“The black gay community HAS TO COME OUT OF THE CLOSET. Whites cannot do that for them. Until more black gays come out and deal with their families and friends more truthfully and openly then the black gay community will continue to suffer more than the white gay community. The HIV/AIDS prevalence among the black gay community is a direct result of more black gays NOT COMING OUT. …
It is everyone’s responsibility to help get the message out about safe sex, yet there are some things that people have to do for themselves. Coming out of the closet is one of them.” —Daniel responding to “If White Gay Leaders Exclude Blacks From Their Plans, Should They Expect Their Support?”
commenters
‘The black gay community has to come out of the closet. Whites cannot do that for them’
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kademonster
Well said.
The Gay Numbers
My response
@Daniel: No one is asking the white gay community to do anything for the black gay community. it is saying provide the resources that comes from fundraising, communication, etc must be shared. the reality is also that money and resources aer denied to the people of color and low income gay communities who are queer. I have a friend who focuses on this issue, from AIDs to any number of other programs, the disparities are incredible. WE should not pretend otherwise. The bootstrap theory has been around for generations,a nd it was as wrong when white straights aid it, and is wrong now. The reason it is wrong is because in the real world no one does it alone. When a black activist asks for support to go into their community and are ignored by white counter parts, don’t pretend that this is because that black activist is not out to their community. The point is that even the ones that are out are ignore. What’s the excuse for this behavior?
kademonster
@The Gay Numbers: actually i am quite positive that the black gay community has started getting agitated that the white gay community isn’t doing as much. I feel bad and I volunteer in my town’s lgbt youth shelter which generally has more african american teens than anything. I’m saddened when I am talking to these kids who r just a couple of years younger than me and their attitude toward being gay themselves is so hard core. Its a cultural attitude that still exists. The black people in power don’t want THAT associated with the “normal” black community because gays are so vile.
jjm16
oxymoron |?äks??môr?än| noun: … (e.g., “black gay community.)
The Gay Numbers
@kademonster: a) One behavior (those of black conservative leadership) does not excuse the exclusion by white gays with money. There seems to be this “not my problem” attitude here that’s destructive. Given the reality that they are being hit for being gay by straight blacks, and for being black, by gay whites- it is no surprise they go with what they know rather than alternatives being presented to them. It is naive to think if you have no choices that you will choose the unknown. No one does that. b) If white gays want to transform what happens in other communities, not just black (but low income, religious, or people of color communities) they must show up. You can’t win if you don’t show up. That’s where the movement has been since well forever. And this is the fruit you see in terms of that mentality. You reap what you sow.
The Gay Numbers
@jjm16: Exhibit A of what I mean is In JJM’s post. Why should any black person, already facing hostility from the black straight community, want to give up that relationship just to replace it with even more hostility from the gay white community? This seems to be the faustian bargain many are advocating here.
j
@Terrance: It’s that knee-jerk reaction of a reply that makes this issue so contentious to begin with. No one is picking on “the blacks”. There’s a legitimate question about representation that needs answered.
Anthony in Nashville
I agree that the black gay community has to take more responsibility for improving our condition. I feel we sometimes get too comfortable playing the victim role instead of stepping up and trying to do something ourselves.
Fitz
I wont put all the responsibility of some of the most in-danger people. Family is family, in my world.. and family is responsible for finding a way to reach all it’s members– the go getters, the drug addicts, the nerds, the jocks, the gay and straight. Last year I told a AA dad of a Trans 15 y/o:” either you are going to comfort this child and teach them how to deal with the world, or a stranger is. Now pick.”
MackMike
Interestingly, few seem to consider the risks to the homosexual black individual who has battled bigotry all their lives (typically years before reconciling their sexual orientation) and the close knit bond that that person would have with his or her family and community. When followed around by security personnel at a department store or pulled over for driving around in the “wrong” neighborhood, who are you going to turn to for sympathy and understanding? Well, folks who understand what you’ve been through and what you feel, I would imagine. Losing that support system would be dreadfully frightening, incredibly isolating, and then one must consider coming out to the very people that he or she has relied upon all their lives, and possibly losing them in so doing….and you’re doing that for a community that does not wish to reach out to you.
We have really got to get it together here. The one thing we all share is the fear that we will lose our families in the proecess of coming out, which just happens to be a riskier proposition for some than it is for others. True, ultimately, the black community needs to make that leap, but would it really pain us to do some more outreach to make it a safer proposition…to let them know that black, white, latino, etc..we are all in this together, and that we will be there for one another as a support, because we all do share that one commonality…we are all a minority within our very own families!
galefan2004
If only HIV/AIDS would stay on the down low. Instead it has a way of coming out in the black females that were unfortunate to be married to closet cases with roaming sexual organs.
galefan2004
@The Gay Numbers: Those that earned it should probably be those that spent it. That is what capitalism is all about. Maybe if the black community did its own fund raising it would be able to use its funds instead of asking the white people for money.
The Gay Numbers
@galefan2004: I don’t speak retarded. Can you translate how your comments have anything to do with what I said beyond you saying you are entitled to black support while given none in return. You didn’t earn black support yet.I do know that when someone has somethhing you want, you don’t try to tell them how to earn it.
galefan2004
@The Gay Numbers: I never said we are entitled to black support. Let the 1% of the population that is black/gay run their own cause, I’m just not going to give them money to do it with.
Funny, but I never asked for black support. I honestly think we will make it just as far without it. If you don’t want to work with us then work on your own. That is just fine with me.
I thought it was you people that constantly bitched about separate and equal. I have about as much interest as going into a black neighborhood as I do shooting myself in the foot, so I’m all for segregation. Seems weird you people would chose to do to yourself what you fought against for so many years though.
whirlybirdy
My father is a black and my mother is white. My father’s daughter from a previous marriage, my older half-sister, lives in North Carolina and participates in that state’s mainstream Black community. I, however, grew up in downtown Manhattan. My father is an artist. My mother, often outspoken, is no shrinking violet. Both my parents encouraged me to be expressive and independant. I had not spoken to my sister for years until a few months ago. The awkwardness I expected with regard to my sexuality never arose. To wantonly blanket an entire community and say they all need come “out” fails to honor the many individuals, like my sister, who never needed to be deprogrammed or persuaded to behave otherwise.
Also, and as my personal opinion, the message implicit in all outrage over the alledged “backwardness” of black culture on this issue is an idea of superiority, which is itself a very dangerous position to feel in relation to another group. The traditional black culture in the society continually resists, with just merit, this gross underestimation.
Peace on Earth today and forever.
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: I’m assuming you’re a troll starved for attention.
galefan2004
@Agent_Cake: Not really, I just get tired of the blacks whining about how its not fair then bitching when we point out the truth. It is in no way my fault that black gays can’t even get the support of their own racial community but want the support of whites simply because they are gay.
TANK
This looks like a job for Tyler Perry–literally, he needs to come out of the closet.
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: Well, when you use clearly racist language like “you people” and “the blacks”. Along with saying thing like “going into a black neighborhood as I do shooting myself in the foot, so I’m all for segregation” that is obviously inflammatory it seems extremely trollish.
It’s also pretty stupid to label the whole of black gaydom as whining segregationists.
I’m black. I’m gay. I’m out to my family. They’re as supportive of it as most of the parents of my gay friends but by no means pflagging it up. I’m not whining for support from anyone.
galefan2004
@Agent_Cake: Sorry, but I value my personal safety, and the black neighborhoods in the area I live are simply not safe. I’m not claiming that the white areas are heaven like, but its common knowledge where I live that if you go into the black neighborhoods you might not return.
As far as my comments about “the blacks” and “you people”. I’m sorry, but I don’t know what the black community wants to be called this week. They change about every week. Also, you people are different than me, so I have no problem calling the black community you people. It doesn’t mean the black community is worse than the white community it just means its different.
sam
@TANK: Right? What’s UP with that?
Personally, I’m not too worried about the whole black/gay thing…communities behave kinda like cornstarch mixed with water: fluid when left alone, but rigid when stressed. It’s the same principle that lead to an explosion of Islamic fundamentalism in the Middle East in the face of encroaching Westernization/modernization. When there’s a perceived external threat to the community, the impulse is toward homogenization and solidarity; only when communities feel comfortable can internal differences be acknowledged and explored. One could argue that the gay rights movement really got started when the (largely white) middle-class community relaxed enough (after WWII, the baby boom, the prosperity of the 50s, &c) to allow for the emergence of a distinct gay identity. Ultimately, the only way black gay people will feel accepted is when both “blackness” and “gayness” lose their pejorative connotations, and everybody can just settle down and be people.
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: I never heard the black community ever change its name from either the Black or African-American Community. It isn’t Diddy.
Also using the term “the blacks”,along with the term “you people” is different from using the term “the black community”. Both of those phrases carry a very heavy condescending, negative, and racist connotation.
As for your first paragraph I’m taking it as a joke because you can’t seriously be that ignorant. That is like saying its common knowledge never to eat in Chinatown because all the meat is either cat or dog.
strumpetwindsock
@galefan2004:
Man, this fight is never going to end so long as we keep seeing things in terms of us and them and you people.
How many chromosomes do you have? We’re all people.
galefan2004
@Agent_Cake: Words are words. Its the intent behind them that matters. My first paragraph was not a joke. There are all kinds of horror stories from people I personally know that have made the mistake of going into certain areas in the big cities around where I live. I also had a friend get his ass kicked by a couple black dudes for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
@strumpetwindsock: We are all people but we are completely different. We are motivated differently (us with our brains them by religion). We behave differently (our women are passive theirs are aggressive). I didn’t make the difference between the two populations of people, I just recognize them and call them what they are.
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: You are clearly comforted by and comfortable in your ignorance so this is a pointless discussion.
But if you’re going to stay around and be racist. At least make it funny. Your pseudo-intellectual racism doesn’t bring the lulz I require out of internet trolls.
RainaWeather
@galefan2004: Who the FUCK are you talking about?
strumpetwindsock
@galefan2004:
Who is this “us” you are talking about, anyway? I don’t know your background and you don’t know mine.
Our women are passive? You obviously never met my great aunt who beaned her husband with a cast iron frying pan.
And “our people” aren’t ruled by religion? If you’re talking about white Europeans they created it as a global empire.
It’s more sad than anything, because frankly half the people I read in here think exactly the same as you do, whether it is about blacks, breeders, straights, Christians, Muslims, or people who support Obama. Everybody is one of THEM – an enemy not worth talking to.
You should actually get out and meet some of the people you think you know all about, because frankly your attitude is a big part of what created that wall in the first place.
galefan2004
@Agent_Cake: I really hate to break it to you, because honestly you are probably the only one you think about like most blacks that feel like victims of an over reaching white society, but I don’t exist to please you.
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: As a troll you exist to please me and the rest of the internet with your antics. I know you can do better to be funnier. I have faith in you.
galefan2004
@strumpetwindsock: My mom is married to a black man who is more racist (towards blacks) than I could ever possibly be. He won’t sleep with black women because he views them as insane. He won’t enter a black neighborhood because he can’t stand black people. He simply doesn’t trust black people. Actually, the vast majority of black people I have ever met are the same way he is as well.
Chitown Kev
@galefan2004:
Good lord, you are one of the most racist pieces of shit i’ve ever seen on queerty. and that’s saying something.
“Our women”? Do you white people drag your women around by the hair like they did back in the day? Have you ever been to a Southern Baptist church? You will see a lot of your kind of people.
And you people actually rule the biggest church on the planet?
Chitown Kev
@strumpetwindsock:
wow, it takes a lot to get me over here to respond nowadays.
strumpetwindsock
@galefan2004:
Well my dear, you are doing your best to make me feel the same way about “our people” (if I may assume you are part of the poor hardworking abused white class who keep your country from falling apart).
galefan2004
@Chitown Kev: Yes, we drag our women around by their hair when they piss us off. Its fun for us. I am a proud member of the Southern Baptist church (the gay friendly one in my town). I am surrounded by my type of people every single day.
As I have said before:
Average Idiot + Internet Anonymity = Raging Lunatic
I’m no different. The truth is, I’m not even nearly as racist as I sound on the internet. I just get tired of the black community blaming the white community for everything.
strumpetwindsock
@Chitown Kev:
Yeah. Good to see you.
I’ve tried to cut back; you see how well I’m doing.
Chitown Kev
@galefan2004:
I would actually agree with you on that depending on the specific point you are trying to make.
Thing, is I’m surrounded by you people too.
and what the hell is a gay friendly Southern Baptist Church?
galefan2004
@Chitown Kev: Its an example of sarcasm. If you posted here often you would know just how much I “love” religion and just how much I “undervalue” the rights of women. Hell, I left the bigoted ass churches for their stance on inequality for women way before I left them because they were bigoted.
Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with black people. What I have a problem with is people that try to blame their problems on the white majority. These are the people that blame the cop that busted them for dealing drugs and claim the only reason they were arrested was because they were black. These are the people that feel entitled to money to support their exclusive causes when they did nothing to earn that money. That is really what this whole thread is about. The black gay community wants to be included, but when push comes to shove, the ones that bitch most about not being included are the same ones that did absolutely nothing for the organization they want to be recognized in.
RainaWeather
Galefan2004’s arguments are so 8th grade I could vomit.
galefan2004
@RainaWeather: Yes because that comment was so mature. I’m sorry I don’t live up to your fine example.
RainaWeather
@galefan2004:
Does that mean that white people like you are the kind who when a cop harasses a black man for no reason assume he must have done SOMETHING? Are you the kind of person who thinks that any black person with a nice car only got it from a welfare check? Do you think that any black person in a good school or good job only got there because of affirmative action? Are you the kind of white person who thinks that complaining about injustice is whining? Because that’s exactly what YOU sound like.
RainaWeather
@galefan2004: What comment?
TikiHead
Man these threads that deal with racism get ugly, don’t they? Unexpectedly revealing too.
Rob
*I thought I’d re-post my response to “Daniel” on the other thread*
Um, plenty of black LGBT people are out. I’m one and in NYC alone, there is a VAST network of out black LGBT people doing all kinds of things. We have our own magazines/blogs/shows/etc. (check out thebleumag.com and swervmag.com, both run by OUT gay black men) that came from the lack of OUR representation in the mainstream gay community. The “well gay people aren’t out” excuse doesn’t really fly anymore when you’ve got blogs like rod2.0 or Living Out Loud with Darian or Pam’s House Blend or out black LGBT people like RuPaul, Keith Boykin, etc., etc. You don’t know about these networks or these people because they’re mostly ignored by the mainstream gay media, who tends to throw out the weak excuse of “not out” to justify their treatment of out black LGBTs. I mean, look at the shameful way the cast of Noah’s Arc was treated at the GLAAD awards last year. Your argument is trash, and people like you make it while you write “whites/latins only” on your craigslist ads, ignore POCs at the bars, exclude us from organizations, etc., etc. I have plenty of LGBT friends of all colors, and thank god they aren’t as misguided as you.
And as a sociologist, let me relieve you of your misguided idea that closeted blacks are the reason for the HIV/AIDS crisis within the community. For many, many years HIV/AIDS prevention messages were tailored exclusively to the white gay community, and they became the face of the disease. Organizations like ACT Up and the like recognized what an issue HIV/AIDS was and made vast strides in curbing it in that community while the black community (which had its own problems here) ignored it as a “white gay disease”. Fast-forward 20 years, and while it has curbed off in the gay population it has exploded in the black community because prevention efforts within that community are sadly still in their infancy.
In short, you need to stop getting your information about black gays from articles about “the DL” and step into the real world.
*I’d like to also add that just because the mainstream media and the mainstream gay media like to pretend we’re all closeted and that out black gays don’t exist doesn’t make it true*
*Also, check out Anthony Woods, an OUT BLACK GAY Iraq War Vet running for congress in California*
galefan2004
@RainaWeather: No, I realize that some cops are simply assholes. I don’t back the cop until the actual evidence of the crime is found, and if there is no evidence of a crime I’m much more likely to back the black person than the cop. Being black isn’t the only reason to have cops specifically target you. In Akron, Ohio, near where I am from, the cops have targeted everyone that they could find that is openly gay.
I don’t think that most blacks are even on welfare. I also don’t believe anyone actually chooses to be on welfare. Actually, when I see a black man with a very nice car I automatically assume he is a hard worker with a good job. That comes from having a black step father that works his ass off and my first guy that I ever actually “dated” was a very decent older black dude.
God I hate affirmative action although I understand its still needed in some places. I hate it because people actually try to say that blacks abuse it. I don’t think that blacks abuse it at all. The blacks I have known that get a good job or get into a good school do it because they worked their asses off. In most cases they had to work even harder than a white person to get to where they are even with the “help” of affirmative action.
I think that the black community would do better if it quit complaining about injustices that happened before they were even born. I think that blacks need to recognize that the MAJORITY of the white community has been reaching out to them for a long time. It just annoys me when they lump all white people together when complaining about injustices. I’m not going to say injustices don’t happen, but yes it does bug me when they bitch at white people that respect them just because another white person doesn’t.
Thank you for your prejudgments of me. Its fun to lump everyone together isn’t it.
galefan2004
@Rob: You can not possibly have just blamed ACT UP because the black community ignored their message just because it wasn’t directed at them.
I would think as an intelligent human being that the black man would look at what is happening to a group he isn’t part of and think that it might just happen to him so he might want to pay attention.
When I was growing up I was taught that HIV/AIDS was a “gay disease”, but the straight community I was in didn’t suddenly think they were immune just because it was a “gay disease”.
Rob
@galefan2004: Sorry bro, I don’t feed the trolls. You are neither smart nor open-minded enough to be engaged in intelligent conversation about this or any other topic, even by Queerty standards.
RainaWeather
@galefan2004: I make no pre-jugdment, I only respond to what you write. But do you realize that you prejudge people on this board? And for the record, when I say “complain about injustices” I am not talking about stuff that happened before they/we were born. I am talking about stuff that happens right now in the present.
“I’m not going to say injustices don’t happen, but yes it does bug me when they bitch at white people that respect them just because another white person doesn’t.”
But you have been doing exactly the same thing on this website. You lump all blacks together and when anyone disagrees with you, you assume that we are your fucking enemy.
galefan2004
@Rob: I’m sorry you think your grounds as a sociologist is, in your opinion, reason enough to blame everything wrong in your life on the white population. You simply just made the statement the only reason the poor black people have a high HIV/AIDS rate is because the white community didn’t care enough to come to them and tell them to use their own brains to think that a sexually transmitted disease didn’t belong to the white community. It must be fun to play the victim, but its blacks like you, that love being nothing more than the victim, that makes the majority of the white community not give a shit about them.
RainaWeather
@RainaWeather: Anyway, I’m done responding to you unless you actually manage to open your mind (and heart).
MackMike
Wow! I just hate to see this all unfold here. We have a lot to do in our community, and we have got to pull ourselves together. As a minority community, our life experiences are incredibly divergent, but that does not mean that we also don’t share profoundly uniting experiences. Not one of us would appreciate, nor likely stand for, any heterosexual telling us that they exactly what it is like to be discriminated against in the unique way that we are. Are other races expected to hide from view whom they love? Are they discouraged from placing a photo of their spouse, boyfriend or girlfriend out on their desk at work? Are they unable to bring the person they love to a family dinner? Are they constantly taunted by religious oppressors? Are they discouraged from doing something so simple as holding hands with their loved ones at a market, mall or beach? No, and when they say that they understand exactly what that is like, it is a dellusion.
To suggest that a white person can understand what a black individual faces, to truly know what it means to be black and what their experience really is is to be dellusional. This holds true, going back and forth throughout all the races that make up the gay community, but in the end we are all as gay people, black, white, brown, yellow and green…we are all subjected to ongoing discrimination by every other minority and majority in society. We all share the very fact that there are those in each segment in society who revile, hate and wish to obliterate us, each of us a minority within our very own families.
And we get caught up in petty arguments that are characterized by the use of phrases like “you people.” Divide and conquer, it is a tactic that social conservatives are hoping to use against us, but they don’t even have to, because we beat them to the punch.
Who here would not rush to help your gay black brother, your lesbian asian sister, as they were being attacked in a gay bashing…in a hate crime based solely on one’s sexual orientation? A lesbian is gang raped and repeatedly called “dyke” in Northern California for hours, then left on a dank cold street naked and beaten. Lawrence King, a Latino, is shot twice in the back of his head while in class in middle school for being outwardly gay. Kids are literally being bullied to death across our nation for being gay. Hate crimes against us are up 24% since 2005.
It is time for us to make some efforts at concession and reconciliation. We don’t have time for dialogues that begin with “you people.” We are a diverse community, and we need to use that as our tool, we should be showing the rest of society how we can all (to use Rodney King’s famous phrase) just get along, by recognizing the bonds that we do have.
If we cannot open our hearts to one another, how can we reveal them to society as a whole, and in such a way that they can better know and respect us. Get it together people, I’m in my 40’s now, I’ve fought during the AIDs crisis as a teenager, I demonstrated agaist DOMA and DADT, I fought measure 22 in California and then Prop 8. I feel as though I’ve been holding a sign above my head for nearly all my life now.
Please frickin’ come together…my arms are tired!!!!!
Chitown Kev
@galefan2004:
On AIDS, there is enough blame to go around, primarily on the black community that did not want to deal with it or it’s gay population. Organizations made ovetures to the black community and were, by and large, rebuffed.
See, I told you, depending on the specific thing, I would agree with you.
RainaWeather
@MackMike: *tear*
Agent_Cake
@galefan2004: I think your talents are wasted on this board. I’ve heard that Ann Coulter is in need of a new speech writer.
strumpetwindsock
@galefan2004:
Oh come of it man.
This is not just a matter of complaining about perceived injustices, but comments like #26 (or was that also a joke).
That’s not about people expecting a free ride, it’s racist nonsense.
Even the notion that the black community is one thing and of one mind is ridiculous and completely false
Rob
@galefan2004: Like I said…not feeding the trolls. You obviously know absolutely nothing about social science or the like, and your ideas about those unlike you have probably been formed by a steady diet of White Man’s Burden with a side of xenophobia. How your brain manages to succeed in turning a basic point about mishandling media messages within two different communities (in which I acknowledged fault in the black community) into some sort of 70’s-style “Blame Whitey” whinefest I will never know. That’s OK. I’m sure things are quite simple in your world. Black and white, even.
ben
I’m just tired of all the bickering. I’m white and I love my black, Latino, Asian gay/lesbian brothers and sisters. We are all in this fight together, even if it sometimes does not seem like it. There need to be more resources for black gay youth where they can come into their own and feel comfortable and love themselves enough so they can come out of the closet and change minds within the black community. More visibility is the only way things will change. Race should not even be a factor, we need to look after and support our own, especially the gay youth who are so susceptible to going down the wrong path because of self-hatred/shame/etc.
Chitown Kev
@strumpetwindsock:
Someone should have given my black atheist/agnostic ass or my anti-religious mother a clue that all black people think with their religion a clue.
Chitown Kev
Jeez, and folks wonder why I don’t post here much anymore.
I’ve been out since I was 17 and I know many black LGBTs that come out at a young age. By and large, in 20 years maybe even 10 or 15 years, this conversation is going to look so fucking stupid.
MackMike
@ben: Absolutely Ben, and you are so right, ChitownKev–though I hope that the conversations ridiculousness is revealed sooner than 10 years hence.
MackMike
@RainaWeather: your earlier comments are right on. Thank you.
strumpetwindsock
@Chitown Kev:
Indeed.
Actually I just recommended a great radio program on another thread which you might enjoy:
http://www.queerty.com/if-white-gay-leaders-exclude-blacks-from-their-plans-should-they-expect-their-support-20090629/#comment-188275
One of the ideas he brings up is that far from expecting a free ride, natives and new immigrants are the ones trying hardest to make the relationship with the white majority work.
I’m sure there are parallels with the situation down in the states.
Abel De La Torre
For fucks sake when will everyone here start to ignore Galefan2004? He only trolls boards where he can successfullyu offend en masse. He means to incite with his comments so please don’t take the bait and just don’t direct comments at him.
MackMike
@Abel De La Torre: What an awesome name! Sorry…it just had to be said.
AlwaysGay
Two years ago a study came out that found black gay people were 67% less likely to identify as gay as white gay people are in America. Which means for every 22.5 OUT white gay people there is one OUT black gay person.
Many gay people repeat what heterosexuals say about homosexuality/ gay people. You grew up around heterosexuals so I understand why however you need to THINK independently because they are WRONG and OPPRESSIVE. That is what is going on with Sidney Brinkley’s comments, he is repeating what he heard from heterosexuals, he’s doing heterosexuals’ bidding. His main concern is not gay rights it’s black solidarity. Many black people believe homosexuality is a white and elitist thing and there is nothing more black people do not want to be seen as than white and uppity. In reality that is far from the case since gay people are systematically discriminated at work in pay, benefits, and promotions. Having a white gay person tell black heterosexuals about anti-gay bigotry would reinforce their own bigotry that being gay is a white thing etc. Only black gay people can talk to black heterosexuals since race is a big factor in how they interpret homosexuality.
Most American black people live in cities; most gay resources are in cities. It’s a BS excuse that most black gays don’t have resources they can easily get to. You just don’t want to be seen as “acting white” or being effeminate or asking for help from a non-all black organization. Where I live there is only one place in the entire county to get help dealing with HIV/ AIDS, other resources for gay people here are hard to find and under-funded.
getreal
As an equality activist who does outreach to communities of color and faith communities there is a perception that gay means other because there is a large percentage of people in both communities that are resistant to coming out. Statistically we need people from both communities to gain full equality for LGBT people in this country and particularly people of color coming out in large number is now a political necessity. As a black person who does outreach to the black community of the civil rights of lgbt people I have seen that visibility of black gays is invaluable in educating people on the importance of LGBT equality.
J. Clarence
That comment is just precious.
There does need to be a more active presence of Black gays throughout the Black community and in the mainstream; however, I think the assertion that black gays are doing nothing and are just waiting to be saved by their White knights, literally, is ridiculous.
Do you not think Patrick Ian-Polk has others ideas besides Noah’s Arc that he wouldn’t mind working on if LOGO or HERE! gives him a call, or call him back. Or maybe give Maurice Jamal a call back to.
Why not like Beautiful People we make a series about Andre Leion Talley’s memoir? Why not give Victor Hodge, who writes Black Gay Boy Fantasy, a ring and offer him rights to run his comic strip in the Washington Blade. Why don’t we hook up one of the many Black gay rappers with a record deal.
There are thousands of Black gays that work hard every day within the Black community to fight it’s religious homophobia. You cannot blame them because the mainstream Queer community doesn’t recognize them for their efforts.
The Gay Numbers
@AlwaysGay: I live in NYC. Most of the resources for gay people are not located in black or Latino neighborhoods. Again, a simple google search would have told you that, but you prefer your ignorance.
AlwaysGay
@The Gay Numbers: Use transportation. As I said before there is only one center for HIV/ AIDS help in the county where I live, people come from across the county.
The Gay Numbers
@AlwaysGay: Why don’t you use transportation to come over to my neighborhoods over in brooklyn? We both knwo the answer. We are not discussing HIV. We are discussing gay rights issues. You are fuck ing retarded as the rest of the racists here.
YankeeGirl226
@The Gay Numbers: I do not agree with everything you always write, but you were spot on throughout this entire post.
sal(the original)
what he says is kinda true……its true……hmmmm
RainaWeather
@AlwaysGay: I agree with the last sentence of the second paragraph.
Mitch
It’s wonderful to see all these “rich, white men” passing down their collective racist wisdom upon a group of black men that are doubly excluded in society – from the white world and from the straight world. Gay people just depress me entirely. Maybe it springs from a culture that’s strikingly superficial, egocentric, and totally shameless, but I foolishly expect our community to be more understanding than this. I’m starting to see that in a “perfect world”, white gay men wouldn’t have to deal with the problem of nonwhite gay men.
Diploid79
@Mitch: I totally agree. This website has moved from being a website that ideally informed us about issues affecting gay people in the world, to an obama bashing forum, to a full-on racial-segregation fantasia. What the hell is going on with queerty?
The Gay Numbers
@Diploid79: Yeah 3 posts about race that does not agree with your views on the subject is certainly a movement toward segregation fantasia. Either that you can not handle any conversation that involves mirrors.
omgyawu
wow…i just realized why i hate this site.
C-Teller
@omgyawu:
lol mte. Queerty is trolling for more page views and hits.
RM
White gays can make it easier for black gays by creating a welcoming community to come out into.
Martin
I realize this may be controversial, but I feel like what are they coming “out” to? Something they definitely don’t have a stake in but something they could possibly redesign, this so-called gay lifestyle? A lifestyle hyper marketed and overly sentimentalized with very real stereotypes used as symbolic references? I dunno guys. Obviously hate or ignorance is not what life is about, but so isn’t a rigid culture.
Martin
@RM:
No one group needs to create a community for another. We just need to know, or see, one another.
jjm16
1.) long before BET obsessed over the gospel industry, many black americans became christian automatons b/c slaves were made victims of the inquisition-modeled by american protestants after the imperialist spanish inquisition of the catholic church-and, later, chose to cling to religion in a country that sucked for them for a long time.
2.) the reason the black community can be called “the black community” is b/c they are marginalized and scorned by offensive racist commentary in their daily lives-particularly espoused by bitter white repubs. and others who will never accept or address blacks as the assimilated americans they are-which fosters rage and effectively engages many black individuals in a culture war against others.
justnow
@galefan2004: same way he is, that a shame
ewe
@justnow: lmao. You are responding to someone from June 30, 2009? That’s cute.