Blacks and Gays

In one of my political science classes at BYU last fall, we had a guest speaker come and talk about civil rights. Incidentally, he was the first black man to go through the temple after the ban was lifted.

During question and answer time, someone raised their hand and asked what he thought about people drawing parallels between the civil rights movement and the gay rights movement. The guest speaker thought that the notion was highly offensive and asked if gays were sprayed with firehoses and segregated etc..

I suppose he is right in a way, but I still must disagree.

The volume of incidents against blacks is indeed much greater and more extreme. The history of the civil rights movement is a violent one. And though we cannot go so far as to say that the two are exactly alike, neither can we say that they are incomparable.

I think it all comes down to the closet. According the 2000 US Census, 12.3% of American citizens are African American. And although estimates range from an extreme low of 2% to an extreme high of 10-15%, I'd say between 6 and 8% of the population are gay. If there was some undeniable, unmistakable and unavoidable biological marker of homosexuality, I think that the similarities between the two groups would be much greater. If one could tell that someone was gay from a mile away, it is probable that the number of gay hate crimes would be much, much higher.

One cannot conceal being black. One can conceal being gay. If it weren't for this, I do not think it implausible to think that the history of homosexuality would be inordinately different and much more violent.



And now, a little relevant satire.

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/33334