"No Good Deed Goes Unpunished": Ryna Workman and the Consequences of Black Women's Muling

A mule, known for carrying the load of others for their entire lives.

Many Black women complain about being seen as the “mules of the world” yet continue to fulfill that role by speaking on political conflicts that do not involve nor affect the daily lives of Black women, defending demographics that are ruthless towards us, and refusing to put themselves and their womanhood first. The Israel v. Palestine conflict has been occurring for almost 70 years. Many people have died. Many people have been hurt. While it is okay to have empathy for others, when you are the least protected demographic on the globe, perhaps staying silent on polarizing conflicts is your best option.

There is not much I can say when it comes to Middle Eastern conflicts, but I do want to point out that when Hamas kidnapped several Jewish women, Israel wasted no time retaliating. Jewish men let it be known that they will always protect and stand behind their fellow Jewish women. I admire that immensely. This is common sense. A man is nothing without the woman who gave birth to him. Every group of men comprehends this except for Black men. The protection Jewish men provide Jewish women is nonexistent in any global Black community. I need Black women to understand and accept that there is not a single group of Black men, not Nigerians, not South Africans, not Kenyans, not West Indian men, and most certainly not Black American men, that will defend Black women on this level. When Boko Haram, a Muslim terrorist group (backed by several Arab countries by the way), kidnapped 276 Christian Nigerian girls, it took Michelle Obama to raise awareness of the issue in the western world. Even till this day, over 90 of those innocent girls have yet to be found. Many have been explained to be dead by the brave girls who managed to escape Boko Haram’s grasp. Black men in Nigeria refuse to stand up to Boko Haram. They refuse to denounce Islam. They have yet to even put a dent in that Islamic terrorist group. They don’t even bother to ask themselves why any Nigerian is practicing an Arab man’s religion instead of one of the many indigenous Nigerian ones. Is there any surprise that their desire to protect Nigerian women is so low? Do you see the difference between the Boko Haram situation and the one of the kidnapped Jewish-Israeli women by Hamas terrorists? The ability of Jewish men to stand strongly behind women they share the same ethnicity with has provided Jewish women with protection. Every demographic of women, except for Black women, have this sort of protection. When Asian men saw Asian women being attacked by homeless Black men, they demanded a hate crime bill. When Hispanic men noticed a lack of grocery stores selling cultural ingredients for their wives to cook meals at home, they built their own. South Asian men have a monopoly over the gas industry across the United States to ensure their wives live well. What exactly have Black men built for Black women? Nothing. Our maternal mortality rate does not inspire them to become doctors or build hospitals for us. Our high sex trafficking rates do not inspire Black men to get a hate crime bill passed for us. Black women refuse to acknowledge this reality. Black men refuse to protect their own land, their own entire continent, let alone the women they share a culture with. Black men have made it loud and clear, globally, that when shit hits the fan, they will run to hide behind white women, Latinas, shit even Asian women via interracial relationships on another man’s hard-earned land. They are cowards.  

Black men’s refusal to uplift his own community has resulted in Black women not being validated in ways other groups of women are. While other races of women can rely on their men to positively promote and protect their image, Black men do the complete opposite by publicly demonizing and degrading Black women. This leads to Black women only being acknowledged positively when they are acting as mules on behalf of others, even when these others do not like Black women themselves. Ryna Workman is the perfect example of muling gone wrong. Ryna Workman is a student at NYU Law University and was on her way to being a successful worker in big law and already had a job lined up for her with a $215k salary at the company of Winston and Strawn. Every law student knows that job offers after graduation are getting harder to find, including Miss Workman, but no amount of education can give you common sense, and Miss Workman is a perfect example of that. She used her platform as the president of the NYU Bar Association to show support for Palestine with no mention or condemning of Hamas terrorists. Many students at NYU were concerned with the message Ryna was putting out and a petition to have her job offer revoked was created. Ryna’s offer from Winston and Strawn was withdrawn, her face was plastered all over social media, and her career was over before it even started. This is the type of muling that sets many Black women up for failure. Ryna Workman lost a six-figure job that could’ve led her to being a millionaire for a group of people that probably would not even piss on her if she was on fire. That is the truth. Point blank. Arab and Muslim men began posting tweets praising women for being pro-Palestine, but many other Black women, including myself, took note of how these men were only retweeting young “pretty” white and Arab women. Ryna’s face was nowhere to be found. Even though Ryna lost her $215k job on behalf of Palestinians, they did not deem her desirable enough and therefore did not even acknowledge her support. Let Ryna Workman be a lesson to all of you Black women reading this. While you may think it is smart or moral to show your support for Palestinians, please note that Palestinians would never do the same for you en masse. These one-sided loyalties, when we are the most unprotected group on this planet, have got to stop.

I need Black women to understand that when you are unprotected, you do not put a target on your back. The phrase “no good deed goes unpunished” is an absolute divine truth. You will not be put on a pedestal for your kind actions. One of my favorite bloggers, Our-True-Nature, wrote “Black women and strategy seem to be on opposite ends because, in anything we do, we can never think strategically or ask “Will this benefit us?”, and I could not have agreed more. The issue is that Black women fail to accept reality. We fail to accept the world for how it is and not what we want it to be. This prevents us from doing so many things or taking a chance at opportunities that would benefit us immensely. If Ryna Workman was strategic, she would have realized that it is more likely for a Jewish man, not an Arab man, to provide her with a high-paying job, and that many Jewish people have helped Black women in the past while Arabs have referred to us as “abeeds”.  Miss Workman would have realized that silence would have been her best option instead of trying to be a martyr for Arabs that have a strong history of treating Afro-Arabs like second class citizens and being violent towards Africans, especially those of non-Muslim faiths.

Ryna Workman is neither noble nor brave. She is naive, ignorant, and irrational. Ryna is the result of a Black woman who has grown up in leftist echo chambers but has yet to realize that unlike the white or Arab female leftists she surrounds herself with, she has no male group to protect her when shit hits the fan. When given the opportunity to correct her wrongs and potentially save her financial future, Ryna Workman doubled down on her political stance, and to add fuel to the flame, she did it all on live television. She may very well never get hired anywhere in the United States again. Ryna Workman’s GoFundMe currently stands at $2000. Most of the donations have come from non-Muslim donors, not from the Muslims she lost her big law position for. This woman gave up a $215k job to support a demographic that has a violent history of terrorizing Black people all over Africa and the Middle East. Miss Workman made a mistake attaching her image to such a deadly and polarizing conflict. This is a perfect example of how Black women’s muling gets them nowhere but a fast ticket to poverty. We need to denounce Black women like Ryna Workman, encourage young Black girls to be strategic with their actions, and most importantly, stop thinking our opinions are needed, or worst, stop thinking we as Black women can be the biggest mules in the world when we are the most unprotected.