It's a Black Thang! The Black LGBT Vote 08' A Presidential Election Forum

Emmy Award Winning Director Paris Barclay Joins Lineup

Journalist and Commentator Jasmyne Cannick and Season 3 Star of BET's College Hill Reality Series Ray Cunningham to Moderate

The Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community will come together on Wednesday, January 23, 2008 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. to hold a Presidential Election forum. The two-hour event will be held in Los Angeles before an audience in the historic African-American community of LeimertPark at the Lucy Florence Coffee House and CulturalCenter located at 3351 West 43rd Place in Los Angeles.

Entitled "It's A Black Thang! The Black LGBT Vote '08," this Forum will mark the first of its kind that features the voices and opinions of African-American LGBT persons, a community whose voice often goes unheard in both the mainstream gay community and African-American community. At the conclusion of the Forum audience members will participate in a mock vote to determine if the primary election were today, which Presidential candidate would have the Black LGBT vote.

Confirmed panelists include: Abner Mason, Executive Director of AIDS Responsibility and former President of the Log Cabin Republicans, Alan-Michael Graves, Board Member, National Black Justice Coalition, Christina Fontenot, Graduate Student, Dillard University, New Orleans, LA, Doug Spearman, Actor (Noah's Arc), Ivan Daniel, C.E.O., Ivan Daniel Productions, Jazzmun, Actor (Punks, The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Heroes), Jeffrey King, Founder, In the Meantime Men's Group, Jewel Thais-Williams, C.E.O., Catch One Night Club and Village Health Foundation, Emmy Award winning director Paris Barclay, Patrik-Ian Polk, Filmmaker (Punks, Noah's Arc), Rosalind Renfro, Partner, Soulful Touch Entertainment, and Treazure Lee, C.E.O., TreazureMag.com.

The organizers of the Forum have invited the leading Democratic and Republican candidates to participate in the Forum.

Journalist and commentator Jasmyne Cannick and Season 3 star of BET's College Hill reality series Ray Cunningham will moderate.

"African-American same-gender loving people are coping with the same issues as the overall Black community including poverty, access to education, health care, employment, and affordable housing, as well as Black female and male incarceration at disproportionately high rates compared to other races," commented co-moderator and journalist Jasmyne Cannick. "While the thought may be that gays are only concerned about gay marriage, when you're Black and gay marriage may not be the defining issue for you in comparison to putting food on the table and having a roof over your head. Hopefully this Forum will shed light on the issues that Black gays see as being most important while letting our Presidential candidates know that our voices and votes count too and that all gays aren't white and all Blacks aren't homophobic or heterosexual and our vote is not to be taken for granted or our voices ignored."

According to the Black Same-Sex Households in the United States Report authored jointly by the National Black Justice Coalition and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the 2000 Census reported that there were almost 85,000 Black same-sex couples in the United States. Some 14% of all same-sex couples who self-identified on the US Census were Black same-sex couples. In California, there were over 6,000 self-identified Black same-sex couples representing 6.1 %. While we know there are more, this number represents the number of Black same-gender loving comfortable enough to identify themselves as being such.

Despite the prejudice Black gays face due to racism and anti-gay bias, Black same-sex couples create and sustain stable families, many of them with children, and defy hurtful stereotypes of both Black people and gay and lesbian people but whose voices and opinions are often silenced in the both the gay community (racism) and in the Black community (homophobia).

The Forum is sponsored in part by LucyFlorenceCoffeeHouse & CulturalCenter, In the Meantime Men's Group, Soulful Touch Entertainment, Michelle's XXX, The Catch One, Village Health Foundation, Gentlemen's Gentlemen, TreazureMag.com, Ivan Daniel Productions, and The Advocate.

Updates on the candidate's confirmation or rejection of the invitation to participate will be forthcoming.

judythpiazza@newsblaze.com