There’s a post and video that’s been circulating on Facebook and the web that’s pretty powerful, and says much about what some call racism within the gay community. And, by “gay,” today, I’m talking about gay men. The same thing may or may not be applicable to other parts of the LGBTQ community at large, I don’t know, and I don’t want to make any assumptions regarding women, bi’s, trans persons, etc. Maybe someone more familiar with those parts of the community may chime in and leave a comment about if anything I say applies or doesn’t to those folks.
I saw this story and watched the video via The Good Men Project, and the story comes from I’m From Driftwood, but I’ve linked directly to the video here:
Nelson Moses Lassiter describes his experiences with what, both some white persons as well as black persons think about race and dating. He describes two experiences back to back, and this point of view makes for a very potent video in my opinion. Here is a bit of transcript:
And he goes, “You’re really sweet, you’re really nice, but I don’t date black guys.” He was just like, “Well, they’re just not my type.” I was like, “Well what does that mean, you don’t like me because I’m black? That’s weird.” And he was like, “It’s okay, though, I have a friend who’s into black guys.” And I was like, “What does that mean? What does it mean to be ‘into’ black guys?” I met this guy and, his friend, and I was like, “So what is it about black guys that you like?” He said, “I like the way that they look and they way they talk, the way they walk, the way they wear their pants down low.” And I was like, none of this has anything to do with an actual black person, this is, these are stereotypes and these are just preconceived notions and things that you hear. It wasn’t that he liked black guys, he was into the idea or into, it was more like an object of affection or a fetish more than actually liking the person. It was at that moment when I realized, “Wow, this is another thing.” So what is this world that I’m slowly becoming a part of because it was the complete opposite of everything I was expecting.
I’m not sure I’d call this racism per se, but for the lack of a more descriptive term, it is worth using. Lassiter describes his experience with how guys who are both white and black treat race as a barrier as if keeping the races separate is a good thing, and this level of segregation hinders our ability to find happiness as individuals as well, as he implies it impacts us as a whole community. This prompts four points I want to make, not really in any specific order, but here is how they came out:
1) Any element about which we create an identity such as our race or our sexual orientation is also an element that can be used as a barrier or not, because our culture, in the most broad sense, encourages us to like people similar to ourselves and fear (maybe too strong a word?) those not like ourselves. This isn’t just a gay thing it applies to everyone. That doesn’t make it OK, but it is important to see it as a challenge to our whole culture not to just the gay community, and ending it as a problem won’t happen within the gay community if we are not also confronting it in the bigger context too.
2) Lassiter expresses surprise that he finds this within a community that is seeking acceptance from others. I don’t grasp this part of his message at all. Just because we are “gay” doesn’t make us more evolved human beings by default. We are the products of the culture and the world in which we come from. In fact, there may be greater segregation within our community, because most of us were never taught to celebrate and seek out diversity. Coming out as “gay” is simply a matter of awareness about our sexual orientation. It is no indication of any intellectual journey we have undertaken to shed the baggage of the broader culture.
3) Race has been an object of fetish historically I believe, with skin color denoting someone as exotic. This is white privilege at work, and combatting privilege or at the very least recognizing how it impacts our viewpoints is a crucial part of the solution.
4) Here’s the big point, I want to leave this post with. I blame gay pornography in a big way!
You see, I hear younger gay men complain all the time about how hard it is to try and date or find someone to date, and on one level I don’t understand that. Why is it harder than it used to be? I think it is partly because of the proliferation of gay porn, and the ease at which porn is the tool many young guys (and older?) use to learn about how to interact with other guys.
In gay porn, all sorts of identity elements gets fetishized. Tall guys, butch guys, tattooed guys, and most definitely thug black guys. Porn encourages gay men to fall for the “idea of what another guy might be all about” rather than who they are as a human being. Porn by the nature of it, perpetuates stereotypes and shallow ways of compartmentalizing people.
About a year ago, I heard about a young gay guy who withdrew from his family and everyone into a world of online interactions and gay porn. He was ridiculed by his step father for being gay, bullied at school to the point he dropped out, and he was too young to get engaged in a community other than on-line. How many young people do you think are probably like him? I bet many.
It used to be that, save for a few clandestine publications which weren’t that easy to get, young gay men had little other than their imaginations until they were older and first started meeting guys like themselves in bars. But now, youth learn what they think being gay is all about on-line, and often porn is a part of that. I hope Lassiter’s video prompts much discussion as this issue. The way people fetishize others is a massive problem and hindrance to intimacy.
There is another aspect of this I’m ignoring for now as well, and that is any discussion about “attraction.” As people we experience ourselves as attracted to certain characteristics in people and not others. For example, I find guys with dark hair and scruffy facial hair very sexy. My husband doesn’t look like that at all. I didn’t stop myself from meeting someone or falling in love based on one exterior characteristic, and truth be told, I’m attracted to lots of different guys for different reasons (and yes, I was very attracted to my husband, and still am). However, the exterior elements to which we are attracted can get misconstrued as shallow efforts to fetishize a person.