The suicide of Joseph Jefferson

By Antoine Craigwell

Joseph Jefferson, from his Facebook page

It was a text message from NYC party promoter Lee Soulja, “Sorry to deliver this info this way, but I’m at work and just got the sad news of Joseph Jefferson’s passing yesterday.” Anyone wanting to befriend 26-year-old Joseph Jefferson on his Facebook page would meet the “Add a Friend” box, but unless they knew that over the past weekend, Oct 23, he took his own life by hanging, that request would never be accepted or returned.

As a young man, Jefferson had, over the years, volunteered to help party promoters such as Soulja, James Saunders and Laurence Pinckney, and according to his Facebook page, was a young man who was interested in climbing the ladder to make something of himself. His list of favorite books all speak to rising above and persisting, and included Miguel Cervantes’ Don Quixote, Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, Becoming a Person of Influence, Jane Eyre, Donald Trump, and 48 laws of power. He graduated from NYC’s Harvey Milk High School in 2002 and in 2003 from Touro College after studying business management. As an activist and someone concerned about the Black gay community in New York City, he was involved with People Of Color in Crisis (POCC) from Sept 2004 until Aug 2009, about the time when the organization’s leaders betrayed many in the community and folded. Landing on his feet, Jefferson became involved and worked as a health promotion associate with the Charles Angel Wellness Center, a program run by Gay Men of African Descent (GMAD), from Aug 2009 to Jun 2010.

“[Jefferson] was a great young man. He worked [with] a lot of different youth programs at POCC, GMHC, and GMAD and always volunteered to help me with Black Pride and other events,” said Soulja.

Pinckney said that Saunders and GMAD are collaborating to hold an event: “Celebration of Life – Stop the Madness” at the LGBT Center on Friday, from 6 – 8pm, to raise funds to assist with Jefferson’s funeral expenses, during which those who are active in the community would speak about the crisis in the Black gay community.

“Joseph, when he worked with us, he was always so pleasant and a great person. He was one of those people who was always great to be with. For all the years I knew him, about five or six years, I never knew his name,” said Pinckney.

On his page, Jefferson’s bio seemed to hint at what he was dealing with, recognizing in his need for belonging, that there are others like him, “It is my life’s commitment to be the Supportive, Nurturing & always provide encouragement to everyone I come across. I am committed to enhancing the self-esteem of others because it has a profound effect on their values, beliefs, thinking processes.

According to Saunders, Jefferson was kind hearted, caring, and serious about everything, “He cared for the community a lot, and was the coordinator for the outreach workers with GMAD.”

Saunders said that to his understanding, after attending gatherings at his home, that he loved cats, was a smoker, but didn’t do drugs. Jefferson, Saunders said, worked and assisted with party promotions for close to 10 years, and was the type of person who always wanted to know what was happening.

“If anyone wanted him to do anything for them, he was always present and willing to help,” said Saunders.

Reports state that his family were not supportive of him, with his mother’s death about four years ago, his relationship with his father was reduced to receiving monetary handouts when needed. At one point in his life he was  homeless. Apparently, one of Jefferson’s friends also committed suicide a few years ago, and he had never quite fully recovered from the trauma.

Jefferson’s Facebook page mentioned that he was in a relationship, but despite the concerns from close friends, the person he was involved with moved in with him. The other person who was in the relationship with Jefferson was the one who discovered him hanging from within the doorway of the bathroom in the Bedford Stuyvesant apartment they shared, his body  still warm when he was cut down, sometime late Friday night or early Saturday morning. Since his death, this other person has become invisible.

Rod McCullum in Rod 2.0 mentions a comment from a friend who wanted to remain anonymous, “Joseph was truly a sweetheart. [He was] E[e]xtremely bright and impassioned about social justice causes… It’s such a loss,” adding that Jefferson seemed in good spirits and “showed no indications of being unusually depressed.”

On his Facebook page, Jefferson said that a person with “a poor self-concept can have all kinds of negative affects on a persons life [,as] T.S Eliot once said ‘Half of the harm that is done in the world is due to people who want to feel important…they do not mean to do harm[;] they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves’. Belonging is one of the basic human needs, when people feel isolated and excluded from a sense of communion with others, they suffer. I have been an advocate for my peers and most importantly youth because most have never had a deep emotional attachment to anyone. They don’t know how to love and be loved in return. The need to be loved can sometimes translate to the need to belong to someone or something. Driven by that need…Most will do anything to belong.”

There are questions: did the relationship end or were there problems in it? Was he upset about it and did not, after investing so much of himself and feeling a sense of acceptance and belonging, feel motivated or have the energy to move on and live, even to working to build another? What ever it was that caused him to take his own life, a life with so much promise and a future, would never be known.

Many in the Black gay community walk a razor edge, living their lives a daily balancing act between feeling accepted and belonging, and disappointment, betrayal or ridicule for who they are. As in the anonymous comment, many who are depressed, who have been living for years with the pain, have learned coping mechanisms and masking techniques. Often many around a person do not know that he or she is depressed, until when the pain has become too much to bear and they engage in some precipitous action. It seems that Jefferson’s behavior and attitude in life hid what was really happening in his mind from those closest to him. He chose, as many do, to struggle, and strove through working in the community, to exorcise those demons in his own mind.

Joseph and Mom, from his Facebook page

Earlier photos of Jefferson, also on his Facebook page, show that as a young man he was chubby, and begs the question about whether he was he bullied, harassed, and called names because he didn’t fit into the stereotypical image of how a gay man should look, and had survived those abuses only to succumb later on. What was raging in his head that caused him to feel as though he had no other choice than to want to remove himself from the land of the living?

James Baldwin, in his novel, “Another Country” takes his readers into the mind of Rufus and through his eyes shows the swirling conflicts raging in his head, while at the same time the decision to end it all solidifies as he makes his last journey uptown to that moment:

“The train rushed into the blackness with a phallic abandon, into the blackness, which opened their coupling…Suddenly he knew that he was never going home any more…

He felt their stares but he felt far away from them. You took the best. So why not take the rest? He got off at the station named for the bridge built to honor the father of his country…

Then he stood on the bridge, looking over, looking down…He began to walk slowly to the center of  the bridge, observing that, from this height, the city which had been so dark as he walked through it seemed to be on fire.

He stood at the center of the bridge and it was freezing cold. He raised his eyes to heaven. He thought, You bastard, you motherfucking bastard. Ain’t I your baby, too? He began to cry. Something in Rufus, which could not break, shook him like a rag doll, splashed salt water all over his face, and filled his throat and his nostrils with anguish. He knew the pain would never stop. He could never go down into the city again. He dropped his head as though someone had struck him and looked down at the water. It was cold and the water would be cold.

He was black and the water was black,

He lifted himself by his hands on the rail, lifted himself as high as he could, and leaned far out. The wind tore at him, at his head and shoulders, while something in him screamed, Why? Why? He thought of Eric. His straining arms threatened to break. I can’t make it this way. He thought of Ida. He whispered, I’m sorry, Leona, and then the wind took him, he felt himself going over, head down, the wind, the stars, the lights, the water, all rolled together, all right. He felt a shoe fly off behind him, there was nothing around him, only the wind, all right, you motherfucking Godalmighty bastard, I’m coming to you.”

by David Malebranche on Saturday, October 9, 2010 at 8:20pm

David Malebranche, MD MPH

Dear Oprah,

On a beautiful, sunny October 7th afternoon in Atlanta, Georgia, I sat down to enjoy a rare occasion where I could come home early from work to catch a new episode of your daily talk show that I have watched on and off for the better part of the past 3 decades.  Upon pressing the info button on my remote, I learned that your show would be discussing a woman who “sued her husband for 12 million and won,” after finding out he had given her the HIV virus.  To say I watched this episode unfold in horror is a profound understatement – I was uncomfortably riveted and disgusted for the entire hour.

To be quite clear, I wasn’t horrified or disgusted by the fact that this unfortunate Black woman had contracted HIV as a result of her husband’s secretive “Down Low” infidelities with other men.  As a Black gay male, physician and public health advocate who has dedicated the past 12 years of my life to the behavioral prevention and treatment of HIV in the Black community, I have heard stories like your guest’s on this day more times than I would like to admit.  To the contrary, the acidic taste of bile that coated the back of my throat as I heard her story was in response to the superficial and sensationalistic manner in which you handled the topic, and how it was apparent that you and your staff have learned absolutely nothing in the 6 years since you originally interviewed J.L. King on your “Down Low” episode in 2004.

Yes, you can claim that for this updated version of your “Down Low” show, you actually included the fact that publically “heterosexual” White men and men of other races are equally capable of having secretive homosexual affairs as their Black counterparts.  And yes, this new version of J.L. King who again opportunistically sashayed onto your stage to promote himself now uses the word “gay” to describe his sexual identity (partly as a consequence of the fame and fortune he attained from appearing on your show).  However, everything else about the show remained stuck in a metaphorical time warp in which Black women are portrayed as simple victims with no personal responsibility or accountability when it comes to their sexual behavior, and Black men are projected as nothing more than predatory liars, cheaters and “mosquito-like” vectors of disease when it comes to HIV.

I felt like I was like watching a train wreck or an car accident about to happen: it was so awful that despite wanting to turn it off, I found myself transfixed and could not bring myself to pick up the remote or change the channel.  From the ominous background music and blurred images on the screen when discussing Black men being intimate with one another (God forbid!), to your declaration that reading your guest’s husband’s sexually explicit emails and messages on gay websites “blew your mind,” the way in which your show was staged did nothing to forward the conversation on the current facts or the social context that currently drives secretive same sex behavior among Black men and the current HIV racial disparity in the United States.  Instead, what came across was a clear, fear-mongering and hyperbolic message: “Black women, look out for your husbands, they could be lying and cheating on you with other men and putting you at risk for HIV.”  It was bad enough that 6 years ago, after your original “Down Low” show, you single-handedly launched a major media and cultural hysteria where Black women across the country were now searching for signs of how they could tell if their men were “on the Down Low” through stereotypical signs and ridiculously offensive generalizations about how homosexual men think and act.  Your show also helped J.L. King and other self-proclaimed “HIV experts” make a lot of money off this capitalistic, fear-based industry to promote their books, movies and narcissistic products on the so-called “Down Low.”  It did nothing, however, but open new wounds and put salt in the old scars caused by centuries of sexual exploitation and calculated pathologizing of Black bodies in the United States and internationally.  The way you and your staff have handled this topic has done nothing but widen the already irreparable rifts between Black men and women, as well as between Black heterosexual and non-heterosexual peoples.

While I realize that this is your show’s “final season,” let me give you and your staff some suggestions on how you can better address this issue of the “Down Low” and HIV in the Black community if you ever wish to revisit this issue during this year:

1.        Please do some research on the facts explaining why so many Black women in the United States are contracting HIV. I can guarantee you that what you find will surprise you, as the vast majority of cases are not due to so-called “Down Low” Black men.  Remember that in other countries like South Africa, India, Russia and China, there are millions of HIV cases attributable to heterosexual transmission.  Ask yourselves where is the proof, outside of anecdotal stories that are splashed on your show, BET and the pages of Essence magazine, that bisexual men are primarily accountable for this horrible disparity among Black women?

2.        If you are going to tell the story of HIV in the Black community, please give equal consideration to the social context and personal story/struggles of Black men who contract the virus, regardless of whether it is through IV drug use or sexual behavior.  I can tell you for certain that if you sit down and ask these men to tell their stories, you will undoubtedly have your eyes opened to the fact that there is much more to their lives than the “predator” labels you so easily ascribe to their actions.  And believe it or not, Black men can also be “victims” of this disease when exposed through their wives or female sexual partners who don’t tell them about the other people with whom THEY have been having sex.

3.        If you are going to talk about the so-called “Down Low,” then really talk about it.  That means, be prepared to discuss how Black men are socialized in this country to believe that our manhood solely exists in our athletic prowess, entertainment value, and the size and potency of the flap of skin that dangles between our legs.  Moreover, be prepared to talk about how these manhood expectations placed on Black man are in stark contrast to the stereotypical images and expectations of “gay” men we see in the media: White men who assume a gender performance of how women are traditionally expected to act.  And then talk about our society’s pervasive disdain, hatred and religious condemnation of anything that does not fall into a heterosexual “man-woman” norm of relationships and behavior, and how this puts pressure on men to deny who they truly are for fear of rejection and isolation.  Only when you begin to scratch the surface of these dynamics can you begin to rise above your current myopic and pathologic lens through which you view and project secret homosexuality and bisexuality as an “immoral act” on your show.

4.        Have your team do better research on the notion that just because men do not disclose that they have same sex relations to their female sexual partners DOES NOT automatically mean that they are irresponsible when it comes to condom use.  Simply put, “coming out of the closet” does not mean that a formerly “Down Low” brother will increase his condom use.  I can provide you team with numerous studies to support this statement if it goes against your preconceived notions of the so-called “benefits” of “coming out.”

5.        Withhold your judgment and disdain for explicit homosexual websites until you take time to explore websites like craigslist, nudeafrica.com, xtube.com and the many others that heterosexuals are just as freaky, raunchy and sex-crazed as homosexuals are.  If you really want to read  some conversations, pictures and videos that will “blow your mind,” check out these websites and do a show on how HUMAN BEINGS are sexual creatures – instead of suggesting that homosexually active people have a monopoly on that market.

6.        Finally, if you are going to have a discourse on homosexuality or bisexuality on your show in the future, please be bold and courageous enough to tell the various sides of men’s stories.  We are not all self-loathing, secretive, unprotected sex-having, disease ridden liars.  Surely in the work you have done in the entertainment field over the past 3 decades, you have interacted with enough same gender loving men to realize that sexuality is a fluid journey for anyone, and that there are many Black homosexual men who are well-adjusted, comfortable with who we are, and at peace with our lives.

Oprah, I was so disappointed with your show and treatment of this follow up to your “Down Low” episode 6 years ago that I don’t know if I really care to watch the remainder of this, your final season.  As a seasoned journalist, you have intricately described and explored the nuances of diverse topics such as eating disorders, mental health, spirituality, violence and criminality, cultural diversity and even the benevolent nature of human beings on numerous shows.  You have approached these topics with a sensitivity and attention to detail regarding the social contexts driving human behavior, that even the most skeptical viewer can understand why some people do the things they do.  So why is it with this topic (the so-called “Down Low”), particularly when it comes to the task of actually humanizing Black men, that you and your staff appear mentally, emotionally and intellectually incapable of creating a show that shows the rich, diverse and complex experience of being a Black male and homosexual in this country?   Is it really that difficult?

As one of the most powerful human beings this country has seen in the past 30 years, and someone whose show I grew up watching, it would be nice if you realized your influence and took more personal responsibility for the quality of your shows that address serious topics like HIV in the Black community.  The careless manner in which you continue to drive a wedge between relationships among Black men and women, between heterosexuals and homosexuals in this country through your one-sided analysis of Black sexuality in your shows is reprehensible.  And I for, one, refuse to sit by idly and say nothing while you spoon feed sensationalism and fear to our community who will all too willingly eat every last drop because it comes from your hand.  I need you to do better Oprah – the world is watching.

David J. Malebranche, MD, MPH

Assistant Professor

Emory University Division of General Medicine

49 Jesse Hill Jr. Drive

Suite 413

Atlanta, GA 30303

NYU LGBT and Delta Lambda Phi host “Glowlight Vigil”

(New York, NY) – For the families of the five young men who committed suicide, September 2010 is a month and a year they would not likely ever forget. These families and others around the nation were rudely awakened to the stark reality of the effects of how vicious and callous homophobia, hatred and bullying was to their sons. By their deaths, these young men have become present day martyrs, expressing through their still, lifeless bodies, what they couldn’t say alive: giving their lives to remove the pain raging in their minds, wanting to let the hurt, rejection, and loneliness stop and drawing attention to the suffering many others endure for who they are. By their deaths, they screamed to the world that young male and gay between the ages of 13 and 20 are the most vulnerable members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. Their deaths have roused many to the perils of those who are young and struggling with their sexual identity and acceptance in today’s society.

A New York University LGBT organization and Delta Lambda Phi plan to host a “Glowlight Vigil” in Washington Square Park at 9:00pm on Sunday, Oct 3.

Below is a list of six young men who felt powerless and so devoid of hope that the only choice they felt existed was to remove themselves from this life. A common theme in all the stories surrounding the reasons why they killed themselves is focused on bullying, name-calling, homophobia and other derogatory comments against young men who were at their most fragile; their sexual identity, like a chrysalis emerging from the protection of the cocoon.

Justin Aaberg, 15, Anoka, Minnesota – Hung himself

Justin Aaberg

Justin was a talented and accomplished cellist, and a composer. On Friday, Jul 9, just weeks after completing freshman year at Anoka High, Justin hanged himself in this bedroom. His mother and two brothers found him. Tammy Aaberg said, “I touched him, because I just couldn’t believe it. I thought I was in a nightmare, and he was so cold and I just screamed and ran out and called 911.” Justin’s mother said she knew for about a year that he was gay, and feared for his safety. But, when he died, she began to hear from other students of how he was harassed and bullied at the school. Justin’s death was part of a series of seven suicides in the Anoka-Hennepin School District in the past year, where some of the students who killed themselves were gay. There are concerns that bullying at the school pushed many over the edge.

Billy Lucas

Billy Lucas, 15, Greensburg, Indiana – Hung himself

According to WXIN Fox 59, on Thursday, Sept 9, Billy’s mother found him hanging in the family’s barn. To many, it seemed as though he didn’t quite fit in. Some of his classmates said he was bullied for being different, but even though he never told anyone he was gay, he was picked on because the other students thought he was. Students told reporters that the bullying against Billy had become worse, and on the same day he died, some students had told him to “kill” himself. One student, Dillen Swango said, “They said stuff like ‘you’re like a piece of crap’ and ‘you don’t deserve to live.’ Different things like that. Talked about how he was gay or whatever.” School principal, Phil Chapple doesn’t deny that students are bullied in the high school, but he said he didn’t know Billy was one of the victims. A Facebook page dedicated as a memorial to Billy, with close to 6,000 followers included some who acknowledged that they knew he was bullied, “everyone made fun of him.” Bullying at Greensburg High School is a practice with a long history, and according to the principal, “We’re discussing where we are going. Where we are looking to establish a committee.” One former student, who did not want to be identified, said that he was bullied several times because he is gay, “I was gay. I was called f**, queer. [i] was thrown up against lockers. I would tell the school officials about it and they would dismiss it. I can’t help but take it personally because when all of this was happening to me I was the same age he was. I also attempted to commit suicide.”

Asher Brown, 13, Cypress, Texas – Shot himself

Asher Brown

According to the Houston Chronicle, on Thursday, Sept 21 at about 4:30 pm Asher used his stepfather’s 9mm Bereta and shot himself in the head, leaving a note. The family said that in the morning he told his stepfather that he was gay. But the family said that Asher was constantly harassed by four students at the Hamilton Middle School in the Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District, he was “bullied to death” — picked on for his small size, his religion and because he did not wear designer clothes and shoes. His mother and stepfather said that while some of the kids accused him of being gay, others performed mock gay acts on him in his physical education class. The parents said they complained to school officials who did nothing. School officials said that they had not received any complaints, which angered Asher’s parents, who called for justice and suggested a cover up to protect the four students who constantly bullied their son. But comments from other parents and students on a Website for a local television station, KRIV-TV Channel 26, said that Asher had been bullied for several years with school officials doing nothing to stop it. The day before his death, Asher reported to his parents that another student tripped him as he walked down a flight of stairs at the school, and when he hit the stairway landing and went to retrieve his book bag, the other student kicked his books out of reach and then kicked Asher down the remaining flight of stairs.

Seth Walsh

Seth Walsh, 13, Tehachapi, California – Hung himself

Seth loved to sing and dance, swim, and perhaps most of all, laugh, The Bakersfield Californian reported. He also had big plans, together with his best friend, Jamie Elaine Phillips, they were going to travel to France when they were adults. CBS News Crimesider reported that on Sunday, Sept 19, Seth hanged himself from a tree in the back yard of his home. He was discovered unconscious, cut down and rushed to hospital where he remained on life support for eight days, finally succumbing to his injuries in the afternoon of Monday, Sept 27. Friends told NBC affiliate KGET that Seth had been picked on for years because he was gay. Some of the young people who taunted Seth the day he hanged himself said that they did not think their actions constituted a crime. “Several of the kids that we talked to broke down into tears,” Jeff Kermode, Tehachapi Police Chief, said. “They had never expected an outcome such as this.” While reports state that on the day he hung himself, he had encountered a group of teens in a park; details of what transpired remain unclear. Seth’s grandparents confirmed Thursday that their grandson was gay, and had known he was gay since he was in the third grade. Kermode said an ongoing investigation has determined Seth was bullied for at least the past two years. While bullying itself is not a crime, police are looking at any underlying crimes that may have occurred, such as assault, vandalism or criminal threats. According to TehachapiNews.com, Seth’s mother, Judy Walsh said, “He was different. He knew he was different. He was a very loving boy, very kind. He had a beautiful smile. He liked fashion, his friends, talking on the phone. He was artistic and very bright.” She hopes her son’s death is a wake up call to the community to “develop more tolerance for different people.”

Tyler Clementi, 18, Ridgewood, New Jersey – Jumped off the George Washington Bridge, NYC

Tyler Clementi

Sometime on Wednesday, Sept 22, Tyler jumped from the George Washington Bridge, which spans the Hudson River, linking New York with New Jersey. When his body was recovered, according to the New York Daily News, the 18-year-old’s cause of death was suicide by drowning. Tyler’s final act came three days after another 18-year-old, with whom he shared a dorm room at Rutgers University. filmed and broadcasted live on the Internet Tyler having some type of sex with another man in his room. The roommate, Dharum Ravi and another student, 18-year-old Molly Wei, who were involved in the filming and broadcasting, was arrested and charged with invasion of privacy, but following the recovery of Tyler’s body, mention has been made of upgrading the charges to classify the action by Ravi and Wei as a hate crime. On his Facebook page, Tyler posted a note mentioning what he intended to do. Subsequent reports state that it wasn’t the first time this had happened and that Tyler had complained to university officials, and even to posted comments on a gay Website.

raymond chase

Raymond Chase, 19, Monticello, New York – Hung himself

Described as an energetic and lively young man, Raymond, an African-American 19-year-old college sophomore was discovered hanging in his dorm room on the campus of Johnson & Wales University in Providence, RI. Raymond who was from Monticello, NY was studying culinary arts. Details about what led him to take his own life are as yet unavailable.