Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

"Malcolm X was gay" Tatchell claims sparks black racialist fury

exosculate said:
I'm really not sure how you have drawn these conclusions. I meant the old Germaine Greer character, though its not unheard of for radical peeps to moderate with age. I do agree he wouldn't have ended where Germaine has though.

He was still preoccupied with Islam and Black nationalism when he died - yes he was looking at other things - but he hadn't discarded stuff that would have helped him in the direction you have outlined above.
Click to expand...

Well, what i and a few others are putting forward is actually a pretty conventional and accepted view - his works, the testimony of his colleagues and family etc all seem to bear this out as well. The Greer comparison is daft though - she was never a public political figure in the way MX was. She didn't have followers, her interventions were nearly all local or media driven - she never had people plotting to kill her and she couldn't ever mobilise a mass of militnat armed people ready to do the business. Sure she shifted th agenda and in quite a forcible manner - but nothing like what MX did (not singlehandedly of course).
 
butchersapron said:
Well, what i and a few others are putting forward is actually a pretty conventional and accepted view - his works, the testimony of his colleagues and family etc all seem to bear this out as well. The Greer comparison is daft though - she was never a public political figure in the way MX was. She didn't have followers, her interventions were nearly all local or media driven - she never had people plotting to kill her and she couldn't ever mobilise a mass of militnat armed people ready to do the business. Sure she shifted th agenda and in quite a forcible manner - but nothing like what MX did (not singlehandedly of course).
Click to expand...


He was more militant by a long long way I don't deny that. Do you really think he was heading towards a colour blind pro working class agenda?
 
exosculate said:
He was more militant by a long long way I don't deny that. Do you really think he was heading towards a colour blind pro working class agenda?
Click to expand...

Not colour blind no (there is no need to be either) - but one that recognised the centrality of class and capital, yes.
 
butchersapron said:
Not colour blind no (there is no need to be either) - but one that recognised the centrality of class and capital, yes.
Click to expand...


I thought he was still in the mindset that recognised the centrality of GOD.
 
exosculate said:
I thought he was still in the mindset that recognised the centrality of GOD.
Click to expand...
Yes he was - doesn't mean that he can't also take on board the above. And he did/was. And given that his questioning had led him beyond so many other things i think there's a a good chance it would have done the same with religion. And if you look at his actual religion, how he interpreted Islam, it was as a very human construct - one that emphasised community regardless of colour and one based around achieving equality for the worldwide poor - not some passive on your knees affair.
 
What a great thread (even if I doubt this is how ernest intended it to be!), ashame there isn't more stuff like this in the politics forum. Very interesting. I've read some stuff about Malcolm X but will have to go and find out more.
 
butchersapron said:
Yes he was - doesn't mean that he can't also take on board the above. And he did/was. And given that his questioning had led him beyond so many other things i think there's a a good chance it would have done the same with religion. And if you look at his actual religion, how he interpreted Islam, it was as a very human construct - one that emphasised community regardless of colour and one based around achieving equality for the worldwide poor - not some passive on your knees affair.
Click to expand...


Fair enough, although I thought Respect keep being criticised on here for having lots of 'religious' voters.
 
Nope - they were/are criticised for approaching religious voters through their Imams in a top down manner and on a cross class basis...but let's not turn the thread into a RESPECT borefest....
 
butchersapron said:
Nope - they were/are criticised for approaching religious voters through their Imams in a top down manner and on a cross class basis...but let's not turn the thread into a RESPECT borefest....
Click to expand...


Agreed - lets move swiftly away from there.
 
yeah but thats an aetheist party (the SWP) backing itself into a 'religious' corner in the UK in 2005 - not someone coming from a profoundly religious environment (muslim and christian) and starting to push towards a militant and possibly socialist direction.

His initial conversion away from the 'white devils' view was meeting white muslims on the Hajj.

Also in terms of being 'colour blind' - I think it the context of America in the early sixties, this is almost a meaningless term, particularly for African Americans.
 
By Any Mince Necessary

I read the article. I'm always wary of PT outing people, but its from his autobiography. I found it interesting and I dont see what all the fuss is about frankly. So he liked a bit of cock, it doesnt change the man or thre message.

I found the rebuttal in yesterdays Guardian more depressing as I couldnt help feeling that the point of the article was thinly veiled homophobia.
 
Gavin Bl said:
Tatchell's made some good points on homophobia in music, and he's obviously got guts - but he's overstepping the mark, and sliding into an bit of a dodgy, or at least obsessive stance on black sexuality, and people in general.
Click to expand...

Why not should " black attitudes" on homosexuality be challenged....is there not a massive groundswell of opininon within that communtiy based on cultural and religious belief`s that is completely on christain missionary religious 17th century beliefs.....are black people to be excused their predujices just because their black...F.F.S......
Some of the most racist homophoblic people i know are from africa...
 
The article by itself is one thing, but as the latest stage in a series of activities, which have all apparently focussed on black people - be they Africans/West Indians/African Americans or whatever - its a bit more questionable.

I agree the rebuttal was pretty crap - but I also think Tatchell is in danger of crossing a line between legitimate criticism of something like homophobia in reggae, to a something is much more dubious.

He's in danger of falling into the 'they're so sexist', 'they're so homophobic' trap IMO. Like the well meaning missionary who always secretly feels the natives let him down. Its like asking all Irish or Scots to take responsibility for drunkenness, because it may be more prevalent in those communities.

Sadly, I'm not even certain that his motives were positive this time. It felt faintly gleeful, knowing the response it might get. The last paragraph is pretty awful.
 
MrMalcontent said:
I read the article. I'm always wary of PT outing people, but its from his autobiography. I found it interesting and I dont see what all the fuss is about frankly. So he liked a bit of cock, it doesnt change the man or thre message.

I found the rebuttal in yesterdays Guardian more depressing as I couldnt help feeling that the point of the article was thinly veiled homophobia.
Click to expand...


Good post...i felt the same way. Why is it that sections of the " Black Community" refuse to condem the backward attitude of many of their own in relation to homophobia and the " batty-boy" culture prevelavent in many of their cultures, esp West Indian culture?????
I was recently arguing with this West Indian guy about that very thing. He was giving it the whole beanie-man kill them thing..When i pointed out to him that the baggy b-boy trousers he was wearing as a fashion statement actually derive their orgin from black male 1930`s Chicago prostitue`s ( in order to facilitate their clients easy entry and exit) he was left speechless....
 
cemertyone said:
When i pointed out to him that the baggy b-boy trousers he was wearing as a fashion statement actually derive their orgin from black male 1930`s Chicago prostitue`s ( in order to facilitate their clients easy entry and exit) he was left speechless....
Click to expand...

i would have thought that was more to do with prison style over-sized trousers.
 
cemertyone said:
Some of the most racist homophoblic people i know are from africa...
Click to expand...
This is because they are deeply conservative when it comes to homosexuality. One African friend of mine was so openly gay that his family, after sending him abroad to a school well out of sight of the community, and then forcing him into a mental institution finally disowned him completely. His gayness served him well in the entertainment industry but most Africans treated him like a pariah. Homosexuality is very taboo and treated as a mental aberration. Frantz Fanon saw homosexuality as a product of colonialism and this in fact is the way it is still treated by most Africans today, it's a white mans thing and doesnt belong in African culture and never existed in pre-colonial societies, so the narrative goes.
 
Raisin D'etre said:
Frantz Fanon saw homosexuality as a product of colonialism and this in fact is the way it is still treated by most Africans today, it's a white mans thing and doesnt belong in African culture and never existed in pre-colonial societies, so the narrative goes.
Click to expand...

That`s an interesting point....(above) but if my memory serves me well i actually read an article by Thactell not so long ago that argues the opposite...that in fact anti- homosexual attitudes within the West Indian /carribean community where actually introduced into that region with the religious fundamentalism that accompanied colonialism.......
 
cemertyone said:
That`s an interesting point....(above) but if my memory serves me well i actually read an article by Thactell not so long ago that argues the opposite...that in fact anti- homosexual attitudes within the West Indian /carribean community where actually introduced into that region with the religious fundamentalism that accompanied colonialism.......
Click to expand...

Yes European missionaries were shocked at the open displays of homosexuality by African communities at the early stages of conversion.
 
Malcolm X: the man behind the myth

There is virtual confirmation of the claim that in his pre-Nation of Islam hustling days, Malcolm Little, as he was, hired himself out as source of sexual gratification for an older white male benefactor. The story is recounted in the autobiography, but there the hustler is a third party called Rudy. Rudy, according to the autobiography, would "be paid to undress them both, then pick up the old man like a baby, lay him on his bed, then stand over him and sprinkle him all over with talcum powder. Rudy said the old man would actually reach his climax from that." Based on "circumstantial but strong evidence, Malcolm was probably describing his own homosexual encounters," Marable says.
Click to expand...
 
I've just got The Autobiography of Malcolm X (the Alex Haley one) - or at least I got it for Christmas & am about to start reading it. Is it any good?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

ATOMIC SUPLEX
You Gov poll says if there was an election tomorrow Reform would win.
6 7 8 9 10
Replies
282
Views
6K
chilango
chilango
L
Oops - How did the Government not see that this was going to happen? (ID cards)
Replies
4
Views
262
Buddy Bradley
Buddy Bradley
editor
King's Army - homophobic right wing religious group march through Soho
2 3 4 5 6
Replies
162
Views
4K
Pickman's model
Pickman's model
two sheds
Unite the union accusations from Graham report with response by McCluskey
Replies
9
Views
425
Smokeandsteam
Smokeandsteam
HeAthen
Chris Philp's time was almost up......
Replies
8
Views
337
Smokeandsteam
Smokeandsteam
Back
Top Bottom