Billy Porter reveals the traumatic moment his cousin threatened to kill him if he ever came out as gay
Billy Porter (YouTube)
Billy Porter has revealed that his homophobic cousin threatened to kill him if he ever came out as gay in a traumatic incident in the 1980s.
The Pose star made the revelation while talking about a video he posted to his YouTube channel last month in which he called out homophobia and transphobia within the Black community.
Speaking to guest host Billy Eichner on Jimmy Kimmel Live, Porter said the Black community is a “very homophobic community across the board” in the United States.
“With that said, as the world has changed and as the world has shifted, the Black community is changing and shifting,” he said.
The actor and singer revealed that a friend called him after he posted the video and said he wanted Billy Porter to know that Black straight men actually love him.
His friend’s cousin said Porter’s language has to be more specific and said his video sounded like he was “just calling out all Black people”.
Billy Porter revealed that his cousin threatened to kill him if he ever came out as gay.
“I have done an addendum to that post to really specify who I’m talking to,” Porter said.
“I’m talking to homophobic, transphobic and xenophobic people in general, specifically Black people in this instance, because Black trans women are dying at the hands of Black cis men at such an alarming rate that it is the highest violence on record.”
Porter continued: “My friend called and he said, ‘You just should know’, and it was lovely because his straight male Black cis cousin was like, ‘Man I love him, my two sons, if any of them turned out gay I would love them no matter what.’
“It’s so good to hear that because my experience in the 80s was a cousin saying if I ever turned gay he would kill me, so that’s what my experience has been.
“So yeah, sometimes my trauma shows.”
Porter urged people to love each other through their differences.
“We’re human beings first,” he added.
The Pose star said the Black community’s relationship with the LGBT+ community is ‘appalling at best’.
In the video posted to YouTube last month, Porter reminded his followers that “LGBT+ Black folks are people too” and lashed out at anti-LGBT+ prejudice within the Black community.
“The Black community’s relationship with the LGBT+ community is appalling at best, and eerily similar to that of white supremacists versus Black folk,” Porter said.
“Hear me Black people and hear me well. I’m calling y’all out right here right now. You cannot expect our demands of equality to be met with any real legislative policy and change when y’all turn around and inflict the same kind of hate and oppression on us.”
