Christina Azenab Jasmine Riley English 1C 18 May 2014 Like a Red Wine Stain On a White Dress: Homophobia in Black America through Ayana Mathis’s “Floyd” in The Twelve Tribes of Hattie “Everybody’s journey is individual. If you fall in love with a boy, you fall in love with a boy. The fact that many Americans consider it a disease says more about them than it does about homosexuality”. -James Baldwin. In his impressionable quote Baldwin voices the prominent yet tacit unacceptance of Homosexuality. Baldwin indicates that homosexuality or queerness in America is equated to an incurable disease or illness has been a conventional theory that it reveals an attitude of intolerance within American society . This widespread notion has held an augmented presence most notably in the African American community.(Crawford et al. 2002:179-180). In a thorough yet, animated analysis of Floyd, Ayana Mathis reviews popular receptions of Homosexuality and Queerness in the African American community. The characterization of Floyd unveils the ostracization that homosexual Black men face which generates a deceptive performance of hypermasculinity. This false performance is displayed through masking emotion and unveiling an attitude of contempt for anything dearth to the ideology of masculinity while perpetuating Homophobia. To understand the congruence of disconnect being an African American male and Queer, in the Black community, one must view how their societal stance is typically disconnected within the community and how it’s disconnect pose as problematic to the archetypical construct of the Black Man. The perception of Black men amongst the Black community stems from the perception of Hyper-masculinity, “Hypermasculinity [amongst men] is... ... middle of paper ... ...nce to any behaviors juxtaposed to that of the heterosexual relationship. The narrative of Carl’s mom not only emphasizing the contempt for homosexuality in the Black community but illustrates the open demonization that is commonly viewed in the African American perspective. (Ward 501) It is noteworthy to illustrate the the countenance that Carl’s mom that made Floyd feel repulsive and brazenly aware of his “wrongness”. This reference can be equated to how Homosexuality in the Black community is wrong and brings about the lingering perceptions of Heterosexuality being right and homosexuality being wrong (Thomas 1996:59) All in all, the complexities behind the unacceptance of Homosexuality in Black America have deep rooted ties to the social construct of a Black man and the social construct to what is Homosexual. These views are at times at loggerheads within the
It is often the case that media and more specifically, film, perpetuates the stereotypes of black men. These stereotypes include not showing emotion, being physically aggressive, embrace violence, supposed criminality, associated with drug use, lack a father figure, sexually exploit women, and others. In the film, Boyz n the Hood, Tre’s father, Furious Styles, encourages Tre to demonstrate loyalty to other people in relationships, resist aggressive behavior, and foster and exhibit sexual responsibility. Thus, throughout the film, Tre challenges the society’s stereotyped norms of black masculinity and what it means to be a black man.
Religion is one point McDowell brings forth in her essay, during the Jazz era she stated that singers such as Bessie Smith, Gertrude Rainey, and Victoria Spivey sung about sexual feelings in their songs. Women during this Jazz era were freer about their sexuality, but due to this freeness, an article called “Negro Womanhood’s Greatest Need” criticized the sexuality of Black women. In this article, the writers criticized Black women of the Jazz era; one part stated “…“speed and disgust” of the Jazz Age which created women “less discreet and less cautious than their sisters in the years gone by”. These “new” women, she continued, rebelling against the laws of God and man” (p.368). Women showing expressing their sexuality is not only an act against God, but also against men.
Spurlin, William J. “Culture, Rhetoric, and Queer Identity: James Baldwin and the Identity Politics of Race and Sexuality.” McBride 103-21.
The film observes and analyzes the origins and consequences of more than one-hundred years of bigotry upon the ex-slaved society in the U.S. Even though so many years have passed since the end of slavery, emancipation, reconstruction and the civil rights movement, some of the choice terms prejudiced still engraved in the U.S society. When I see such images on the movie screen, it is still hard, even f...
In each film's representation of the transgressive woman-the black daughter who looks white, and who, because of the contradiction between being and seeming which defines her, can fit comfortably into neither culture-there is a correspondence between feminine sexuality and alterity which results in a sexualization of the radical 'otherness' of the black woman. (44)
There are many, many forces — physical, historical, cultural, and political — that shape and constrict the life chances of black males in the U.S. Some of these are longstanding legacies that may take generations to shift. But in other ways, the social, economic, and symbolic place of African-American men and boys is recreated and reinforced every day. In particular, public perceptions and attitudes toward black males not only help to create barriers to advancement within this society, but also make that position seem natural or inevitable. Among the most important mechanisms for maintaining (or changing) these perceptions are the mass media with their significant power to shape popular ideas and attitudes.
Within this new racial caste system, where mass incarceration has become ‘The New Jim Crow’ as Alexander has suggested, there is an obvious racial hierarchy due to the disproportionate rate incarceration of black men to white men. bell hooks discusses the definition of what it means to be a “real man” which is being an upper middle-class white man (73). The socialization of black men has created the “contradiction between the notion of masculinity he was taught and his inability to live up to that notion. He is usually “hurt,” emotionally scarred because he does not have the privilege or power society has taught him “real men” should possess” (73). This creates this alienation and frustration, and then mixed with the history of racism with the current racial caste has continued to dehumanize people of color. Black men especially have been targeted through the ‘War on
In the past decades, the struggle for gay rights in the Unites States has taken many forms. Previously, homosexuality was viewed as immoral. Many people also viewed it as pathologic because the American Psychiatric Association classified it as a psychiatric disorder. As a result, many people remained in ‘the closet’ because they were afraid of losing their jobs or being discriminated against in the society. According to David Allyn, though most gays could pass in the heterosexual world, they tended to live in fear and lies because they could not look towards their families for support. At the same time, openly gay establishments were often shut down to keep openly gay people under close scrutiny (Allyn 146). But since the 1960s, people have dedicated themselves in fighting for
In this narrative essay, Brent Staples provides a personal account of his experiences as a black man in modern society. “Black Men and Public Space” acts as a journey for the readers to follow as Staples discovers the many societal biases against him, simply because of his skin color. The essay begins when Staples was twenty-two years old, walking the streets of Chicago late in the evening, and a woman responds to his presence with fear. Being a larger black man, he learned that he would be stereotyped by others around him as a “mugger, rapist, or worse” (135).
Thesis Statement: Even though in the south a gay black man would not be accepted by many, changing your point of view can happen at any age through acceptance and respect. Keeping an open mind to change how we think is a learning experience and one will grow as a person.
Brown begins to deconstruct the system of manhood in America as he talks personally to his interactions with other black, gay men and co-workers. “Why don’t they just come out,” Brown’s co-worker states in conversation with him. Brown states that, “Sexism and heterosexism practiced by both heterosexuals and homosexuals are at the root of the many problems gay men face in forging a homosexual identity.” His cited evidence from other books and interviews with a few of the participants add another dimension to the case study, but once again does not rely on his data collected from the survey. Brown also does not discuss how he chose certain participants in the survey to conduct interviews with. Often in the academic journal Brown skips from topic to topic summarizing the selected authors pieces of work; which made his implications depend on the evidence in those scholars’ work rather than the quantified data he found. Ultimately, Brown’s findings and implications were left not fully expounded
In a society where being gay is a problem in its own other oppressions tend to interlock into one creating more problems. The oppression or racism and the oppression of heterosexuality interlock causing major issues. As a black person we face negative assumptions, images and stereotypes. Racism goes way back to slavery, lynching, burning and maiming. This has left its footprint on the oppression faced today. Black gay have trouble fitting in with others. According to Gay Racism by J. R. G. DeMarco, “black gays are largely and invisible minority. They are invisible, that is, until they attempt to mix with the White gay community. Then, all the negative stereotypes leap to the minds of the people involved.” Although they share a common interest
A major political change occurred recently in the United States of America and we are still seeing the ramifications of this event. On June 26, 2015, the US Supreme Court ruled to legalize same-sex marriage in all fifty states. Around half a decade ago, Frantz Fanon expressed his opinion on interracial marriage. Now, in the 21st century, his opinion on same-sex marriage would make a great chapter in his new book. The sixth chapter of Fanon's Black Skin, White Masks discusses his philosophy that white men internalize homosexual feelings for black men, specifically about black men's penises. His book claims that the "negrophobic woman is in reality merely a presumed sexual partner--just as the negrophobic man is a repressed homosexual (Fanon
An issue that has, in recent years, begun to increase in arguments, is the acceptability of homosexuality in society. Until recently, homosexuality was considered strictly taboo. If an individual was homosexual, it was considered a secret to be kept from all family, friends, and society. However, it seems that society has begun to accept this lifestyle by allowing same sex couples. The idea of coming out of the closet has moved to the head of homosexual individuals when it used to be the exception.
When one hears the words “LGBT” and “Homosexuality” it often conjures up a mental picture of people fighting for their rights, which were unjustly taken away or even the social emergence of gay culture in the world in the 1980s and the discovery of AIDS. However, many people do not know that the history of LGBT people stretches as far back in humanity’s history, and continues in this day and age. Nevertheless, the LGBT community today faces much discrimination and adversity. Many think the problem lies within society itself, and often enough that may be the case. Society holds preconceptions and prejudice of the LGBT community, though not always due to actual hatred of the LGBT community, but rather through lack of knowledge and poor media portrayal.