In Her Father's Footsteps

Bernice King in the running to head SCLC

The youngest daughter of the late Dr. Martin Luther King is one of five being considered to head the civil rights organization famously helmed by her father, back in the day. You can find the details here.

If she is successful in being chosen, King will become the first woman to preside over the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. That is a good thing. We need more women to take charge of these organizations injecting new blood and a new way of thinking. Bernice King does represent in that respect.

However, the youngest daughter of Martin and Coretta Scott is also a fundamentalist preacher and a leader in the anti gay movement.

Her many homophobic stances are in direct conflict with the teachings and practices of both of her parents, who were always inclusive in practice and toward the end of their lives, in speech.

The blatant homophobic tendencies of the Black church are literally killing our people and our community.

Choosing the Reverend King to head the iconic SCLC would be a major step backward instead of forward into the 21st century. The Black church has failed to lead when it comes to the issues destroying our communities.

Rather than face the scourge that is AIDS or the violence that permeates our neighborhoods, the church has chosen to hide behind outdated thinking, wrapping itself in the irrelevance of the past, while wondering out loud why their congregations are shrinking.

It is time for all Black organizations to rejoin the fight for civil rights in the way the fight was defined by Martin and Malcolm and Fannie and Bayard and the others who go nameless...

It was a fight for the rights of all people....not just some people...

As long as one is bound..so, too, are the rest of us...bound and not free..

Reverend Bernice King would be a refreshing change, but she would be the wrong change for a struggling Black Community that desperately needs direction free of false platitudes ...

Gay Pride Month...Big Whup!

Pardon me for being a day late, since I’m writing this on June 2nd, but there were other things on my mind from this past weekend....

Yesterday President Obama signed the first ever national proclamation designating June as LGBT Pride Month. Check out the statement here.

I will be perfectly honest with you, I feel the same way about Gay Pride Month that I feel about Black History Month....

I’m Black since birth....58 years....I’m lesbian since well, probably from birth, but I had the epiphany at the age of five the first time I fell in lust for a girl, so I figure I’ve been officially gay for the past 53 years...

So since I’m this way all of my life....24/7...365...366 during leap years.....one month don’t cut it....simply ain’t enough...I prefer to celebrate my fabulousness everyday and will....

However...

Black history is American history....I will not celebrate until all...history is taught as a part of the regular curriculum, period...It should not be a separate but unequal section in the Library, as it still is...There is more to Black history than Martin Luther King and the Black Panthers or Malcolm X....

The same holds true for LGBT Pride/history....let’s start with the Black openly gay man who stood beside Martin Luther King, yet is never mentioned when talking about the Black Civil Rights struggle....I’m talking about Bayard Rustin. You can read more about him here.

Suffice to say never got his due respect...

Obama’s proclamation comes 40 years after Stonewall...

Check out Stonewall history here...

During those 40 years, too many of us have been beaten or been killed.... The Black Community and Black Church remains as homophobic as ever.....Hate crimes continue to happen....two this past week in my neck of the woods...one passed off as a street robbery..but it was covered on the news...the other passed off as bar fight...instead of a homophobic attack...it, too received coverage on the news...that’s a good thing.....that is progress....

However...

I’m trying to be patient with Obama...but his foot dragging is honestly getting on my nerves...

Instead of the platitudes and "let’s all respect each other crap" I would love to see a little fire and kick ass attitude.... like.....I don’t know...."I’m the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces....and it’s gonna be this way from now on.....No More Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell..."

Worked for Truman when he desegregated the troops....

Or maybe...."I’ve changed my mind....gay marriage is better than civil unions... and prop 8 is bad law."

Smart man that he is Obama knows that there are a thousand federal benefits difference for couples between civil unions, domestic partners and marriage....so let’s cut the crap.....marriage between consenting adults is the only real equality....

Even if he can’t automatically reverse these crappy policies....he can at least speak out about them...decisively...instead of this namby pamby BS of....."We’ve got to love one another and respect one another".....or silence.....

Especially since I don’t see any bipartisan respect coming back in anything Obama’s done....

Don’t matter what he does....the so called right wing conservatives are so pissed off about having a Black man in their White House that he will never be able to do right in their eyes....

So...

When somebody spits in my face....I throw a left hook....plain and simple....Obama needs to flex those well honed muscles of his....

I would...

Obama’s got the people behind him....He’s got the numbers on Capital Hill....What are they going to do.....impeach him?....

they can try.....

Okay...given the choice of having an LGBT proclamation from the most powerful leader on earth....I am happy he did it....

Thank you Mr. President....

But I wish you’d put the hammer down and get to work....on some of the things that you promised during your campaign...