The Rejected to INBLK: Who Gets to Control the LGBTQ+ Conversation?
- 10 hours ago
- 4 min read
Long before LGBTQ+ people had podcasts, YouTube, livestreams and social media, folks were already talking about us. Doctors talked about us. Churches talked about us. Politicians talked about us. The media talked about us. Everybody had something to say, but the people actually living the experience weren't always controlling the conversation.
That's what makes the 1961 documentary The Rejected, produced by John W. Reavis Jr. for San Francisco public television station KQED, so interesting. The documentary was groundbreaking for its time because it brought a serious conversation about homosexuality directly into American homes. But watching it today is also a reminder of just how differently gay people were viewed and discussed.
And baby, some of those conversations were WILD by today's standards.
The documentary brings together doctors, religious leaders, legal professionals and other experts to basically ask: Why are people gay? Is homosexuality an illness? Can gay people change? Should homosexual behavior be illegal? And how should society deal with homosexual people? In other words, everybody was trying to figure the gays out.
But then something important happens. Members of the Mattachine Society, one of America's earliest gay-rights organizations, get an opportunity to speak for themselves. Instead of everybody else explaining gay people, actual gay men are sitting in front of the camera discussing their lives, discrimination and stereotypes. In 1961, that was major.
Now fast-forward more than 60 years, and that's where I Am Me Inc.'s INBLK series comes into the conversation.
INBLK takes that idea a step further. Instead of waiting for somebody else to invite us into conversations about LGBTQ+ people, we create the conversation ourselves. We choose the topics, turn on the cameras, grab the microphones and sometimes ask the questions people are scared to ask out loud.
And in our own way, I Am Me Inc. is making history with INBLK. We're creating and documenting real conversations from today's LGBTQ+ community, with a special focus on voices and perspectives that haven't always been centered in mainstream LGBTQ+ media. These conversations aren't just content for today. They are becoming part of the record of what Black LGBTQ+ people, our community and our allies were thinking, experiencing and talking about during this moment in history.
INBLK gives LGBTQ+ people and allies a space to talk about race, sexuality, gender, relationships, religion, politics and what's really happening in our communities. Sometimes we agree. Sometimes we don't. Sometimes somebody says something that makes the whole panel go, "Wait...WHAT?" That's okay. Real conversations aren't always comfortable.
And there's another major difference. Black LGBTQ+ voices weren't centered in The Rejected. With INBLK, we're not sitting on the sidelines. We're at the table. Our Blackness doesn't disappear because we're LGBTQ+, and our LGBTQ+ identities don't disappear when we're talking about issues affecting the Black community.
Who You'll Hear in The Rejected
As you watch the video we've included in this blog, here are a few people and conversations to pay attention to:
Dr. Margaret Mead, a well-known anthropologist, talks about homosexuality across different societies and cultures. One of the interesting points she raises is how much society and culture influence the way homosexuality is viewed and treated.
Dr. Karl Bowman, a psychiatrist and former president of the American Psychiatric Association, discusses sexuality, possible causes of homosexuality, whether it could be changed and whether punishment was an appropriate response.
Hal Call, Don Lucas and Les Fisher of the Mattachine Society bring something different to the program: gay men speaking about themselves. They discuss stereotypes, discrimination, marriage as a possible "cover," laws affecting gay people and the reality that gay people lived everywhere, not just in big cities like San Francisco and New York.
Bishop James Pike and Rabbi Alvin Fine bring religion into the conversation, showing how religious leaders of the time were trying to make sense of homosexuality and how gay people should be treated.
Legal voices including J. Albert Hutchinson and Morris Lowenthal debate whether private consensual homosexual behavior should remain criminalized. Their exchange is especially interesting because you can hear arguments about government, morality and LGBTQ+ lives that still have echoes today.
And while you're watching, pay attention to what's missing too. This conversation is heavily centered around gay men. It doesn't represent the full LGBTQ+ community we understand today, which makes the contrast with modern platforms even more noticeable.
Watch It for Yourself
We've included the video right here in this blog because reading about The Rejected and actually watching it are two different experiences.
Listen to the terminology. Listen to the questions. Watch who gets treated as the "expert." Then pay close attention when the gay men finally get the opportunity to speak for themselves.
Some moments might make you uncomfortable. Some might have you saying, "Wait...they really said that on TV?" And others may have you wondering why a few of these debates still sound familiar more than 60 years later.
That's why INBLK matters.
Years from now, somebody could look back at the conversations we're having today the same way we're looking back at The Rejected. They'll see what we were talking about, what we were fighting for, what we disagreed about, what made us laugh and what mattered to our community.
That's history too.
The Rejected represents a time when gay people were beginning to get a seat at a table where everybody was already discussing them.
I Am Me Inc. is making history with INBLK by making sure we're not just being talked about. We're documenting our voices, telling our stories and having the conversations ourselves.
We aren't waiting for somebody to give us a seat.
We're building our own damn table.
Pull up a chair.
Let's talk.
Get Involved!!
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We hope our monthly educational blog, released on the first Monday of each month, has provided you with valuable insights into the lives and experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals throughout history. Understanding history is vital as it illuminates our experiences, contributions, and the societal changes that are needed. If you have suggestions for someone to feature or are interested in creating an I Am Me History Blog, please contact Peirrce M. at peirrce@iammecorp.org.
Thank you for dedicating time to History!
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