Black Women, Stop Blaming Black Gay Men For Your Problems!

Just one day after I mentioned how surveillance culture and technological advances have given everyone access to your private behavior, here comes another example of what can happen in the age of the internet.

When Michael Cole Smith and Jamil Smith got married several weeks ago, they posted photos of the event on Facebook for their friends. The photos were then cross-posted and sent via email to untold numbers of people, including “urban” websites like Media Take Out and Bossip, starting a chain reaction of catty comments and vitriol about black same gender love.

One individual, Sandra Bradley, an administrative assistant in the President’s office at Morehouse College, saw the photos and lauched an e-tirade on black gay men. In an email she wrote at work, she noted the grooms looked straight and said black gay men are the reason straight black women can’t establish relationships. Here is a sampling of her comments:

“Black women can’t get a break, either our men want another man, a white woman (or other nationality that’s light with straight hair), they are locked up in jail or have a “use to be” fatal disease. I’m beginning to believe Eve was a black woman and we Black women are paying for all the world’s sins through her actions (eating the apple).”

Bradley’s attitude is common among many women, and it never fails to work my nerves. How much longer are black women going to blame other people for their unhappiness? Bitter black women are always looking to point the finger at someone else for their poor relationships, but when you point the finger, there are three fingers pointing back at you. Black gay men are not the reason you are single! 

Have they considered the possibility that if they had more realistic expectations of men instead of dismissing anyone who isn’t a perfect 10 in finances, occupation, material possessions, appearance, and sexual ability, they wouldn’t be so lonely? Perhaps they should stop glorifying the thug/playa/hustler types that even successful women seem to desire (i.e., Beyonce/Jay-Z , Faith Evans/Notorious BIG, and Whitney Houston/Bobby Brown). After all, you rarely see a “bad boy” without at least one girlfriend.

Instead of blaming black gay men, women would be better served accepting they may not get their Fantasy Man, but they likely can find someone who will treat them with respect if they make respect a requirement for courtship. You tend to be treated as poorly as you allow people to treat you, and unfortunately too many black women have given black men the message that respect is optional for a relationship, since they don’t respect themselves.  When men realize their games and lies don’t work anymore, they change.

Thankfully, Bradley was fired from her job. Kudos to Robert Franklin, the President of Morehouse, for demonstrating that homophobia is not acceptable.   Franklin raised eyebrows when he went against the grain of historically black colleges and condemned homophobia earlier this year, it is great to see some actions behind his words.