Exploring racism and homophobia in the lives of gay-identified Aboriginal men in Melbourne

1. Exploring racism and homophobia in the lives of gay-
identified Aboriginal men in Melbourne

3.  Along with
traditional
groups, there are
many urban
Aboriginal
people, including
a small but
significant sub-
population of gay
men in most
major cities

4.  This paper reports on an ongoing community
development action research project looking at the
experience of homophobic and racist abuse and
violence in the lives of gay Aboriginal men.
 The report of the Second National Indigenous
Australian Gay Men and Transgender peoples
Conference (Anwernekenhe II) includes the
recommendation, in relation to sexual abuse, that

5.  To work with gay Indigenous men:
 to develop appropriate research methods to
document their experience of homophobic and
racist abuse and violence;
 to reflect on this experience; and
 to develop models for community-based
responses to prevent it, and to help those affected
by it to heal

6.  The project was initiated in 2001 with the
employment of a gay Aboriginal research
officer, and developed slowly.
 Community liaison work was conducted, and
a community steering committee formed to
determine how the project would proceed.
 Key issues identified were that “cultural
safety” was a key requirement of research
processes

7.  Particularly there was a need to identify data
collection and analysis methodologies which
took advantage of Koorie interaction styles
including
 the distinctive use of small group sharing of
knowledge and experience known colloquially as
“yarning”, and
 the importance of breaking down distinctions in
expertise and status between “researchers” and
“researched”

8.  The methodology began with a sequence of
recorded discussions between the research
officer and individual members of the steering
committee which used personal reflection and
theory building to propose an experientially rich
framework for the investigation.
 The key issues identified in this stage were used
as an informal framework for discussion in two
weekend-long small-group discussions in rural
retreats.

9.  This paper reports on outcomes from the
Melbourne stage of the project, including
analysis of initial discussions and two
weekend retreats, focussing on two main
areas of discussion.
 The first area concerns issues of racism and
homophobia in the Aboriginal community.
 The second area concerns issues of racism in the
gay community

10.  Homophobic reaction to gay family or
community members is never expressed as
outright rejection of individuals, but in
smaller, subtler exclusions framed by kinship
practices including
 the failure to extend appropriate kin rights and
obligations to male partners, and
 the failure to extend appropriate respect to gay
men in relation to their position within kinship
structures.

11. My partner and I had been going out for a year and
he mentioned to his nephew - he’s not teenage or
anything, you know, he’s well into his twenties - he
said that E... and I had our one year anniversary.
And his nephew just laughed his head off. He
couldn’t even for one moment think that it was nice,
have any sensitivity towards it, and he just laughed
his head off. And just thought it was the biggest joke
on earth to try and maintain that a gay relationship
was equal to a heterosexual relationship.

12. My younger brother grew up in a period where HIV/AIDS just became
a big issue, and he was sort of growing up and going through school
when homophobia in general was being experienced by people and
there was a lot of hysteria around AIDS. It was like the gay menace to
the community, so he sort of grew up in that. So he had no
understanding whatsoever about what homosexuality was, what being
gay was. And yet he knew that I was gay. He knew that I had a partner
and he accepted all of that, and it was around him all that time. And
then I began to notice the way he would react towards me. And he
became violent in the end [small laugh] and I had to bash him. [All
laugh.] If I didn’t bash him, my other brothers would have flogged him
and I would have rather bashed him myself. Because if my brothers
would have got him they would have flogged him, like they say, so it
was best for me to gently bash him, than have my brothers flog him.
And he’s learnt from it. He’s totally accepting. …Proud little fella but
he had the lesson.

13.  Although traditional gender systems may
have ascribed roles to transgendered men:
 modern ways of being “gay” are viewed as artefacts
of European colonisation
 so that gay Aboriginal men are challenged on the
authenticity of their mode of being Aboriginal by
family and community members.

14. I think about, when I was living in Queensland and became
aware of the whole scene, that there was almost a generation
of men who were all in their late 40s, early 50s, who all would
be crossing dressing. I’m thinking of people like Ronnie B, and
one other bloke I knew, and they all had that same kind of
feeling in the community, that there was an acceptance that
wouldn’t have happened in the community I grew up in, but at
the same time it was a cruel sort of acceptance. At the same
time you accepted it was O.K. for that person to have that
sexuality, he was a freak, or making fun of him. Poor Ronnie B
used to get stick from all the kids in the community and even
adults, used to be horrible to him all the time.

15. Before HIV AIDS and all that stuff was around, all gay guys were like,
pederasts. Now that they’ve got AIDS around, now they’re all AIDS
carriers. You know anything derogatory they’re going to pin it on gay
guys. And we all know that intravenous drug users too are at risk of
HIV and even straight people at risk of HIV. And if it really took hold
of Indigenous Australia, we’re the fastest growing nation in the world
and to conceive children you have to have unprotected sex. And we’re
probably going to miss out on a generation of babies because HIV
AIDS has taken them. Before they can grow into maturity. What about
all these other issues that affect our community and then the
community will blame gay guys for it. They’ll say, well you brought it
into the community. And all this kind of stuff. Whereas if the so-called
heterosexuals of the community wasn’t doing the drugs or however
they caught HIV AIDS well then they’d realise that it wasn’t just a
homosexual disease. It don’t discriminate on who or what colour you
are. It’s a killer.

16. I’ll start off by making the point that Aboriginal men
and Torres Strait Islander men who are gay, I think
generally we don’t want to be known for only just that
category. We identify ourselves as Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander men first of all, and you know,
our sexuality just happens to be a by product of who
we are. It’s really important that we’re seen as being
identified with our land and our country and our
culture first of all, before people start want to putting
sort of labels on us and stuff like that.

17.  Master narratives of “being gay” that are
widely accepted in the Melbourne gay
community – for example, the “coming out”
narrative – do not give Aboriginal men the
space needed to claim gay identities that are
communally legitimated

18. I find it difficult, first of all, because you're isolated from being gay,
and then you get isolated from being black in the gay scene. But
even amongst gay guys from home, there’s that sister girl/gay man
thing. Transgender thing and all that kind of stuff, where they call
me sister girl. And like, I don’t fit the profile of a sister girl. And
when you call the sister girls gay men, they say, no I’m a sister girl.
And it’s pretty much the same thing. Like at least, the way I see it,
is that like, at least you could own it yourself. Like that person
could have helped me out with saying where I identify and how I
identify and whether I fit into the structure and all this kind of
stuff. There was just nothing, still is nothing, up home.

19.  The hypersexualisation of black men in post-
colonial sexual cultures frames Aboriginal
men as either “hung” Mandingos or otherwise
“sluts”
 It takes no account of individual bodies or
sexual styles

20. I remember going down to the Peel once, walking into
the Peel and this was I don’t know how long ago it was I
think it was probably the 80s maybe late 80s and they
had gone through a South Sea Islander phase, one of
replicas, a seven foot kind of black cock in the middle,
and I was thinking it was the most uncomfortable feeling
I’ve ever had in a place. Like, my god, who are you? They
wouldn’t fucking know one of these if it hit them in the
face…and it’s that sense that you’ve got to be either
Mandingo or some kind of you know cute little
Polynesian coquettish little thing, there’s nothing else,
there’s no normal space…

21. Yeah, the kind of way in which Aboriginal public
figures get treated in Australia, some of which is fair
and some of which is not but if you look at all the kind
of controversies in the last ten years they’ve always
been - - they’ve always had an element of sexuality or
sex in theme and kind of feel that there’s a dual kind of
disadvantage that people carry and also wanting to be
public and open about sexuality as well as their
Aboriginality, and what sort of space that puts us in, in
terms of public stuff. And I think it’s pretty vulnerable
sometimes.

22. A 'wallet' is an affluent gay male who uses money to
attract Black men. A 'fossil' is an older gay guy or
chocolate queen, and the term is usually applied to
someone over fifty years of age. A 'mutton' is an older gay
guy who dresses as a much younger man. Women who
hang around Black gay guys are known as 'fruit bats'. And
dickhead gays are known as 'skin backs' - as in wanker
(the foreskin is jerked back and forth). And last but not
least, what these types all have in common is their
avaricious pursuit of some 'culture stick' - or Aboriginal
penis.

23.  Low key racism pervades social interaction
and the cultural iconography of the gay
community in Melbourne in ways that
exclude Aboriginal men

24. I met a woman last Thursday, and we had a
few drinks in this bar, I just sort of met her
around, and she sort of found I was gay. She
just said: I can’t fathom an Aboriginal gay
person, I just didn’t expect Aborigines to be
gay, I thought that Aboriginal men were
Aboriginal men and that there was no
homosexuality or homosexual element there…

25. They all assume all Aboriginal men are easy
and will open up and give in at the end of the
night and you can be standing there and
pissed up and everything, and they’ll come
along and try and pick you up when they’re
pissed too but they wouldn’t give you two
fucks earlier in the night – they wouldn’t care
about you….

26. It’s not all that exotic racism. This is not the Mandingo
cock syndrome, this is dirty little half-caste, pop behind
the wall, give me a hand job, a blow job … And there’s
nothing nice at all, its ugly sort of racism, it’s the lowest
common denominator kind of stuff. It’s like the whole
black velvet notion in the past. It sort of applies to us
too I guess, there’s similarities there like you know. Like
black velvet, all those really racist terms about
Aboriginal woman, and how, you know, conquer the
colony, conquer the men through the women. I think
it’s still that kind of stuff, it’s still that whole colonial
mind set.

28.  Mutual support through
informal networks and
increasingly formalised
structures (AFAO’s
Strategic Alliance,
NAPWA’s APN+

29.  Koorie community events at gay community
venues or gay events at Koorie community
venues
 Family nights at the Star Hotel
 Miss Reconciliation
 Rural retreats

32.  Staying Negative
 This site was launched as
part of the 'Staying Negative'
campaign. It contains
information about safe-sex,
sexual health, cruising,
relationships, and personal
issues. It also contains
personal life-stories written
by gay men who are HIV
negative, including Bryan, a
Koorie guy

34. I reckon it sounds like a great idea, talking and
communicating with elders and spreading the word
and stuff, and probably, as somebody said earlier about
getting people when they’re young and educating them
to try and stop entrenched homophobic attitudes
prevailing later on. So I think you know, getting kids as
well, like primary school and following through with
high school, and maintaining that thing that gay
brothers and sisters are all right. Gayness is all right.
Stuff like that. Could be really beneficial to the struggle.
… maintaining that thing that gay brothers and sisters are all
right. Gayness is all right.

35.  The other thing that needs to happen is that there’s a
working party that the Minister of Health has set up on
gay and lesbian health. Koori issues should be on that
agenda, and that process can come talk to Koori gay and
lesbian people about their health needs and people need
to be saying there, we need attention to our needs in
those sorts of services. The other way to push this is not
just through organisations but also through policy
processes.
 There needs to be representation on the Victorian AIDS
Council, at the top level. So there’s that opportunity for
a voice from the Indigenous community.
… that opportunity for a voice from the Indigenous community

36. The Living with HIV Program is a part of the research
program at the Australian Research Centre in Sex,
Health and Society (ARCSHS) at La Trobe University,
Melbourne, Australia.
ARCSHS is funded by the Victorian Health Promotion
Foundation to undertake a program of social research
into social, psychological and cultural aspects of human
sexuality and sexual health and is affiliated with the
University of Melbourne.
ARCSHS is funded by the Australian Department of
Health & Aged Care as a Collaborating Centre to The
National Centre in HIV Social Research.