Ian David

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Thu Nov-06-08 06:52 PM
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Why African-Americans Voted for Prop 8 and why The Mormons fought for it (Boot-licking Bullies)

Edited on Thu Nov-06-08 07:20 PM by IanDB1

Part of the problem is that African-Americans have had to fight "The Mandingo Stereotype" for generations-- the notion that they could not control their sexual urges. This has been part of their struggle towards equality and respect.

Many of the heterosexual black clergy feel that if they concede that some people are "born gay" that this will cause them to lose some of their own hard-won ground. The feeling is that if they concede that someone cannot keep themselves from being gay, that they will somehow be conceding that black men cannot keep themselves from raping white women.

A more cynical reason is that many feel relieved to have a scapegoat they can blame the ills of their own community on. Rev. Louis Sheldon says that homosexuality is the greatest threat to the urban community, for example.

Many black churches are willing to share a common enemy with the white fundamentalists, under the premise they will believe, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

That particular pathological strategy is not exclusive to black churches, either.

For example:

Queer allies: The little-noticed alliance between gay marriage opponents and alleged terrorist sympathizers
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1203/marriage_terrorists.php3

Yes, Jewish groups are allying with anti-Jewish Muslim groups to fight gay marriage. Muslim groups are allying with anti-Muslim Christian groups to fight gay marriage.

It's a sick, sick world.

A CounterPunch Special
"Segregation (and Hypocrisy) Forever"
The Legacy of Strom Thurmond

By KEVIN ALEXANDER GRAY

Mandinkas were the fiercest warriors of Africa. After a Caribbean slave revolt in the 1800s, John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, the leading intellectual of the Southern gentry, invoked the specter of Mandingo slaughtering white masters as justification for their enslavement. Black male sexual prowess was also a big part of the myth. The often used colloquialism, "once you go black you never go back"--is the myth of the big black, well-endowed buck, Mandingo.

In the 1970s, the myth became the movie "Mandingo" in which one-time heavyweight champ Ken Norton played a noble slave who burns down the white man's plantation and escapes to freedom with the blond Southern belle in his arms. My mother took us kids to see the "controversial" movie when it was shown at the local drive-in theatre. And at the top of her stack of romance novels was a cover showing a muscular, caramel-colored black man caressing a buxom, blond lass, her ample white breast barely covered by the straps of her torn hoop dress, her long blond ringlets cascading over her shoulder with the title "Mandingo" emblazoned across the cover.

The Mandingo stereotype entraps black males to this day as evidenced by the pop culture embrace of the pimp, gangsta rappers along with a host of psycho-sexual-social illusions. The myth fuels denial over homosexuality and feeds rampant homophobia in the black community. As black gay and bisexual men practice a dangerous sexual secrecy, the AIDS crisis in the black community worsens. As a friend told me, "One of the worst thing to be is a gay black man in the south. The preacher wants you to lead the choir, and maybe even give him a blowjob every now and again, while condemning, denying or damning your very existence from the pulpit."

As for white women, during slavery a white woman marrying or consensually having a child by a black man usually found herself in legally sanctioned bondage. "Defilement" or being "spoiled" during the Jim Crow era most often meant banishment--or stripped of being "white" for one's "nigger-loving" ways. White men used "protecting white womanhood," the first plank in the Klan platform, as a pretext for controlling white women, but in some respects it trapped the men in a psychotic effort to prove their own sexual dominance.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/gray03082004.html

According to some statistics I have seen, African-Americans are more likely to be homophobic than any other ethnic group.

But I have read conflicting statistics in various places, so I'll accept that information only provisionally for now. (If anyone has any definitive studies on that, please let me know.)

The usual explanation is that they tend to spend more time and church and because of the rampant racism in our country they are more often deprived of an education.

And in church, they are the captive audience every Sunday of someone who tells them what he says God wants them to believe. And often what they're told is that God wants them to hate homosexuals.

The old racist stereotype (see: Birth of a Nation for an illustration) used to be that black people couldn't control their sexual urges and would rape white women any time they were given the chance.

Of course, come the civil rights movement, they did a good job fighting that false stereotype. For the most part, it has worked. But not every bigoted racist is convinced. They never are.

Traces of the "black men are sexual beasts" stereotype linger in the form of the "black men have bigger penises" myth.

The dangers of flattering myths
http://idsnews.com/story.php?id=22646

At the risk of catching hell from my fellow black men, I feel I must make this point very clear: not all black men are anatomically gifted, either in regard to their physical abilities or sexual attributes. To think otherwise is to implicitly accept a racist stereotype, albeit a seemingly flattering one.

This particular notion derives from the "Mandingo" caricature of decades past. Mandingo is a stupid, muscular, jet-black, sub-human creature, most often portrayed as a field hand, who preys on white women. Mandingo's primary function is physical labor, and he is noted specifically for his sexual promiscuity and prowess. Overwhelmed by the animal nature of Mandingo, the helpless white women either fall victim to their own uncontrollable sexual urges and have sex with Mandingo, or more often, he takes them against their will -- similar to the snatching of Fay Wray in "King Kong" and the explicit premise of D.W. Griffith's racist "classic," "Birth of a Nation."

Not so flattering anymore, is it?

More:
http://idsnews.com/story.php?id=22646

Now, people who believe homosexuality is a "choice" are more likely to be anti-gay than those who understand that gay is something you are BORN as.

So, consciously or not, the black clergy has decided to fight the idea that people are "born gay," because that would imply that homosexuals are born with certain urges (for example, an attraction for the same sex) that gay people "can not control."

And if gay people can not control being gay, what does that do when black people confront racists who believe that black men can't control wanting to rape white women?

The possibility of biologically determined sexual urges frightens the black clergy because they're afraid that accepting gay people as "born gay" means giving credence to the false idea that black men are "born rapists."

There's also the idea that African-Americans are still afraid of the same white southern crackers that have abused them for centuries. They're afraid to stand-up for the rights of those people that the white fundamentalists hate, because it would bring down the whip of whitey's lash.

In case you haven't read carefully (or in case I have not been clear enough) please understand that I am discussing racial and gay stereotypes that I do NOT agree with and that I find reprehensible.

I have nothing against black people or gay people, and I whole-heartedly endorse their liberation from oppression and bigotry. I apologize in advance if I have not been clear enough to make that obvious.

Oh, and obviously NOT ALL African-Americans are homophobes.

I can follow-up on that in another post if anyone's interested.

Actually, let me at least throw in one link:

Coretta Scott King
Links Gay Rights and
African-American Civil Rights
http://www.hatecrime.org/subpages/coretta.html

More:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=221x3942#3947

See prior thread:
Black Gays Search For Acceptance In Shadow Of Martin Luther King Day
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=221&topic_id=25036

Let me explain why The Mormons are going nuts over Proposition 8.
Posted by IanDB1 in Religion/Theology
Wed Oct 29th 2008, 06:54 PM
The Mormons (as an organization) are boot-licking bullies.

Boot-licking bullies abuse those less powerful than themselves, while licking the boots of those who are more powerful than themselves.

The Mormon Church's reputation is tarnished by that whole "polygamy" thing, and they feel that in order to gain legitimacy, they must lick the boots of the powerful by abusing gay people to prove that they are NOW in favor of "Traditional Marriage."

They're screaming, "We're not polygamists! We don't WANT a slippery slope to polygamy! We're AGAINST Gay Marriage! Let us lick your boots! We'll gay-bash for you to prove it!"

Boot-licking bullies.

I'm not a physically violent person, but the next Mormon that approaches me is going to need to go get their hearing checked, after he or she changes their underpants.

More:
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/IanDB1/5955