Cobb

Mr Cobb. After looking over your website i cannot find the proper forum to post this subject but i really would like some feedback, pro or con on it.

Did anyone see the Oprah Show which featured a man who introduced the term,'Down Low'to the masses? The term is known in the sub culture it is composed of as "D.L." Basically, according to the tall, nice-looking, 'married with kids,' hetero -black man on Oprah's stage, "D.L." is a lifestyle where heterosexual men who have basic American lives with careers, families, children, BMWs or Saturans, and who happend to have quick homosexual 'trists' on the sly.

When Oprah asked him if he consierd himself gay, he quickly answered "Not at all. We are not involved in any way with the gay lifestyle nor associate with gay men per se. This is just a spontaneous sex act that happens, and doesn't affect our life in any other way."

He also told Oprah."I can spot another man who is DL. We can make discrete contact with our eyes. I can do it now with someone in your audience and no one would know but us."

Can anyone comment? Is this for real? Is the guy kidding himself? Is this a secret that only DLs know about who have an underground secret societ that is functioning alive and well with the knowlege of their wives or significant others?

I know several men on the DL, well it's more accurate to say that I discovered that some of my friends were. In each case, it was someone who never appeared to be anyone 'gay' but who I had known to be accused of being a 'fag' - denied, of course.

The DL is real, and so is the secrecy. The secrecy is not impenetrable but it's just as good as any other kind of cheating on spouses. Probably better because the very idea of a certain kind of black man being gay just doesn't hold.

I know a man who chose the particular neighborhood where he lived because it was off the beaten path. Not a lot of traffic; that way particularly nobody notices the men who come by.

When the NYT published its story, I wrote this little thing. I think that the DL is just what you would expect it to be given many blackfolks attitudes to gays. Some of the ugliest stuff I've heard in public said about gay men came from black ministers.

I should also say, 'in the interests of full disclosure' that the man who was my best friend between 1978 and 1983 was gay. We hung out together all the time and I never knew, nor did any of our friends. Interestingly enough, I practically broke in on him and his 'cousin' one evening and they actually convinced me that they had been working out with weights. I'll write more about it..

Your comments enlightened me. Thanks, Michael. Then it seems that staying in the closet is the more desirable choice, as well as pragmatic and exigent, in the black community because you said because of its endemic, (judgmental) religiosity. Btw, when you found out your best friend was gay, what was your response?
Were you shocked? Or did you review the clues?

I can sympathize with these men's dilemma but are they really "gay,per se?" ie, They live as normal family men, so technically, they are bisexual. (Altho, one can't be half pregnant.)

Q? is DL as a phenomenon indigenous to the black community because of the more intense prejudice against gay men, or it is also as prevalent among other demographics? I can readily understand why a person would not wish to be labeled as a gay man, due to the social alienation the terms "homo, fag" et al, may engender.

For the same reason, many Jews and blacks have lived (and are living) their entire as WASPs.
To wit, arent these Americans in a sense, also DL?

Your comments enlightened me. Thanks, Michael. Then it seems that staying in the closet is the more desirable choice, as well as pragmatic and exigent, in the black community because you said because of its endemic, (judgmental) religiosity. Btw, when you found out your best friend was gay, what was your response?
Were you shocked? Or did you review the clues?

I can sympathize with these men's dilemma but are they really "gay,per se?" ie, They live as normal family men, so technically, they are bisexual. (Altho, one can't be half pregnant.)

Q? is DL as a phenomenon indigenous to the black community because of the more intense prejudice against gay men, or it is also as prevalent among other demographics? I can readily understand why a person would not wish to be labeled as a gay man, due to the social alienation the terms "homo, fag" et al, may engender.

For the same reason, many Jews and blacks have lived (and are living) their entire as WASPs.
To wit, arent these Americans in a sense, also DL?

maybe I can help with some clarity by using the following quote: I can spot another man who is DL. We can make discrete contact with our eyes. I can do it now with someone in your audience and no one would know but us." This is commonly known as gaydar. Hello people wake up!

Men on the DL, I know a few, i feel sorry for all of them. Sorry because they cannot be themselves and it's one of our most important rights.

They cannot be themselves because number one, religion has millions of people caught in a web of fear, confusion and shame. While they do it themselves. Number two, America is not quite ready for all this and the government has also brainwashed most into believing that they have or should have anything to say about behaviors mandated through religion. Government has no business in straight, gay or any other kind(s) of people's bedrooms. Number three, DL is 100% about the black community because white men who have sex with men, did not start identifying as being on the DL. African American men coined this phrase
white men and other races of men are simply in the closet, in denial, and some of these are bi-sexual.

Being bi-sexual denotes that you accept and share this reality with your partners.

On the DL is forced on our brothers because on top of the church and government it is very hard to grow up in any African American family and at some point in your mid-teens announce that you think you are bi-sexual or possibly 100% gay. Many times they become homeless youth that then turn to drugs and selling themselves to survive.

Love is The Message

Hi, I noticed you were talking about bisexual issues at this site
Please feel free to submit your site to shdir.com (if im mistaken, im very sorry, it's a semi-auto program to find relevant sites ;-)