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Serving Those to Whom We Are Responsible

5/29/2013

I’m black yall,

I’m black yall.

And I’m blacker than black.

I’m black yall.

- Dead Mike, from the movie CB4

Well, that Memorial Day weekend lasted a bit longer than expected; but, you have to enjoy friends and family when you can. Loved ones do not live forever. Today’s topic will center on black men and black men’s responsibilities to one another. And, since there is no greater exemplar of the practice of middle-class patriarchal masculinity than President Barack Obama, let us ask: does President Obama have any responsibilities with respect to black men in America?

Our president, along with the First Lady, has been taking some heat (what’s new) over the past few weeks. First, there was the April 14, 2013 piece in The Philadelphia Tribune by Reverend Kevin Johnson. Entitled “A President for Everyone, except Black People,” the article takes issue with the president over what Johnson characterizes as the president’s apparent lack of concern for black Americans and the issues that they confront in their daily lives. Johnson, one of the original forces which helped to engender the political rise of Barack Obama on the national scene, recently became disenchanted with the president and his administration’s policy sometime during the planning stages of the president’s re-election strategy. According to Johnson,

in 2012, two prominent Philadelphia lawyers convened a meeting between White House senior advisor, Valerie Jarrett, and a cross-section of Philadelphia’s African-American leadership. The purpose of the meeting was to candidly discuss the president’s re-election strategy and policies toward African-Americans.

The meeting was initially cordial until I mustered the courage to ask Jarrett a question I have heard repeatedly in the African-American community, “Over the past four years, what has President Obama done to help Black people?” (Johnson)

Johnson was then met with the refrain of talking points that the White House has developed in response to criticisms of the type leveled by Johnson and his ilk. According to Jarrett, Obama’s administration has accomplished: “the passing of Obamacare, the increase in PELL grants, etc.” (qtd. in Johnson). Jarrett went on to remind those gathered that “we are family” and that “the president is the president of all Americans, not just Black people” (qtd. in Johnson). Johnson’s piece goes on stating that Black folks “too sing America,” still (Hughes), and concludes by asking some pointed questions, most importantly: “Why are [black Americans] so loyal to a president who is not loyal to us? What is it about our community that we continue to support candidates nationally and locally just because their skin has been “kissed by nature’s sun”” (Johnson)?

About a month after the Johnson article, the Obamas – yes both Michelle and Barack – were taken to task by Ta-Nehisi Coates of the Atlantic for their seeming condescension to black communities, particularly during this spring’s commencement addresses to newly graduated African American college and university students. In his May 20, 2013 offering, Coates argues that while “perhaps [African Americans] cannot practically receive targeted policy…they have earned something more than targeted scorn” (Coates). Coates is not necessarily off the point here. Addressing the graduating class at Bowie State University, the First Lady reminded the students that “instead of dreaming of being a teacher or a lawyer or a business leader, [too many of our young people are] fantasizing about being a baller or a rapper” (qtd. in Coates). Additionally, in a gathering of students who have more than likely read books, and evidently read them well, all of their lives, Mrs. Obama goes on to say: “And as my husband has said often, please stand up and reject the slander that says a black child with a book is trying to act white. Reject that” (qtd. in Coates).

For his part, Mr. Obama – who is “not the president of black America [but] the president of all America” – has played the role of admonisher-in-chief, at least according to Coates (qtd. in Coates). Addressing the graduating class at Morehouse College – one of iconic, historically black colleges in the United States, where the focus on education has always been at a premium – President Obama reminded the graduates of the following:

We know that too many young men in our community continue to make bad choices. Growing up, I made a few myself. And I have to confess, sometimes I wrote off my own failings as just another example of the world trying to keep a black man down. But one of the things you've learned over the last four years is that there's no longer any room for excuses.

We've got no time for excuses-- not because the bitter legacies of slavery and segregation have vanished entirely; they haven't. Not because racism and discrimination no longer exist; that's still out there. It's just that in today's hyper-connected, hyper-competitive world, with a billion young people from China and India and Brazil entering the global workforce alongside you, nobody is going to give you anything you haven't earned. And whatever hardships you may experience because of your race, they pale in comparison to the hardships previous generations endured -- and overcame. (qtd. in Coates)

I believe that the two passages referenced are what upset Coates. And, I cannot say that I disagree with him. Coates states,

I would have a hard time imagining the president telling the women of Barnard that “there's no longer room for any excuses” -- as though they were in the business of making them. Barack Obama is, indeed, the president of “all America,” but he also is singularly the scold of "black America. (Coates)

Having sat through numerous graduation ceremonies at some all-female institutions of learning, I have to admit that I have never heard a guest speaker suggest to the women that “there’s no longer room for any excuses” regarding why women get paid less than men or, why women represent a smaller percentage of the managerial and executive positions in the workforce compared to men, etc., etc.

At any rate, Jonathan Capehart, Washington Post columnist, author and sometime MSNBC television personality, took issue with the positions held by both Johnson and Coates. In his May 21, 2013 article, “Obama Can’t Win with Some Black Critics,” Capehart chastises Johnson for his claim that Obama “ignores the concerns of black people”; Coates, for his claim that the Obamas “talk down to them” (“Obama Can’t Win”). Moreover, Capehart asserts that Johnson and Coates are simply “incredibly short-sighted” in their criticisms of President Obama (“Obama Can’t Win”). He goes on to remind us that he alerted us to the actions of Obama some time ago and that we should have paid attention. In an article written in response to the myriad of books about President Obama, Capehart states,

By searching for [marquee] moments, Harris and others appear not to care about the myriad actions Obama has undertaken that affect the lives of all Americans, yes, but also of African Americans more directly. And I certainly don’t advocate for Obama to burst into the East Room clad in Kente cloth and brandishing a definable “black agenda” or whatever else so many blacks seem to want from him to prove that he cares. (“Stop Waiting”)

Ultimately, Capehart seems to believe that what black critics are missing, or leaving out, in their criticisms of President Obama’s policies towards black Americans is the staunch opposition offered by the Republicans, especially since the 2010-midterm elections. He writes,

that’s what’s missing from most African American critiques of Obama: an appreciation for Republican resistance to his agenda. To expect the president to introduce an explicit and definable “black agenda” in a Congress filled with people who believe him to be a socialist destroying the country while illegitimately occupying the Oval Office is seriously naive. (“Obama Can’t Win”)

Sounds like an excuse to me.

            What I find interesting in Capehart’s article is the fact that he does not really refute what Johnson and Coates have to say; he simply believes that there are explanations for the first African American president’s apparent treatment of African Americans. While he lists a number of accomplishments that the president successfully saw through during his first term – increases in funding for HBCUs, the passage of Obamacare (and that ish is barely being implemented), the Fair Sentencing Act, and banking regulations – very few of those policies were or are aimed at the demographic (s) which have levied complaints against Mr. Obama. What about the citizens who are not enrolled in the undergraduate university, who do not sell crack, who do not have healthcare facilities in their areas and who rent? That sounds like a great number of the people that I know. Many of them claim that they would simply like to hear some sincerity, some intimate understanding, regarding their plight from the first African American president. I digress.

            My biggest issue with the president and his administration is: he has turned out to be like most politicians in power. He is no different. Just darker. I am beginning to become very disturbed by the way in which this administration uses race. So, Johnson’s question is very important: “What is it about our community that we continue to support candidates nationally and locally just because their skin has been “kissed by nature’s sun?” Have we been supporting Obama simply because his skin has a darker hue than usual? It seems we have. For the most part, Barack Obama has very little in common with many of the people who may refer to themselves as black. Do your own test. What do you and Obama have in common? I believe that if people who feel themselves deserted by President Obama ask themselves this question, then they will realize that the president did not desert them. They were never on the same team in the first place. And this is not your typical American race rant. There are different types of black Americans. Sometimes, the only thing that they have in common is a shared, relatively speaking, melanin level.

            When Michelle says “when it comes to getting an education, too many of our young people just can't be bothered,” who exactly is the our to which she is referring? All of the young people I know are literally killing themselves to get an education. It cannot be the graduates at Bowie State because their dedication to education would be self-evident. And, suggesting that an educated black man is trying to act white went out of style a long time ago. But, it does underscore the idea that race is a performative act. Like it or not, long standing historical and cultural norms have been accepted and established in America regarding the performance of blackness, and whiteness for that matter. Among African Americans – black Americans – there is no shared and agreed upon understanding of blackness, or criteria by which blackness is defined. Never has been. So when Mrs. Obama says our children, I ask again: to whom is she referring. And then she goes on to say that the children want to be ballers and rappers, not business leaders or teachers or lawyers. First of all, has anyone asked these people why they want to be ballers and rappers? Ballers, usually businessmen who have created enough wealth to create a world of their own where attempts can be more readily facilitated to mitigate the impact of societal influences on them and those that they love, are ingrained in the American mythos. How the hell do you all think we developed the nickname the 49ers? Those people were not heading west to attend the university. They were seeking wealth. Yes, like just about everyone who has ever immigrated to America. And rappers. Did not your husband Mrs. Obama employ Jay-Z in his efforts at election and re-election? Remember, “My President is Black?” And some rappers are some of the nation’s most gifted businessmen; I m not always very pleased with the nature and scope of their businesses, but nonetheless they are businessmen. Perhaps it is the autonomy and sense of freedom from society’s every reflecting mirror that these young people seek in their pursuits of becoming a baller or a businessman. Perhaps it is the escape from having to go to work everyday among many who have no cultural or generational or… or… understanding of them. I think that if the First Lady inquired a bit more as to the reasoning behind such fantasies, then perhaps she could concentrate more on motivating the children to accomplish their dreams. Anyone can be a rapper, just like anyone can be a businessman or a lawyer. To be a great rapper or lawyer or businessman or baller requires hard work, effort, luck, dedication and the functional education of the chosen field. This is the case when attempting to make any dream come true!

While Capehart wants to suggest that the Obamas, or at least the president, speak to black audiences from the perspective of peers and not from on high, the reality is just the opposite. Barack Obama is the President of the United States; he is, more than likely, not anyone’s peer reading this blog. He’s not anyone’s homie; he is the president. Act like it! Some of Obama’s detractors seemingly want him to act like a black man who has become president (whatever that means). Now, the rift with some American demographics seems to rest on one’s criteria for blackness. They want him to be their peer because his skin appears black. I hate to tell them that the president probably does not have a lot in common with them. The representation of some conception of blackness may be more important to them than the president. The symbolic capital associated with some conception of blackness may be more important to them that to the president. For example, Capehart would suggest that the president does not have to wear Kente cloth to prove that he cares about some black agenda. I don’t think anyone is asking him to wear Kente cloth; the creation of some jobs would be nice though. But, we might want to reconsider wearing the Kente cloth at our graduation ceremonies to symbolize our connection with some lost African past then. I mean, the man spoke to graduates with Kente cloth draped around their necks (you Stanford African American Graduation Ceremony participants remember this, don’t ya?). Barack Obama has internalized a middle-class patriarchal masculinity, which seems to have a bit of an Episcopalian tint to it. A tint that suggests that middle-class African Americans do not represent blackness like, let’s say, some lower-class Baptist African Americans. Those African Americans who shout (Rev. Wright comes to mind) and love Popeye’s and who feel as though they have yet to be touched by the policies of the Obama administration do not share many cultural and social similarities with the guy who grew up in Hawaii (did you see the prom pictures?). And there is nothing wrong with that. But when people assume that he stands with their inmost thoughts and feelings just because he has a skin tone similar to theirs, people assume at their own risks. I know he was branded (everything’s a brand these days) as the first black president; but we never asked what he considered black to mean. We always thought he would pull us in a backroom and tell us his real feelings and inmost thoughts as a black man and as president (you know, like most members of the professional managerial class do. One of my friends just reminded me of how Condi Rice gathered us black students together to tell us things that she would not dare say in front of some of her Republican allies). Never happened. Probably never will.

            It would be nice if some black men could simply use the sight of a seemingly black American in the oval office as a method of somehow instilling pride in themselves and the African American community. It would also be nice if black men, whom, upon reaching some zenith of success in their chosen fields, would represent themselves as black men. Whenever we get the opportunity to take on a role with high visibility and importance, we stop (for some reason) referring to ourselves as black men, but simply men. Barack Obama, Robert Griffin III, Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan. These are just a few men who do not represent themselves as the best black president or best black quarterback or the best black golfer or the best black basketball player, but the best president, quarterback, golfer and basketball player, respectively. So when little black boys, who are dangerously overdetermined, look to great images and spokespersons of their race for inspiration, they have none; or, better stated: the best is never reserved for them. At least, they have none who seem proud and happy to be black. What they seem to have are heroes and role models who cannot run away from blackness fast enough. I mean what is Tiger, kablasian or something like that? And, Beyoncé? In one of her latest commercials for a multinational beauty aid corporation, she is Native American, French and African American. Are not mutts of that pedigree overdetermined as black in America? I jest. I jest.

            Maybe President Obama and the First Lady have some responsibility to connect with African Americans and blacks regarding their inmost thoughts and feelings, and maybe they don’t. Maybe they do connect with the inmost thoughts and feelings of some Americans and if you feel otherwise, then you just happen to be SOL, because they are not talking to you or for you. Wait for the next African American president. Maybe you will get lucky. But this I know: the University of Illinois elected its first black president in the 1880s; they have not had another since, if memory serves me correctly. Members of a disgruntled African American and black demographic (s) who are not pleased with the first black president’s performance may have to add that to their long list of grievances and disappointments as part of the American citizenry. To the gods!

Works Cited

Capehart, Jonathan. “Obama Can’t Win with Some Black Critics.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2013/05/21/obama-cant-win-
with-some-black-critics/

- “Stop Waiting for and Start Paying Attention to Our First Black President.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/stop-waiting-for-and-start-
paying-attention-to-our-first-black-president/2012/06/03/gJQAxQGCCV_blog.html

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. “How the Obama Administration Talks to Black America.”

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/05/how-the-obama-administration-talks-
to-black-america/276015/

Hughes, Langston. “I, Too, Sing America.”

                     http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15615

Johnson, Rev. Kevin. “A President for Everyone, except Black People.”

  http://www.phillytrib.com/newsarticles/item/8637-a-president-for-everyone,-except-black-
  people.html

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The Scandal of Rhimes and Washington

5/20/2013

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In their outlooks regarding representations of African American women, Shonda Rhimes and Kerry Washington display the attitude of inheritors of the privileges of the post-Civil Rights era (and not necessarily for the good). Let’s get some things straight from the outset:

1) Do I believe that Rhimes’s and Washington’s onscreen and narrative representations of African American women are damaging and unhealthy: yes! I also acknowledge that the representations of black women in America are overdetermined.

2) Do I believe that the children of the post-Civil Rights era are schizophrenic and confused, and need to figure out who they are: yes!

I do not know Rhimes; I no doubt could benefit from working with her. From what I have learned about her, she is

an American screenwriter, director and producer. She was born January 13, 1970. Rhimes is best known as the creator, head writer, and executive producer of the medical drama television series Grey's Anatomy and its spin-off Private Practice. In May 2007, Rhimes was named one of Time magazine's 100 people who help shape the world. Rhimes was an executive producer for the medical drama series Off the Map, and developed the ABC drama series Scandal, which debuted as a mid-season replacement on April 5, 2012. (Wiki)

Now, while the description from above can be found on Wikipedia (and I mandate that my students never use any Wiki product as source material, wow), just about every biographical description that I found on Rhimes on the web described her the same way: American. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with Rhimes being described as an American, for that is her nationality. She is rarely described as African American in biographical descriptions of her found on the web, but as she once said

I’m a black woman every day, and I’m not confused about that. I’m not worried about that. I don’t need to have a discussion with you about how I feel as a black woman, because I don’t feel disempowered as a black woman. (James)

Rhimes acknowledges the overdetermined nature of her being in America: she is a black woman every day. And about that, she is not confused. I wish I understood her perspective(s) on blackness in America with a bit more clarity because her shows leave me confused at times. And, some of the other people who watch her show Scandal are confused, too. Or, at least, critical in a fashion reflective of confusion about something. And that something seems to be race. More specifically, a lack of developed blackness.

When discussing the topic of race and its historic portrayal on the screen within mainstream Hollywood, Rhimes has suggested that,

when people who aren’t of color create a show and they have one character of color on their show, that character spends all their time talking about the world as ‘I’m a black man blah, blah, blah’… That’s not how the world works. (James)

Rhimes, seemingly, holds a world-view that suggests that the world is unconcerned with the “blah, blah, blah” of being a black man. And, if the world is not concerned with the inmost thoughts and feelings (the blah, blah, blah) of being a black man, then why should her shows reflect a concern with black men, their concepts of masculinity and any other blah, blah, blah? Moreover, if we take a look at the shows that Rhimes has been credited with writing or producing, then I think we can agree that while the shows’ demographics may have been diverse, they are not necessarily high Nielsen scorers in African American households. Consider the following: Hank Aaron: Chasing the Dream, Blossoms and Veils, Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Crossroads, The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Inside the Box, Seattle Grace: On Call, Seattle Grace: Message of Hope, Off the Map, Gilded Lilys and Scandal. With the exceptions of Hank Aaron and Dorothy Dandridge, none of Rhimes’s shows can be said to reflect any determined focus on blackness: and those that do, do so simply because of the works’ respective subject matter. Rhimes’s shows rarely reflect any concentration on blackness; any concentrated awareness of blackness in her shows seems to exists simply as part of the narrative fabric.

So, that brings us to Scandal. According to Rhimes, “Scandal’s D.C. is a post-racial fantasia where color is a non-issue” (qtd. in Parham). Scandal’s D.C. is an utopian setting, where problems and problematic occurrences exist, just not with relation to race. It is a place where people – good people, bad people, indifferent people, jump-off people – can just be people. Perhaps that why Kerry Washington, who does not

want to ignore [her] Blackness [and] just want[s] to get to the point where [her] racial identity is simply a part of what makes [her] unique in the way being from the Bronx makes [her] unique, or being an Aquarius, or being born in 1977 and having hip-hop be a part of [her] heartbeat [makes her unique],

makes such a great choice for portraying Olivia Pope (Good). Rhimes has created the perfect world of fantasia where Washington can display her greatest desires of being. Yes, Scandal’s D.C is a fantasia, where color is a non-issue. It is a place where blackness is nothing about which any exceptional attention should be paid. Race is like one’s city of birth, or one’s zodiac sign, or one’s year of birth…or one’s musical genre of choice. Yes, race is a social construction. Just another something that makes each individual who they are. Rhimes has chosen not to highlight race on Scandal; Washington seeks to live in a world where one’s blackness is severely sublimated. To quote Rhimes, is that “how the world works?” Does race have very little significance in twenty-first century America? Oh, to be Sasha and Malia!

Now, Washington is a good actress; she has mastered her craft and has been, I would imagine, handsomely compensated for her labor. However, I think we all would have to admit that most of Washington’s character portrayals, on the small screen and the big screen, have reflected the “tragic mulatta.” Yes, I said it: Kerry Washington has allowed herself to become type-casted as a twenty-first century tragic mulatta! Consider her characters Nikki Tru and Broomhilda von Shaft, from I Think I Love My Wife and D’jango Unchained, and of course Olivia Pope from Scandal.

The Tragic Mulatta

William Wells Brown, an African American novelist, is most credited with inaugurating the entrance of the tragic mulatta onto the African American literary scene with the publication of Clotel; or, The President's Daughter in 1853. Our good friends at Wiki suggest that

the novel explores slavery's destructive effects on African-American families, the difficult lives of American mulattoes or mixed-race people, and the “degraded and immoral condition of the relation of master and slave in the United States of America.” It is a tragic mulatto story about a woman named Currer and her daughters Althesa and Clotel, fathered by Thomas Jefferson; their relatively comfortable lives end after Jefferson's death. (Wiki)

While most would argue that Brown develops the tragic mulatta character type in the guise of Clotel (at least in African American literature), I would argue that it is Harriet Beecher Stowe, in Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1852, who first presents the tragic mulatta to American audiences in the guise of Eliza. At any rate, the tragic mulatta is usually a mixed-race Jezebel; a woman of color of such beauty and desirability that she often finds herself in situations, not of her own doing, which nonetheless lead to her downfall and destruction as a human being. Her male superiors are usually defenseless against her feminine charms. Moreover, according to David Pilgrim in “The Tragic Mulatto Myth,”

the tragic mulatto is a stereotypical fictional character that appeared in American literature during the 19th and 20th centuries, from the 1840s. The tragic mulatto is an archetypical mixed-race person (a "mulatto"), who is assumed to be sad, or even suicidal, because they fail to completely fit in the white world or the black world. As such, the “tragic mulatto” is depicted as the victim of the society they live in, a society divided by race. They cannot be classified as one who is completely black or white.

The female "tragic octoroon" was a stock character of abolitionist literature: a light-skinned woman raised as if a white woman in her father's household, until his bankruptcy or death has her reduced to a menial position and sold. She may even be unaware of her status before being so reduced. This character allowed abolitionists to draw attention to the sexual exploitation in slavery. (Pilgrim)

I would argue that many of the major roles – at least three – that Washington has portrayed as an actress in Hollywood reflect a mix of the Jezebel figure and the tragic mulatto, resulting in a twenty-first century version of the tragic mulatta. And while Pilgrim may argue that the tragic mulatto is neither completely white nor black, we must remember that the “one-drop” rule of American genealogical history mandates that anyone with at least a drop of African American blood is overdetermined as black. So, the tragic mulatto may feel divided between the black and white worlds, but the tragic mulatto is classified as black. The tragic mulatto is usually the only person confused about what race the tragic mulatto is considered.

Nikki Tru

In I Think I Love My Wife, Chris Rock stars as Richard Cooper, a successful, happily married practitioner of middle-class patriarchal masculinity. His audience is led to understand that Richard portrays much of the criteria of middle-class patriarchal masculinity and his reflection and portrayal of that criteria work to explain his apparent success. He is intelligent, loyal, rational, attractive, virtuous, and above all seems to possess the self-control needed to navigate corporate America as an African American male. Richard’s tenuous grasp of self-control is thrown into question with the entrance of Nikki Tru, played by Washington, onto the screen. As the IMBD cast description explains,

an encounter with an attractive old friend, Nikki (Kerry Washington), suddenly casts doubt over [Richard’s] typically resilient self-control. At first she claims to just want to be his friend, but she begins to show up consistently at his Manhattan financial office just to talk or have lunch, which causes his boss, secretaries and peers to view him with varying degrees of contempt. When Nikki begins to deliberately seduce Richard, he does not know what to do. Against his better judgment, he flies with her out of town for one day on an errand, where he is beaten by her boyfriend, and returns too late to make a sales presentation at an important business meeting, causing the loss of a lucrative contract. Later, when she and her fiancé are about to move to Los Angeles, Nikki asks Richard to come to her apartment later to say a “proper goodbye.” When he gets to Nikki's apartment, he finds her in her underwear in her bathroom. In the moments before it seems Richard will consummate his attraction to Nikki, he realizes how grave the loss of his wife and children would be, so he walks out on Nikki. Richard returns home, surprising his wife, and for the first time in the film, they begin to rebuild a genuine rapport, with a possible promise of good things to come. (imdb.com)

Washington’s character follows the typical patterns of the Jezebel and tragic mulatto figure in American narrative. She uses her feminine wiles to seduce Richard against his better judgment; she is the cause of Richard’s loss of self-control when it comes to all things sexual. Like the tragic mulatto, she is left alone and distraught (destroyed?), when Richard decides that he loves his wife and returns to his happy home. Men must be on the lookout for women like Nikki Tru, for she poses a grave threat to middle-class patriarchal masculinity. She is so fine, so beautiful, a man might just lose his self-control and destroy his marriage and career and …his humanity(?) in the attempt to posses her.

Olivia Pope

In ABC’s Scandal, Washington plays Olivia Pope, a highly educated, intelligent, deliberate, sexualized and powerful political fixer centered in the nation’s capital. She is also the president’s mistress. Now, the connection with the tragic mulatto is rather evident. When one takes into consideration the history of sexual relationships between women of color – black women – and white men in America, the obvious social critique regarding Olivia and Fitz’s relationship cannot be ignored. And, although the show rarely speaks of race, even Washington’s character cannot escape the obvious implications of the relationship when she mutters that she is beginning to feel “a little Sally Hemings-Thomas Jefferson” about the relationship with Fitz. William Wells Brown would smile. In the effort to reinvent the tragic mulatta figure, it seems as if Rhimes and the creative team over at ABC decided to craft the character trope with an assumed inverted power relationship with the character’s male superior; however, the history and culture of the United States almost precludes the audience from interpreting Pope as anything other than an overdetermined jump-off broad. Which is sad, because Washington’s character is the first representation of an African American female lead on network television in some time. Well, maybe not African American for Oprah Winfrey reminds us that

[Olivia Pope] is a fully realized woman…[Kerry Washington] is not just in this role because she is African-American. [Kerry Washington represents] a new moment for our culture. (Winfrey)

What moment is that, Sophia? And where is Harpo, anyway?

While Washington’s role should be celebrated for the powerful reflection of black womanhood that it illustrates, the trace and specter of America’s racial past haunt Pope’s characterization, especially with regards to her relationship with Fitz. I mean, here is a woman that can do anything that she wants – including win the election for Fitz – but she cannot find herself an unmarried man? Perhaps, we are to understand that what this powerful, smart, ambitious, feared African American political operative wants is a married white man.

Broomhilda von Shaft

No role underscores the idea that Washington has been type-casted as a tragic mulatta more than the role she played in Quentin Tarantino’s 2012 smash hit D’jango Unchained. In the movie, Washington stars as Broomhilda von Shaft (Shaft, really? Shut yo mouf), the enslaved wife of D’jango, himself a slave and played by Jamie Foxx. The plot of the movie revolves around D’jango attempting to rescue his wife from the evil white slaver Calvin Candie, played by Leonardo DiCaprio. Two of the motivating reasons for D’jango’s attempt to save his wife: 1) to rescue her from the sexual proclivities of Candie and his enslaved male wrestler population and 2) to protect her from labor in the field, for Broomhilda has always been a house hand and she would not survive the demands of a field hand…and she is too beautiful to be wasted in the field.

On the one hand, Broomhilda is overdetermined as a sexual object and chattel property by Calvin Candie; he wishes to keep her enslaved and do with her as he pleases, for she is his property. And a proper Southern gentleman – a man reared on middle-class patriarchal masculinity – should have the power and strength to do with his property as he pleases. On the other hand, Broomhilda is overdetermined by D’jango as the helpless, pitied feminist presence that must been hoisted upon a mantle and protected within the cult of domesticity. So, in actuality, what we have is an ideological struggle between the enslaved black man and the free white man over the role, purpose and function of a black woman(…I’m sorry, a woman for whom her blackness is but one component of her being). Does Broomhilda have a say? Not in the movie. The audience is privy to no words – neither in English nor German – which reflect Broomhilda’s perspective on the matter. We get that she does not wish to be the concubine of Candie, but are we to understand that she wishes to be caged away by D’jango. I do not think Olivia Pope would go for that. Broomhilda is definitely a victim of society. And, the audience is afforded an understanding of the desires of both white men and black men regarding Broomhilda (consider the opinions of D’jango and Candie and Dr. Schultz and Stephen), but we rarely hear from Broomhilda herself. By the end of the movie, she simply rides away with D’jango. I guess it is up to the former slave, with his tenuous grip on concepts of middle-class patriarchal masculinity, to provide the protective space in which Broomhilda, the mulatta slave too delicate to work in the fields, can be established within America’s cult of domesticity.

I was going to be really critical of Washington for playing so many tragic mulatta roles. And then I was going to criticize the NAACP for celebrating her roles, along with ESSENCE and ELLE and Ebony and Jet. But in a world where The Academy sees fit to celebrate the roles depicted in The Help, who am I to pose critical inquiry regarding the representation of African American women in narrative and onscreen? And then I read a VIBE interview featuring Washington and I realized that she knows little about African American history. And so, her ignorance with regards to the impact of the characters that she is paid to portray should not surprise me. In an interview for VIBE, just before the Christmas premiere of D’jango Unchained, Washington was asked the following:

Before D'jango was even completed, the screenplay and the trailer received criticism from black people who objected to the treatment of slavery, suggesting it is not serious. It is a spaghetti western not a heavy drama like, say, Roots or The Color Purple. Were you prepared for this type of scrutiny?

She responded by saying,

This [D’jango Unchained] is not a doc. This is a Quentin Tarantino film. But I remember there was this one moment in the script where Jamie's character was put in an awful crazy medieval metal mask. I said, ‘‘That's some sick thing Quentin thought up.” And when I went to the production office to meet about my wardrobe, I saw into the research office. Twenty photos of real masks like that. It made me sad. I realized as much as my degrees and everything I've read on slave narratives [should have informed me], I didn't even know that they wore masks like that, that people did that to us. It took a Tarantino movie for me to know that that's not some crazy thing out of his imagination. That's how it went down.

You see, even with all of her degrees, Washington was ignorant of how it (the horrible treatment of African American slaves) went down. Thank you, Tarantino for enlightening her. (Does anyone find it humorous that she received her education from Tarantino – that great illustrator of all things black – regarding the history of slavery?) If Washington was ignorant of the devices used to curtail the movement of slaves, then I would not find it surprising that she is ignorant of the tragic mulatta in America’s narrative history. Maybe someone should show her some pictures of the plight of the tragic mulatta the next time she is on a movie set. Then she will know how it went down.

            Both Rhimes and Washington are children of the post-Civil Rights era, born in 1970 and 1977, respectively. I believe that the children of the post-Civil Rights era are schizophrenic; they have driven themselves crazy by trying to have their cake and eat it too. On this topic, I too agree with Kenneth Warren (and I hate to agree with him on anything). In the effort to continue the legacies of Truth, King and Jordan and live out their ambitions as Americans, children of the post-Civil Rights era have lost sight of their history and at times their humanity. God bless ‘em! They are, collectively, an underdeveloped bunch with the weight and promise of an entire race on their shoulders. And, perhaps I am bias because I too am one of these souls. But I live a conflicted existence and one must find blame or cause for the disillusionment now being so thoroughly enjoyed. I live somewhere between the demands of the Black Panther Party, the unfulfilled promises of Operation Push and the exploitation of one's race and skills as exhibited by Justice Clarence Thomas. Am I an “American,” African American, or a black man ignorant of his lineage trapped in America? Am I to add to the recipe of what makes this country what it is, for good or bad, or am I to figure out a way to rip it asunder and put it together again? Should one utilize one's skills and talents for personal and material gain or for the promotion of some “just cause” to the benefit of some larger group of brethren? Or, maybe, just maybe, I should say fuck it, take some Oxy or thorazine and live in the post-racial fantasia that is the America of Rhimes and Washington.

Works Cited

Arceneaux, Michael. “Jamie Foxx & Kerry Washington Open Up About Race.”

  http://tvone.tv/topics/celebrity_gossip/celeb_news/jamies-foxx-kerry-washington-open-up-
about-race.html

“Clotel.”
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clotel

Good, Karen. “Kerry Washington on “Race” and “Colored Girls.” Essence.
http://www.essence.com/2010/10/25/kindred-spirit-kerry-washington-on-2-new/



James, Kendra. “Quoted: Shonda Rhimes on TV Diversity.”

“Shonda Rhimes.”

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shonda_Rhimes

Parham, Jason. “Why Does “Scandal” Keep Avoiding the Race Question?”

                        http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/05/shonda-rhimes-and-scandal

Winfrey, Oprah. Oprah’s Next Chapter. Episode nine. Oprah Winfrey Network, 2012.

Pilgrim, David. “The Tragic Mulatto Myth.” Jim Crow: Museum of Racist Memorabilia. Ferris

            State University, 2000.

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Game Theory and Sexuality

5/13/2013

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Massive amounts of cash.
Different game theory,
wit’out knowin’ the languages’ll leave ‘em all weary.
Smack ‘em all silly,
wit’ the four-fifth. Really.
Please don’t get too near me,
actin’ all picadilly.
See, they be talkin’ that.
Never, ever walkin’ that:
life of extravagant livin’,
plentiful givin’.
Tryin’ to erase they memories as chil’ren.
Man, I can’t hear ‘em.
They accents is foreign.
And me,
I abhorred ‘em.

- from “How I Hunger,” found in Mental Disorders, Labancamy Publishing, 2006

In the May 6, 2013 issue of Sports Illustrated, Jason Collins acknowledges that he is a homosexual man. Since his announcement, Collins has received praise from two Presidents of the United States, has been interviewed by Oprah Winfrey, has received an award for courage and has been offered the opportunity to write his story by numerous publishing houses, according to some media outlets. Now that the initial media attention has began to subside, the hating – read reflective criticism – has begun. And, it is the nature of some of the reflective criticism that presents the opportunity for discussions regarding masculinist issues.

One of the first people to publicly criticize, or should I say analyze, Collins in a manner in need of public admonition was Chris Broussard. Broussard, one of my favorite sports analysts, reporters and journalists for ESPN, while referencing Collins’s sexuality, seemingly questions Collins’s religious and spiritual integrity. Following Collins’s announcement on April 29, 2013 that he would reveal his homosexuality in the upcoming issue of Sports Illustrated, Broussard, while a guest on ESPN'’s Outside The Lines, stated the following:

I'm a Christian. I don't agree with homosexuality. I think it's a sin, as I think all sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman is.... If you're openly living in unrepentant sin, whatever it may be ... that's walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ.

Before Monday turned to Tuesday, Broussard issued an apology and attempted retraction:

Today on OTL, as part of a larger, wide-ranging discussion on today's news, I offered my personal opinion as it relates to Christianity, a point of view that I have expressed publicly before. I realize that some people disagree with my opinion and I accept and respect that. As has been the case in the past, my beliefs have not and will not impact my ability to report on the NBA. I believe Jason Collins displayed bravery with his announcement today and I have no objection to him or anyone else playing in the NBA.

After Broussard’s statement, ESPN, as a corporate entity, released its own statement – in support of Collins and distancing itself from Broussard’s earlier statement:

We regret that a respectful discussion of personal viewpoints became a distraction from today’s news. ESPN is fully committed to diversity and welcomes Jason Collins’ announcement.

The Broussard Incident (as I like to call it) reflects a number of problematic masculinist issues in my opinion. For starters, Broussard’s strength and power were undermined; Broussard’s apparent inability to envision the ever widening field of the “commodity” was displayed; Broussard’s antithetical stance to the public narrative was magnified; the importance of ESPN'’s economic interests in comparison with Broussard’s value as an analyst was explicated.

Strength. One of the most sought after criterion of middle-class patriarchal masculinity is strength. While we, men, have evolved from a tunnel focus on brute strength alone, our primal desire for strength manifests itself in a whole hosts of other arenas in our lives. In America, the power, clout and influence offered by one’s occupation usually suffices for the power, clout and influence that brute strength once supplied. In Broussard’s case, he has profited tremendously from being associated with ESPN, “the Worldwide Leader in Sports.” Such an affiliation has allowed Broussard to be recognized as an expert in the arena of sports, particularly with regards to professional basketball. He was a guest on Outside The Lines, in part, due to his expertise regarding all things basketball related. In theory, when Broussard suggests that due to the practice of homosexuality, Collins walks “in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ,” he is not only making a statement about Collins with regard to religion and spirituality, but with regards to character as well. Broussard ventures into the role of gatekeeper regarding who is of a rebellious nature and who is not; and, by implication, who is capable of acknowledging authority and following rules and who is not. Broussard functions as an arbiter of character in an arena – the NBA and its attendant entities – where the employees (the players) are heavily scrutinized, especially employee character and background. Broussard, however, is no NBA owner. He is not a GM. He has no strength – no power, clout or influence – in relationship to the forces that control the NBA and its message(s) other than that afforded to him by corporate partners of the NBA: like ESPN. And, ESPN only allows Broussard influence in the arena of NBA analysis. Broussard’s perspective on Collins was a distraction from the desires of ESPN; Broussard will not make that mistake again. Broussard may want to find strength as a man in an arena other than his occupation, for ESPN can and will diminish his influence when Broussard’s power, clout and influence are in opposition to the desires of the company.

Intelligence. Broussard is a smart guy. No manly American man wants to be thought of as dumb or stupid. We may not all be members of cum laude societies, but we like to think that, individually and collectively, we have an intelligence that is of value and that can be productive. Broussard’s level of intelligence, seemingly, allows him to understand the value of being recognized as a person of religious conviction in America (if only in a Machiavellian sense). He understands the role of Christianity as a “commodity,” a personal selling point, alerting those in his company that he is most likely like them. He states that he “is a Christian.” He does not seem to understand the value of one’s sexuality as a commodity in America in 2013. As Collins himself acknowledges in the Sports Illustrated piece, ten years ago about one-third of the U.S. population was in favor of same-sex marriage; today, almost two-thirds are in support. One’s tolerance of the sexuality of others has become a commodity in 2013. Broussard should be aware of this. He is a smart guy. Jason and his agent are surely aware of Jason’s sexuality as a commodity, as a way to “sell” Jason and capitalize on his assets.

Some have suggested, perhaps in a manner slightly sarcastic and full of satire, that Collins has employed simple game theory in his use of his sexuality at the end of his “less than stellar” NBA career. In his article for World Net Daily entitled, “NBA’s Jason Collins: Gay Superhero,” Matt Barber describes Collins as a “fading, 34 year-old free agent” who, “just as he was ready to move to the next level of his basketball career (couch, Cheetos and NBA 2K13 on his PlayStation)…may now have to contend with millions in product endorsements, speaking fees and, potentially, even a renewed NBA contract.” There may be a bit of haterade detected in Barber’s tone. The article begins in a tone reflecting envy regarding all of the attention that Collins has received as a hero and for being courageous for his stance on sports and sexuality. Responding to Collins being described as courageous, Barber writes,

With everything to lose and nothing to gain, Jason Collins, in one single, selfless act, has rushed forward to jump on that “homophobic” grenade of persecution each of his LGBT brethren, sistren and whatever-else-tren face daily. For every oppressed dude-digging-dude, chick-digging-chick or cross-dressing whatchahoozie, Jason Collins has “taken one for the home team.”

Danger? Fear? Difficulty? One can only imagine. Have you ever tried to fend-off a herd of undulating, adulating media-types and Hollywood celebs? Me neither. Guy could get slobbered on – might even skin an elbow.

Certainly, Barber exhibits a bit of jealousy regarding Collins. Here is Barber (presumably a heterosexual male) not receiving any national attention as a man of courage (and he probably is a courageous man, too), yet the gay guy receives accolades for his courage, from the President! For men like Barber, men like Cameron Kyle should be acknowledged as heroes, for their actions: not homosexuals like Collins, for their sexual preferences. He writes

Oh, sure, a bunch of those “Christians” and conservatives are up-in-arms over the president’s “bizarre priorities” – that he would personally call Jason Collins to congratulate him over “the love that dare not speak its name,” while completely ignoring a guy like Cameron Lyle.

Who is Cameron Lyle, you ask? Well, little chance you’d know. And why should you? He’s just some attention-grabbing track and field star from the University of New Hampshire who sacrificed his athletic career to undergo the excruciating process of donating bone marrow to a total stranger dying of leukemia.

Yeah, I know. What a prima donna. They call that “heroic”? Puhleeze. Sure, like in a 1950s kinda way. We’ve evolved. We’re talking “gay pride” here. So, naturally, Collins gets the call – a little “one-on-one” if you will – while Lyle gets the shaft.

It takes courage to donate bodily material to a complete stranger, not to live out your desired sexuality, according to Barber.

Did I mention that courage is a criterion of middle-class patriarchal masculinity? So here, Barber is upset because the gay guy fits the criteria of masculinity better that he, or perhaps Kyle. I say: men we need new criteria for masculinity if we are to live in tact, as full human beings. If we are to work on the hows and whys of the manifestation of petty jealousies within and between us; if we are to be the supportive partners to women that are needed for us all to develop our most; if we are to become our childhood dreams, then we must renew and reinvent ourselves. But, I will admit, Barber’s comments also point out the material gain that Collins stands to attain as a result of his announcement.

Simply put, game theory is strategic decision making. And so, if, at the end of a professional basketball career, Collins has concluded that he can facilitate his ability to continue to live in the luxury that over $34 million in earned NBA salary has afforded him over the last decade by embracing his homosexuality and selling his sexuality as a commodity to the American public, then so be it. Don’t hate the player, hate the game. The economic appeal of Collins and his story has already been felt by NBA executives:

Last season, Collins changed his jersey number to 98, out of heretofore unspoken solidarity with Matthew Shepard, the University of Wyoming student who was kidnapped and killed in an anti-gay hate crime in 1998. In the first twenty-four hours after Collins went public, No. 98 became the top-selling custom jersey on the Wizards’ Web site.

Yes, Collins stands to make a lot of money as America’s first active, gay athlete. I will say, however, that I am a little uneasy about the “extortionist” nature with which Collins’s impending free agency has been presented to potential NBA suitors for Collins’s services. NBA clubs have been placed in the position of being accused of homophobia if they do not offer a contract, at a minimum of $1.4 million, to Collins – an aging, NBA journeyman who has never averaged more than seven points a game. But hey, if Marcus Camby is still on an NBA squad, then I guess Collins should be. Someone should tell Broussard that he should broaden his horizons regarding the commodity as we continue to live in the machine that is America.

Difference. Difference is something that African American men have had to deal with since the inception of the thought of the Union. To alleviate the collateral damage that sometimes results from being different, African American men have sought middle-class patriarchal masculinity: to be just like all the rest of America’s men, white men. And, part of such an assimilation has been an acquiescence to Christianity as the milieu from which one draws one’s religious understanding and spiritual grounding. Some African American families, post-Migration, acquired identities reflecting such an acquisition of Christianity; perhaps, the Broussards are such a family. But, the criteria by which the mainstream of America’s population judges and evaluates its members have evolved, somewhat, since those days of yore (maybe, perhaps?). Broussard’s inability to recognize such an evolution only serves to underscore and reinforce difference of the very nature that his family seemingly sought to eradicate. Broussard is totally out of step with the public narrative regarding homosexuality. He is against it; the American public supports it. He finds himself at odds with the American public. A position not wholly unfamiliar to black men in America, but a position that Broussard’s occupation at ESPN suggests should no longer be a concern of black men like Broussard. (Too idealistic? Maybe).

With Broussard being an African American man of a light-skinned complexion, I did not like the idea of Broussard suggesting that Collins did not fit the criteria of a Christian: that Collins was in rebellion to Christ. I am quite sure that at some point in Broussard’s life he was, perhaps, teased for his skin. Perhaps his authenticity as a black child was questioned. I would ask Broussard to reflect on those instances, if they ever occurred, when he makes declarations about Collins and Collins’s rebellion of God and Christ. I would be willing to bet that Broussard’s distaste for those who question his authenticity as a black man because of his skin tone would be similar to Collins’s distaste for those who question his religious and spiritual authenticity because of his sexuality. I would hope that African American men – who suffer from the overdetermined interpretations of others – would not continue the cycle of projecting traits we find uncomfortable about ourselves onto others. Freud is dead. Let his shit die too!

Lastly, the Broussard Incident illustrates that the economic bottom-line of a corporate entity far outweighs the value of and validity (or lack thereof) of perspectives taken by the corporation’s employees. Put another way, ESPN will not risk losing the economic relationship that it has with the American people because of some heartfelt remarks made by one of the company’s analysts. ESPN sells sports news. They sell it to poor people, rich people, old people, young people, straight people and GAY people. ESPN is “fully committed to diversity and welcomes Jason Collins’ announcement.” If Broussard does not have enough self-control, rationality and loyalty (all criteria of masculinity as practiced in America) to ESPN to understand ESPN’s commitment to the public it serves, then perhaps Broussard should not be working at ESPN. When presented in such as way, all of the independence and freedom of thought as a journalist that Broussard once believed he had is placed in stark relief: he is one who better damn well do as his superiors demand and command. Hence, his apology. And when episodes like the Broussard Incident happen, they can result in men like Broussard speaking of feeling emasculated by the company. That emasculation occurs because the criteria by which men like Broussard may be evaluating their masculinity is flawed. As long as men, particularly African American men, have a tenuous hold on the criteria of middle-class patriarchal masculinity, they will continue to experience periods of emasculation and the rage and anger associated with such emasculation. I tell you, we need some new criteria.

So, to everyone hating on Jason Collins: get a life. If you want to criticize him about anything, then criticize him for lying to that young lady for eight years. She will never get that time in her life back. And for that, I empathize with her. Although I believe that Jason should be afforded the space to develop a healthy masculinity that works for him, I do not believe that that masculinity should be in opposition to America’s feminisms; if anything, the newly created masculinities should function in tandem with and as a benefit to America’s feminisms.

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So, What Exactly is Masculinity Anyhow?

5/3/2013

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I originally intended to write about Jay-Z and his influence on masculinity in my first blog, but Jason Collins and his announcement made me scratch that. As is probably known by now, Collins is the first, active major league sports athlete to announce to the world that he is gay. Collins is also African American. His story is not receiving such attention because he is the first black gay athlete in America, but because, other than Martina Navratilova, he is the first active athlete who is gay. He has embraced the dialogue that his announcement has started and has been commended for his courage. I am not concerned with Jason’s intimacies and relations; what does interest me is what his performance insinuates and suggests for concepts of American masculinity in the twenty-first century.
Collins says he is happy to begin the conversation about gay athletes in sports; the conversation, however, cannot be contained by the sports arena. The sports arena simply serves as another conduit through which we can discuss matters of sexual orientation, sexuality and masculinity. And to those ends, Jason’s announcement caught the ears of some of my peers who would normally resist discussions of homosexuality and masculinity. But, because they are sports fanatics – and strict adherents to sports talkshows like First Take, Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption – they couldn’t escape the abundance of attention that Jason has received since Monday. I learned some pretty interesting things about my friends. About myself. I learned that I have a visceral reaction to men dressed as women. I learned that some believe, as one of my colleagues put it, that “Homosexuality is some white shit. Black folks didn’t play that before slavery.” And, of course, there was the admonition from one of my most pious of friends who believes that homosexuality is a sin against God and, while she could overlook an active, penetrating homosexuality, she could never see eye to eye with men who are passive homosexuals. I left my friends, feeling not so much upset, as confused. With them. And with myself. Some issues where in need of investigation: Why do cross-dressing men engender a visceral response in some heterosexual men? Is there any truth to homosexuality, at least among African American men, originating with contact with European civilization? Can we/should we allow for different types of homosexuality? Does it matter?
The idea that homosexuality among African American men began with and was influenced by contact with European civilization, more specifically the idea that American chattle slavery engendered homosexuality among black men, is nothing new. I have heard such an explanation of black male homosexuality while a member of many African American communities throughout my lifetime. What has surprised me over the years has been the fact that it has usually been African American women who posit such a claim. African American men rarely speak on issues of homosexuality with what could be acknowledged as any kind of depth. And, African American women writers have been even more graphic and forthcoming about
interracial homosexual bonds between white men and black men in their literature. In Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs hints of the sexual horrors suffered by a male slave at the hands of an overly-sexed homosexual master:

... when [the young master] went north to complete his education, he
carried his vices with him. He was brought home deprived of the use of
his limbs, by excessive dissipation. Luke was appointed to wait upon his
bed-ridden master, whose despotic habits were greatly increased by exasperation at his own helplessness. He kept a cowhide beside him, and, for
the most trivial occurrence would order his attendant to bear his back,
and kneel beside the couch, while he whipped him till his strength was
exhausted. Sometimes he was not allowed to wear anything but his shirt
in order to be in readiness to be flogged.

Here Jacobs insinuates that the young master and Luke engaged in homosexual, or, at least homosocial, practices initiated and motivated by the perversities of the white master.
More recently, Toni Morrison, in her highly acclaimed novel Beloved, writes of the damn near rape of Paul D as he is forced to perform fellatio on white prison guards while in the Georgian coffle. Indicative of the common sexual exploitation of African American women by white men, the suffering of Paul D in the coffle in Alfred, Georgia, where the guardsmen’s ritual exploitation each morning of their black captives - fellatio at gunpoint – was one of many atrocities to be survived, Paul D’s plight reminds us that black men too suffered sexually at the hands of white superiors.
If we are to believe, as Pauline Hopkins reminds us, that fiction serves as a record of the inmost thoughts and feelings of a people, then both Incidents and Beloved would serve to underscore the belief held by some that homosexuality among African American men is in no small measure due to influences by and contact with white Americans of European descent. The history of cultural practices among Africans in the New World suggests that there is reason to reevaluate such a stance.
I want to make it clear that I am aware of white masters, and some among the white male population in general, who took sexual liberty with their slaves. In Tropical Versailles, Kirsten Schultz writes of slaves, male adolescent slaves, accosted and molested on the streets of Brazil by random, recently arrived Portuguese men. When one considers the fact that a master’s sexual liberties with his slaves were only limited by the master’s imagination, then it is not hard to imagine that a master with homosexual desires would act those desires out with his male slaves. But, the point that I want to make here is: some black men displayed sexual proclivities deemed other than normal outside the presence and authority of white masters. And under such circumstances we must acknowledge that homosexuality and homosexual acts were not always forced by a superior authority. Sometimes, as a result of unfavorable sex ratios in the slave setting and sometimes, as a result of institutional gender inversion in Africa, black men participated in consensual same-sex relationships.
In many locales throughout the New World, due to the intense labor demand, more male African slaves were imported than females resulting, at times, in a great disparity between the number of female slaves and male slaves on a given plantation, or arena of labor. Sometimes the ratio was as high as ten to one (male to female). It should not surprise us that male slaves sought out other males to satisfy their sexual impulses. Since the personal and private lives of slaves remained largely hidden from the master class, few of these homosexual encounters were ever recorded; yet we should not let the silence of the records keep us from asking how gender-isolated men either maintained or reformulated their sexual and gender identities. Some no doubt remained “heterosexual,” perhaps resorting to celibacy and/or self-gratification. Others became so desperate in their quest for sexual satisfaction that they resorted to bestiality – recall the scene that Morrison paints in Beloved. Before the arrival of Sethe, the men were found “fucking cows, dreaming of rape.” But I would suggest that, because the male slaves faced such isolation, some did recast their sexual identities as they reached out to their male peers for a combination of sexual and emotional sustenance. We see the phenomenon played out daily in America’s modern prison system and we saw it played out for entertainment value in the motion picture Life, starring Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence. Consider the relationship between Jangle Leg and Biscuit. Jangle Leg! Jangle Leg!
Records of slave societies, particularly in South America in places like Portugal, reveal several instances of same-sex behavior on the part of male slaves in the New World. For example, in Brazil, between 1591-1769, eighty-five sodomites appeared before authorities; thirty three were of color. The use of such historical records can give us some insight regarding the nature of same-sex relationships among male slaves in the New World.
The case of Joane, a “Negro slave from Guiné.” Joane and another Negro of Guiné were witnessed as they entered Joane’s place of work in the middle of the night. The unidentified Negro reported that Joane brought him to the place to sodomize him. It was later discovered that while Joane did wish to have sexual relations with the man, Joane preferred to be acted upon rather than do the acting. Joane was accused of seducing another man of African lineage, a Duarte. Upon questioning, Duarte acknowledged that he and Joane were partners; but, he was quick to boast that he, Duarte, was the active partner while Joane was the passive partner. Other incidents of cases of consensual same-sex behaviors have been recorded, mostly of peoples from Central and Western Africa. One of the more famous of these cases involved two slaves, Antonio and Frances. In his testimony Antonio describes how he and Frances met. He says that around June of 1647 Frances propositioned him, asking if he wanted to spend the night with him. Antonio accepted his offer, and the two had sex with one another. According to the record, this relationship continued, with the two men having sex on several occasions. It appears that their relationship ended only when the religious authorities stepped in and had Antonio sold off.
Even though some same-sex relationships were clearly enduring emotional attachments, others had less to do with loneliness and the search for affection than with flexible gender categories that apparently existed in various parts of Africa. The narrowness of Western gender constructions did not , and still today don’t, recognize this third gender category that some African men brought with them to the New World. As a result, men adhering to the flexible gender categories of some African societies were categorized as sodomites, as homosexuals. Men like Frances believed that they had the orifice (buraco) of a woman. He reports that there “were many in his country who had the same buracos who were born with them.” In addition to the buraco, Frances took on the dress and mannerisms of a woman. His admission suggests that there were many like him (back home…in Benin? Angola?) who were endowed with buracos and who dressed and acted as women. Frances’s gender and sexual choices were apparently an accepted part of his African society, an integral part of Frances’s identity which the New World sought to erase because he was a sodomite. In many New World societies, acts of sodomy had long been punishable by death, but in some locales the worst punishment was reserved for partners like Frances, the rationale being that masculine male penetration was a natural act, while feminine male reception was not. Such social and cultural vacuums in the Western mentality affected Africans and their descendants in the New World in profound ways, confining them to sexual, gender, and family categories that were alien to them…and confining…and constraining…and suffocating.
These cross-dressing men were so prevalent in some Central African societies that there was even a word for them in the language of Angola and Congo: jinbandaa. The term jinbandaa in Central Africa did not carry the same negative moral connotations that the term sodomite carried in the New World. Jinbandaa was significant in Central African religious beliefs. The stem of the word means medicine man and throughout Central Africa words similar to jinbandaa imply religious power. In fact, several revealing descriptions from the Angolan coast in the seventeenth century suggest that jinbandaas were a discreet and powerful caste in Angolan society. As early as 1606, the Jesuits in Angola described jinbandaas who were

extremely great fetishers, and being men went around dressed as women and they had by great offense called themselves men; they have husbands like the other women, and in the sin of sodomy they are just like devils.

Another description reads:

…all of the pagans respect them and they are not offended by them and these sodomites happen to live together in bands, meeting most often to give burial services…This caste of people is who dresses the body for burial and performs the burial ceremony.

Three important points are revealed about the jinbandaas in Central Africa: 1) they were a discreet social group who lived together, 2) they were respected by others in the community, and 3) they performed traditional burial ceremonies and exercised a wide range of spiritual roles. Taken together, these three points produce a compelling argument for the religious power and respectability of the jinbandaas. In Central Africa, jinbandaas carved out their own third-sex (gendered defined) living space in society. The spiritual capacity of the jinbandaa was so universally known, it seems, that they were referred to not by their patterns of dress or by their sexual behavior, but by their roles as religious leaders. When these African men encountered the New World we begin to see the breakdown of the gender-defined organization of the society. So, I guess one could argue that it is after contact with Western white men that some African men become recognized as gay or homosexual; but, it could also be argued that some African men, while not classified as homosexual, exhibited - what would become recognized as - homosexual tendencies. What is clear is that modern Western standards of sexuality and gender did not fit African men and it seems that some African American men are still suffering from this in 2013: men like Jason.
Perhaps, cross-dressing men elicit a feeling of the uncanny in me (like the Jewish character Shylock engenders a feeling of the uncanny in Harold Bloom). Perhaps, I have internalized America’s fascination and idealization of middle-class patriarchal masculinity with its attendant visceral reactions to anything that seems to contradict middle-class patriarchal masculinity. I am still working through it. What I do know is: there were no such things as heterosexual sex and homosexual sex before the advent of the middle-class. All of this is spelled out very clearly (well, maybe not so clearly) by Michel Foucault in The History of Sexuality. Before the rise of the middle-class (think French Revolution, American Revolution), societies were generally divided into the upper-classes and everyone else. No one cared what kind of sex another person enjoyed (except the Church). If you were born into the upper class and the aristocracy, then you were always an upper-class aristocrat. If you were not born into title, then you would most likely never transcend your social class. The French Revolution screwed this manner of social organization all up. With the advent of the middle-class, the entrepreneurs, the New Men – those new to entering a new sphere of life – needed new ways of distinguishing the middle-class from the lower-class people from whom they had just escaped association. So, in the legal (penal and civil) sphere and the social sphere, new edicts and expectations regarding behavior were established. Some of these codifications pertained to sex. Around the end of the eighteenth century, marital sex between a man and a woman was defined. All other forms of sex (which had been practiced as long as man had been on Earth) were outlawed and deemed improper. Just think about it: there are U.S. laws still banning sodomy, in 2013. The middle-class, with its doctors and lawyers and orators and philosophers and…and..developed the discourse of sex and sexuality and what is permissible and proper. And any sex which does not lead to procreation is bad sex! Any concept of femininity which does not lead to procreation is bad! Any concept of masculinity which does not lead to procreation is bad! Middle-class conceptions of sex and sexuality not only suggest that any sex that Jason Collins has as a homosexual man is bad, but immoral (Church), illegal (law) and disgusting (social). And not only that, Jason’s masculinity should be in question for he does not fit the middle-class patriarchal conception of masculinity. I know what you are asking yourself: what the hell is middle-class patriarchal masculinity?
Middle-class patriarchal masculinity reflects the following criteria: nobility, intelligence, strength, articulateness, loyalty, virtue, rationality, courage, self-control, courtliness, honesty and physical attractiveness as defined in white Western European terms. Men, masculine men, reflect these criteria. If one is lacking in any of the above, then one may be lacking as a man. I find it ironic that Jason Collins, a member of one of the most respected African American, blue blood, upper middle-class families, feels confined, constricted by the demands of middle-class patriarchal masculinity. I mean, does Jason not reflect all of the above criteria? Yes and no. He was not honest with himself for fear of what others may have thought of him. Does that make him any less of a man? Yes, according to the above criteria. And that is what I detest regarding middle-class patriarchal masculinity. The criteria, especially for African American men, is damn near impossible to live up to. Jason had more access to the development of the criteria than most African American males and he found it stifling, suffocating. For African American men middle-class patriarchal masculinity is problematic; black men, at best, have a tenuous hold on these definitions. Few of the elements of middle-class manhood can be attributed to blackness. Especially if you have any kind of rhizomatic connection to the jinbandaa, which could live spiritually in your makeup. Attempting to live according to the principles of American middle-class patriarchal masculinity often leads to spiritual demise. Just ask Jason.
Nevertheless, middle-class patriarchal masculinity has been used as the ideal criteria by which America raises her young boys to men. And, as a result, African American men are trapped in cyclical, overdetermined roles of dominance, which have, at times, led to feelings of failure or feelings of lack. The failure of the folk spirit to embrace modernity during the Migration involved the failure of black male entelechy to carry that spirit as revealed in art – song and music, literature, drawing and painting - to Northern environs. Not hearing or seeing or feeling that spirit as expressed in art, some African American men seem to suffer from forms of impotence, from a kind of generalized inadequacy that speaks to aimlessness. To combat such impotence, we need to develop concepts of masculinity that work for us, in the twenty-first century. And in doing so, let us not forget that the travail of black mothers should be the conduit through which black sons acquire an understanding of masculinity that is at once both sexual and political, and impediments to this mean a confusion that could lead, at least, to spiritual demise. Thank you, Jason, for providing an avenue to present such a position to those in my peer group.

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