About the National Black Justice Coalition
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Since 2003 NBJC has provided leadership at the intersection of mainstream civil rights groups and mainstream lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) organizations, advocating for the unique challenges and needs of the African-American LGBT community that are often relegated to the sidelines.
At this juncture in the organization’s development, under the leadership of its Executive Director Sharon Lettman, NBJC is seriously engaged in an evaluation, strategic planning and infrastructure strengthening process to achieve maximum impact and greatest return on investment in this unique intersection space. We are focusing intently on increasing NBJC’s capacity and infrastructure to better serve our constituents and stakeholders and more powerfully fulfill NBJC’s mission. We urge you to join us as a partner and invest in the success of NBJC’s mission and institutional capacity.
The need for NBJC is stronger than ever in the greater movement for justice and equality for all. Without authentic, meaningful representation and active participation from the African-American community, it is not possible to effectively position LGBT equality within the broader civil rights context that it deserves. This requires much more than token representation and episodic partnerships; it entails building relationships and sustained collaboration, including addressing the unintended consequences of subtle racism within the larger LGBT community that has been a barrier to full partnerships. And within the African-American community itself, the need to eradicate homophobia is critical to building acceptance and respect for our own brothers and sisters, our own families.
NBJC is simultaneously deepening its footprint at the grassroots and community level as a powerful compliment to building leadership and institutional partnerships. Homophobia, and the anti-gay oppression it engenders, has severely limited the extent to which LGBT African Americans live open lives. As NBJC moves forward, we are deepening our focus on the African-American family, putting a face on the Black LGBT community, and fostering a collective effort to accord dignity and respect to all African-American families as an important step in individual and community empowerment.
Progress on LGBT social, employment, even marriage equality issues coincides, in time, with increasing openness of LGBT people; polls have repeatedly shown that respondents who know an out LGBT person within their family, workplace, and/or social networks have increased support for policies that foster equal rights. Increasing acceptance and respect for Black LGBT people within their families and communities is essential to increasing that openness within the African-American community and gaining support for LGBT equality while forging the emotional and institutional links to the broader LGBT civil rights agenda.
