The Gayborhood and the Ghetto

TNG is taking a much needed break from Dec 19-Jan 4. TNG will return with new content on Jan 5. Until then, please enjoy this post from the past year. Original publish date: 11/21/08

Ed Jackson is a photographer, an avid reader of TNG, and lives in Petworth with his "registered Domestic Partner." He is often accused of being a "Pollyanna" and belives that strangers are only friends he has yet to meet.

I think there are some glaring deficiencies in the recent column exploring the origins of "gayborhoods" that are relevant to the ongoing discussions about the relationship between the African-American and LGBT communities. I am also surprised that references to U Street, Columbia Heights and LGBT grassroots activism can be made with no mention of the populations that exist in "gayborhoods" prior to "pioneering" gays venturing into DC's most recently gentrified neighborhoods.

The statement is made that, "Partially born out of disinvestment in the city and partially born out of the pioneer spirit of disco-era gays, a critical mass of policy decisions dating back to the Great Depression left neighborhoods depopulated, but ready for new residents." The problem is that that line of thinking is myopic and ignores a few inescapably relevant facts. In order for this version of "urban planning" to jibe, it has to be based on a shaky foundation of historical revisionism and identity politics.

What you refer to as "disinvestment," has been historically referred to as "redlining." Divestment is an innocuous term for the well-documented practice of denying mortgage, business and capital improvement loans in areas that were predominately African-American. Some of the "policy decisions" to which you refer included denying GI BIll grants to African-American soldiers returning from defending our nation after WWII, men like my Grandfather. Many of those grants allowed whites to purchase homes and laid the groundwork for what was referred to as "white flight" to the "suburbs." The policy decisions also included moving manufacturing jobs out of cities and away from areas with an already dwindling white population. Those decisions trapped Black and Latino families in dying urban areas with a shrinking tax base and no opportunities to spur economic development or move.

Calling these neighborhoods "depopulated," unless I am misunderstanding the meaning, is the equivalent of claiming that the Pilgrims discovered the United States. The neighborhoods were not "depopulated." They were just no longer heavily populated by whites. It seems like gays often forget that there were honest, hardworking families living in Shaw, Logan and along U Street struggling to survive before they got there. When I lived on U Street, I spoke to my neighbors, and they told me how they stayed when the area had been destroyed by the riots and overrun by drugs and violence. They told me about the actions they took to make the areas safe enough for pioneering gays to even consider moving there.

I don't believe that gays move into neighborhoods with "fewer negative urban preconceptions." Otherwise, why would longtime residents of some of DC's most recently gentrified neighborhoods tell me that, "white people move in and change everything. They don't go to our churches or try to become a part of our community. They don't respect us. They move in and just do whatever they want."

And white gays and lesbians have told me, "THEY don't want us here," or refer to the area as someone did in one of the responses to the column as "ghetto."

I could go on, but I want to make a couple of things as clear as possible. I am NOT calling anyone a racist. I am NOT implying that anyone is doing anything that is racist. I am saying that there is a conspicuous disconnect between the LGBT and African American communities.

This limited perspective on "gayborhoods" is one example. Another is the fact that SOME in the LGBT community have tried to make an issue out of the nearly 70% of African Americans who supported Prop 8 (little mention is made of the fact that white people voted for Obama and Prop 8 as well). It didn't surprise me at all.

In 2004, one of my Aunts told us that two Sundays before Christmas a white minister spoke at her church. He told her congregation that progressives and the gay community were trying to exterminate black families. He told them that liberals supported abortion because most of the babies being killed were black. He also said that same-sex marriage would destroy black families, which most African Americans will say are already in peril. It was part of Karl Rove's "Pink Strategy," and during his political commentary on Fox News he bragged about the increase in black voter support for Bush during the 2004 election. Now you know how he got it, and the remnants of his divide and conquer approach were made evident to the mainstream LGBT community on election day.

Some of my white friends have asked me how can Blacks believe that stuff. I replied, "Who is there telling them anything different? Where has the LGBT community been when Black gays and lesbians were trying to come out to our families and needed support? Where has the LGBT community been as HIV/AIDS has waged a full-frontal assault on the Black community?"

And then I hear some of the white gays and lesbians I have known in DC say, "They don't want us here. They don't like us." The reality is that more and more experts are coming out to say that the side trying to defeat Prop 8 had virtually no presence in the Black or Latino communities. It's not that they don't want or like you. I have Black neighbors here in DC who say that white folks "don't speak," which is seen as a sign of disrespect. All it means is that white folks don't say "hello" or "good morning." I ask them, well, why don't you say something, and I am told, "they won't even look up at us. They walk right by us as though we aren't even there."

That's what bothers me the most about this piece. It walks right by the historically Black presence in areas that become "gayborhoods" and the impact the transition has on the people who already live there. To me it demonstrates a fundamental lack of knowledge about the Black community, and reminds me of a story I will share in closing.

A few years ago, HRC issued a press release praising Cracker Barrel restaurants for their treatment of gay and lesbian employees. I emailed them because the NAACP was mobilizing against the chain for refusing to seat African Americans and, in some cases, serving them food out of the garbage can. I got no response. So, the next day, I tweaked the letter, sent it to the Washington Blade and cc'ed HRC. Within an hour, I was getting emails from multiple people in the organization trying to explain their support. But they couldn't get around the fact that their imprimatur meant that the gay part of me could work there, but the black part of me would have to eat out of the garbage can.

The point I made in the letter was that I am perpetually being put in positions where I am forced to defend the LGBT community to African-Americans and to defend the African-American community to LGBT people. The HRC press release, the results of Prop 8, and this article are all indications that neither side is talking to the other, and I am pretty sick of having to constantly play the role of referee. There is so much the two communities can learn from one another, and they are natural allies in anti-discrimination fights. I am just wondering if the recently formed marriage group and the group formed to stop violence against LGBT people in DC have reached out to any African-American organizations. If not, I would strongly encourage you to do so.

And as it pertains to urban planning, please try to remember that the word "disinvestment" represents the destruction of dreams for millions of poor, minority families. "Depopulated" flat out ignores the struggles of people who stayed in the "ghettos" after they were abandoned by businesses, banks and the majority population.

I don't say any of this to "play the race card" or to place blame. There are countless LGBT youth of color whose acceptance depends on the LGBT community having a consistent and respectful presence in our communities, and the passage of Prop 8 demonstrates that when the civil rights of LGBT people are put to a vote, having a supportive and respectful African American community in our corner can make a critical difference.