Pam Spaulding: Black, Gay and Reclaiming 'Civil Rights'

As someone who is black and lesbian, it's tiring and absurd to encounter the argument that the black civil rights movement somehow exclusively owns the ability to use "civil rights." And the result of that is any challenge to this thinking amounts to stepping on the third rail.

There is no Oppression Olympics that requires a certain level of historic suffering by a group of people to be able to use those words. I refuse to cede them to anyone.

In the Bay State Banner, there is an article by Talia Whyte, "Black gay couples in Mass. mark marriage anniversary," that shows just how black gays, even prominent ones, have had to deal with the issue of being rendered invisible -- but how marriage equality in the state has begun to crack through the wall of homophobia within the black community there.

Cambridge Mayor E. Denise Simmons celebrated the occasion at City Hall as the city was the first to issue same-sex marriage. Simmons is the first out black lesbian in the country to serve as mayor, following in the trailblazing footsteps of Kenneth E. Reeves, was the first openly gay black man to become mayor.

Full article here.