We Can Multitask: We Can and Should Handle Racism, Queerphobia and Misogynoir
Protests in the streets continue as not only police brutality (which itself is a large part of our struggle) but antiBlack racism in general plague the Black people of America as it has for 400 years. As activists continue to make strides in letting this country know that we will take nothing less than the better treatment we are owed a big issue is the wonder if that when we say “Black Lives Matter” are we talking about all Black lives or only some, specifically straight cis-gender men and if that betterment that we desire has a big asterisk for everyone who doesn't fit that definition.
Truly it feels like the revolution is here but there is a giant elephant in the room that if we are to get everything we fight for racially we cannot ignore and that is the marginalization of non-cishet men in our community.
Misogyny(the act of sexism) and queerphobia (bigotry towards LGBTQ people)is not specific to the Black community but it is especially heinous to Black people and when you mix sexism, transphobia and homophobia with antiBlackness it is much more severe as well as alot of times emotionally/physically detrimental and deadly. It is even more heartbreaking when done by our own.
while those of us who fit the description of non-cishet men were signing campaigns and protesting for all Black people (or sometimes specifically for Black men) these are a very small amount of occurrences involving the attack of Black marginalized genders and sexes by Black cishet men that have taken place in the past month:
In one instance a young girl and boy who appeared to have a some sort of previous relationship were talking and flirting when his friends chime in and make fun of him and the girl, yelling for them to kiss each other and bringing up what they may do when they aren’t around them. The boy whether fronting for his friends or simply not wanting to engage in flirting/kissing with her around them (which is absolutely fine as he is not obligated to and he shouldn’t feel coerced into engaging in physical affection at the behest of his friends or the girl) brushes off the girl to her apparent confusion as it is rumored they had some sort of relationship. This is where the incident should have ended. What happens next is him and his friends, wearing Black Lives Matter T-shirts no less, picked her up forceably and despite her cries threw her into a dumpster where she laid crying, crowding her recording the incident and laughing, no one moving to help her. While luckily she was eventually provided community support in the form of a makeover and funds just to make her feel better as she deserves the hurtful event that took place is not only a disgusting act but symbolic of the issue at hand.
In another instance a guy (who was found out to be 30 years old while the girl was only 17) named Rodney Abdoul Moultrie was asking a girl out as his friend recorded and she turned him down. He decided to hit her with a skateboard and she fell back onto the ground and as she laid there in serious condition (because while on tv getting knocked out can be a funny temporary thing in real life if a person is knocked out that can be a sign of serious damage done) he walked to his friend and talked down on her. It is reported that she has brain damage and he is now on the run.
Two of the most heartbreaking and devastating occurrences also happened this month towards two activists no less.
One was the murder of 27 year old Dominique Rem’mie Fells, a trans Black Woman dancer, artist, activist and prospective fashion student here in my hometown of Philadelphia. Her body was found dismembered in the water on the bank of the Schuylkill river. The man who killed her, Akhenaton “Akh” Jones, also a community organizer and someone she most likely met and trusted was on the run from authorities and has been urged by fellow community activists to turn himself in. To make matters even more upsetting it was said that her death was used by the housing program she was apart of to garner support for them yet friends and other residence spoke out that during the period that she was missing the staff that she regularly had conflicts with immediately threw her belongings in the garbage despite not knowing where she was, if she was okay or why she was missing nor having been gone long enough to warrant such a drastic measure.
The second was the murder of activist and creative Oluwatoyin Salau, only 19 years old and fighting for our community as a whole (especially noting the detriment done to Black queer folk) who even noted on her twitter that the same Black cishet men she fought for were the same ones disrespecting her, went missing and her body was eventually found. While looking for protection and shelter at a church a man who claimed to be of God offered her a place to stay at his home where once she was there he sexually assaulted her. She escaped and asked for help via twitter. Eventually she went missing and it was found out that her assaulter had killed her and dumped her body. He was a Black man. After her murder while many grieved the loss of an innocent young Black girl who lived her extremely short and young life fighting for our people however quite a few Black cishet men made it known they felt if it was her own fault, belittling and even in some cases making fun of her death.
To the Black community (because lest we forget even Black marginalized genders and sexes can support behavior against us) cishet men are top of the crop and we are the garbage, the refuse unworthy of refuge even in our own community.
Even beyond the physical let’s look at the common verbal phrases said against us:
“Black women are golddiggers” said by the Black community despite Black women statistically being more likely to economically date down in our race as well as being much more likely compared to any other race and gender combination of color to date our own.
“Black LGBTQ are enacting an agenda” said by the Black community when Black LGBTQ people ask for what we have constantly been asking for as a Black community in general which is the ability to be able to live, not be treated like less than and inhumane. Agenda talk itself is a racist dog whistle from white supremacist conservative talking heads that has unfortunately seeped its way into our community.
Insert a million different sayings directed at Black mothers, Black sex workers who service men, Black feminists, Black people for queer rights and the Black people (even if cisgender heterosexual men) who do one of the biggest cardinal sins in the Black community and love Black marginalized genders and sexes people correctly.
Black marginalized genders and sexes are regularly talked about as a collective as leaches and race traitors when in actuality if anything we generally wind up the protectors and safety keepers of those in the community who collectively or even on an individual level do not care for us as people but could not get the same precious treatment from cishet men of our community.
Black mages (shorthand for Black marginalized sexes and genders) regularly are on the front lines and in a community that hates them all they have to look forward to when they get back in a possibility of a death and marginalizing from someone that looks just like them. A racist harming a Black queer marginalized gendered person is a tragedy and a disgusting act of systematic oppression when it is done by someone outside of our communities enough. Systematic oppression will always hurt but when its from someone who looks just like you it is a pain that is difficult to heal.
It is common for the Black cishet men of our communities and those that protect sexist/queerphobic ideologies to repeat the same dialogue used by white people and those who protect racist ideologies when this mistreatment is brought to light.
“This is divisive” no it isn’t but sexism and queerphobia are. The dehumanizing that the Black community does to it’s most marginalized members seperates them and attempts to alienate them from Black cishet men who are given peak importance. Divisiveness is continuing to let it go on without mention, not bringing it up in hopes that one day we will also be appreciated and worthwhile, a day that will never come if we don’t bring it up. Frequently Black non-cis men dedicated to the safety and advancement of the Black community as a whole are met with disdain, even threats, when that dedication includes non-cis men. A Black non-cishet person is in danger from white racists as much as they are in danger from the same community that looks just like them. Calling it divisive among other waving offs is mimicking the same rhetoric white people who want to hide their racism but still want to silence Black people use.
“Okay well why are people stressing All Black Lives Matter? Isn’t that like saying all lives matter?” nope. Black non-cismen are apart of the group being highly discriminated and marginalized against. “All Lives Matter” is an AntiBlack dog whistle that tries to say, even though who say it usually dont feel that way and do not value Black lives, that all lives matter and therefore since naturally they all matter Black people should shut up about our lives mattering when time and time again faced with us being shown that they do not in antiBlack places from antiBlack people. “All Black Lives Matter” is saying that Black lives including cishet men, but not singularly, matter and that you cannot say that Black lives matter to you if the most marginalized of Black lives do not matter to you too such as the lives of marginalized genders and sexes.
We shouldn’t have to pick our poison of if we want to be victims of racism or victims of sexism and queerphobia and usually we’re being both at the same time because we are at the same time Black marginalized genders and sexes. We are not unfeeling machines, we are not punching bags or ego boosters for the man afraid to put his hands on his fellow cishet being still looking to feel like his toxic idea of a man. We are Black people and sexism and queerphobia even our own community hasn’t taken a day off to fight antiBlackness so we cannot hesitate to talk about the issue.
It wasn’t the time for a group of Black boys to throw a Black girl into a dumpster but it happened.
It wasn’t the time nor is it ever the time for a man to go out and kill a Black girl, young enough to be his daughter and fighting for our people at that but he did it nor was it the time for grown ass Black cisgender heterosexual men to make excuses for her killer and belittle her death but they did.
It wasn’t time for every time that a Black cisgender heterosexual man who alludes to how little he would kill a Black woman or a Black queer person over but it happens time and time again.
So now is the fucking time to talk about it and honestly? Fuck talk, to do something about it. I want white racists to live in fear of putting their hands on a Black person and I want sexists and queerphobes to fear putting their hands on a person of marginalized gender or sex including the sexists and queerphobes that are in the Black community as well. If this is to be a true revolution then we need to understand that systematic bigotry to marginalized groups, including intracommunity, cannot survive. If Black women and Black queer people do not matter to you as much as Black cisgender heterosexual men do then Black Lives do not matter to you.
