Connectedness and the Sociopolitical Involvement of Same-gender-loving Black Men

Abstract

Employing a national sample of over 800 same-gender-loving black men, we explore the relative impact of community-level support/comfort and the importance of sexual orientation and racial identity on two dependent variables—sociopolitical involvement within lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) communities and sociopolitical involvement within people of color (POC) communities. Findings indicate that feelings of connectedness to LBGT communities is the most important predictor of sociopolitical involvement within both LGBT and POC communities; while, counterintuitively, being comfortable within the LGBT community had a negative impact on the sociopolitical involvement of these men. Further, the impact of the importance of identity was negligible.