Conversation: Being Black and LGBT, Homophobia, and Transphobia

via HuffPost Gay Voices, by Janet Mock and Clay Cane

Our Voice To Voice conversation series began in January with a collection of interviews between LGBT authors discussing their work, queer life and some of the challenges of writing.

In February, celebrating Black History Month, we've asked some prominent and inspiring individuals to join the Voice To Voice series so we can get an window into some of the issues that define and challenge people who are both African-American and gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.

Last week we featured Laverne Cox and her twin brother M. Lamar and on Monday we offered a conversation between two Charlotte, North Carolina lesbian activists, LaWana Mayfield and Rhonda Watlington.

On Tuesday we shared Meshell Ndegeocello and Toshi Reagon's discussion.

Today we're featuring a conversation about identity between Clay Cane and Janet Mock.

Clay Cane is a radio personality and journalist who's contributed to numerous publications such as The Root, theGrio, The Advocate and BET.com, where he's the Entertainment Editor. Aspiring to be a James Baldwin with a pop culture twist, he spends his Thursday nights as host of Clay Cane Live on New York's WWRL 1600AM.

Janet Mock is a writer who earned a GLAAD Award nomination for her story about growing up transgender. She's also a Staff Editor at PEOPLE.com, hosts the relationships podcast "The Missing Piece" and is writing her memoir about her adolescent journey beyond gender.

In 2012, she was named one of theGrio's 100 most influential leaders making history today for "challenging the stigma surrounding gender identity."

Here, Cane and Mock discuss their decision to be out as journalists, the duality of being black and LGBT and dealing with homophobia and transphobia, respectively.

Janet Mock: So happy to finally meet you! I feel I already know you from reading your work and being a fan of your radio show.

Clay Cane: I feel the same way! I’ve wanted to interview you for a long time. I loved your article in Marie Claire because it created such a buzz in the community and sparked a dialogue I hadn't heard in a long time. And congratulations on the GLAAD Award nomination!

JM: Thank you. The outpouring of support is surreal to me. But I'm sure we can spend the hour fan-girling out. [Laughs]

CC: Yeah, I'm sure we could go on and on. Okay, I have a question for you: Having "come out" as trans in such a public way, when you think of gender identity, what does it mean to be a woman?

JM: I can only talk about what it means to be me. I intimately know what it means to be Janet, this young woman who comes from this evolutionary existence having grown up trans.

To be a woman means standing fully in your truth and owning the totality of your experiences -- things that have really nothing to do with gender.

That sense of owning who you are is what attracted me to you. You've talked about the duality of your experience as a black, gay man, quoting Zora Neale Hurston, saying, you're not tragically colored or tragically gay. Can you expand on that?

CC: For many people, they look at being LGBT as having a tragic life: living an existence of shame, rejection and anger. That's not my story and I will not let that be my story.

Actually, being gay saved my life. If I would've been straight, I would’ve more than likely been in jail or dead like the other boys in my neighborhood in West Philadelphia.

Because I was gay, I was introverted. I would stay home and study, listening to Madonna and Prince! [Laughs] I wouldn't be the writer that I am if I don’t fully accept all of the dimensions of myself.

JM: I find that to be fully you is amazing but it's a whole other thing when you do it in your profession as you've consciously done as an openly gay journalist.

CC: I got into the writing industry via other gay men who were closeted. They felt like it would hurt their careers if they were out. Well, from the start of my career I made the decision to be who I am because I didn't want anybody to say, "Well, he interviewed T.I., but he's a faggot!" Being out made me a better writer.

You can't sit down with a stranger and get the truth out of them when you're paranoid about somebody finding out your truth. The truth is, being who I am has never stopped me from getting a job.

I wouldn't have gotten my radio show on WWRL if I had been closeted. What about your coming out as a journalist?

JM: While making the decision to tell my story, I definitely took on other people's thoughts about me, internalizing other people's transphobia.

So when I came out publicly, I was armed for people to say awful things about me. Instead, I was overwhelmingly embraced.

I wasn't expecting the love and light that actually came my way, and the opportunities that arose as well because I chose to be open about my journey.


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The Down Low Made Me Do It!

via Huffpost Gay Voices, by Earnest Winborne

As a black man, I've been very blessed to have an amazing career working as a producer in television. For more than three decades, I have worked for some of the biggest names on some of the most popular shows in television history.

I've seen it all -- from producing for local television stations to working on The Oprah Winfrey Show and The View. I've been to every award show red carpet possible through my years with Extra, E! News and Access Hollywood, just to name a few.

And more often than not, I have been the only black male on the team. And as a double whammy, I am almost always the only openly gay black man on staff.

So, when the media first became infatuated with the idea of the "Down Low" back in the late '90s, for me the issues and topics were magnified because it hit so close to home -- not because I was in the closet hiding anything, but because as the token gay black man, my straight colleagues assumed I had all the answers.

But they weren't asking the right questions. All over the tube, from Jerry Springer to CNN and everything in between, everyone was talking about the Down Low.

There were books and documentaries, newspaper commentaries and radio shows. The Down Low was everywhere.

 It was so prevalent that even the straight guys on my camera crews looked up from their sports pages to ask me about it.

As the only black gay rep on the staff, I got asked, "Why are so many black gay men in the closet?" "What is it about the black community that won't allow black gay men to come out?" "Is it true that these closet cases are spreading HIV/AIDS to black women?" (This is a huge myth, and according to the CDC, it's the prevalence of intravenous drug use that is to blame.)

Then, the discussion turned to my personal life. I got asked, "When did you decide to come out? Was it difficult for you?"

And that's when it hit me. I realized my story was still new to them because my experience as a gay black person is never seen in the mainstream media. I realized that even folks in the liberal entertainment industry needed to be educated.

 I was an anomaly; they were used to seeing gay people who looked like the characters on Will & Grace or, in today's world, like Cam and Mitchell on Modern Family.

And when they do see black gay men in the media, it's usually a discussion of the mysterious men on the Down Low.

Why are these nameless, faceless people who are creeping, so to speak, getting more media attention than the black same-gender-loving (SGL) people who are open and honest and living in their truth?

Where are the black SGL role models who are productive members of our communities? Where are the television segments, talk shows, newspaper articles and stories that feature people like my friends and me?

I realized that black gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are the invisible people. Like Wanda Sykes has said, "There are no black gays. We're like unicorns. We don't exist [in the media]."


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NBGMAC to Host a National Webinar for Young Black Gay, Bisexual and Same Gender Loving Men

The National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Coalition (NBGMAC), co-sponsored by FHI 360, invites young Black Gay, Bisexual, and Same Gender Loving men from across the country to participate in a national webinar on October 14th, 2011 at 3:00PM (EDT) to develop solutions for addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic within the young Black Gay, Bisexual, and Same Gender Loving community.

Click here to register!

Thirty Years of HIV/AIDS: A New Challenge Is on the Horizon

via The White House Blog by Ron Simmons, Ph.D.

Dr. Ron Simmons has made such a tremendous impact on the work I do for Black men who have sex with men (MSM).His service over the years stands as a framework for what it really means to work for the  betterment of  your community. Read his words...

When I reflect on the 30th anniversary of the HIV epidemic, I am simply amazed. Amazed that I am still alive after living with AIDS for over 20 years and that there is an effective treatment for HIV that is one pill a day. I remember the early days of AIDS, there was no name for it—only fear.

Doctors were afraid to touch you. Nurses were afraid to feed you. And your friends that tried to give you encouragement to not feel hopeless, died themselves from the disease. Today HIV/AIDS is a preventable and treatable disease. There is a lot least stigma and fear. The President of the United States speaks openly and affirmatively about ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic. In many jurisdictions, government funded programs provide a safety net of health care and support for people with the disease. So much has changed in 30 years, yet new challenges appear on the horizon.

One of the most serious challenges is the “paradigm shift” in HIV infection among Black men who have sex with men (MSM). Studies have found that the traditional paradigm, the theoretical model of a positive correlation between high HIV risk behavior and high HIV infection, may not be true for Black MSM. Such a paradigm shift would have a profound impact on the effectiveness of prevention efforts targeting Black MSM in the United States.

Read more.

AIDS, the silent killer of the Black community

Reposted from CNN.com by Keith R. Green

Editor's note: LZ Granderson writes a weekly column for CNN.com. A senior writer and columnist for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN.com, he has contributed to ESPN's "Sports Center," "Outside the Lines" and "First Take." He is a 2010 nominee and the 2009 winner of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation award for online journalism and a 2010 and 2008 honoree of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for column writing.

(CNN) -- I assumed Dr. Ronald Ferguson, senior pastor at Antioch Church of God in Harlem, was misquoted in Thursday's New York Daily News.

I thought, "No way did a member of the clergy say 'God does not want to see homosexuals in our parks.' "

I didn't think it was possible for a man working in New York City, with the letters "D" and "R" in front of his name, to compare homosexuality to pedophilia and bestiality. ("If children start to believe it is OK to be gay, they will think it's OK to be a pedophile or have sex with animals.")

I found it completely ridiculous to even think a black pastor's response to a gay pride event in 2011 would be to stay inside his house.

Read the rest here...

Trailer: 'In My Own Image - Healing Black Men Who Love Men'

Reposted from Facebook by Keith R. Green

This is indeed powerful and so long overdue. I eagerly anticipate the full-legnth documentary!

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This trailer is for the upcoming documentary 'In My Own Image - Healing Black Men Who Love Men.' The film features the voices, experiences and transformations of 40 young adult and adult same-gender-loving (SGL) Black male leaders from throughout the country. According to the men involved this experience changed their life forever.