Introduction

We been defying this from the beginning and sure aint no stoppin sir! William Dorsey Swann, known as Queen, who was a former enslaved black persxn and the first LGBTQ activist. William was the first drag queen and many of the firsts for the LGBTQ community hundred years before Marsha P. Johnson and Stormé DeLarverie, a biracial activist who performed in black spaces, existed. Storme punched the police at the Stonewall Uprising (the mythological “throwing the brick”). Queen fought for gay rights and was locked up for 10 months for hosting a ball event during the late 1880s.

So ya know Black folks are hated all tha times, right??? We sho’ is hated some mo. Wait, ain’t you know the “I Have a Dream” speech by Dr. Martin Luther King?? Listen, the movement started with a Black Gay man, Bayard Rustin. A shame his name ain't echoin everyday! Humph…. Many of the greats during the Harlem Renaissance were Bi, Gay, Lesbian, Pan, Queer, Same Gender Loving, or not heterosexual. I bet you didn't know this? *claps*

NEXT..

Yall get stuck on the Master's Tools. Let’s name the master's tools: Binarism, cissexism, and more. These tools are dominated by cishet and cisqueer folx regardless of race. We be tired of the questions:

Who wears the pants?

Who wears the dress?

Which one is the boy or a girl?  

WAIT.. 

Who says we finished?? Black LGBTQ Lives, for many people, is nothing but a commodification and “merchandise” for you. We flaunt our pride, strut our excellence, and stroke our hand because we are beautiful. We do not “just” fall. We dip with just oomph. We be dancin and voguin across the country in the club, on the streets, or in the house. The fashion and makeup artists continue to leave us in a phenomenal sensation. There are countless hidden gems within the Black LGBTQIA communities. We historically survive racist-ladden homoantagonism, transantagonism, bi-antagonism, and ongoing and senseless killings of our Black Trans sisters. HIV/AIDs stigmas draggin’ us everyday like there ain't no tomorrow. We endure unsafe and non-accessible medical care.

Our creativity uplifts us. But… We are constantly appropriated up and down, left to right, and front to back. Hunty, yall just love us.

Let’s tow dem Master’s Tools like the AAA company, starting with:

Acknowledge the Black and Brown LGBTQ people were the catalysts of consequences that allows many things in the mainstream LGBTQA community;

Accept that racism removes them from the mainstream LGBTQ community. The organized faith plays a huge role in determining the quality of lives for the Black Deaf LGBTQ. Yet, Cishetero-norms continues to dominate the spaces of Black Deaf LGBTQ and; 

Appreciate the movements LGBTQ paved for many people, our works, our creativities, and our existences.

Like Bayard Rustin once said, I believe in social dislocation and creative trouble.

**Most videos are American Sign Language translations, the artists do not own the rights to the songs.**