Als’s piece ‘My Mother’s Dreams for Her Son, and All Black Children’ from the New Yorker was about the writer’s experience and struggles growing up as a black queer male in America. Als talked about how his identity and his reaction towards racist incidents were shaped by early life experience. 

Als wrote,’Like any number of black boys in those neighborhoods, I grew up in a matrilineal society, where I had been taught the power—the necessity—of silence.’ Als’s mom was the primary caretaker and provider of his family, as he has an ‘only occasionally live-in father’. As a black female living in mid-twentieth-century America,  his mother did not have the energy nor the resources to take care of any possible ‘trouble’ caused by her boys while working multiple jobs and taking care of the chores at home; thus most moms in his community told their boys to stay silent and away from any event that could potentially get them into trouble, including activism. Later in the article, Als mentioned that boys in his community sometimes engage in violent political demonstrations like riots and looting, and he grew to understand that a lot of the actions weren’t performed as proof of masculinity, but rejections of the silence they had learned from their moms: the boys wanted to be heard by the world and be given the same weight as their white counterparts. Unfortunately,  they were often deprived of legitimate ways to speak up in American society, and violence appeared to be the fastest way to attract attention.

‘I don’t remember exactly how many times we moved; in those days, my focus was on trying to win people over, the better to protect my family, or—silently—trying to fend off homophobia, the better to protect myself. My being a “faggot” was one way for other people to feel better about themselves. My being a “faggot” let cops know what they weren’t.’ In this quote, Als talked about how his queer identity put him at the bottom of the hierarchy in a community oppressed by the rest of the society. He also mentioned that in many cases, it was black individuals that act as functionaries in service to power, killing, and oppressing other members of the black community. His personal experience is another manifestation of an unfortunate phenomenon- black people were incentivized to turn on,  to distance themselves from, and to pick on the ones even more marginalized within their own group, just to trade for basic safety and dignity.

Als later wrote ‘When white America asks black artists in particular to speak about race, it’s almost always from the vantage point of its being a sort of condition, or plight, and, if those collaborators can actually listen, what they want to hear is, Who are we in relation to you?’ Working as an established figure in the publishing industry, which is generally considered liberal,  Als still feels like he is just a minor supporting role in a play starred by his white colleagues- people want to hear about his miserable experiences as an African American in America, but not necessarily out of interested in him, nor are they truly dedicated to change the inequalities African Americans face; they want to hear how they fit into the narrative, and often it’s just a narcissistic and patronizing way to make themselves feel ‘cultured’.