A long-overdue Bent Alaska update — October 2013

Audre Lorde, poet and writer (Black History Month)

A self-proclaimed “Black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet,” Audre Lorde was a Caribbean-American poet, writer, and activist in the civil rights, antiwar, and feminist movements. Bent Alaska presents her story as part of our celebration of Black History Month 2012, with thanks to GLAAD and the Equality Forum.

National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day: I am my brother’s/sister’s keeper

February 7, 2012 marks the 12th year of National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day. The 2012 theme is “”I am My Brother’s/Sister’s Keeper: Fight HIV/AIDS.”

James Baldwin, author (Black History Month)

James Baldwin was an African-American and gay writer whose novels and essays captured the conflicted spirit of late 20th century America. Bent Alaska presents his story as part of our celebration of Black History Month 2012, with thanks to GLAAD and the Equality Forum.

Bent Alaska celebrates Black History Month

February is Black History Month. Bent Alaska will be carrying a number of features and stories this month in celebration of Black History Month, and celebrating the lives and achievements of Black LGBTQ people in particular.

Wanda Sykes, comedian and actor (LGBT History Month)

Wanda Sykes is an Emmy Award-winning comedian and actor praised for being one of the most entertaining women of her generation. She was the first African-American and first openly gay master of ceremonies for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Bent Alaska presents her story as part of our celebration of LGBT History Month 2011, with thanks to the Equality Forum.

Wanda Sykes

“They pissed off the wrong group of people.  Instead of having gay marriage in California, we’re going to get it across the country.”

Wanda Sykes (born March 7, 1964) is an Emmy Award-winning comedian and actor praised for being one of the most entertaining women of her generation. She was the first African-American and first openly gay master of ceremonies for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.

Sykes was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, and raised in the Washington, D.C., area. Her father, an Army colonel, worked in the Pentagon; her mother worked as a bank manager. At a young age, Sykes discovered her passion for making people laugh. She was outspoken and entertaining in high school. In 1986, she graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in marketing from Hampton University and began working for the National Security Agency (NSA).

Sykes’s stand-up career began spontaneously at a talent showcase. She quickly made close friends in the comedy world, including rising star Chris Rock. She was a performer and writer for “The Chris Rock Show” and won the 1999 Emmy for outstanding writing for a variety, music or comedy special. In 2002, Sykes won her second Emmy for her work on “Inside the NFL.”

In 2003, Sykes launched her first television show, “Wanda at Large.” On the show, she played Wanda Hawkins, an unsuccessful stand-up comic hired to be a correspondent on a political talk show. Sykes acknowledged, “Wanda Hawkins is basically me personified. We have the same attitude, the same point of view—pointing out hypocrisies in the way we see the world.”

Sykes has starred in “Wanda Does It,” “The Wanda Sykes Show” and “The New Adventures of Old Christine.” HBO has produced two Wanda Sykes comedy specials, “Sick & Tired” (2006) and “I’ma Be Me” (2009).

Sykes appeared in the feature films “Evan Almighty,” “Monster-In-Law” and “My Super Ex-Girlfriend,” and provided the voice for characters in the animated films “Over The Hedge” and “The Barnyard.” Her first book, Yeah, I Said It, is a collection of comedic essays on current events, family and life.

In 2008, Sykes came out when she announced her own marriage while speaking at a rally for same-sex marriage. In a March 2009 interview, she told The Advocate tells the story of how she met and married her wife:

In 2006, Sykes went on a weeklong, end-of-summer vacation with friends to Cherry Grove, one of two predominantly gay communities on New York’s Fire Island. (“I’m not making that Pines money,” she says of the neighboring, ritzier enclave, Fire Island Pines. “But it’s so nice over at the Pines. Nice coffee shops, gourmet foods, and all that crap over there.”) It was a nasty, rainy day, but on the ferry ride to the island Sykes spotted an intriguing woman. “She had on this black trench coat and was carrying a computer bag,” she says. “I was like, We’re going to Fire Island — what the hell is she doing with her laptop?”

It wasn’t so much the trench coat or the laptop, though, that sparked Sykes’s attention. “She just caught my eye,” she says. And that’s when something happened that she’d never experienced before. “It was like a voice inside me saying, See? That’s what you need, Wanda. That’s what you need.” Sykes’s eyes well up with tears as she tells the story. “She’s beautiful, but there was just this aura about her. We’ve been inseparable since.” Inseparable and protective: Sykes, walking a tightrope, will not say what her wife does for a living. In fact, she tells the whole story of their meeting without once uttering her wife’s name. Later Sykes decided to give us her first name, Alexandra, for the article. “She’s not in show business. I want her to have as much of her private life as she can.”

Two years later, emboldened by the California supreme court’s ruling in favor of marriage equality, she and Alexandra decided to make it official. “This was it,” Sykes explains. “We’re in love and we want to spend the rest of our lives together. That’s why you get married.” So they rented a small hotel in Palm Springs and were married in a simple ceremony before about 40 friends and family members. “We had an amazing weekend. I don’t like to talk about it. It was a very special moment for us, for our friends. I like to keep that.” Sykes is happy—and obviously sentimental: “Even looking at the pictures, I just go back to that moment and get all teary-eyed.”

She lives in California with her wife, Alex, and their twins, Lucas and Olivia.

In her “I’ma Be Me” comedy on HBO in 2009, Wanda Sykes talked about what it would be like if you had to come out black. Watch:

For more about Wanda Sykes, visit her website, LGBT History Month page, or Wikipedia article.

Photo credit: Wanda Sykes at a Marriage Equality Now rally in Sacramento, 16 February 2009. Photo by Elijah Nouvelage (wanderinghome on Flickr); used in accordance with Creative Commons license.

Langston Hughes, poet and writer (LGBT History Month)

A celebrated poet and writer, Langston Hughes is one of the most significant voices to emerge from the Harlem Renaissance. A major contributor to American literature, his legacy includes 25 published works. Bent Alaska presents his story as part of our celebration of LGBT History Month 2011, with thanks to the Equality Forum.

Langston Hughes

“What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or does it fester like a sore—and then run?”

A celebrated poet and writer, Langston Hughes (born February 1, 1902
died May 22, 1967) is one of the most significant voices to emerge from the Harlem Renaissance. A major contributor to American literature, his legacy includes 25 published works.

Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri. After his parents divorced, he moved to Lawrence, Kansas, where his grandmother raised him until her death. By the time he was 14, he had lived in nine cities with various families.

Hughes showed impressive literary aptitude. In eighth grade, he began writing poetry, short stories and plays and was elected “class poet.” His breakthrough poem, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” was published shortly after he graduated from high school.

In 1921, at the urging of his father, Hughes enrolled at Colombia University to study engineering. He left after two semesters due to racial discrimination. Over the next few years, Hughes worked odd jobs while pursuing a writing career. He traveled to Africa and Europe on the crew of a shipping vessel before moving to Washington, D.C. While employed as a busboy, Hughes met poet Vachel Lindsay, who helped promote his work.

In 1926, Hughes’s first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published. Well received by literary critics, it earned him a reputation as the country’s leading black poet. A year later, his second book of poetry, Fine Clothes to the Jews, was published. Heavily influenced by blues and jazz, his work portrayed life in black America and addressed racism and oppression. He continued to write and publish poetry throughout his life.

In 1929, Hughes graduated from Lincoln University, a historically black university in Chester County, Pennsylvania, where Thurgood Marshall, later a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, was a classmate. He later traveled to Haiti and to the Soviet Union, where he studied communist theory, but lived in Harlem as his primary home for the rest of his life.

His first novel, Not Without Laughter, about a black boy in 1920s rural Kansas, was published in 1930, and his first collection of short stories The Ways of White Folks, was published in 1934. He continued to write stories throughout his life, many of them featuring the character Jesse B. Semple, often referred to as “Simple,” a representation of the the every day black man in Harlem. He also wrote several works of nonfiction, plays and screenplays, and works for children.

In 1934, Hughes became head of the League for Negro Rights, the main African-American branch of the Communist Party. A victim of McCarthyism, he was subpoenaed to appear before the Senate Permanent Sub-Committee on Investigations in 1953.

Like most artists of his time, Hughes was not open about his sexuality. Literary scholars point to his poems “Joy,” “Desire”, “Cafe: 3 A.M.” (about police harassing “fairies”), “Waterfront Streets”, “Young Sailor”, “Trumpet Player”, “Tell Me”, “F.S.”, and some of the poems in Montage of a Dream Deferred as having gay themes; his short story “Blessed Assurance” deals with a father’s anger over his son’s effeminacy and “queerness.”

Hughes died at age 65 from prostate cancer. His ashes are memorialized in Harlem at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

Langston Hughes’ poem “Weary Blues” was one of 21 poems featured in short films in the Moving Poetry Series “Rant Rave Riff” by Four Seasons Productions. “Weary Blues” is spoken in the film by author and Harvard Professor Dr. Allen Dwight Callahan. Watch:

For more about Langston Hughes, visit his pages at poets.org or the Poetry Foundation (both of which have articles and poems), his LGBT History Month page, or his Wikipedia article.

Image credit: Langston Hughes by Winold Reiss. Pastel on illustration board, 1925, 76.3 x 54.9 cm (301/6 x 215/8 in.). National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of W. Tjark Reiss, in memory of his father, Winold Reiss.

Keith Boykin, commentator (LGBT History Month)

Keith Boykin is a political commentator, a New York Times best-selling author and a veteran of two presidential campaigns. He is the editor of The Daily Voice and has appeared on CNN, MSNBC and BET. Bent Alaska presents his story as part of our celebration of LGBT History Month 2011, with thanks to the Equality Forum.

Keith Boykin

“I’m not on a show with a pink triangle or rainbow flag—which means that being gay is just a part of who I am.”

Keith Boykin (born August 28, 1965) is a political commentator, a New York Times best-selling author and a veteran of two presidential campaigns. He is the editor of The Daily Voice and has appeared on CNN, MSNBC and BET.

Born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri, Boykin became politically focused working on local campaigns while in high school. At Dartmouth he was the editor of the daily newspaper and graduated with a B.A. in government.

After college, Boykin worked on the Dukakis presidential campaign. Thereafter, he attended Harvard Law School and continued working on campaigns, including the 1992 presidential campaign of Bill Clinton. Boykin worked as special assistant to the president and served as President Clinton’s liaison to the LGBT community.

In 1994, Boykin became the executive director of the National Black Lesbian and Gay Leadership Forum and completed his first book, One More River to Cross: Black & Gay in America. In 1997, he served with Coretta Scott King and the Rev. Jesse Jackson on the U.S. presidential trade delegation to Zimbabwe.

Boykin wrote two other books, Respecting the Soul: Daily Reflections for Black Lesbians and Gays (1999) and Beyond the Down Low: Sex, Lies, and Denial in Black America (2005). His work shed light on AIDS, internalized homophobia and black men on the “down low.”

Boykin is a commentator on major political talk shows. In 2004, he starred on Showtime’s “American Candidate” and hosted BET’s “My Two Cents.”

Keith Boykin is working on a fourth book, For Colored Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Still Not Enough. He lives in New York City.

Joe Hawkins, host of Keeping It Real Online TV, interviewed Keith Boykin in 2008. Watch:

For more about Keith Boykin, visit his website, LGBT History Month page, or Wikipedia article.

Photo credit: Keith Boykin. Associated Press, licensed for LGBT History Month via the Equality Forum.

Kye Allums, athlete (LGBT History Month 2011)

Kye Allums, is the first openly transgender athlete to play NCAA Division I college basketball. Bent Alaska presents his story as part of our celebration of LGBT History Month 2011, with thanks to the Equality Forum.

NAACP’s first LGBT Town Hall: Gay Rights are Civil Rights

Comedian Wanda Sykes, who is performing in Anchorage next month, and CNN reporter Don Lemon headlined the NAACP‘s first ever LGBT Town Hall at the annual convention in Los Angeles last week, supporting same sex marriage and using humor to explain why ‘praying away the gay’ doesn’t work.

Julian Bond, former NAACP chair and veteran civil rights activist, gave a strong opening speech on the panel theme “Our Collective Responsibility: Overcoming Homophobia.”

He explained that the LGBT Task Force was formed in 2009 with the National Black Justice Coalition, and described the NAACP’s three-point mission to increase acceptance of black LGBT people in the African American community:

1. strengthen the NAACP’s knowledge of LGBT issues and policies,
2. build alliances with LGBT organizations, and
3. advance awareness of LGBT issues as they relate to the programs and interests of the NAACP.

He also addressed several areas where conflict exists between the LGBT and the African American communities.

We know that black lesbians, black gay men, black bisexual people and black transgender people suffer a level of discrimination and harassment far beyond the level felt by straight black women and men.

If you disagree, or if your Bible tells you that gay people ought not be married in your church, don’t tell them they can’t be married at City Hall. Marriage is a civil rite as well as a civil right, and we can’t allow religious bigotry to close the door to justice for anyone….

For some people, comparisons between the African American Civil Rights movement and the movement for gay and lesbian rights seems to diminish the long, black historical struggle with all it’s suffering, sacrifices and endless toil. People of color, however, ought to be flattered that our Movement has provided so much inspiration for others, that it has been so widely imitated, and that our tactics, heroes, heroines and methods, even our songs, have been appropriated as models for others….

People of color carry the badge of who we are on our faces. But we are far from the only people suffering from discrimination…. They deserve the laws, protections and civil rights, too.

(Thanks to Metro Weekly for the partial transcript.)

There were several moments of controversy during the 2 hour discussion. NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous joined the panel and was asked why the organization has an anti-gay preacher, Keith Ratliff, on its board. Ratliff claimed in March that gay rights activists have “hijacked” the Civil Rights movement.

Jealous responded, “He did not say it in the name of the NAACP…. We have board members who hold all sorts of divergent views.”

The last speaker, transgender audience member Ashley Love, pointed out the importance of including transgender people in the discussion:

“The NAACP was founded because black people were being excluded from having a seat at the table,” she said. “So why would we as an LGBT black coalition exclude transsexual and transgender people, who are the most vulnerable, the most marginalized, the most endangered in the entire coalition?”

Other critics of the Convention noted that there were neither transgender nor bisexual members of the panel.

But the people at the town hall, and many of the news reports, agree that the first NAACP LGBT panel was a good start for the veteran civil rights organization, and could have a positive effect on the regional branches and thousands of members nationwide.

Today is Black AIDS Awareness Day

National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day 2009 on aims to get Black Americans educated about the basics of HIV/AIDS, get tested to know their HIV status, get involved in their community around the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and get treated if they are living with HIV/AIDS.

Because “Black Life Is Worth Saving!”

For AIDS testing and information in Alaska, contact Four A’s in Anchorage and Juneau, and Interior AIDS Assoc. in Fairbanks.