The Stigmatization of Black Men’s Sexuality

The Stigmatization of Black Men’s Sexuality

Our recent discussions regarding Black women’s sexuality prompted me to reflect on stereotypes about the sexuality of Black men. The post-Reconstruction era started a mania over the belief that Black men were a danger to the purity of white women. It was believed that Black men had an overwhelming lust for white women. This was the justification for and impetus behind the lynchings that that took place during that time period. There were many issues that fed this fear and the violence that it created.

The political power that the African-American community gained during reconstruction fed fears of the white community that their authority would be supplanted. Essentially they feared they would be treated the way they treated the African-American community. The threat to the power and wealth of middle-class and elite whites and fear of lower class and poor whites of losing their higher position in the social hierarchy was manifested in paranoia. One thing this power rested on was the supposed purity of the white race.

Fears that white women would begin having bi-racial children and diluting the “purity” of the white race fed into the belief that extreme measures needed to be taken to prevent this from happening. While a man can deny paternity, when a woman has a baby she cannot deny being the mother. If white women had non-white children denying them their civil rights would not be as easy as it is to deny rights of people born to two black parents. These fears created a perfect storm that led to a rash of violence and murder.

The solution for the problem of the Black man’s lust for white women was to eliminate the offending man. Punishment was not sufficient. Death was necessary in order to prevent further offenses by the accused as well as deter others from transgressing. All that was needed was an accusation. Proof was not a requirement. The word of a white women would always be believed over that of a Black man. Often white women who had consensual relationships with Black men would cry rape if the relationship was discovered or if she got pregnant. It was not always necessary for there to actually be physical contact. The case of Emmitt Till is one infamous example.

A native of Chicago, when Till was fourteen he went to Mississippi to visit family. He was accused of whistling at a white woman. There was no proof, no trial, he was murdered. His face was so badly beaten that he was unrecognizable. His mother, Mammie had an open casket funeral because she wanted the world to know what was done to her son. Recently the woman that accused him came clean and admitted that she had lied. A fourteen-year-old boy was brutally murdered because it was believed he had whistled at a white woman.

Emmitt Till is just one example of the horror visited upon the African-American community based on racism and fear. While the era of a whole town turning out of a pretty afternoon with their children to watch the hanging of a Black man is over there is still a stigma attached to interracial relationships between a Black man and a white woman. A video of a preacher denouncing such relationships was making the rounds of social media within the past couple of years. He said that if a white woman came to him and asked that he perform her marriage to a Black man he would refuse. It is also worth noting that the same stigmas did not apply then or now to white men with Black women. But that is a discussion for another post.