Reading this article, I found myself not being shocked by any of the things I was reading. I previously read about all the issues that were brought up and personally seen them in action. I couldn’t help, while reading this article, about how being gay (or bi, trans, etc.) in the African-American culture is completely unacceptable. You are looked upon as being less than a man (or woman) and “not black” because in you are basically going against your own race or culture.
Since African-American/Black and Latinos are low in the social hierarchy in America, there’s the need to hold onto any chance of being part of the dominant culture. Since heterosexuality is the dominant idea or the what’s normal, most members of these communities hold on to them as tightly as possible. What backs their position up are there strong religious beliefs that say that homosexuality is demonic.
Believing in such ideology causes many problems. It causes Black and Latino youth to verbally and physically show that are heterosexual and that they aren’t nothing close to being gay, bisexual or any of that nature. This sometimes causes them to be physically and verbally violent against those who do identify to be a member of LGBTQ community. This, therefore, leads the raising number of suicides or other emotional problems for those who struggle with their identity.
I agree, speaking as someone who is both black and Latino I can say that for the most part being gay in either culture is not looked upon as something positive. When I came out as trans my family believed it was demonic and they were ashamed to be associated with me. They cared more about what other people would think than they did me and even today it is still very hard for them. Further more my community back home is mostly African Americans and Latinos. Both reinforce that if I am going to be male than I have be super masculine or in the Latino culture machismo (macho, manly). In any case it is very hard to be seen in society as “normal” because of all these social constructions and ideas of masculinity it is even harder when you have a religious family/community that also upholds all the social constructions that society has made.
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Someone brought this up in a previous post but I think it really depends on what culture you are in that determines people's views on bisexuality and sexuality in general. For example, when I visited Wesleyan, I was shocked at how all forms of sexuality were so openly discussed and acceptable. My cousin who attends Wesleyan came back over thanksgiving break and declared she was bisexual to our family. She had previously attended a strict, private high school in the south that frowned upon homosexuality and bisexuality but she said her views completely changed once she entered into the open community of Wesleyan. But I know, in my high school environment and the environment of the UYN children, homosexuality was seen as unacceptable and wrong and students commonly used the term "no homo" or "that's so gay" to establish their masculinity and heterosexuality. I was very disturbed in the article to read that poor black females resorted to pregnancy as a means of avoiding the label of homosexual. If women are resorting to motherhood and men are resorting to violence and hate crimes to establish heteronormativity, how will our culture and society ever be accepting and not fear being labeled as gay or bisexual?
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