Girl on Girl Love?

I know it can’t just be me, but for the past few years I’ve been noticing a disturbing trend among mostly some African-American women. Sometimes my thinking can be a little unorthodox. This might be one of those times. Recently I was out to dinner with my twin goddaughters, their mother and brother, and I noticed a couple sitting at the table next to us. She was light-skinned twenty-something woman with shoulder length black hair. I wouldn’t have paid them much mind except she had a mustache which kept drawing my attention to her face. Her other half had left and when He returned to the table, I realized that He was a She--slim build, locks at the nape of the neck left hanging and some in the top swooped up into a ponytail. “She” had on a white t-shirt, and slim jeans—a common outfit among African-American males. I asked my friend if she thought they were a couple and she said yes which confirmed my thinking, but there was no proof. They could have just been two friends out having dinner, but this phenomenon was something that I’ve witnessed frequently and there was no doubt that the two were a couple. Now before we get to the part about me being anti gay and anti lesbian, I’m not. People love who they love.

What’s disturbing about this trend is not the same-sex relationships, but the nature of the relationship. In the type of couplings that I’m speaking of, the “male” tries especially hard to evoke his manhood from the haircut, to the style of dress complete with sagging jeans and boxers showing, to the way He takes the lead in the relationship. One couple was shopping. He paid for the shoes and carried the boxes. Another twosome was sitting so close at the table that they only need one seat. This isn’t Nick and Jules in The Kids Are Alright or Hillary Swank in Boys Don’t Cry. This is Snoop from The Wire in real life, and they’re trying hard to imitate heterosexual couples. It’s like they’re playing dress-up, only they believe that it’s the real thing.

With all of the negative statistics about the state of black male/female relationships, I wonder if some women have resigned themselves to not having a “real” man so this is the next best thing to one. I’ve seen lesbian couples of different nationalities, but only among African-Americans have I seen this level of hyper masculinity that screams, “Look at me! And that’s what concerns me. Who’s trying to dupe who? Are the “males” transgender or gay? Are the females lesbian, bisexual or something else? Is this self-expression? Is it proof that sexuality is fluid and not stagnant like we’ve been taught to believe? Or is this another way to castrate the Black male image?