Words From a Wicked Woman

Respect yourself, respect yourself
If you don’t respect yourself
Ain’t nobody gonna give a good cahoot, na na na na
Respect yourself, respect yourself

So say the Staple Singers in the song “Respect Yourself” from the 1972 album Be Altitude: Respect Yourself. It occurred to me as I was searching for housing information for disabled people that I was running across all these souls who, for one reason or another, didn’t like who they were. They disliked the way the rest of the world reacted to them and so they downplayed their difference instead of acknowledging it and moving on. These weren’t only disabled people, but gay people and black people and . . . and . . . Anyone who wasn’t white, hetero and able-bodied seemed to face the same issue at some point in their lives: whether to come out of the closet. “Coming out” isn’t only a gay thing and it isn’t always something one does in front of a crowd of family, friends and peers. The most important step in coming out is acknowledging to oneself that there is something that sets him or her apart from the majority of other people in one’s environment. Having “come out” to oneself, the next thing is to accept the difference and become comfortable with it. As any out gay person knows, that is far easier said than done. It often takes many years to get comfy in one’s own skin. It’s almost as though coming out is giving birth to an infant. That child has to grow up in the world for a few years, make the usual mistakes, learn the usual things, go through puberty, grow physically, emotionally and spiritually to become a mature adult. It doesn’t happen overnight.

I used to hang out in African history newsgroups on Usenet in the mid 90s or so. I’d often encounter a number of North Africans, particularly Egyptians, who’d swear on the holy Koran that the population’s phenotype is the same now as it was upwards of 3000 years ago. Given the number of times North Africa, especially Egypt, has been invaded by everyone from Nubians to Babylonians to Visigoths to Greeks to Romans it is impossible that the population has not changed. Invaders have this nasty habit of leaving their seed everywhere. If they didn’t, all black folks would be approximately the same color with minor variations. We aren’t. We range in shade from what used to be called “light, bright and damn near white” to a brown so dark that it looks blue. All of them are lovely, in my opinion. Unfortunately, my opinion is not shared by many. Slavers and colonists found that it was in their interest to divide populations, turning them against each other, as a way of controlling them. We see the legacy of that today in the genocides of Rwanda and Sudan. People with certain physical characteristics were labeled Semitic and, therefore, Caucasian while their brethren were labeled Negroid–black. Very bad things happened to black people while Semitic people might be spared some of the hardship and may even inflict it on their “lesser” black neighbors. Consequently, we have the Janjaweed who are Muslim and darker than a paper bag, but consider themselves to be Arabs, slaughtering Nubians–black Africans–in southern and western Sudan. It does not help that those in the south are also Christian or animist. However, it is a mistake to characterize the slaughter as sectarian because it isn’t. Black Muslims are being killed just like black Christians. The Christian Science Monitor called it what it is–racism–in a 2004 article.

“Race - not religion - is the fundamental fault line in Sudan, though religion has certainly added fuel to the fire in the south. Indeed, since independence from the British in 1956, the demon of Sudan has been race. The Arab north, except for brief periods when token Africans were included in government, has exclusively held political and military power. To protest political exclusion, military repression, enslavement, and economic exploitation, Africans in the south rose against the state several years after independence,” writes Makau Mutua, a law professor and director of the Human Rights Center at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Mutua adds, “President Omar Bashir and his fundamentalist Islamic government declared a holy war against African groups in the south - the Dinka, Nuba, and Neur peoples.”

As mentioned, many, though not all, Egyptians consider themselves to be Caucasian just like the Janjaweed. Furthermore, feelings of superiority are endemic. There is a population in southern Egypt near the Aswan Dam that is more Negroid than people below the dam in the north (the Nile flows south to north and empties into the Mediterranean Sea). Priceless Nubian antiquities were destroyed when the dam was built and the world lost one of the most important caches of artifacts that may have contained clues to understanding the as-yet-indecipherable Meroitic script. There was a great hew and cry from archeologists, anthropologists and other scientists when it was learned these lands would be flooded. Unfortunately, the Egyptian government felt it was more important that the dam be built and there was little time for experts from the United Nations to find and catalog these treasures. I know why I think this happened. It is obvious to me. However, an Egyptian from Cairo or Alexandria may feel differently. I say that it was naked racism. It is the same racism that commands a great many to deny they have any black blood no matter how dark-skinned they happen to be and in defiance of history and logic. You see, black is shameful. Black is never to be admitted. Respect yourselves, my Egyptian friends.

PerezHilton.com is a website that specializes in trashy celebrity gossip. I’d heard of the site but never ventured forth until last night. The article I read purported to include a transcript of an encounter between a celebrity rumored to be gay and another gay man he’d met on a gay dating site. There were also web cam photos of this celebrity to add credence to the transcript. The entire thing made me want to take a shower in lye soap. Hilton, who is a gay man himself, outed this celebrity before said celebrity was ready to open the closet door, assuming for the moment the rumors are true. This isn’t the first time Hilton has said this celebrity is gay, but this does appear to be the first time there was something approaching documentation of a gay encounter. The outing, should that be the correct description, did not go over well with readers. Many called for Hilton’s head and said they’d stop reading (yeah, right!). There were no positive comments in several screenfuls. Furthermore, he said that two other actors–one male and one female–were gay in another article. While there have been rumors for many, many years about the woman, the male actor has never incited scrutiny of his sexuality to my knowledge. The remarks Hilton made about the woman were needlessly rude and crude calling her a “dykon,” presumably because she is a lesbian and she’s a lesbian icon. I won’t quote his remarks about the two of them together. For the most part, the comments were just as disapproving of this outing as they were about the other.

If you disrespect anybody that you run in to
How in the world do you think anybody’s s’posed to respect you

Perez Hilton is not a journalist. Maybe he never claimed to be but I want to assure him now that he is not. I’m not angry with him for attempting to out three people in the two articles I read. That’s what he does. I even understand that by figuratively dragging these people out of the presumed closet he is helping the rest of us feel as though we, as LGBT people, are not alone. How can we be alone when there are so many celebrities who are also gay, lesbian or bisexual? There is a method to Hilton’s madness. Nevertheless, I ask myself if non-consensually outing someone is anyone’s place. Personally, under most circumstances, I don’t think that it is. For whatever reason, if the people Hilton writes about are queer, they have chosen to remain closeted. They have that right. Dragging someone out of the closet can have some very, very nasty repercussions, including suicide and outright denial internally and externally in the legitimate press and in court rooms a la Tom Cruise. Celebrities, just like everyone else, have a right to privacy. Hilton, as a gay man, should understand this. Boy, you’d better learn to respect yourself.

Finally, I bring up the case of people who are clearly disabled (wheelchair-bound, missing limbs, etc.) who absolutely refuse to admit it or say the word “disabled” or any of its politically correct cousins in reference to themselves. In their minds, “disabled” and all the associated terms remind them and others of drooling, retarded (yes, I know that’s not the word used these days), idiots who have no way of fending for themselves or even communicating effectively. They choose to never be associated with such people.

Let me state for the record that I am a disabled person. I have a severe birth defect of the lower right extremity; I have a musculoskeletal condition, and; I will be replacing the natural knee in my left leg with an artificial knee in March due to the overuse it has experienced by doing double-duty for nearly 45 years. I will also be getting (I hope) a motorized wheelchair in the next few months to increase my level of mobility. Although I’ve been physically-challenged since birth, on any given day, very little thought was given to my limitations–until I turned 23-years-old and all hell broke lose. I’ll save that story for another time. The point that I’m trying to make is that I honestly do get the various head games played by people who are not able-bodied. The rest of the world often pities us and inadvertently shames us for things we cannot control. Furthermore, we are all lumped into the same category no matter the source or degree of our impairment. I have little in common with someone who is blind or deaf, for example. I’d also be hard-pressed to relate to someone with autism. I hope, however, that I’d not be as utterly clueless as most able-bodied people can be. That would be tragic. Even more tragic is the person who has a very obvious and serious abnormality saying that they are not disabled. Admit it, deal with it and move on! There is no shame that rightfully belongs on our shoulders. Yes, I do feel it sometimes, however, I tell myself that the problem isn’t me. The problem is with the people who’d reject me because of relatively minor restrictions. I’ll never be able to wear a swimsuit at the pool or beach without some people staring; I’ll never be able to climb the steps of the Eiffel Tower or the Statue of Liberty; I need to park close to the entrance of every building I visit; I tire easily, and; I’m in almost constant pain on some level every day. Oh, I also walk with a limp, so I guess no one will be watching my ass and whistling as I walk down the street. There is still a little bit of sadness sometimes. I can’t help it. I miss what I never had. On the other hand, I’ve done pretty well given the challenges I’ve faced already and will face in the future. Again, that’s a story for another time.

Disability Bitch, one of the bloggers on the British blog Ouch!, wrote of a disabled acquaintance who won’t label himself as such but will take the generous benefits allowed in the UK. “If you’re not disabled, please get out of my parking space. Stop claiming Disability Living Allowance too, as there’s barely enough to go round as it is!” It seems the guy wanted to have his cake and eat it too. Well, things just don’t work that way. I used to be a lot more vain when I was younger than I am now. I wouldn’t get a motorized cart for the longest time because I would be readily identifiable as physically impaired. Again, it was the reactions and questions of other people. I still have not figured out why perfect strangers feel they have a right to ask me, “So, what happened to you?” If it’s a man, most of the time I’d like to answer, “No, Sir, the question is what’s going to happen to you when I put my fist in your balls.” Um, I guess impertinent questions get to me. Of course, if someone is willing to hold a door that wouldn’t meet Americans with Disabilities Act rules (even though they are called “guidelines”) I can turn my lips up at the corners and stifle a wince as I mutter some innocuous lie. Those doors are awfully heavy, you know. Now that I’m older, wiser and weaker, I don’t care if someone decides they don’t want to get to know me because I may be in a wheelchair from time to time. It is their loss and not mine. I truly despise shallow people and anyone who would do that is definitely shallow. I have learned to respect myself.

What do all of these things have to do with coming out? What do they have to do with respecting oneself? As I wrote above, coming out is a process that begins deep inside. It is the realization and acceptance of some part that is different from that of most other people. Many of the people in North Africa need to accept that race is difficult to determine at all these days. This is especially true in populations that are a potpourri of conquering people and cultures. Nevertheless, North Africans do have black blood and there’s no way around it. Some of them have more than others, for sure, but it is there nonetheless. They need to come out of the closet in their own minds, throw out the racist colonial mind-fucks and learn to respect themselves for all of who they are.

Closeted LGBT folk, I hope you’re reading because you, too, need to open that door and come out. I know how difficult it is to do in light of career, family and religious obligations for all closeted people whether they are famous or not. Unless a closeted person is harming the LGBT public or being a hypocrite, I do not think it is anyone’s place to invade that person’s privacy. Certainly, it is no one’s place to drag anyone into the gutter as Perez Hilton has done. He does not respect himself, his readers don’t respect him and those he writes about are not in a place where they can accept and respect themselves wholly and completely. It is my hope that they all learn respect for themselves and each other as time passes.

Whether one’s disability is invisible or very apparent, claiming it is integral to learning to accept and respect oneself. There will be dim-witted people who will mock and pity you. In reality, you should pity them for their miniscule brains and life experience. If allowed, having a disability can be a way to learn empathy for others. I would never say that a disability is a positive thing, for that would be utterly disrespectful of the hurdles disabled people have to overcome. However, I would not necessarily label a disability as a negative either. It’s kind of like an arm. It is a part of the person that’s there. It is a neutral–or can be.

It seems to me that the primary reason people deny their identity is due to the reaction of others. We cannot live our lives for other people. Certainly, none of them would live their lives for us. Unfortunately, others can cause terrible hurt, shame and pain. In reality, the shame is theirs. It does not belong to us. Fling it away! In your mind, remind yourself that you are a survivor. You have survived the ordeal of your affliction and can survive the pain others have tried to inflict on you through their ignorance. You are a strong person to have done so. Remember that and show a little respect for yourself. If you don’t respect yourself no one else will respect you.

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