Cleveland Pride

An Academic Essay on the Double Consciousness experienced by LGBT people in the modern world as compared to the Double Consciousness experienced by blacks in the 1900’s.

“That is so f*cking GAY.”
“Wow, what a f*cking F*GGOT.”

Without further ado, I wish to present you with vernacular of America’s youth and young adults. These homophobic phrases have evolved from the less elaborate ‘that’s gay’ which echoes off the walls of elementary schools around the nation. Such phrases are clear indications of the rampant homophobia found within heterosexist America. Normalized homophobic expressions, along with society’s assumption that heterosexuality is the ‘normal’ sexual orientation, forces LGBT people to live with a fragmented identity not unlike the ‘double-consciousness’ of Blacks as described in W.E.B. Du Bois’ “Of Our Spiritual Strivings.” In this essay, I will discuss the similarities between the experience of being LGBT in modern America and being black in America at the beginning of the 20th century in terms of the misrepresentation of one’s own people and exclusion from mainstream society by hate, both as components of double-consciousness.

Before continuing, it is essential to consider the historical context of Du Bois’ publication. In 1903, when The Souls of Black Folk was published, it had been approximately forty years since the Emancipation Proclamation and 13th Amendment were ratified and roughly 30 years since the 15th Amendment was passed (United States Constitution). Black people hoped that the abolition of slavery, in addition to the right to vote would provide and end to their suffering. Obviously, simply passing laws that abolished slavery and allowed universal manhood suffrage would not end the suffering of African-Americans. Du Bois recognized that the “freedman has not yet found in freedom his promised land” (Du Bois 3). With this in mind, we consider double-consciousness as described by W.E.B. Du Bois:

After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman, the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world, — a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of aworld that looks on in amused contempt. (Du Bois 2)

One aspect of double-consciousness, or two-ness, that Du Bois talks about is seeing “himself through the revelation of the other world” (Du Bois 2). The other world refers to the dominant, white society in the 1900’s. A black man was only able to view himself in terms of what he was defined as by white America; he was not allowed “true self-consciousness” (Du Bois 2); he had already been labeled. Du Bois illustrates this point by considering double-consciousness in art and corresponding distortion of the message. He asserts that what beauty means to a black artist is not the same as what beauty mean to the larger, dominant white audience and, furthermore, that the aforementioned disjunction causes misrepresentation of the artist’s message (Du Bois 3).

Similarly, we LGBT persons in America experience a double-consciousness with respect to seeing ourselves through the “revelation of the other world” (Du Bois 2). To follow Du Bois’ example of art, we will consider our relationships depicted in movies and books. Controversy surrounding gay media demonstrates that what we view to be a ‘normal’ or beautiful relationship is not accepted by mainstream culture; the American nation as a whole is opposed to the LGBT life-style. Books depicting positive gay relationships meet strong revocation. According to the American Library Association, Daddy’s Roommate ranked as the second most challenged book from 1990 – 2000 and Heather Has Two Mommies ranked as eleventh. Our attempts to convey our message via literature meet unashamed disapproval, hence, a disjunction between our message and the larger heterosexual audience.

More recently, Brokeback Mountain was the first large-scale, successful gay film to hit the big screen and is a prime example of how our portrayal in the media is and controlled by heterosexual America (the other world). For this film, the two lead actors, director and screenwriters were all heterosexual (“Brokeback Mountain”). The people in charge of the ‘gay message’ in Hollywood are heterosexual men! This is not to say the movie negatively depicted gay men, but regardless of its message, it is bizarre that no gay people were involved in at least one of the leadership roles involved with the production of Brokeback Mountain. Just as black artists were limited in their conveyance of their message in art because of the ‘other world,’ LGBT portrayal in art and the media are limited either because they are not involved in their own representation or, the message meets strong disapproval. The inability for a group of people to efficiently convey their message to the larger population is disempowering.

Another concept that Du Bois discusses concerning the occurrence of double-consciousness involves racism and its foundation in culture, righteousness and progress (Du Bois 5). A century before Du Bois wrote The Soul of Black Folk, there had been a wealth of studies developing scientific racism (“scientific racism”). The unfounded idea that black people were biologically inferior provided a basis for discrimination as they threatened the very progress of our young nation. The appropriate response, as it seemed to many, was exclusion from mainstream society and racism. Negroes were both inferior and American; this disjunction highlights another aspect of double-consciousness. In heterosexist America, being gay is viewed as a choice, like religion or occupation; if it was not a choice (like skin color) then there would have to be inclusion in things like hate speech laws. As of August 2007, firing someone for being gay was protected in 31 states (“EDNA”). In Ohio, neither gender identity nor sexual orientation is included its Hate Crime Law (“Ohio Hate Crime Laws”). It is interested that regardless of the explanation for the difference (being black or gay), the overall purpose for explaining differences is exclusion from white, heterosexual America. This lends to the experience of two-ness experienced by both LGBT and black people.

Not only do I think that double-consciousness is something valid for both black and LGBT people, but I also think that the double-consciousness (but not oppression as a whole) is more intense for LGBT people. Since being LGBT is not a physically identifiable attribute, we are frequently perceived as ’straight’ on a fairly normal basis. So, the fact that many of us can ‘pass’ as being straight, and that ’straight-ness’ is desirable in our heterosexist society, makes being gay something that can be hidden easily (obviously much different than being black). With this in mind, the internalization of one’s sexual identity in a heterosexist society causes an intensified experience of two-ness. This may be one reason why ‘coming-out’ is such an intense and exhilarating personal process; the bringing together of the two parts of consciousness that were so disjunctive is a resolution to the double-consciousness, at least in terms of self-acceptance.

The LGBT community experiences a double-consciousness similar to that experienced by Du Bois. With this, maybe we can be thought of as a sort of ‘eight son’ of America; a group of people working toward equality under the law in a heterosexist society. Hopefully one day, children and teenagers will not have to experience the feeling of two-ness that so many people experience today.

Works Cited:

• “Brokeback Mountain.” .
• Du Bois, W.E.B. “Of Our Spiritual Strivings.” The Souls of Black Folk. Electronic Text Center, Universiy of Virginia Library.
• Employment Non-Discrimination Act (EDNA). August 25, 2007. Human Rights Campaign. .
• Ohio Hate Crimes Law. March 19, 2007. Human Rights Campaign.
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• “Scientific Racism.” .
• “The 100 Most Challenged Books of 1990 – 2000.” American Library Association. .
• United States Constitution .

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