BLACK BROTHERS ESTEEM
Twenty-Five Years of Black Excellence
By Preston Vargas, Ph.D, Director of Black Health at San Francisco AIDS Foundation
For twenty-five years, Black folks in the Bay Area have said that in their time of need they found their way to Black Brothers Esteem (BBE) at San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF). Yet what if, in all actuality, BBE had been calling to them all along?
The soul of our community reaches out for those who feel the need for a support network, a community, a legacy of Black excellence. As Black same-gender loving men, we have come together for more than two decades with our unique lived experiences, different embodiments of gender, and varying ages. To date, BBE is one of the longest surviving intentional communities for Black same-gender loving men, cis and trans, and non-binary people in San Francisco. It is one of San Francisco AIDS Foundation’s longest running programs.
Black Brothers Esteem was founded in 1996. During that time, HIV-related deaths were disproportionately impacting Black LGBTQ+ communities. Our Black queer establishments and community havens were shrinking and given less consideration and support than white gay men’s communities. So, rather than wait for any leftover resources to trickle into our communities, a small group of Black men came together to create for ourselves what we knew we deserved. These brothers created BBE, a community that supports and empowers same-gender loving African American men living with HIV or those at risk of transmission.
When our community members reflected on what it takes to build and sustain a flourishing intentional community for twenty-five years we dove into some hard truths. Reflecting on our challenges, successes, and growth, BBE member Ron Lewis stated, “Any group that has gone on two decades or more, they can say some of the same things about what I’ve experienced.” As a group of primarily Black men, we’ve grappled with these tough moments and became honest about how we engage the external systems of oppression, the wounds we may carry, and the internalized oppression that might threaten us.
Black men are indoctrinated into a world that encourages Black men to wound each other. It is part of our commitment to step out of hyperindividualism and be transparent with each other as we each embark on our self-discovery. In doing so, our approaches to use internal conflict as opportunities for restorative justice and growth have awarded us with the skills we’ve needed to survive an ever-changing landscape—the early decades of the HIV epidemic, the gentrification of San Francisco, racially motivated violence against African Americans, and most recently the COVID-19 pandemic.
These are the gritty parts of life that have emboldened us. BBE member Ms. December Wright would say, “So is life and the beat goes on.” When life complexifies, we find the beat. We find the rhythm that draws us back into enjoying our lives. If we can’t find a beat, well then we create one!
Friday night you can join us for karaoke, dominoes, Family Feud, or a movie screening during our Movie and Game Night. Or maybe a Friday evening with leading Bay Area health professionals at our Ask the Experts is more your style, with discussion about HIV health, generational attitudes towards PrEP (medications used to prevent the spread of HIV in people who have not yet been exposed to HIV), or the science of U=U (which has shown that people with HIV who have an undetectable viral load cannot sexually transmit the virus to others).
Our Outreach teams are active each week on social media spreading encouragement and positivity, and in community in the Tenderloin, Fillmore, SOMA, and Civic Center districts passing out safer sex supplies, event flyers, PrEP or HIV medication enrollment information, and sexually transmitted infection testing appointment slips encouraging folks to test early and often. Our monthly excursion Something New has us out together as a proud group enjoying the City’s delights with free tickets to the theater, a San Francisco Giant’s game, or trip to Six Flags. And on our weekday afternoons you could find comfort in sharing Black queer literature at Brothers Who Read or bringing forward your experiences of Blackness and queerness to community at Phoenix Rising. Together we celebrate the big moments with grand events for Juneteenth, Pride festivals, Kwanzaa, and National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day just to name a few. When we come together we bring in those rhythms of solidarity and purpose with some food, good music, keen intellect, and healthy, clear boundaries.
The world should know that COVID-19 did not and could not stop us. The lessons we learned in those first years of the AIDS epidemic and the subsequent decades since haveguided us. When shelter-in-place went into effect, we went digital. We supplied our community members with smartphones and technology training and we glided into virtual gatherings and events. We shared food resources, personal protective equipment, Black-centered COVID-19 education, and opportunities to connect with one another. We grieved together and held vigil as we lost some community members. And yes, we were often visited by the post-traumatic stress from our experiences with AIDS, isolation, and racist health disparities in our communities. Yet we moved through it together. Another BBE member Rufus Harris reminds us, “we all do things together as a group. It is better that way, together, than one person at a time.”
As a family and a community it is our responsibility and our honor to support movements, policies, and efforts that increase the support, liberation, and empowerment of Black LGBTQI+ folks. We recognize the importance of civic engagement in order to protect our liberties as Black people. So, we work to empower our community members to make informed decisions. As BBE member Rickey Beard notes, we have differences yet we listen for the similarities. “We put our principles before personalities and we are able to do together what we cannot do alone.” It is one of our practices to honor the individual while collectively uplifting ourselves as a community. We strive to embody this whether it is when we engage in anti-oppression work, facilitate civic engagement gatherings, or when our BBE Goodwill team visits our folks living in nursing homes, transitional care, or hospice.
Like many Black-prioritized groups we were embodying diversity, equity and inclusion long before it was popular to do so. As our own organization of SFAF developed a strategic plan to center the prioritized communities of BIPOC and Queer and Trans People of Color, BBE’s Steering Committee and long-term members guided the decision making processes regarding BBE’s community priorities and engagements. We experimented with how to weave our community offerings with what leading Black HIV advocates and policy makers from across the U.S., including those at SFAF, had set forth in We The People; A Black Plan to End HIV.
Now, coming into our 25th year, Black Brothers Esteem is one of the pillars of SFAF’s first Black Health portfolio; an intentional community of programs and services created and led by Black community members for Black community members. We are excited to be part of the dream that this portfolio will further the work of Black Brothers Esteem, Translife, and other seedling communities.
To see our dream of a community be born, grow, and branch off into new communities has been a profound joy. It is our dream to continue growing and evolving. To continue igniting and sustaining change. To continue to contribute to the creation of liberatory movements for Black and brown folks. This is about our community, our power, and our liberation.
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@STAF.ORG, IG: @BBE.SF
