“Today, blacks are no longer the litmus paper or the barometer of social change. Blacks are in every segment of society and there are laws that help to protect them from racial discrimination. The new ‘niggers’ are gays. It is in this sense that gay people are the new barometer for social change. The question of social change should be framed with the most vulnerable group in mind: gay people.”NEXT: Mabel Hampton, witness to herstory in the making Photos: Library of Congress
“[Another prisoner] says, ‘I like you.’ ‘I like you too,’ [I reply]… We went to bed and she took me in her bed and held me in her arms and I went to sleep. She put her arms around me like Ellen used to do, you know, and I went to sleep.”In 1932, she met Foster (right) and the two remained a couple until Foster’s death in 1978. Throughout the years, Hampton squirreled away hundreds of letters, photos and other items that chronicled African-American and gay life and history, including her own. She became a prolific philanthropist, volunteer and a piece of living history, appearing in the 1980s documentaries, Silent Pioneers and Before Stonewall. In one of many oral histories she recorded before her death in 1989, Hampton mused:
“I’m glad I became [a lesbian]. I have nothing to regret. Not a thing. All these people run around going, ‘I’m not this, I’m not that.’ [Being gay] doesn’t bother me. If I had to do it over again, I’d do the same thing. I’d be a lesbian. Oh boy, I would really be one, then! I’d really be one! Oh boy!”NEXT: A diagnosis leads to activism for Phill Wilson Photos: Joan Nestle/The Lesbian Herstory Archives.
As early as 1984, 1985, 25% of the AIDS cases in America were African-American. The majority of children with AIDS were African-American. The majority of women with AIDS were African-American. African- Americans have always been disproportionately impacted by HIV and AIDS. The thing that strikes me about the AIDS epidemic is that, quite frankly, it’s always been about race, or it’s always been about ‘the other,’ and that’s one reason why stigma has been such a barrier to end this epidemic.Asked what advice he would give young people today, he said:
“I basically would say to anyone, young, old or otherwise, that there will be an accounting, and you have to be comfortable with that. [The] price of the ticket for life is to leave the world a better place than you found it. That’s the minimum payment that we owe for the privilege of having spent time on this planet. Make sure that you at least pay the minimum dues.”NEXT: “You. Better. WORK!” Photo: Todd Williamson/PRNewsFoto
Frank Ocean
Hip-hop star
We were as a gobsmacked as everyone else when, in a blog psot, Frank Ocean revealed his first romantic relationship was with a man.
I was 19 years old. He was too. We spent that summer, and the summer after, together. Every day almost, and on the day we were together, time would glide. Most of the day I’d see him, and his smile. By the time I realized I was in love, it was malignant. It was hopeless.”
In the message, apparently first written in December 2011, Ocean indicated the other man was already spoken for. But the singer says says being open about his past has allowed him “to feel like a free man.”
Ocean has written songs for Justin Bieber and John Legend, but it was making a bold public statement in advance of his own debut album, Channel Orange, that was a pop-culture breakthrough. And Orange‘s subsequent critical and commercial success suggests hip-hop might be accepting of an openly gay or bi superstar. After Ocean’s revelation, music mogul Russell Simmons remarked:
“Today is a big day for hip-hop. It is a day that will define who we really are. How compassionate will we be? How loving can we be? How inclusive are we?
…[Ocean’s] gifts are undeniable. His talent, enormous. His bravery, incredible. His actions this morning will uplift our consciousness and allow us to become better people. Every single one of us is born with peace and tranquility in our heart. Frank just found his.
Frank, we thank you. We support you. We love you.
Ditto.
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Eric Auerbach
When will the click-through photos end???
LizzyGirl
Marsha P. Johnson.
Red Meat
Frank Ocean has done nothing for the gay community or the music industry. Being gay is not an act of anything. There are far more artists in the last 20 years that have done more than come out of the closet.
As for his talent, he has done nothing Usher or Justin Timberlake have not done. Even the prick Chris Brown did it better.
Eric Auerbach
@Red Meat: The world disagrees with you:
http://www.villagevoice.com/pazznjop/albums/2012/
2eo
@Eric Auerbach: Jazz album that got less than 2000 votes on a website directly about the thing he is in.
Lets not get ahead of ourselves, the world doesn’t give a fuck about Frank Ocean, it’s good that he’s come out and is continuing doing the thing he loves in spite of criticism.
But lets not go assuming he’s up there with MLK, Harvey Milk and countless others.
Eric Auerbach
@2eo: What? That’s Pazz and Jop, the best-known, most respected music critics’ poll in the country.
LadyL
@Red Meat: @2eo: Visibility is power. It’s light and truth and transformation. That’s never more true than in black communities that have long been ruled by cultural ignorance, groupthink insecurities and religious intolerance. Ocean’s coming out is significant and potentially huge for young black and minority LGBTQ and their families.
dugman
Did we have a brain fart and just forget James Baldwin? Baldwin had to go off to the safety of Paris to write and publish ‘Giovani;s Room” one of the few gay themed novels around when I came out. He also wrote on the themes of race and sexuality and the intersection of those themes.
stfallon1028
Thank you for including Bayard Rustin on this list! A forgotten hero to the cause is finally getting the recognition he missed out on in life.
MickeyP.
I love Wanda Sykes! She is a great comedian,IMO.
hamoboy
How do Frank Ocean and RuPaul get on this list but not James Baldwin? Speechless.
CM79
I say take Frank Ocean’s name off the list. He played the gay card because it was the only one in his hand. Frank is basically propped by a media who seemed to know what the worst outcome could have been in his coming out, and went out of their way to shield him from it. Behind the forced critical praise, on every blog, message board and real life conversation I’ve been witness to where he’s the topic, I see a stalemate in reaction; he has his defenders, but he also has many callous detractors.
Lefty
I’m sure Bayard Rustin would have dreamt that one day all his work would result in being on a list with Don Lemon and Frank “he’s never said he’s gay” Ocean.
I wonder if a similar list is being compiled of white gay people who changed the world. With Harvey Milk, Lance Bass and the Honey Boo Boo dude…
The Real Mike in Asheville
Very confused, very: how about a column about those who are changing: Don Lemmon, Frank Ocean, Wanda Sykes, et al, and those who have: Bernard Rustin and Mabel Hampton.
Alas, a list of 8 is a list missing too many: No James Baldwin? No Langston Hughes? Where is Alvin Ailey? Long, long before RuPaul — who is making waves for the LGBT community and I applaud that — there was Sylvester.
Barbara Jordan? Alice Walker? Sheryl Swoopes?
******
Honorable Mention — Julian Bond, the gay community has no better friend and advocate than the Chairman Emeritus of the NCAAP. An all-out advocate for equality for all; and his advocacy for marriage equality is changing the LGBT community as the walls of resistance from the larger black community crumble.
AdamK17
Wanda Sykes grew up in suburban Maryland actually. She went to the same High School I did, just about 20 years apart.
Dehreeus
White, gay websites kill me trying to make Frank Ocean into some gay, black hero. He doesn’t even want to be associated with us and the fact that y’all label everything black “hip-hop” is so annoying. Bye.