African-Americans

COMMENTARY: Tom Joyner's homophobic message to the Black community

The Rev. Irene Monroe - SDGLN Contributor
May 15th, 2013

On May 1, Jason Collins, the 7-foot center for the Washington Wizards and a former Boston Celtics, came out. His statement, “I’m a 34-year-old NBA center. I’m black. And I’m gay” made the cover story for the May 6 issue of Sports Illustrated.

On May 2, three Morehouse College basketball athletes were accused of raping an 18-year-old Spelman College student. The story didn't hit the airwaves as the Collins story did.

Many in the African-American community were silent on both incidents because they view both as poxes on the community.

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COMMENTARY: The lost souls of the Republican Party

Ken Williams - SDGLN Editor in Chief
November 7th, 2012

The Republican Party has lost its heart and soul. The party of Abraham Lincoln, founded in the mid-1850s as a political movement united against slavery, has morphed in the 21st century into the party of hate and the party of no.

The party that was primarily comprised of Northerners and rejected by pro-slavery white Southerners is now dominated by white Southerners. The party that was once embraced by freed slaves is now overwhelmingly void of people of color, including African-Americans, Latinos, Asians and immigrants.

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COMMENTARY: Will black ministers follow Obama on marriage equality?

The Rev. Irene Monroe - SDGLN Contributor
May 18th, 2012

African-American ministers have come out for, and against, President Barack Obama's stance on marriage equality.

LGBTQ activists of African descent have pondered what would be the catalyst to rally those African-American Christian ministers to support same-sex marriage and engage the black community in a nationwide discussion.

Last week the answer arrived in Obama's support of marriage equality.

Black church takes chance, reaches out to LGBT teens

Meghan E. Irons - Boston Globe
February 7th, 2012

BOSTON -- Eziah Karter-Sabir Blake swiped the play debit card through a plastic reader during a game of Monopoly recently. Another multimillion-dollar sale. The buyer, Giftson Joseph, rubbed his hands together, a glimmer creeping in his eyes as he playfully nudged the Rev. Catharine A. Cummings.

The three - one gay, one transgender, one straight - sat around a table at a new youth drop-in center at Union United Methodist Church, a historically black congregation in the South End, the heart of Boston’s gay community.

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COMMENTARY: In "Hot-lanta" you stay "in the closet" as CNN’s Don Lemon did

The Rev. Irene Monroe - SDGLN Contributor
May 26th, 2011

CNN’s Don Lemon has penned a memoir titled "Transparent" that will come out in September. In writing his book, Lemon said "the decision to come out happened organically."

One of the motivating reasons for Lemon, 45, now revealing his sexual orientation is because of the suicide of 18-year-old Rutgers University freshman Tyler Clementi.