Queer | Black | Woman

I went to church this past weekend. I have been wanting to go back, for a while, to get closure pretty much and to finally decide if I was going to leave or stay. There was a story about an ex-lesbian who was straight, broke up with her ex-fiancé, went to work at a female dominated organisation, met a wonderful girl, dated her for 5 years, stumbled upon church one Sunday, attended, became really involved and decided she had been living a lie and left her girlfriend and gayness behind and is now doing life with a very nice gentleman.

The other day I heard that Flabba was stabbed to death, allegedly by his girlfriend. My initial reaction was “I wonder what he did”. But of course the majority of South Africans did not share my sentiments. Their reaction was more like “OFF WITH HER HEAD”.

On Instagram I came across a post speaking about the definition of ‘Ineptocracy’. It went like this “A system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers. And he commented and said “True for us here”.

By ‘us here’ he means for us, South Africans, here in South Africa.

By ‘the least capable to lead’ he means the ANC

By ‘least capable of producing’ he means black people

By ‘member of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed’ he means black people

By ‘by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers’ he means white people

The I-found-God-and-stopped-being-a-lesbian Lesbian; the woman who so dared to kill a man, a famous man and the so blatantly, hiding his racism in plain sight, racist pastor have all plagued me this week. Leaving a sour taste in my mouth.

The I-found-God-and-stopped-being-a-lesbian Lesbian

I saw her pic on an Instagram post. Her story of ‘sexual identity crisis’ was not written about but they enticed me by telling me to come hear the uncut version of her story. She was so obviously a Dyke, I had to go see what her story with the church was about. And to be very honest I hoped that it would be a positive one. One about how the church accepted her and who she loved in such a way that her sexuality didn’t define her or the role she could play in the church. I hoped for this scenario so much but that was not the case, as I knew it would not be. In fact the opposite was true. They used the story of a woman who clearly had a tough upbringing, who spent her life searching for what was perhaps lacking in her life since early on and made it about her sexuality, sorry I mean ‘sexual identity crisis’, because being gay is so much of a non-thing that we don’t even call it by name.

My friends and I had a discussion about it afterwards and the boyfriend of one of my friends said “I have never heard more bullshit in my life” and I can’t find a better set of words to round up my feelings about it. It is absolutely despicable that they would take the story of one woman and use it to sell their message of ‘crises of sexual identity’ and how coming to church can ‘fix it’. In my opinion this woman’s story had absolutely nothing to do with her sexuality and everything to do with her search and need to belong. She just happened to have been dating a woman when she found God and so of course church cured her of her sinful ways. Sigh. My words honestly fail me when people who are so greatly trying to live the word of God, be the word of God and sell the word of God are the exact people who spout ignorance and judgement and hate. Because telling people that its wrong to be who they are is hateful! It reminds me of when I had a discussion with a friend who I attended this church with and she was asking me why I stopped coming and she said “So you are dating a woman! I am having unmarried sex and don’t tithe as well as I should, but I still come to church”. So basically she is sinning and I am sinning, this shouldn’t stop us from going to church. And of course one day she can decide to stop having pre-marital sex and decide to start tithing every month, and since I was attracted to men before I can decide to stop being attracted to women. And bless her soul she was not trying to be facetious, but her statement said to me “I am comparing your sexual orientation, which I deem a sin, to my sins of pre-marital sex and bad tithing. You are a sinner Amanda and sinners need Jesus”. Also, had me at a loss for words that people could be so flippant and unaware, so unaware.

The So-blatantly-hiding-his-racism-in-plain-sight racist pastor

That person, that white person who has black ‘friends’ and therefore feels like they can make underhanded comments and make unfair and unfounded criticisms of black people because they can’t be racist, they are just being honest. Here is a bit of a newsflash. Saying you are ‘just being honest’ does not make you any less racist. Having black people on your staff does not make you any less racist. Having black people in your congregation…also doesn’t make you any less racist. I am so sorry to tell you. Acknowledging that apartheid was wrong and should never have happened but proceeding to say ‘it’s over now, we are 20 odd years into democracy, black people need to curb this feeling of entitlement, and for heaven’s sake stop bloody toi-toing’…guess what! Yup…also makes you racist, and honestly, it makes you an asshole. The biggest reason that certain women think that men can’t be feminist and certain people think that only 5% of the white population in this country are not racist is because it is extremely difficult to relinquish your power, your maleness, your privilege, your whiteness and open your eyes to what’s really going on in the world.

The woman who so dared to kill a man

A friend of mine wrote “this is so sad. Killed by your very own woman. Unbelievable”. But also, newsflash, no, people being killed by their very own partners is actually very believable. It just happens the other way round. Thousands of women are killed by their intimate partners every single day in this country. There just isn’t as much of an outrage about it. Community members don’t stand outside of magistrate courts and shout “no bail” and taunt the defendant’s family when these scores of women are being slain every day. No one stands outside mag courts and professes what valuable and respected members of society these women were.

I am queer, I am black, I am a woman. And this week I was just pissed off at people shamelessly trying to un-gay me, trying to ‘just be honest’ by making value-judgments about my blackness and by people normalizing the violence against my body.