CNN hits hot-button topics of blacks, LGBT rights, and the Obama admin
From Pam's House Blend - Front Page 11/1/2009 3:43 PM
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According to Don Lemon, CNN is working on a "Gay in America" series as it has for blacks and Latinos (one can only hope that the network will not leave Ts out of the picture).
A series that gives a fair picture of our lives -- including the diversity of the community -- it will be a timely and necessary subject to address as equality legislation is being pondered and enacted at the federal, state and local levels in the United States. It is a change that is occurring in an environment filled with disinformation, scare tactics and outright bigotry that needs the disinfection of sunlight.
One subject rarely broached is the issue of the black community and the subject of LGBT rights. CNN's Don Lemon takes a good crack at it here:
LEMON: Still ahead -- the big gay secret. Why so many gay black men lead double lives, killing themselves and black women.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRAY: I think homosexuality in the black community has been something that like I said we really don't talk about, that on the down-low thing didn't really come about. I didn't know that there were that many brothers on the down-low until the book came out myself. And I started educating myself on the topic, because many of us live in the 51st state of the United States, and that's the state of denial.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: My expectation is that when you look back on these years you will see a time in which we put a stop to discrimination to gays and lesbians, whether in the office or on the battlefield.
(APPLAUSE)
You will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men or two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Except for marriage. President Obama promises equal rights to gay people, but this is one issue where the president may not enjoy unified support from African-Americans.
Angela Burt-Murray from "Essence" magazine. This whole idea, though, of the down-low. There was a book written about it. The stigma that's killing black men and women in record numbers, time for some soul searching here?
More below the fold, including an interview with GLAAD's Jarrett Barrios.
BURT-MURRAY: Absolutely. It's time for the African-American community to get real. And that homophobia does exist in our community. We've embraced it and the silence is killing us. African- American women, the leading cause of death is HIV. So women, 18 to 34 are being killed because we refuse to talk about this issue and accept gay and lesbian people in our community.
LEMON: Do you think it's a stigma men say, black men say, I can't come out because my black sisters won't accept me? I won't be --
BURT-MURRAY: Right. My church won't accept me.
LEMON: My church won't accept me.
BURT-MURRAY: Yes, my community won't accept me. And those are very real fears. But the community has to understand that we have to move beyond this because it is killing us.
LEMON: OK. We talk now about out in the open, about the down low, the black community's dirty little secret.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LEMON: I was researching something for a story I was doing as part of our Gay in America series, and there was one young man at work who said -- I said, well, do you know anyone who is on the down low who I can interview about what have you? And he said, no one, I couldn't tell you. He said, I am. And I said, why can't you -- why won't you just come out? He said, because my sisters won't love me. They won't accept me. My family won't love me. My family won't accept me. And I say, so you walk around working, pretend that you're straight? And he said, yeah, I have to do that in order to survive. What is that drama?
TYREE "DJ DRAMA" SIMMONS, APHILLIATES: It's a shame.
(LAUGHTER)
You know, it's tough. I mean, you know, my, being a person shouldn't be judged by, you know, who they fall in love with, you know, who they feel is special to them, you know what I mean?
FARRAH GRAY, AUTHOR/ENTREPRENEUR: I think homosexuality in the black community has been something that, like we said, we really don't talk about, that on the down low thing didn't really come about. I didn't know that there were that many brothers on the down low until the book came out myself. And I started educating myself on the topic because many of us live in the 51st state of the United States, and that's the state of denial.
LEMON: You see the president speaking to the largest gay rights organization in the country, really in the world, the HRC, saying that he is going to get rid of, abolish Don't Ask, Don't Tell. He's going to abolish the domestic partnership thing, defense of marriage act, I should say. He is going to -- he supports civil unions, didn't go far as to say he supported same-sex marriage.
As someone who is a church leader and also a community dealing with people who are on the down low, what does this do to you? As he said, this is a challenge. Do you agree with him?
BISHOP EDDIE L. LONG, SR. PASTOR, NEW BIRTH MISSIONARY BAPTIST CHURCH: We've had members of our congregation with a gay lifestyle, et cetera. And that's nothing that we can deny. A lot of times we never address it, we act like it wasn't there, et cetera. And when you get in the body of Christ and people of faith, I'm finding that different sides, the way you interpret scripture. I think the bottom line of the whole thing is, number one, respect, number two, love.
But if my conviction would be personally, if my conviction was, well, I don't believe in the gay lifestyle, and I believe it's not God's way. I should be respectful.
TYRONE MCGOWAN, MOREHOUSE COLLEGE SENIOR: Don, I believe that if there's any place that our brothers and sisters who choose a different lifestyle should be accepted, it should be the church. They should be able to find love, embracing affirmation in the church from the pulpit.
PERRY: We could argue all night whether it's chosen or not. That's inconsequential. What we can in fact deal with is what is. If one person believes it's a choice, if another person believes it's part of who they are, in the end we're talking about a person who has identified him or herself as a homosexual. And as such, we need to treat that person with a certain level of respect.
CNN also spoke with Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD)'s President Jarrett Barrios, on the topic of the Obama admin and the LGBT community.
I'm not surprised that Faux News doesn't give us the time of day regarding our issues (unless it's in a negative light), but is MSNBC giving as much time/less time? Just asking, since I haven't seen much reporting during news segments.
Wow this is pretty cool. Maybe they'll actually show that not all of us are dancing shirtless to THUD THUD THUD, having a lisp-fest... in leather... and doing T. And who gunna host it... Anderson Cooper? Oh that rite... he a DL brother himself
In blunt terms, if people are using that study as an excuse to have unprotected sex - that's their own irresponsibility. Imagine a pharma company proclaiming they are beginning AIDS vaccine trials, and people use that as an excuse to have unprotected sex. It's not the fault of the pharma company for informing people of possible progress on AIDS research. No one should assume anything.... I didn't mean to get off subject, I was originally responding to something Neil brought up. But I do remember this conversation a long time ago.
My issue with that whole theory, AJ, is that there are FAR too many people that assume they have that "X Factor" and use that excuse as a way to justify not having protected sex
Yes, I agree... There has been a lot written about major plagues in Europe (especially the big one of 1348) wiped out so many people that survivors possessed certain genes that played a role in protecting them. These genes were passed on, and it's been discovered they play act in protecting T-cells. Although plague is a bacteria and HIV is a virus, but they attack the immune system in similar ways.... But this is confined mostly to Northern Europeans, and it's not a huge percentage of people. It couldn't explain the statistic by the CDC of HIV infection rates among women of different races.
Ok, not really, HIV didn't come from white people. I don't know where it came from. But Europeans were disgusting people for quite a long time by global standards, living far too close together without proper means of sanitation. (end self-hatred rant)
It's the same old story. Europeans are filthy people who lived in large, unclean cities, or at least did until recently, and are thus immune to all the horrible diseases they have flying about their population. When they met other people, who didn't live in unclean cities, and have less immunity to such a diversity of illnesses, the people they met tended to get very sick and die. It's what happened in America.
Yes, it's because of a particular gene that helped certain Europeans survive in the face of the black death. The black death also infects white blood cells. The gene is a mutation in the cell wall, and if you had it, you were more likely to survive the black death, and thus, procreate. If you have one copy of the gene, HIV still gets in because you also have the default version. If you have two copies, you're immune to HIV. I think it was some PBS production or the discovery channel that I heard that on.
Wow, I never knew that Neil. I've never even heard of that before, I'll have to do some research to learn more about it. I agree with what you're saying Ryan, every race has men on the DL. The black community has decided that this is something that needs to be discussed, is that so bad? Hopefully, maybe they can serve as an example for other races/communities so that we all can break down this hate that's forcing people to play on the "DL".
That being said, I think there are many things within the black community that attribute to this. Religion is big, but I don't think that all the blame should be placed there. The culture in general is highly masculine and praises "masculinity". Being gay for some reason is contrary to their idea of "masculinity". If anyone is demonizing anyone, it's hip hop and rap artists who show these videos of being "pimps' with girls dancing all around, not doing anything that could be construed as gay, and when they do say or act something that may be construed that way, the use the disclaimer "no homo". That is just the tip of the iceberg though. You could even look at foreign cultures such as Jamaica that harbor an immense hate for gays that probably also attributes to this. Anyway, I'm rambling now. I hope that with all this discussion we're moving in the right direction!o
11/2/2009 11:03 PM
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Neil
I believe AJ that Northern Europeans are more resistant to HIV than are Africans and thus African Americans. This simple biology helps explain some of your statistic.
11/2/2009 2:21 PM
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Ryan
I agree, AJ. But focusing solely on the DL, as this CNN piece does, is unnecessarily inflammatory. Why not use this opportunity as a way to question the incarceration policies in the US, for example? Isn't the fact that a very high percentage of black men are in prison, where STDs like HIV run rampant, just as relevant to this conversation? The answer to the problem of AA women with HIV are many, and men on the DL is just one of them.
If there is a hell, there must be a location for those who use religion as a justification for bigotry
11/2/2009 2:00 PM
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Ryan
But AJ, the problem is that "on the DL" isn't just a black issue, it's an issue that concerns all races. To frame the "DL" as a black issue both demonizes African American men and implies that no Latino, white, or Asian men who have sex with other men then go home to their wives and spread HIV.
I think there's also a problem here with the implication that the black community can just come together at some kind of picnic or something and discuss issues. The black "community" as it were is as much of a "community" as the LGBT population is...they're diverse, they have varying interests, and they generally don't all see eye to eye on too many issues. They don't come up with coherent policy positions that they all sign onto. Quite simply, the phenomenon of the "DL" and its relation to the HIV problem (if you want to frame it that way) isn't just something that the black community should be concerned with, and it's ignoring a lot of elephants in the room to frame it that way.
Again, for people interested in a much deeper take on this, read Prof. Robinson's piece on it I linked to earlier.
Everyone is open to talking about issues that effect the black community from the outside. However, whenever someone brings up issues that effect the community from the inside (in this case, HIV and LGBT issues within the black community) suddenly people get sensitive and the topic turns inevitably to race instead of the real issue. Why is that? It seems like CNN is doing more to expose a stereotype from the inside rather than perpetuate a stereotype from the outside. Stereotypes exist because people don't sit down and have open discussions about it. That's why CNN's series of Black in America, Latino in America, Gay in America, etc. are good for everyone to see.
Ray, I don't mean to nit-pick here, but only a very low percentage of blacks are Southern Baptists, which shouldn't be surprising given their participation in the racist past of the US. Only about 8 percent of the 17 million Southern Baptists this country are non-white (1.4 million), and that percentage includes Latinos. There are about 35 million African Americans here, and thus only a very very small percentage of AAs are Southern Baptist.
While it may not be the "only" factor, Religion plays a very big part in this issue. Southern Baptists. Evangelicals. Threats of Hell, a literalist approach to scripture (selective, of course, emphasis on 'gay = worst sin ever'). That's the issue at its core. Add on to that socioeconomic structures.
African Americans (and even more so Latinos) tend to have strong family bonds and deep religious roots... It's not surprising that there is a stigma surrounding LGBT issues within those communities. Poverty, especially in the cities, and not enough resources/information also plays a role (no matter what race/gender you are). However, it can't be addressed if people are afraid to talk about it, and lumping everyone together to avoid accusations of racism doesn't help either. If there is an issue within a community, talking openly and honestly is the only way to shed light on it.
11/2/2009 1:11 PM
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Ryan
Rick, the reasons why the connection between black men and the DL is "widely known" have nothing to do with any empirical study and more to do with structural racism in society that has treated black men as hypersexual beasts for centuries.
I agree that ignorance and silence are never a good combination for preventing HIV, but I think this CNN story asks for an end to ignorance and silence at the expense of perpetuating some dangerous stereotypes.
11/2/2009 12:13 PM
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Ryan
I agree that this question needs to be addressed, but not in a way that implies that black men are the ONLY ones who live on the DL or that being on the DL is the sole cause of the high HIV rate in the black community. There are DL men of every race and it's a red herring to blame these men for spreading HIV.
It's almost time (if not already time) for these issues not to be "HOT BUTTON TOPICS" anymore...particularly for the *black* community. It's really tired. We don't debate whether or not people should be vegetarians, left handed, sky divers or the morality behind it...it's just a fact of life. Get over it and move on to bigger problems America...Black America.
A series that gives a fair picture of our lives -- including the diversity of the community -- it will be a timely and necessary subject to address as equality legislation is being pondered and enacted at the federal, state and local levels in the United States. It is a change that is occurring in an environment filled with disinformation, scare tactics and outright bigotry that needs the disinfection of sunlight.
