"black./womyn.:conversations..." helen on...

helen talks about the hardship she has had in relationships due to her disabilty...part of a new documentary on lesbians of African descent...coming soon!.

"black./womyn.:conversations..." will be a feature length docu-film that will concern lesbians of African descent living in the U.S. It will include over 50 interviews with black lesbians of all ages /classes /nationalities/locations discussing a variety of topics including coming out, sexuality and religion, love and relationships, patriarchy, visibility in media, among others as well as a series of short vignettes representing the topics discussed. I'm hoping to provide a film that can encourage progressive dialogue between people on dealing with the image of the black lesbian and the stereotype that come with who black lesbians are portrayed to be. I hope to encourage conversation between black lesbians dealing with class and age, and the lack of communication between these groups and how that affects the overall unity between black lesbians as a group in society.

www.myspace.com/tionamproductions

check for updates:

http://blackwomynconversations.blogspot.com/

There was a woman

that I was dating

and um, she told me,

--and this was the first time I ever questioned my disability

and the impact it had on my social life--

she said "Helen, I um, can't be with you 100%.

I do love you, I do care for you,

but I can't be with you 100%"

And I said "why?"

She would never say it.

I said "because of my disability?"

She said "yes".

So I felt like, felt at that point,

that if she was honest enough to tell me that,

then most people are thinking that,

that I'm only gonna give her but so much

_as she's going to be able to give me.

Um, so, it's real difficult.

It's real difficult.

I mean, yeah I meet women,

I love women, I love beautiful women,

but when I started to see that it's not, this is not for me,

I'm just going to y'know let you go

and that's just about mine,

I have no problems with that,

but I think that the black, black women, or black lesbians, or whatever you wanna call us,

we are fearful of the unknown.

To look at me, you don't know what this is.

So you're afraid of it,

cause you're not familiar with it.

So it makes you more, um,

you know, when we are afraid of things,

we try to stay away from them,

instead of trying to, to get the knowledge of what that is,

or what that person is,

or what that disability is,

or why that person is the way they are.

So we have a tendency to run away from things that are unfamiliar and that we're afraid of.