BMX-NY Outing (11|12|2010): "Through The Night" Theater Play (14th St. Union Square

During the latest Black Men's Xchange-New York sdialogue, participants set about defining and facing off with fear. The community defined fear variously as:

"False Evidence Appearing Real..." "It's the obstacle that can either prod us to divinity or hold us back..." {Facilitator reads dictionary definitions: "'a feeling of anxiety and agitation caused by the presence or nearness of danger, evil, pain, etc.; timidity; dread; terror; fright; apprehension..."} "The absence or reduction of faith..." [Participant reads definition of 'faith.'] "'unquestioning belief that does not require proof or evidence..."

What are we afraid of, as Black men, and as Black men who love men?
"Rejection..."

"Success...Being in a successful relationship...Because [I] may never have experienced it...[I] may not have felt worthy...For having been molested [as a child]...For having been in bad relationships...Beyond therapy, I learned I have the capacity to love and that I am worthy [of love]..."

"Commitment..."

"Of other Black people...Like they won't accept me [was a] major hurdle to get over..." {Facilitator asked: "How did you get over the hurdle?"} "[I discovered] they did accept me...They were waiting on me..."

"Fear of being alone...When I strive to be the individual, I find it a very lonely path...[I fear] loneliness...[I've a] fear of looking at myself...[I fear] that I am what people say about me...Of people laughing at me..."

"Being around different types of Black people...I find myself putting on a different kind of voice...[Sometimes] I feel irrelevant...like I'm being laughed at...being mocked..."

"Fear of new experiences... of failure...Of being judged..."

How do we challenge our fear of the stigma around homosexuality?
"[I experience fear around] certain kinds of Black people, particularly Black males...If I'm on the 'A' train...If I show affection for another Black male, I worry about whether I'll have to fight...I have to weigh consequences..." {Facilitator says: "Or, perceived consequences..."} "Yes, perceived consequences..."

"I've a fear of becoming an elder who's preoccupied with younger guys in a negative way..." {Facilitator asks: "Are you savoring relationships with young men now?"} "Yes...But, Malidoma says, 'When the elders don't know their place, the youth don't know their place...'I'm thinking about those brothers who [leer] at the fourteen-year-old girls...{Facilitator says: "Well, I've entered my elder-hood now...And, for having savored relationships with youth when I was a youth, and relationships with men as a man...It's not that I don't find youth attractive...youth is intrinsically beautiful...no matter how the person actually looks...And some young men are sexually attractive...But, I don't seek to bed them...They are my sons...And, your awareness of the place of elders [at the age you are] now may well protect you from behaving lecherously as an elder..."}

"I remember those conversations thirty years ago [about becoming like the older men we saw sitting at the bar preying on young men]...I'm having a good time [as an elder]...I love our seniors...We forget the wisdom older people have...If we learned to appreciate elders [the community would be healthier...]"

"Temptation...All this online stuff...These young kids are looking for daddy..."

Are we afraid to acknowledge and confront racism?
"We've been socialized, trained and indoctrinated not to acknowledge racism......To take care of White people..."

"Fear and denial...Denial being the bugaboo...Like when you're asleep...You don't know you've been asleep until you wake up..."

{Facilitator says: "There's a connection between fear and denial...Sometimes we deny that which we're afraid to face...because it's too painful...or, we're afraid it's too painful..."}

"I've a fear of being crazy...which I used to think was endemic to Black people..."

Are we afraid of being seen as less than men?
"I am the living embodiment of the fact that homosexuality is not an abomination..." {Facilitator asks: "If homosexuality is not abomination then, what is it?"} "It is a gift..."

"Most of my close friends are heterosexual, and they've given me opportunities to reveal my sexuality...But, I have been afraid..."

{Facilitator says: "Yes...that goes back to fear of perceived consequences...There is a risk involved in being who we really are...As a boy, youth and some years into [my] adulthood, I lived everyday of my life in mortal terror of the word, 'faggot.'...And, not just of someone leveling the epithet in my direction, but, [even] in my presence...because I would have to fight, because, [I believed they were talking about me, and] in my mind, that meant I was a non-entity...It wasn't until I tested HIV+ that I finally risked revealing my sexuality to many of my friends...And, I have some really smart friends...So, I really had nothing to be afraid of, but I know that fear well...}

"I have a fear of revealing my flaws for fear of being judged...appearing ignorant..."

"I'm learning every day not to be afraid of the beauty and the brilliance that I am..."

"it's nobody's business who I have sex with [is a standard defense for not being present in our sexuality]..."

I've a fear that, after two Masters, and I'm going for another and a doctorate, I'll only have white men to choose from because Black men will be overwhelmed..."

{Facilitator says: "That fear is a reality for a lot of Black women who, because, they're permitted to move into and through academe, garnering multiple credentials, many brothers feel threatened...Because Black men are not permitted entrance to higher ed.....It's not an accident that there are more Black men entering prison than the academe...It's not that Black men, as a matter of course, are anti-intellectual, or have no sense of the options higher ed. Can afford..."} "That's not true...Black men can and do enter higher ed." {Facilitator says: "You're right...Black men can and do...But there are more blocks put in the way of their entering..."} "Yes, there are blocks put in place..." {Facilitator says: "But, one can go around, over, under or through the blocks...Thank you for that distinction..."}

"Right now, I have very few fears...The fears I thought I had have become my greatest strengths...It was easier to disclose my HIV status than my sexuality...Speaking in forums like this is a fear of mine...I'm still in the closet, to tell the truth..."

"I cannot begin to tell you the hurt I feel when I hear a minor has taken his life...It's important that we share our story and our testimony...We have to save each other..."

Is there an antidote or an opposite to fear?
"If I have a fear, I immediately attack it...I don't fear death [anymore]...I've had three experiences when I closed my eyes and thought, 'This is it...'But I woke up...I let go of a lot of them [fears]...Racism...there is a level of conscious anxiety...I've always felt sovereign unto myself...I don't answer to anyone...This is the movie I signed up for...I feel fear as an encapsulated experience...Standing in front of a group of Blacks...Feeling my differentness, even before it gets to my sexuality...Religion [is an oppressive force]...Leviticus...Who the f_ _k is Leviticus?...He's never come to my house to pay the rent..."

"For me, fear is not something that happens and leaves...If anxiety is fear...What do you mean, fear is an encapsulated experience?..."

"Once you recognize what it is, it's a choice...For me, there's never been a complete [system] of support..."

{Facilitator says: "Yes, that's it, in a nutshell...Fear is a choice...But, we'll come back to that...In saying, for you, 'fear isn't something that happens and leaves,'...does that mean that anxiety is a constant force in your life?...[Participant nods]...It is my considered observation that you are not alone in that...[For instance, someone] has talked frequently here about how, on his job, at which he has excelled for twenty years and counting, he has watched as other Black same gender loving men who have been exemplary on their jobs have been systematically dismissed...and how that has been a source of unending anxiety for him...And that is why it is imperative that we understand that fear is a choice...Because we've no control over the external circumstance...what we have control over is how we conduct ourselves in relationship to the circumstance(s)..."}

What are the benefits of facing and overcoming fears?
"We miss so many opportunities to coalition and move forward together...I think of the Mandela quote that, we are powerful beyond measure...We can be lights to other SGL men who, for seeing our light, will turn on their own..."

{Facilitator says: "Yes...That is why it is imperative that we understand who we really are...That we are Gatekeepers...Gatekeepers are the members of the community whose job it is, when the community is in crisis...taking cues from nature and the ancestors...to restore the community to harmony and balance...Malidoma Somé tells us that, all same gender loving people are Gatekeepers...Not all Gatekeepers are same gender loving, but all same gender loving people are Gatekeepers...And, when we don't realize that's who we are, we are incapable of doing that job as powerfully as we might..."}

If there really is strength in numbers, how might we use each other to work through and beyond our fears?
"We must support each other's being in the world..."

"How can we support each other's being in the world?"

"When I stopped calling myself gay and nigger [I began developing the capacity to support other same gender loving brothers' being in the world]...The dialogue in your head about your own people, when you're on the train out in the world [in which you judge them negatively]...If you can get a handle on that [that's how we can begin supporting each others' being in the world...]"

"Since I became aware of the [notion of] Gatekeepers, it's been so liberating...I was with my spiritual teacher and a friend of hers the other day, and her friend said, 'Thank God for gay people! Because, you can't count on them other children to take care of you!...We're causing a change in the community, whether we realize it or not...I'm seeing a change in my family...I used to be fearful and timid...now I see how powerful I am..."

"Find an older man or an Egun or an ancestor who represents what you want to be...Make a list of all the things you do in private that you wouldn't do in public, and just go live it...be genuine..."

"Treat and speak your sexuality as normality...""