 Slavery's Role
We all know about the devastation of slavery, but one aspect of it gets little discussion. What I call the "mental neutering" of the black man. Pundits love to pontificate about the broken homes -- ie. being raised by a single parent, or grandparent -- of the african-american community, but the "homes" of african-america were being broken up deliberately way before now. Often times whole families were placed on auction blocks, with the father going to this plantation, mother going to that plantation, and if there were children and they were old enough, or atleast "looked" old enough, they may have been sent to a third, or fourth plantation. If the different plantations were nearby, some visitations were allowed, but its was purely at the plantation's master discretion. Most of the time it was not allowed, because if a child was born, which plantation do they belong to. Remember, the more slaves you had the more value your plantation had. So the assaults on the black family structure have their roots in slavery, and thus began the stressing of family connectivity and hating, or at the very least disagreeing with, anything that is "perceived" to threaten it, whether it was dating ouside of the race, or homosexuality. Religion was the one thing that the slaves had to cling to. It was the one thing the master did not punish the slaves for excercising. However, with 2 church doctrines, one saying God meant for you to be slaves, and one saying God meant for you to be free man, but both saying homosexuality is an abomination, and a threat to the family, it wasn't hard to see why slaves gravitated towards a view of this nature. Slavery rendered the black male helpless to defend his family. He never knew if his wife, and children, if any, would be sold to other plantations, thus who he is, his manhood, was attacked. And unfortunately an unhealty rationale was used to justify hating gay people for attacking manhood.
 Jim Crow's Role
This "neutering" didn't stop after slavery. It made it's way into Jim Crow era when blacks were not only lynched, but in quite a few a cases the lyncher sexually assaulted, and often time castrated victims before hanging them. And if the on-lookers were "lucky" they got a 3-for-1, when the victim would set ablaze while hanging. There was, and is, a fascination with the black male sexuality. Although, during Jim Crow, it took a sadistic form and was seen as an assault on the "white" power structure. Plenty of people have been hanged, but a sexual component was placed on black men. The white power structure sought ways to "feminize" the black male, and by feminize I mean to submit ones authority. The black man was made to submit to "white" authority, even relenquishing his authority in his own house. And it is the submitting of authority that, IMHO, that causes this knee jerk reaction to black gay men by the black community. As a straight black man I could care less, live and let live is my motto. But I do have a gay cousin and his brother, and I talk all the time. And one telling question he always ask, in some form, is "...why is my brother like that....doesn't he know black men already have a strike against them...and what about kids". As you can see, the overarching issue is not that his brother is gay, although I think he is still uncomfortable talking about it, it is the perception that his brother has given up his true power -- that of progeny, passing on legacy, protecting the family tree. That's not to excuse the religious part of this. Frankly, I think it is a cover, it is easier to say God wants me to hate you, because there's no personal responsibility in knowing why I hate, or actually tackling the reasons for the hate.
All in all, I just wanted to give my 2 cents to discussion....for what it is worth. |
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