As for empirical evidence, anyone who’s ever been involved in scholastic studies knows that these are often merely suggestive; that they sometimes contradict each other and cannot really “prove” much, given the inherent parameters built into any study. Just as one doesn’t need to have “studies” confirming the prevalence of homophobia in the general population, you don’t have to read formal studies to know that separate Gay Pride parades exist in most major American cities, engendered by the exclusion of people of color in the gay community. And might a perusal of many gay magazines or dating websites that exhibit or state “caucasian only” give some clue that some troubling subliminal (and otherwise) messages are being communicated? As a person of color, I too have experienced racism in the gay community (I was called a “nigger” by a patron in a gay bar in New York, the first and last time in recent memory!). Comparing notes with many other gays of color have revealed similar experiences. These surely don’t exist in a vacuum. So it really bothers me that so many Gay Whites–having experienced discriminatory treatment themselves–are so quick to cite, say, Black homophobia, yet so dismissive of the problem gay racism in their own communities. Clearly, one can’t begin to solve any problem without first admitting that one exists.

To have an enlightening conversation on this issue, we’ll need to leave aside the topic of sexual preferences of white lgb people.

My observations and solutions

1. We could benefit from less racial insensitivity and more racial diversity online. I’ve noticed the loudest cries of racism in the gay community is coming from the younger generation. I believe this is because their coming up in an age where their first encounter with the “gay community” is online. Unfortunately people are more likely to strip themselves of empathy over the internet. I think many young gay lgbt people of color get online and are exposed to highly racially insensitive beliefs and preferences. Unfortunately, there seems to be a substantial amount of rejection, whether as friends, lovers, or sexual partners, of lgbt people of asian and african descent. And you know what they say about first impressions.

I think it’d be helpful if lgbt people of color were urged to seek more influential positions in gay media and activism. Maybe large lgbt blogs and other media entities enlisting lgbt people of color who are more likely to choose more diverse stories, highlighting non-white people, lifestyles, perspectives, etc.

Pender: Not to discredit your argument, which is well put, but I sense this is a scenario where you’d “have to walk a mile in my shoes to see where I’m coming from”….This is to say if you’ve never been black in the lgbt community, you could’nt possibly imagine how it feels to be disregarded solely based on your skin tone or color. Its out there just because some entity hasn’t polled a particular segment of the lgbt community doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

It’s like everyone thinking racism is dead because people chose Obama for president. Its not true (as we all well know) and we don’t need a survey to prove it…..But I digress….

What amazes me is we want equality in society yet we refuse to treat each other as equals….boggles the mind!

Why do you feel that the experiences of others are isolated and statistically irrelevant? Why trivialize it? How is this discussion derailing the discussion of black homophobia? People are still talking, demonstrating, increasing visibility, and demanding respect. Why do you think this is not the case?

Again, I understand that you don’t feel that there is a problem with racism in the gay community. I respectfully disagree.

If discussions like this, can lead to more minority lgbt visibility in gay media, then I’m all for it. If it can give a person pause, before racially profiling a minority customer in a gay bar, then I’m all for it. If discussions like this one can increase integration in the gay community, then I’m all for it.

As a white guy, I am not qualified to make grand declaration about racism in the community.

Why not? Racism and all forms of prejudice are human problems, not limited to one race or another. To make a comment like this quashes any real discussion about race that many liberals claim to want to have, but really are only lectures about how bad “whitey” is. I’m willing to bet that a number of readers just balked at my last statement, especially the word in quotes, and are now putting me into a neat, tidy lil box they can label and dismiss. That’s how this game has been played for far too long by far too many of light and dark skin tones. Rather difficult to actually have that discussion we all say we want to have when this is the reaction we all normally have. I remain skeptical of liberals and conservatives when they talk on this subject because at least half of what they say is platitudinal BS.

I do think that the overall tendency, in online discussions about gay rights generally and on this site specifically, is that discussions of black homophobia are immediately derailed by commenters defensively and reflexively insisting that it is somehow balanced out by gays being racist.

And while I admit that I misinterpreted your post — and I really am sorry about that — I don’t think we’d be discussing this issue if not for some sort of white guilt about discussing black homophobia. The reason this is a topic for conversation is the kind of false balancing that is so unhelpful to honest assessments of reality.

Your questions about being attracted to a single race or about de facto segregated bars or Pride events are good ones. But some people’s interest in anecdotes is not. The racist comment some gay guy made about New Orleans reveals nothing useful about the gay community at all, and in fact it’s actually counterproductive because it encourages us to stereotype a minority group (in this case, gays) based on one or more isolated and statistically irrelevant occurrences. It’s offensive for the same reason it is offensive to use a single example of a crime perpetrated by a black person as justification for the notion that black people in general are lawless or violent. The same goes for assertions like Trey’s that “I choose to go along with what I’ve seen, heard, and experienced.” Imagine if that were an acceptable standard for making wide-ranging condemnations of a minority group. Imagine if it were considered legitimate to ascribe a certain negative quality to black people because of what you’d personally seen, heard or experienced. Unthinkable.

I also disagree that even a disproportionately low level of racism among gay people means that there is a problem of racism in the gay community, because while the words might technically be true, they stop being useful when you use them that way. As I said, EVERY group has at least a slight level of racism (and sexism, and homophobia, and ageism, and anti-disability-ism, etc.), and to suggest that this constitutes a community problem is to make the concept of a community problem so broad as to apply to everything, all the time, forever. The statement is irrelevant to the extent that it is true.

I guess the reason I react so strongly to this topic of discussion is that I really do not want to see the notion that the gay community has a problem with racism become widespread unless there is statistical evidence that it is true. Because when it becomes widespread, it gets used an excuse and sometimes even a justification for homophobia. It also walks too close for my comfort to the line that we saw on this blog a few days ago that explicitly said gays were “to blame” for the passage of Prop 8 — for not doing enough outreach, for alienating minorities, for whatever. Yes, in practical terms, we could have and should do more; but morally, we shouldn’t HAVE to. Homophobia is always the fault of people who harbor it, even if we missed an opportunity to diminish its existence or effect.

OK, enough. Again, my apologies to those I’ve wrongly criticized (Timothy and everyone else discussing the issues abstractly without resort to or justification of anecdotes as the basis for stereotypes).

I’m lucky in that I have a diverse group of friends. Their thoughts and feeling on a host of issues inform the way that I interact with others. Perhaps, if everyone tried to interact with people outside their race, class, or scene, there would be a lot more understanding.

I thought that I’d include the link to the Rolling Stone article on Shirley for anyone who doesn’t know what I’m talking about.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/14474389/shirley_q_liquor_after_imus_a_black_face_comic_who_sings_12_days_of_kwanzaa

Please read this carefully.

You have repeatedly asked for evidence that racism is a problem in the gay community. And repeatedly you have been told that this is a strawman argument.

In other words, you are attributing positions to others that they do not hold and then demanding that they prove their point with emperical evidence.

As best I can tell, no one here is making the claim that racism is more dominant in the gay community. Nor even insiting as factual that it is AS dominant as in the mainstream community.

They are only saying that racism is present in the gay community.

A number of people have given testimony as to seeing, hearing, or being the subject of race-based discrimination. And I hope that you will agree that if persons are feeling as though the community is mistreating them, then we have a problem.

Even if the gay community is less racist, even if 75% of black gays were to say, “oh jolly goodie there’s no racism here at all”, we would still have a problem. We would still have a sizable number of people who were experiencing discrimination and I hope you will agree that this is not OK.

I do agree with you that it is not useful to categorize the gay community as generally “racist” because that term implies a pattern of consistent behavior and attitude that is as of yet unsubstantiated.

But we are asking here, not telling. I’m not providing studies, as I don’t have any. I am asking for input and I will offer the courtesy of not challenging people on their personal experiences.

If I were required to guess, I would suppose that the gay community is less racist than the non-gay community. But that is based on nothing more than my own personal experiences, and I would be doing nothing more than extrapolation and conjecture. Others here may well assume the exact opposite based on their own personal experiences.

And it does me no good to plug my ears and claim that my experiences outweigh those of others.

I would very much recommend that you spend a little time listening and a little less demanding proof. And I’d not read more into the statements of others than is there.

Like AJD, I’m in an interracial relationship and his comments really resonated with me. It doesn’t seem to be an issue for most of the people we know (a substantial number of whom, straight and gay, are also in interracial relationships). But more than once someone (nearly always a person neither of us knows particularly well) has made a comment based in exactly the kinds of stereotypes he describes. It doesn’t happen much, but it’s exasperating and depressing. It certainly disabuses one of the notion that this is no longer an issue.

Nevertheless, I’m reluctant to judge anyone for being attracted (or not) to people of a particular race. While such a preference *might* be a manifestation of racism, I don’t think that it’s necessarily always the case. If you find yourself disproportionately attracted to or refusing to date people of a certain race, then maybe you should ask yourself why. There may be something deeper and really unhealthy going on – on that point I agree with AJD. Then again, there are LOTS of physical attributes that are turn-ons/turn-offs, some of which correlate fairly closely with race, some not at all. If I like older, heavier, uncut men, that doesn’t mean it’s out of animosity towards towards young skinny, Jewish guys. And whose business is it anyhow? You like what you like, and who knows why. As Tavdy points out, the idea that you must answer for what turns you on has more than a whiff of RR-type intrusiveness about it. No one is morally obligated to think you’re hot.

But while you may not be answerable for what turns you on, you ARE answerable for how you behave towards others, whether you’re attracted to them or not. What Trey has written about his experiences saddens and appalls me – there is simply no excuse for that kind of behavior. None. And judging from the comments on this thread alone, he’s far from the only one with these experiences. That’s not the kind of community or society I want to live in, even if it doesn’t directly affect me.

I don’t know if the incidence of racism inside the gay community is the same as society as a whole or slightly lesser – I’m not a social scientist and I’m guessing it’s difficult to quantify these things. But two things Brian said make a lot of sense to me, in part because I can find direct corollaries to them in my experience as a gay person. One, is that we have such an exaggerated image of what racism looks like, that many people fail to see it at all in its more subtle(and more common) manifestations. In other words, just because you’re not burning crosses and wearing a white sheet doesn’t mean you’re entirely free of racial animosity. By the same token, just because you’re not holding a “God Hates Fags” sign doesn’t mean you’re not a homophobe. A couple of months ago I wrote on another thread on how having gay “friends” has actually *enabled* the bigotry of some people, rather than attenuating it. I suspect Brian is talking about a similar dynamic going on with the official “diversity” rhetoric.

Two, I also think that the statement about anecdotes in large quantities constituting compelling evidence is, well, compelling. One of the things that I find frustrating with some straight people is that we tell them, over and over, that our sexuality wasn’t chosen and what do we get back? “Hmm. Is it a choice? I’m not sure. I think we need more evidence”. So apparently our word just isn’t good enough. That’s pretty insulting and I imagine that people of color feel a comparable frustration where their experiences with racism are dismissed or disbelieved. That’s not to say that *every* accusation of racism is justified, but where there’s smoke there’s usually fire. If we want to have to any moral authority when we discuss the failings of other communities, we need to be vigilant about our own.

I heard some Republican gays imply that the Katrina disaster was because of cultural issues in the black community, and I thought that was pretty messed up. What you describe, however, makes me somewhat glad the guy who said that is gay because it reduces the chances that he’ll reproduce.