Another
View Takes A Daring Look
at African-Americans and Homosexuality in
Alicia
and Saundra
(1701)
Another
View takes a daring look at gay rights
and the African American experience. This special
edition of Another View will feature
a black lesbian couple who along with six other
gay and lesbian couples have filed suit against
the state of New Jersey to legalize same sex marriages.
Another View will also explore the
murder or Sakia Gunn. In May of 2003 15 year-old
Gunn was stabbed to death on the corner of Broad
and Market Streets in Newark, NJ after rebuffing
advances from 29-year old Richard McCollough by
saying she was a lesbian. Gunn is perhaps the
youngest African-American woman on record to be
murdered because she was a lesbian. More than
3,000 people attended the star basketball player's
funeral, most of them gays and lesbians.
Since
then, the lesbian and gay community in Newark,
NJ and surrounding areas have formed three support
groups for gays and lesbians including a local
chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians
and Gays (PFLAG). Poet Amiri Barka has also joined
the cause and will share his thoughts on the season's
premiere. His daughter Shani Baraka, a lesbian,
was murdered in August 2003. Though her murder
was not a bias crime, he has been pushing an agenda
to stop the violence against all women and has
been speaking on behalf of gays and lesbians ever
since.
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