? God, she has horrible taste in men?
Very rarely are the men blamed or called out for the role they play in why things ended. And very rarely do we ask, “Damn, why can’t a man keep Halle?”
That double standard is a heavy burden for women to bear, and so to have men like Justice and company pour more salt in this already gaping wound is really too much. And I know what it’s like to be in your feelings, but it’s not OK to try to defile, humiliate and hurt an ex because of those feelings. Maybe I am naïve to expect folks who couldn’t honor their girl while they were in their relationship to then honor her when it’s over, but for your own good, please put down your smart phones, shut up and move on.
Because the only person who looks like a fool is you.
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