OPINION: Stop Using Black People As Pawns In Gay Marriage Fight
From the Washington Post:
Their refrain was as familiar to me as dining hall food, and equally as offensive. All too often, white liberal classmates at the University of Virginia would ask, “Shouldn’t blacks, more than any other group, support gay rights?”
I never understood my classmates’ need to align the historical struggles of blacks with those of homosexuals and then push their quadratic equation of oppression on me. Was not one point of Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man,” a classic text for college seminars, that blacks deserve an existence free from an assigned role? That they should not be pawns in any social movement? And even if they hadn’t read the book, wasn’t it clear that stereotypical assumptions based on race are regressive?
RELATED: OPINION: Black Voters Should View Gay Marriage As A Civil Rights Issue
Hearing that from my white peers was one thing — they and I often viewed race through different lenses, with mine being one shade darker than rose. But last month, one of our greatest civil rights leaders also sang the same cacophonous tune in an attempt to peg African Americans’ morals and opinions to our socio-historical identities.
“Black people, of all people, should not oppose equality,” Julian Bond, the chairman of the NAACP, declared at the National Equality March in Washington.
RELATED: Black Voters Drove Gay Marriage Ban? Online Debate Rages
To be clear, Bond has used this line several times, and when he says “equality,” he isn’t talking about the right to vote, the right to eat at a public restaurant, the right to attend an integrated school or the right to a fair trial. He is talking about the right to change the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples.
Dr. Conrad Murray CHARGED
Comments
40
% %
-
regg4uu12-18-2009 7:35 am
-
msveevee112-3-2009 7:20 pm
-
msveevee112-3-2009 7:19 pm
-
msveevee112-3-2009 7:09 pm
-
sweet-n-evil-8912-3-2009 6:12 pm
-
ronchillin12-3-2009 1:47 pm
-
toodelicious4u12-3-2009 1:00 pm
-
toodelicious4u12-3-2009 12:27 pm
-
airforceboston12-3-2009 9:42 am
-
TMAC_3500012-3-2009 3:25 am
-
MentalEKliptz12-2-2009 3:41 pm
-
NICOLETI12-1-2009 1:08 pm
-
NICOLETI12-1-2009 1:03 pm
-
TMAC_3500012-1-2009 4:44 am
-
Yasmine08612-1-2009 1:39 am
« Previous 1 2Marriage is a Sacred committment between a Man and a Woman! Let’s not degrade it with Homosexuality!
*world, they ain’t never lied* (somehow got deleted. my bad)
And what pisses me off with the ignorance of black folks is that white ppl (illuminati, freemassons, devilworshippers) are responsible for this brain washing of today’s society. Did yall know that while they were elimanting black men from the strong black families of our african ancestors that to strip them of their manhood, whites also raped black men therefore pumping that homosexuality into the minds of strong black men that we had for leadership back in the day. Bravo! When ppl used to say that this was the white man’s Yall done let these white folks win all these yrs and now the 1st black as the president will still be under the white man’s power to lead and destroy and dumb black folks still have not gotten a clue. That’s a damn shame! SMFH!
Sick sick sick! I am no follower so there will be no support from on this or anything else that is detestable in God’s eyes. Yep, this world will be ending very, VERY soon. Then will ppl and their demonic desires such as this will be exposed.
You know I’m starting to think that BP and NewsOne are putting these articles on here to keep us commenting and arguing with each other. Every time they have some article about race and/or gay issues people get into heated discussions… I wonder what they would do if no one cared enough to comment anymore… Just a thought.
when gays are stolen from there homeland, sold as chattel, hanged, being constatly beaten down from generation to generation come holla at a player
before this thing come into play you tried to bring us in that bedroom mess and it’s not the same noway nohow i’ve been around gays when they stuck there nose up at us so now we cool B.S.
This is for NICOLETI!!!!! I understand what you are saying but, WE cant support every new decision that comes along! All because a person dislikes something doesn’t mean that they’re discriminating against it! I work around racist people a lot but, they don’t walk around all day say’n she don’t deserve a position with the company because she’s BLACK!!! One point you made was in fact right! WE don’t choose what race we want to be so yes, We have no choice but to be black! However, a person can make a decision on their sexual preference! You don’t come out ya mama’s belly say’n ‘I wanna be gay!!!!’ You have to grow and experience life before you can make that decision! Therefore being gay is a choice!
Damn! I didn’t even know that gays and lesbians existed back in the Billie, and Langston days!!! Back to the point…. This articles statement about blacks should strongly support the gays, is a bunch of bullshyt! Just because we struggle to get to where we are doesn’t mean we should support everyone else choice and decisions! That’s just as dumb as saying that, because whites finally came together and started supporting minorities that, they should support everything as well! Its dumb and it’s two different situations!
i personally don’t think they have anything to do with each other but the fact its a form of discrimination. but that’s where it ends a persons skin and sexuality is two different things. when i go out everyone knows im black but a gay person lets people know if they are or not. and marriage has nothing to do with civil rights its a religious act and last time i checked religion is suppose to be separate from the government so its wrong to force churches to do something they don’t believe in. and last but not least blacks was killed and still are killed over thier skin color as there is a number of laws to protect them
MentalEKliptz, actually you’re the ignorant one. Of course I know there are gay blacks. The point is that GAYS were not out there marching, just a few in the closet blacks who were gay if you get the point. I’m willing to bet you didn’t check that shyt anywhere. You can gasp all you want, this marriage shyt is your own battle, not one for blacks to fight.
TMAC, did you really show your ignorance with that last post?
Last I checked, there are MANY gay African Americans and they were present marching with the best of them. Check your history. Might surprisingly educate you.
Jah Bless!
From a BLACK GAY! *gasp*
It was law that a black person could not marry a white person. Should we revert back to that law, since it does not stop black people from voting, going into certain restaurants, going to integrated schools, or have somewhat fair trials. I mean it is the same difference.
Discrimination is discrimination and what they mean is we as black people should realize what it is like to be discriminated against by a nation and have it be socially accepted to be told that we are less than. Who is to say that gays were not out there in the civil rights movement fighting for black rights? I mean a majority of the white people that accepted and supported blacks back then were probably the gays, they were just in the closet at the time. If you let someone discriminate against another and do nothing about it…. where will it stop at. It is like a joke a comic once said, I think it was Chris Rock. When the 911 attacks happened people were saying things like “We proud to be Americans, F you terrorist” Then it was “F you Middle Easterners and Mexicans” He said he started to pay attention because he knew what was eventually coming. That train is never late he said and it did come and is in the station as we speak. Blacks with college educations are the hardest hit by economy right now. Going to an HBCU might make it 70% harder to get a job, just because they see the name of your school on the application. If we sit back and let one group be discriminated against we open the door for more possibilities in the future. No one is saying that being black and being gay are the same thing. If the nation tells you you can not marry someone based on their skin color, it would be clear cut dicrimination. Yet we sit back and say it is not when they say it about a person’s sexual orientation. It is discrimination and you are a black man/woman should know how it feels to have a nation hate you for something you can not control. You did not choose to be black and they did not choose to be gay. It is not a choice, if it was then at what age did you choose to be straight. I mean were you masturbating to a pic of someone of the same sex and then decide that you were only going to get excited for people of the opposite sex. Where you ever attracted to same sex people and then decided to not persue those feelings. If it is a choice for them, then it is a choice for us as well. I know I never wanted to muff dive and I was born Hetero.
Yasmine086, nobody’s forgetting anything, especially that there was never any gays out fighting for black folks.
Duh dumb dumbs … we know being gay is not the same as being black. However, it is history repeating itself in a different form. Discrimination, hate crimes, de facto and de juro discrimination, etc. Damn how quickly we forget. IT’s really a shame…