Is gay their ethnicity

When I woke up this morning Reggie was watching the video of Wanda Sykes from the White House correspondence dinner. Once I fully woke up and gathered my wits about me (a 30 minute process on a good day) I logged on and went to check her out myself. For the record let me say I have been a Wanda Sykes fan for awhile, well before she came out. I watched her short lived sitcom on Fox and she was the only reason I sat thru “Monster in Law” with that damn J-Lo, plus anybody who can get under Dr. Bill Cosby’s self righteous skin is ok in my book.

Anyway after I had finished , she did very well in my book by the way, Reggie asked me if I felt she had not done her due part by including her recently outted lesbianism into her act. I knew his question was academic and not an actual slight, so as with most things I answered with a story. I won’t retell the entire story here I will just give the reader’s digest answer. I was a huge fan of Ellen’s sitcom until after she came out on the show and the whole show became about her coming out. Curious I asked Reggie why that question had come up and he told me before I got my ire up (no difficult job) that nobody had said anything…yet. But he was bracing himself for the backlash from the gay community for her lack of “pride” at the event.

To late I thought, as my ire was clearly up and alert now. As I rolled my eyes and breathed through my nose at the ridiculousness of it all Reggie, clearly the sea of calm in our little family, said I should not get mad at the gay community as being gay is their ethnicity.

Let me take a beat here and explain some gay community stuff. The gay community for all its bluster for wanting to be treated like everyone else is one of the most diverse divided societies in this country. When I usually speak of the gay community I usually mean white people who are gay. Yes gay comes in all flavors and colors, but like the rest of America there are divides and separations. You don’t believe me, the group that fought against Prop 8 in California last year planned and laid out this fight for awhile but it was not until the week before the election when one of the higher up decided, maybe we should get some of our literature out in Spanish, I mean it is California after all. If it is not the exotic boyfriend white gays usually don’t include browns in their community.

So when Reggie said their gay is their ethnicity, it gave me pause (and lowered my ire). Could this really be the case? Could all this uproar and constant grinding of teeth I hear from the gay community stem from the fact that they feel that in this country, which for the next 40 years will still cater to whites really believe that their gay struggle puts them on the same par with the struggle of other “ethnic” groups?

Food for thought indeed and questions in need of answers, so I ask you blogosphere. I have a lot of readers from many groups’ black, white, yellow, pink triangles, red black and green power fist. Is gay an ethnic group?

A story that never goes stale....

It has been a long time since I have told my coming out story.

I came out over 15 years ago right before being gay was really a gateway to being cool and interesting. When I was growing up I was that quiet moody but oh so bright kid that didn’t seem to make many friends. Not only was I a social misfit in school but because of test scores I skipped the 5th grade so everyone was a little older than me for a lot of my school life. On top of that, I was gay. I knew it and I think my mother knew it too. But somewhere along the way we had both made a pact of secrecy to never ever bring it up. I remember trying to talk to her about it once I had to be about 13 years old and her eyes literally pleaded with me to not have the conversation so I back peddled. I stuffed it all deep inside me and sat on it. Every time I thought it might come up I threw food on top of it so now I am a fat social misfit.

It took me another 7 years of torment and torture to get myself to a place where I just didn’t give a damn anymore. My mother was the first family member I came out to, luckily she too had grown some and when we had the conversation she didn’t beg me not to. My grandmother was a very different story. Now for those that know me outside the internet machine know how much I love my grandmother. A psychic even told me once that she and I have shared many past lives together and I am inclined to believe that. So imagine how hard it was for me when she could not accept her gay grandson. Not only did we have a huge fight followed by a series of smaller ones but we pretty much spent a year away from each other. And while her reasons were not biblical she just could not understand why I would choose to be gay. That statement told me more about then and still holds true to this day about how straight people tend to see gay people. And I guess that is why even if I have told this story 100 times I should tell it 500 more, just for those in the cheap seats.

As I told her that day in a rather sarcastic manner (hey I was 20) when she asked me why I would choose this I responded with “ I am a young intelligent black man in America, I feel I didn’t have enough strikes against me so I figured if I was gay I might win some kind of Nobel prize!”

Coming out is rarely easy for regular folks, I have seen and heard of people getting disowned, thrown out of their houses, beaten etc and that is from family member. People who are suppose to love you and have your back. And while I am sure it is hard all over I can speak from experience how hard coming out is in the black community. I picked my Tuesday invite to go out to Wanda Sykes because she did something quite courageous. She came out as a black lesbian. She just lost a third of her audience. She may never be cast in any of the African American orientated Christmas or church movies now (on the surface not a bad thing) but this will affect her career. My only hope is that others will follow suit and join her on this side of the closet.

And for all my religious friends out there who are going to use the bible against me when it comes to homosexuality I am posting one of my favorite scenes from the West Wing.

Tuesdays Invitation!

Wanda Sykes was born and raised in Portsmouth Virginia. She is comedian, writer and an actress best known for her commentary on life, current events, and the battle of the sexes.

For the record, I have always found Wanda entertaining, even though I have questioned some of her choices in roles. However realizing how limited choices are out here for black actors and comedians I gave her some slack. I also supported her when she was attacked by Dr. Bill Cosby for her brand of comedy. She was a writer on the Chris Rock show and made guest appearances on several shows before landing a co starring role on the CBS show “the New adventures of Old Christine.” Her filmography includes “Monster In Law” ,”Pootie Tang”, “My Super ex Girlfriend”, “Clerks II” and several others. Recently Wanda has made headline news for outing herself at a anti prop 8 rally in Nevada.

So Wanda Sykes., please accept this invitation to the Dinner party of the year. Your opinion, your outrageousness, and your courage are more than welcome!