No matter my personal opinion about this event is it not all a cluster fuck.  There are good things that come from this event, there are good people who plan, work and attend this event.

While Black BEAT might still be salvageable, I’ve lost my desire to bail water of the boat that is sinking.

Perhaps sharing what is good might convince someone(s) else to take my bucket.

Black and Brown and all hues of PEOPLE!

Three courageous women took on a challenge a decade ago and filled a void that still exists, its just that the void envelopes you less because they had a vizion.  I am forever grateful for that vizion.

That vizion of FUBU gives people a safer place to be their authentic selves. That is never a bad thing in my neck of the woods.

In 2014 it was especially gratifying to me because I saw even more people who I could relate and identify with on many more levels. There appeared to be a bigger effort to reach out and embrace more who are not hetero while at the same time holding onto the historic hetero attendees.

Watching the men of ONYX walk the hall on my left and members of the LGBQTIAA community walk the hall on my right infused my soul with so much hope and love. As I continue to move to be my most authentic self embracing my unique sexuality which is so varied and inspired in so many ways, seeing so many colors of that PRIDE rainbow in the halls brought tears to my eyes.

If Black BEAT gave people of color a safer place to exist extending that armor to others is a natural and overdue progression.

Each One Teach One

If other events I’ve spoken of here at Vizionz are the party of the century, Black BEAT is kinky college in a sense.  For me as an individual learning comes not just in a model workshop environment. My greatest growth in the past four days didn’t come from a workshop, it came from fellowship and communicating with those I love.

My presence in those workshops though increased my kink IQ, my humanity IQ, and my personal emotional IQ.   I walked into an electricity workshop and finally found an implement that did not make my vagina wet when attached to my body.  I sat in an informal gathering of other attendees who shared their stories of survival and got to a point where the words it is okay were able to come from my mouth and my heart. I sat in the same room on a different day and I got to speak on the “cause” that feeds me these days, self definition.

I grew this weekend.  I grew almost as much as my son seems to have grown in my absence.  That doesn’t happen by accident. It is a purposeful design that I applaud.  Willful ignorance is appalling to me.  Black BEAT gives the individual the opportunity to expand their mind and the benefit of that cannot be measured.

Aphrodite Brown