Black evangelicals would push Alexander Robinson into oncoming traffic as fast as you. He knows it and should come out and tell you specifically that there are indeed ignorant black people worthy of scornful criticism from us. Dan Savages sentiment for calling on that ignorance of the religious right adjacent to their own words for the need to heal and move forward are dead on right. The only thing he is coming up against are gay white men and women who attempt to be conciously and verbally politically correct while having no diversity at all in the family so often touted as the one they chose. You are full of bull. Stop defending hate and putting down gay people for attempting to fight it by throwing what they receive directly onto the faces of those that deserve it.

Very well put and intelligent. Thank you. I'll be turning to you for guidance in the matter of where to put my energy and time and resources anyway, because I happen to be lucky enough to know you as a wise and compassionate person. It's wonderful to see you here at the Bilerico Project. Brava!

cindy: good plan but a plan can include both tactics and you are somewhat dismissive of what i wrote. Actually you just ignored it altogether for your own plan which is fine but not written in stone. NO. I personally feel it is productive to confront taboo subjects when it smacks of hypocrisy. Anger and lashing out have been the cornerstone of many a worhty revolution.

Nichole: I do not need your approval or allowance to voice my opinion anymore than WE need approval or allowance of straight people (black or white) to marry. It is called equality under the law and currently the lack thereof. If black evangelicals turn out in high numbers against us, it is our duty to confront and discuss it. The debate should really be how no one feels comfortable challenging the african american vote for fear of reprisal and calls of racism and silencing while having no problem labeling the white evangelicals as narrow minded. Both groups are! The one glaring difference is that as a group, african americans should know better simply because of experience and therefore must be told that there is no mountaintop to travel to without the rest of us. And it must be communicated very BLUNTLY. If that bothers people, that is tough. Discrimination at the hands of people we are being told to understand is nonsense. The only solution requires the exact opposite;understanding on the part of whoever voted yes on 8 and no to adoption etc. I am catering to the correct cause in my mind, not some mass psychosis known as religious beliefs.

Another white liberal telling us that we have not right to be angry. The facts are facts ladies and gentlemen. The evangelicals, mormons and yes African Americans (70%) do not want us to have equal rights. Yes blacks have a much longer and harsher history of ugly racial discrimination. Does this now give them the right to bash gays? They apparently think it does, based on their narrow dogma. I do not know what we should, could have done? I will not be cowed into thinking bad about myself because of my feelings.
Dan Savage was brave for speaking the truth. We need more truth to power. I sincerely hope we are not ignored by the Obama administration, but in a way I hold little hope of his administration doing much for our advancement. Next time I am not going to vote for a candidate so eagerly just because he threw me a few bones with not much meat.

i think your post is great, cindy. this is exactly the kind of measured determination freedom to marry has partnered with others to convey in developing background materials, media briefings, and talking points. you strike the same themes we have put forwarded in our post-election public comments (see, for example, my interview in gay city news, or on the signorile show).

amid all they have on their plate right now -- and we should give everyone a chance to catch their breath -- equality california institute is working with freedom to marry on post-election polling to go beyond the exit-polls and find out what moved people, what concerned them, where they got their information, and what we can learn from them. we will do serious over-sampling in people of color communities to ensure that we have good data to work from (on top of the conversations we must redouble in every community -- always the key ingredient).

i was pleased you avoided throwing "the blame" back on anyone (including our movement alone), as some do in pushing back against the "blame blacks" stuff. there is no need for blame, and plenty of need (and opportunity) for work and progress. i am confident that despite the bitter moment of the prop 8 vote, we will see a bump up in support for gays and marriage in african american (and other) communities right away. and the progress we've clearly made in various demographics shows the power of engaging, rather than withdrawing, sulking, or attacking...

evan

Gays voted for McCain in the highest proportions ever for a Republican presidential candidate. I'm sure that at least part of that unfortunate statistic is down to the existence of racist white gays in the community.

Coalition politics is hard.

I found it interesting that it was discussed how the african american vote didn't matter by showing how if they hadn't have voted prop 8 still would have passed. A better way of looking at it is what would have happened if the african american vote had been similar to the white vote? Or had been the opposite with 30% for and 70% against.

While the underlying problem is narrow-minded religious folk, it isn't improper to look at the breakdown of support among different races. The homophobia in the african american community isn't a product of the color of their skin, but more so a product of their religiosity. The fact remains though, that more outreach needs to be done to this community. More effort needs to be done in educating and informing all minority groups that we are in this fight together.

Wouldn't it be great if we had a sea of African American faces at the big Prop 8 protest rally today? Saturday Nov.8 at 6pm in Sunset Junction. Info at www.afterprop8.org.

I'm sorry, but I don't see homphobic black churches as "possible allies" any more than I see James Dobson as a potential ally.

I've watched the LGBT community beat itself up over race for the last twenty years - and you know what, it's right to address racism in our community, because it's destructive and simply wrong. But I think one needs to recognize that this will not bring around homophobes who happen to lead black churches.

What Savage was pointing out - correctly - is that you can't build a coalition with a movement that will not speak out against the homophobia in its own midst. Church leaders who speak out against equality for GBLT people are still accorded respect in the African American community. Until that community takes care of its own problems, there's no alliance there.

It's also worth noting that the racism in the GLBT community tends to be of the clueless variety - white people who don't stop and think about issues of race. In the African American community, homophobia is intentional and activist. They are not just two different -isms.

Cindy Rizzo, I am so pleased to read your comments. I was stunned when I went on line yesterday to read that homophobia amongst blacks was apparently THE reason why Prop 8 was passed.

I'm a black woman living in Britain with family in California. My impression was that black people made up about 6% of the electorate, that the Proposition was not put forward by blacks, the campaign for it was not funded by blacks, and that Latinos and whites also voted for it and that these electorates were bigger than the black one.

I could understand if black people were being criticised on the basis of 'you know what its like to have your human rights denied, so you shouldnt sanction that happening to anyone else, period.' But the stuff I read, on blogs like Andrew Sullivan's, made clear that blacks were the major obstacle to the LGBT community achieving equality.Period.

And it seemed that black LGBT people were invisible.Your approach-strengthening support for them, seems crucial to me.
Black people commenting on blogs like LadyJax's blog http://ladyjax.livejournal.com/603663.html, talked of no/little attempt by LGBT activists to campaign to stop the bigots winning the arguement as against serious campaigning by the Mormons and others. I think that has to change.

The elephant in the room here is of course religious dogma and its divisive effects on the world at large. There will be no change until each voter one by one realizes that their real, flesh and blood brothers and sisters take precedence over old traditions. I honestly believe marginalizing religious flights of fancy is the only way forward.

And that is exactly what they are afraid of, be they white, black or brown.

Absolutely we need to have strategies now for empowering LGBT people of color. However, we also have to hold black churches accountable for their ignorance and bigotry. You're right that if all we do is point out their ignorance and bigotry we'll accomplish nothing, but pointing it out is the first step. The next one is finding ways to force them to engage in dialogue with us. (Will they dialogue with us if we call them ignorant bigots? That'd be a good point, but it's too late to debate that. They are ignorant bigots, lots of us have called them ignorant bigots, and now we have to move beyond it.)

This article would be good for a Queer Politics class circa 1993. But this is 2008 and it just sounds like your making excuses for black people. The article actually infantilizes the whole group for not being able to move beyond what is it you say a "century of historical context."

Dan Savage is right. It is unfair and there is nothing racist sexist classist... about turning to a group that overwhelmingly voted for Prop 8 and saying, in 2008, what gives?

It's not like there was a public vote; it was done in the privacy of the booth and still this?

Ken

There aren't enough African Americans in California to have a significant effect on a future vote. If you're interested in helping overturn Prop 8, fine. If you're not interested that's fine, too. After supporting affirmative action in the city of my birth which was 60% black and after supporting Barack Obama for president from the beginning and after listening to what African Americans have to say for years about civil rights, after being told again and again by African Americans that being gay has nothing to do with civil rights, I'm feeling tired and pretty much indifferent.

If you want me back as your ally, then you'll have to approach me.

There aren't enough African Americans in California to have a significant effect on a future vote. If you're interested in helping overturn Prop 8, fine. If you're not interested that's fine, too. After supporting affirmative action in the city of my birth which was 60% black and after supporting Barack Obama for president from the beginning and after listening to what African Americans have to say for years about civil rights, after being told again and again by African Americans that being gay has nothing to do with civil rights, I'm feeling tired and pretty much indifferent.

If you want me back as your ally, then you'll have to approach me.

I read the Dan Savage piece to which you object, and you've made several important misreadings, including:

1. Savage was venting his anger the morning after an election. There's nothing about that anger that's incompatible with taking proactive steps to remedy the problem. If anything, this anger might be an accelerant (or at least a kind of Kublar-Rossian stage along the way) to the kinds of strategies you suggest.

2. Your shorthand summation of Savage's post -- "Now, see, here are the real bigots" -- is at best a wild exaggeration, at worst utterly unsupported by the language of his piece.

3. As far as I can tell, Savage was not joking when he said he would no longer be invited to speak at NGLTF events.

In other words, your critique of Savage is based on faulty premises.

Hi Cindy Rizzo. Long time no "see."

Thanks for your words here. I think history will record the passage of Prop 8 as the event that propelled marriage equality forward.

Mark my words.

I remaine in the clouds about President-Elect Barack Obama and will allow nothing to dampen my celebration. Not even this.

Keep in touch.

An old warrior from 7 Haviland Street.

Apparently, doing outreach to African Americans is like doing outreach to James Dobson's family and church. But if the intersectionalist-queer-theory-loving-coalitions-on-paper-people want to keep dreaming, go ahead. It was this thinking that got us into this mess in the first place.

Christ, younger evangelicals will come around quicker.

Stop excusing anti-gay bigotry by anyone. 70% of black voters voted to eliminate gay people's civil right to marry. And yes they did push proposition 8 over the top. Along with heterosexuals in every ethnic group gay people's civil right to marry was eliminated.

And stop imposing this untrue, bigoted and hateful meme on gay people that we are just as or more racist than heterosexuals because we are NOT! Got that? 70% of gay voters selected Obama for president. That is a much higher number than he got from Asian, Latino and white heterosexuals. Gay people have voted for many black politicans including Jesse Jackson, Deval Patrick and Ron Oden. Only once have blacks elected a gay person to office higher than city council. There is no comparrison between the level of anti-gay bigotry expressed by blacks and racism in the gay community.

Black people make up less than 7% of California's population - how can their votes possibly be scapegoated for Prop 8??

Instead of telling white gays to seek out alliances with black folks, which is what many have done, you should be telling black gays to stand up and fight for themselves.

Stop expecting white gays to lead you and speak for you, do it yourself.

A brotha on the down low can't blame that on a white gay not putting his issues as a black gay man at the forefront. As gays we speak for all gays - regardless of color - we always have.

In the No on 2 campaign in Florida, it got the support of the NAACP and black activists. So clearly, you can't say nothing was done. The reason that both campaigns failed was they were not run effectively. And this applies to the attitudes of communities of every ethnicity.

The "No" campaigns were not able to effectively respond to the slander and hatred of the Yes on 8 campaign. They were not willing to send people on the ground, to churches especially, white churches, black churches, and send people to argue their case and to talk about the issue.

Instead, we looked like people pleading for rights on our knees. This country will never pay attention to a civil rights movement that expects the politicians and the personalities of this country to fight our battles for us. The success of Prop 8 is partly due to gay people's silence and apathy, our concern with building up a clubbing and parade culture instead of an activism oriented and demonstration culture.

Quote: "estimated black votes against Prop 8 - 309,851"

Since the African American Gay population in California is estimated at around 200,000, it is arguable that only 100,000 straight African Americans in the entire state voted to support the Gay community. Most likely those 100,000 were the parents or siblings of the 200,000. In other words, homophobia in the non-Gay, non-Gay-related African American community in California could well be approaching 100%.

There is no way you can make the argument that this is acceptable behavior or that the African American community should not be held accountable for it.

Here's the thing, peeps.

we're talking about how this screws us. It's not *just* that these reactions are racist, it's that they are making firm-- drawing clear, angry lines -- onto a division that really isn't as clear as you think it is. And the more *we* make this 'black v. gay'? The more it will become that. Which it actually isn't, and wasn't on election day.

What it was: A couple of percentage points by a group that includes many poor, first-time-voting elderly grandmothers who have never even discussed same-sex marriage. That's what we're talking about.

And on the flip side, a group of rich white gay men who never got off their ass to build door-to-door or community support for marriage, now screaming the N-word in the street.

Which do you think sets the movement back further?

Thank you Ms. Rizzo for the most intelligent and productive analysis of race and the Prop 8 vote. Your suggestions for how to deal with the situation is spot on.

I would add, that those suggestions don't just go to how to win at the ballot box (distasteful as it is that our rights are up for a vote in the first place), but your suggestions also serve the arguably more important goal of combating homophobia in black/latino communities by those most affected by it.

Great article.

We have a right to be angry. We have a right to grieve. And we have a right to have a knee jerk reaction and spit out some of the bile left in our gut at having our hopes dangled in front of us only to be snatched away by the rhetoric of hate and divisiveness.

Yes, you do. But be aware that when you do that, it may have unintended consequences.

I'm black. I'm also a lesbian. I'm also someone whose marriage is now in legal limbo thanks to Prop 8.

And I'm also someone who skipped a protest tonight because I don't feel safe in a large group of white gays and lesbians.

There are black GLBT people. And I'm not the only one of use who's looking at the racial epithets and pointing fingers and deciding that these aren't my people either.

I completely agree with Cindy. As a 51 year old white gay man, I have supported NGLTF over HRC for just this reason: we have to be an ally to have allies. Single issue organizations do not help us. The white gay communtiy has not done a good job in being visible and vocal in the concerns of communities of color.
Where have we been as slavery has been reinstated via the prison system? The "criminal justice" system has incarcerated black men at an increasingly rapid rate and the prison guard lobby is the most powerful lobby in CA. Where is the analysis?

I have given money to African American gay organizations - unfortunately, some of these organizations have not survived. White gay people need to support POC queer organizations with more that just talk.

We need to support the higher education of poor people of all races. If you look at Prop 8 voter breakdowns, those with higher education tended to vote no, regardless of their race. We need to stand up to Gov Arnold and say no cuts to education. We need to support critical thinking. How many white gay men voted to end affirmative action in CA (Prop 208)? How many actively campaigned against Prop 208?

We can rail all we want about the vote but if we are going to turn things around we need to reach out to straight POC and take up their issues, we need to support our straight allies, and we must support queer POC organizations.

I'm so tired of left-wing people such as yourself who have taken over the gay rights movement that are willing to excuse the horrid bigotry of the black community. Ask any gay person, hispanic, Korean or Jew how bigoted blacks can be. But you ignore it. You have spent so many years making gay rights fourth place to the civil rights movement for blacks and woman and your love of abortion rights it's not funny. It's time for gay and lesbian groups to wake up and start focusing 100% on gay rights ONLY. We are the only ones that will and until people like you get over your politically correct fear of being called racist for daring to criticize black people, we'll always be sold out.

Unfortunately you, HRC, and the Gay and Lesbian Taskforce not only DO NOT speak for me, you DO NOT speak for the vast majority of gay and lesbian folks in this country!

The campaign to elect Obama was amazingly well organized in terms of fund-raising, inclusion of all who would work, and emphasis on the registering of young and African American voters. Can the glbg community approach things this way? Hire Barak's organizers? What are best approaches to take? Who are the best spokespeople? Is blitzing with tv spots a good idea?

Cindy Rizzo is bright, scholarly, and hard-working. Is she our next Barak?

Hi,
I'm a transsexual who recently found this blog. I'm also currently married to a Asian women who has given me her support. This support did not come easy, but with time and a lot of discussion between us we have come a long way. You may say why is any of this relevant. She come's from a very strong catholic background and without taking the time I did (almost 10 years, mind you not every day) to educate her on my plight I don't think I would have gotten her support. If I would have taken the route as some here are suggesting "In Your face, you will do what I say or else" I'm sure I would not gotten anywhere with her. It seems some here want to force there view of the nay sayers. How is that any better than what the political supporters of Prop 8 did and are doing. If we want to build more support for equal rights for all, then we need to better educate the public. It will be a hard fight, because the religious orgs do have a strong foot hold in many of the communities that we need support from. Am I upset, YES I am. But to me, just sitting her blaming the Blacks, Latinos or any other group with out even trying to have a intelligent dialog I assure you will not get us anywhere. Education will be the key to our success and I believe Cindy has some valid points. We do have to strengthen our support with our allies and try to build up dialog between the ones that are apposed. If we can't do at least that, I'm almost positive that we will not ever see any positive change for the future and it could even get worse by other states overturning the right to marry. I have a stake in this too as a transwomen, when I change the sex on my legal documents, they could have easly take away my right to stay married to my wife or any other women. People, lets join together and at least start taking a look at what didn't work this time and correct those issues and do some proper education. Thank you all for you time.
Michelle Lee

Turnout was the problem with prop 8. The youth of california did not come out to vote. Turnout in SF was a miserable 50%!

Maybe if the media (both Left and Right) hadn't so poisoned the primary options of Ron Paul, the youth vote wouldn't have been MIA. Obama still would have beaten Paul, but at least Paul would have gotten tolerant libertarian youth to the polls and they could have made all the difference in Prop 8.

What's wrong with angry?
I have every right to be angry at the 70% of the African American population who voted yes. I have every right to be angry at the 49% of the white population that voted yes. We can and should be angry at ourselves for not targeting the intense homophobia in some minority groups. I can be both angry at our shortcomings and at the hatred coming from those who voted yes minority or otherwise. To blame us for other peoples hate, to give that 70% a free pass because we didn't do enough is wrong. We didn't do enough, and they voted for hate and bigotry. I'm angry at both groups.

Homophobia, the last socially acceptable form of discrimination.

Thank you so much for this column, Cindy Rizzo. What a sane perspective, with constructive ideas toward coalition-building and broadening of the LGBT movement.

However much some may want to point fingers at African-Americans, Prop 8 carried many groups in supposedly progressive California: Latinos, Asian-Americans, Pacific Islanders, white men, orthodox Jews, retirees, and others. And some of those yes votes were the result of a stream of disinformation from the religious groups funding Yes on 8, with some of the most incendiary ads and print materials circulating in the last two or three weeks before the election.

But like you, Ms. Rizzo, I felt very conflicted last Wednesday. Happy that Obama won, but all too aware of the limitations that still persist.

Well, I am not sure I agree the issue (Blacks voting against Gay marriage). In my mind there are at least 2 side issues and the issues also goes to the heart of the problem.
The issue of generalizing is that it leaves some of the unknown issues out of the question.

1. The very fact that the Prop 8 was worded extremely poorly (on purpose?). The wording (to me) indicated that if you were to vote "YEA" on Prop 8 you were approving gay Marriage. The double negative wording was at best confusing and misleading.

2. The numbers sited above also do not take into other minorities (Hispanics, which IIRC CA has a few). It would be clearer if the numbers were segregated out and then a clearer picture might be seen.

I know that anything said would be at best a guess as to why one minority group would vote against Gay Marriage, so maybe a post election survey should be taken.

*IF* it can be shown that *ANY* religious organization gave money to either side then probably champaign rules were broken and the church(s) can be held accountable.

Black Gay Male

I am frustrated with these attacks as a black gay man is because many of the white gay community have decided to take their anger out on all of the African-American community. 70% of the African-American community voted yes for prop 8. But 30% of the African-American voted no for prop 8.

I am a black man and I am also a gay man. There are issues I have to deal with in this country because I am African-American. There are other issues that I deal with because I am gay. However, the bigotry that I was not prepared to deal with came from the gay community.

I agree with many bloggers that we need to evaluate what happened and then design a solution to address the situation. However, many African-Americans who voted no on prop 8 who were both straight and gay reported being the unwilling recipients of anti-black sentiments.

I think that it is unwise to alienate the 30% African Americans that is standing with you because of the 70% that does not understand what it really means to be gay in the United States and voted yes on prop. 8. Just to reiterate, black LGBT people are dealing with three and four minority statuses at least.

If you do not value the 30% which are on your side and use the 70% as an excuse, then that is okay with many of us. We want to go with you and work with you on this. However, we are both black and gay and we are not taken the heat on this. We deal with racism from the gay white community for being black and homophobia from the black community for being gay.

Many of us believe that gay issues are civil rights issues as well. I do not know the name of the black woman who made this statement, but I agree with her. "It doesn't matter who was oppressed first or who was oppressed the longest. What matters is that no one is oppressed." We must work so no one is oppressed.

The struggle for civil rights for all minorities links us together, and we need to cooperate and support each other rather than to blame and fight against each other. Both movements have existed through the same time and have been intertwined. Black civil rights leader Bayard Rustin (one of Dr. King's top advisors) said back in 1987: "The barometer of where one is on human rights questions is no longer the black community, it's the gay community. Because it is the community which is most easily mistreated." Remember, an injustice to any of us is an injustice to us all. It matters not what is the level of the offense, but that there is any offense at all. Most gay people understand it was religious prejudice fueled by conservative religious leaders of all colors who used fear and belief systems to overcome logic, reason and fairness. Don't let Faux news divide and conquer.