open post: when "consciousness" fails to recognize linked oppressions. or: if you're brown, stick around (unless you're gay).

i was just having a discussion with my godbrother around this book, and had a thought:

i've noticed that the problem with [black / "afrocentric" homophobia] is that they're focused in on sexual acts, which, in turn, are sometimes confused with fetishistic practices. but trying to bring the complexities of kink into the conversation is pretty futile...

generally:

what makes babies = good
what doesn't make babies = bad.

the quality of the relationships in question and/or the psychosocial underpinnings of human relationships as a whole never comes into the conversation. it's black folks' fear of rejection/extermination/cultural annihilation on steroids. now, that's a real fear that's been imbued in us over generations--but we have to get beyond internalizing our oppression, even in our bedrooms.

so you have all that. coupled with a general lack of education around the basics of sex and sexual expression (except in the most patriarchal, male-dominated/controlled, sexist sense), it's a recipe for disaster when it comes to queer people.

folks wanna complain about "europeans" being sexually/sensually repressed, not realizing they've caught the same disease.

in my understanding, our ancestors understood ALL ways of being, living AND loving--balanced, imbalanced, and beyond. [emphasis added]

and, as i added later, this attitude can also make things pretty rough for the sistas, albeit in a different way*.

what do y'all think?



*aside from the blog entry, i also find that these same voices are the ones railing against reproductive justice for black women and other women of color, couched in "concern" and, again, that looming fear of genocide.