During the most recent dialogue, Black Men's Xchange-New York members met with heterosexual Brothers to look at RESURRECTING BLACK MANHOOD and the Fear of a Same Gender Loving Planet.  Participants' considerations were taken up from the following angles:

What is manhood?

"[A male] taking care of what he needs to take care of...himself, his family, his community..."

Does sexuality define manhood?

"No."

"In a societal context, masculinity and sexuality go hand-in-hand from childhood [through adulthood]...[They are] the boxes we're given [to operate out of]..."

When and how did you transform from being a boy to being a man?  Was there a rite of passage?  Was your sexuality a part of that rite of passage?

"Sex isn't really a rite of passage...As Black people, we don't have any rites of passage..."

"When I lost my virginity to a woman [it was a rite of passage]...All my friends said, 'He likes women!'...'He's a man'..."

"I was raised by my father [as a single parent] with my younger sister...I didn't have much to compare him to...The things people define as manhood and womanhood, I saw in my dad...He would go to work...[Then, come home and] cook, sew, wash the floors...Manhood is also defined by power, control, domination...On a certain level, sexuality is part of that definition also...You expect men to have a certain amount of strength, and women not to...I reject that vision of manhood...I'm not sure I ever thought about having sex with a woman as a rite of passage...It's just something men do...I remember guys in high school having all this sex with girls...I thought, 'Oh, I better have sex with girls'...And so, the first time I had sex, I don't remember [experiencing it as] a rite of passage, but I do remember feeling more like a man..."

"[Taking] sexuality and linking it with power...We are socialized to be conquerors...Sex with as many women as I can...drinking [as much of] this stuff I'm not supposed to be drinking [as I can]...smoking [as much of] this stuff I'm not supposed to be smoking [as I can]...Putting this external piece inside [a girl]...[all constitute] a form of power...You play sports, have sex...The first time I had sex I felt like, I'm  in this, what am I supposed to do?...But, I figured it out...and I felt great after..."

"I remember seeing guys having sex with girls and recognizing it as a rite of passage...[Seeing them] getting married...having a child...I never shared those rites of passage...Accepting myself [my sexuality]...Accepting myself as not perfect [were rites of passage for me]...I came to this meeting in hopes that talking about this stuff with heterosexual brothers would be a rite of passage...And it is..."

{Facilitator says, Thank you for that...You are absolutely right...I never thought of it, but, accepting my sexuality was absolutely a rite of passage...}

"I was 12 or 13 taking a shower and seeing my first pubes [was something like a rite of passage]..."

{Facilitator says, "I remember 'comparing hairs' with my male friends, [and expressions like]...'Ha, ha, ha...My dick is bigger than yours!'...[Apart from that] Traumas were rites of passage for me...People uttering the word, 'faggot' was traumatic...and fighting if someone had the nerve to say the word...not [necessarily] to me, but even in my presence...because, faggot was not just the scum of the earth...faggot was the scum of the scum of the earth...[Because] Where many of us thought of ourselves as 'niggers,' anyway...nigger being sub-human...faggot was a nigger's nigger...sub-sub human..."}

"Graduating from high school...going to college...defining myself...going to grad school [were rites of passage]...Yale...the white man's world...an institution that did define me...made me feel like a powerful man..."

"When I felt at ease with heterosexual men was a rite of passage for me..."

What role does fear play in the dynamics between same gender loving and hetero Brothers?

"A big role...Fear of not being a man is the fear...[Being seen as] 'faggot,' [and] 'pussy'...Not the church stuff...That's a scapegoat..."

"Fear has played a major role...It has driven me...You may think SGL men are not real men...[So, I decided] I'm going to prove you wrong...I'm going to outdo you...Especially with Black heterosexual men...It would not be cool to walk hand-in-hand with another man [in my neighborhood,] but, if I go downtown...[It's okay]...It infuriates me, [the way hetero Brothers] treat gay white men differently...[They don't accost or challenge or threaten them]...It goes back to the trauma we've had as a people...I was in a bar and this white man was pushing up on me and I thought, if this was 40, or 50, or 60 years ago, I wouldn't have been able to say no...Back in [the day,] people talk about how [our] women were raped during slavery, but they don't recognize the fact that we were raped too..."

{Facilitator says, "Excellent point...Some of the fear that informs the dynamic between same gender loving and heterosexual Black men involves real and perceived power...As enslaved people, we didn't own our bodies...Not only could we not protect our women and children, we couldn't protect ourselves...And so, the slave holders used us as objects of sexual abuse and of pleasure, just as they did our women...And, that is part of our cellular memory...Some of the reverberations that make up the stuff of Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome that we don't talk about...For many heterosexual Brothers, particularly when you factor in the dynamic of patriarchy which values manhood both, in terms of heterosexism, and misogyny, the fear and hatred of women...Same gender lovingness represents powerlessness...}"

"Fear is the absence of love...What is it that gets in the way of our loving [ourselves and each other?]...The trauma...I remember, when I came of age [was] when I started being watched...People started clutching their purses [when I was present]...I became part of that [unlovable] fraternity..."

"[There is also the] fear of someone being more man than you [are]...[And] being able to take your manhood..."

{Facilitator says, "Yes...And with that, you raise the specter of another important facet in the dynamic of fear...It has been my considered observation in these dialogues with hetero Brothers, and out in the world, that many more Brothers than will admit, were molested as boys by pedophiles...I, myself was prematurely sexualized...and for that trauma, or the fear of that trauma, many heterosexuals [incorrectly] conflate homosexuality with pedophilia...Where one is about biological wiring and the latter is a psycho-pathology..."}

Who sees, or has seen homosexuality as a threat to the Black family?

"I have a nephew who is [a brazenly] effeminate SGL youth, who I tell [it's all about] when and where!...You have to protect yourself!...There are places where you have to tone that stuff down...You can get hurt..."

"I have a son...My dad forced me [to be a father]...He didn't stand there and make me [impregnate a girl,] but...[I didn't want a child]...I love him now...[But] I feel like a hypocrite... [Because] I didn't let him visit two friends who are openly SGL...I don't think he should see that...I don't want [to risk] him being influenced by that..."

"For those of us who were raised by both parents, were you influenced by your parents' heterosexuality?..."

{Facilitator asks, "How do you feel about your sexuality?}  

"Not good..."

{Facilitator says, "That might account for why you don't want your son to see same gender loving men together...I'm not sure exactly what you're afraid of when you say you don't want your son influenced by seeing same gender loving men together...As a child, I saw my parents walk around naked sometimes, but they didn't fuck in front of us...I believe that as we muster the courage to express our natural inclination toward each other in front of our children, it will empower them with a broader vision of love...of humanity...and serve to normalize what, till now has been deemed abnormal...It's not an accident that, while gay liberationists are fighting and winning struggles for same sex marriage, we're still playing darting eye games with each other, cowering in the face of our attraction to each other on trains and in other public spaces, lest the object of our attraction reject, or worse yet, revile us publically...I  remember when my niece was thirteen and came to spend the summer with me in New York...I was still in my last long-term relationship...David and I took her to City Island for seafood...and at the end of a long day, we came home and David was sitting in the arm chair reading his paper and my niece sat with me on the sofa watching TV...and all at once she became agitated and asked to use the phone...She went into the study and came out a few minutes later and handed me the phone...It was my brother and sister-in-law, each explaining to me in their own way why they wanted my niece to pack and prepare for her maternal aunt to come and pick her up because they didn't want her 'exposed to that lifestyle'...Beyond asking, 'Well, why did you send her here in the first place?...Did you think I was not going to be who I am because she was here?'...The irony was...My sister-in-law's sister is a distinctly same gender loving woman..."}

"I think of MLK's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail"...When people kept telling him, 'You're going too fast' [in pressing for Civil Rights]...and he asked, 'But when?'...The rights of gay and SGL people are the Civil Rights movements of our time...When do we in our community...which is very homophobic...stand up for our rights?...If not now, when?..."

"When I hear this, I hear, I am not normal, and so I must be discreet...When I understand that everything in nature fucks across gender...[then, what am I afraid of?]...When I start acting certain ways around children [that are counter to my natural inclination]...it is a thought infection that [I] pass on...A thought infection we're spreading...I am accepting that I am abnormal [and that others must be protected from me]...That I am not natural...I am natural!..."

Does Black male homosexuality compromise the resurrection of Black manhood?

"Hyper-masculinity is what is fucking us up...How do we debunk hyper-masculinity?...How do we see manhood as more than just one thing?..."

"For me, it all comes back to fear...How it plays with how I interact with SGL Brothers...is [the fear] of seeing part of an SGL Brother in me...When I see something I don't like or want in myself, I'm going to lash out at it...We have to develop the ability to accept, to engage homosexuality...[This] will come from rejecting our fear and with remembering love is the healing [for all that ails us]..."

"We're in the process of trying to change manhood...Black male homosexuality is part of Black manhood...When we realize we don't have to prove anything...We encompass all aspects of manhood...Who get's to say what represents manhood in our community...[As men,] are we taking care of our community or not?...That's the question!..."

"Leadership is demonstrated by action...What action a person takes...which, when we're talking about manhood, we're describing leadership..."

"But, this space is good...This is where we begin to come together and redefine manhood [to include all of us]..."