By: Ian L. Haddock
Changing Our Narrative
I had the privilege of writing for TheGrio this month regarding my Blackness being more prominent as a Black, gay male moving through Pride month. I wanted to acknowledge that it is important for me during this time to be proud of my Blackness, as well. As you know, this Pride month has definitely been one for the books. The beginning of this week we found that the Supreme Court has decided that LGBT+ people are protected against discrimination from employers and it gave us just reason to celebrate, but still with the funeral of George Floyd, killing of Rayshard Brooks and the random people hanging from trees, we have much to protest.
With all these things happening, I now fully believe that my Blackness is the most present in the movement for equality as it is the most at the margins. Still, because a man with a trans experience, Tony McDade, two killings of women with a trans experience, Dominique “Rem‘mi” Fells and Riah Milton, along with the passing of one of the greatest innovators and mobilizers of the Black LGBT+ movement, Dr. Ron Simmons being virtually quieted, I am having a difficult time finding pride. Though Black Lives Matter has the largest movement for racial equity in my lifetime and the LGBT+ rights movement is consistently moving in leaps and bounds, the microcosm in which I live in seems to be overlooked, downtrodden and marked out.
I’m tired.
Pride started as a riot by two transwomen of color, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, when police raided the Stonewall Inn because homosexual acts were illegal in every state except for Illinois at the time and they were in a gay club. Incredible to think that at the beginning of the LGBT+ movement were two women of color and, at the beginning of the movement for Black Lives Matter, were women of color who identify as lesbians. We are always on the frontlines, but always the first to be overlooked.
I do not desire to take from these movements anything as these movement in their singular spaces mean so much to my intersections, but it is necessary for each of these movements to understand it is impossible for me to extricate myself from either of the movements when my intersections exist within both of them. I am a black, LGBT+ person and though my identity—because of the structure of white supremacy—classifies me as black first, gay is just as much a part of me as my Blackness.
This is not just about who/ how/ what I love, it is the very essence of my being. While black folx* were raised in their neighborhoods and knew the families around them as family, I was largely raised around house fathers and mothers in black, queer communities. While black folx* were raised to be educated out the constraints of the society they lived in, I was raised on how to survive by black, queer people. While black people learned the line dances and cookout music, I was raised on how to vogue, eight count and drag by black, queer communities. This was not because I just wanted to be engulfed with the amazing culture of black, queer folx*, but because I was not accepted in my black community. So, my intersections can’t be split.
In my whole self, I am both of these intersections and the fight for equality must include all of them.
I am so proud to show up and do what I must for Black Lives to Matter. Sitting on the side of white supremacy, I know that I will continue to move forward in the need for equality in regard to the LGBT+ movement. Still, Black Lives Matter. All Black Lives Matter. Trans Black Lives Matter. MY Black Life Matters.
