Why Is It So Hard To Be Gay?

i-D Vice, one of London’s top fashion websites, released an article asking “why is it so hard to be gay and black”. They discussed about American musician Frank Ocean and CNN journalist Don Lemon, as well as a Nigerian.

A London based Nigerian journalist, who used the pseudonym Adejola Funmi, shared his experience coming out. Funmi was expelled from his Christian school for being homosexual; it was labeled not ‘Christ like.’ He was later sent to Nigeria, so they could “cast the gayness out”.

Adejola traveled from church to church for deliverance. He shares: “I slept in church for about three days, during that time prayer warriors came around me and were praying… they didn’t give me any food and they’d whip me with branches of palm trees. They were whipping me to cast the gayness out of me.”

To also cure his homosexuality and cast out demons, he was stripped naked and bathed in a river by the church, forced to drink snail water and lick grounded charcoal.

“One should no more deplore homosexuality than left-handedness,” he concluded.

For the full article titled ‘Why is it so hard to reconcile being both black and gay?’ originally published on i-D Vice, read below.

NOT BORN THIS WAY

Since the 1990s when the scientific community first suggested that homosexuality might be genetic (after drawing blood from gay men and observing sexuality patterns of these men’s brothers and uncles from the mother’s side), I gotta admit that the struggle to have us breathe easier in the world has received a boost. More people have been forced to reconsider: If it’s natural, then it must be okay; then there’s nothing they (gays) or anyone else can do about it.

I do not subscribe to the born-this-way theory, however. In fact, I dislike it. I have never spoken about my orientation propped against the pillar that phrase is supposed to be.

Why?