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The last time I was on television, I made a reality show.
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
I had recently come out, and I was still dealing
with a lot of, like, internalized homophobia,
and I was incessantly cheating on someone that I love very much.
And I wasn't being the man I knew I could be.
So, I had this idea that if I document everything
I'm most ashamed of, and release that out into the world,
maybe that could help me release some of my own shame.
And I was really proud of the show that I made.
And after it came out, I checked Twitter
to see if maybe it connected with someone else
who might have been going through the same thing
I was going through, and the first thing I read was,
"Why this nigga Jerrod got a white boyfriend?"
And that's on me, I fucked up.
I got so caught up in homophobia, I forgot about racism.
Now, I don't know if any of you
have ever been bullied online by a group of gay Black men,
but let me tell you, it's not fun.
They were so mean to me, y'all.
Like, I saw a tweet, somebody posted a picture
of a white man holding a raccoon
and it said, "Look, there go Jerrod and his boyfriend."
It was devastating. Kind of funny.
That's what made it worse. And I read all of this shit.
I couldn't look away.
I read every word. I know what you're thinking.
"Just put your phone down, Jerrod, you don't need this shit." I couldn't.
You ever, like, hear celebrities say shit like,
"Oh, I don't really check Twitter.
I don't read the comments." They're lying to you.
Everyone reads every word, even the reclusive celebrities.
Like, if you wanna get a message to Daniel Day-Lewis,
all you gotta do is tweet:
"Hey, Daniel Day-Lewis, fuck you." And he's gonna read that shit.
People were saying, like, such personal shit
about me, and my life, and my sex life.
Somebody said that I hate myself,
I hate Black men, and that I only hooked up
with white men, and that's not true.
I'm here to tell y'all that is not true. I've hooked up with plenty of Black men.
It's just that my type of Black man tends to be pretty masculine.
So, sometimes I find myself in these sexually competitive situations
where neither one of us wants to submit.
So, we end up, like, holding our dicks in a Mexican standoff.
Just being like, "Alright, alright, you suck my dick."
"No, nigga, you suck my dick."
"Alright, 69 on three."
This shit went on for weeks.
I read so much about myself for many, many weeks,
and I started spiraling.
Like, it was hurting my feelings and I needed to do something.
So, I started seeing a Black therapist to figure out why I got a white boyfriend.
Session one, I'm not gonna lie, I came in hot.
I kicked in her door, I was like, "Tell me, am I Clarence Thomas?"
And she was like, "Okay." She was like, "Relax, Jerrod.
Take your coat off. Get comfortable."
And she asked me what was wrong,
and I told her that the internet was being mean to me.
And she said, "What are they saying?"
And I just read someone tweeted that the reason I have a white boyfriend
is because I have an inferiority complex to white people.
And my therapist lit up.
She was like, "Well, let's explore that, Jerrod.
"Take me through your childhood.
"Tell me your relationship with white people.
Have you ever felt inferior?"
And I thought about it really for the first time.
I was like, huh.
Like, just thinking about my childhood, like,
my neighborhood was basically all Black.
My elementary school actually seemed like an experiment
done by the NAACP.
For real, they played Whitney Houston's national anthem every morning.
Isn't that crazy?
My grandma worked in a cafeteria there. All my neighbors were all Black,
except, I remember there was one white family
who lived in a house at the end of my dead-end street.
But all of them-- this is true--
all of them suffered from some form of mental disability.
So, I told my therapist,
I don't think I have an inferiority complex,
'cause for the first 13 years of my life, I thought all white people were retarded.
I actually did. I really did. I did. The first white film I ever saw
was Forrest Gump, and I was just staring at the screen like,
"Man, how are white people functioning in the world,
and they're so, so retarded?"
You know what didn't feel good?
Having Black people mad at me.
Yeah, you ever been through that?
It doesn't feel good. No, no one can handle that.
Like, and what feels great is when Black people like you.
Like, I was walking down the street the other day,
and a Black dude just rolled down his window,
and he was like, "Hey, I see you."
Who, me? You see me?
I stood up straight, and you know how it made me feel?
Seen. I felt seen. I love Black people's approval.
Don't get me wrong, I like white people's approval, too.
White approval makes me feel financially secure.
I want Black people to like me, but one white lady
from HBO liked me, and I've been a multi-millionaire ever since.
So, it's different.
Thank you. Thank you. I'll let her know.
I was really anxious. I'm an anxious person.
I have a really specific brand of anxiety.
I'm my most anxious when everything's peaceful.
Like, when things are going good, that's when I'm really nervous.
I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I think if I lived here in New York on 9/11, that would have been
an emotionally validating experience for me.
No, I'll tell you why. 'Cause I would've walked outside.
It would have been a peaceful day, birds chirping.
Then all of a sudden, a plane crashes into a building
and my first thought would be,
"I told you motherfuckers some shit was going down."
That's what's happening in my heart, I'm nervous.
And I bring that anxiety to my relationship.
I'm the anxious one in my relationship.
'Cause what's crazy about love
is that when someone tells you they love you,
you just have to take their word for it.
That's crazy. That's not crazy to y'all?
That's insane. I need more proof than that.
I'll be waking my boyfriend up in the middle of the night.
Like, "Do you love me?" Just like shaking him,
like, trying to catch him off-guard.
I understand weddings.
I didn't like weddings in my youth.
I used to rebel against them. I used to get mad
when my friends invited me to their wedding.
I'd be like, "Why you invite me to this mid-show?
"The chicken's dry. You playing top 40 hits.
"I had to book a flight to watch you make a decision?
Like, I came all this way to watch you slow dance with your father? Fuck you."
That's how I used to feel. That's before falling in love.
Now, I realize that the point of a wedding isn't the party.
The reason you have a wedding is for the witnesses.
That's why you have a wedding.
A wedding is a time where you get the person
who claims that they love you to stand right here beside you.
You invite everybody you ever met before in your entire life.
Your family's there. His family's there.
You invite doormen from buildings you don't even live in anymore.
They're all there.
And you get all your best friends to line up behind you
just to stare at this motherfucker.
The whole point of the ceremony
is for you to turn to them and say,
"Hey, what's that shit you were saying about you love me?
"No, tell them. Your auntie flew out.
"Tell your auntie how you said you want to die with me.
Say it. 'Till death.'"
That's why you have a wedding. Alright.
I understand it now because I'm in love and I want to get married.
Yeah, I do, I do.
I love my boyfriend a lot, he's my best friend.
Like, I like every moment with him.
I like laying in his lap while he plays Mario.
I hope we're together forever.
We just had an anniversary on January 6th.
Yeah.
He insurrected my heart.
He doesn't like when I say that, but I like that.
And it's so new to me, it's so exciting. You know, like, he's my equal.
And that's really important that you be with your equal.
Don't get me wrong, we're different.
We have a lot of differences. We grew up differently.
We listen to different types of music.
I grew up listening to a lot of rap, a lot of Jay-Z.
So, all of my favorite songs are usually about a drug dealer
with a gun who did what he had to do to survive.
And my boyfriend grew up listening to a lot of Bjork.
And, like, Joanna Newsom.
So, all of his favorite songs are about a sparrow getting an abortion.
So, we're very different.
But I think we are equals, and that's important.
It's important that you be with your equal.
You have to, 'cause if you feel like the lucky one,
that means you're getting cheated on.
And if you know they're the lucky one,
you're just constantly looking for a way out.
So, you have to be equals.
My boyfriend and I are equals.
I'm rich and he's white, so we're equals. That's even.
Even Stevens.
But I can't help but compare myself to him all the time.
Anything my boyfriend does to better himself,
I take as a personal indictment against me.
Like if he gets out of bed before me in the morning,
I feel like a lazy piece of shit.
This is the best example I can think of.
We bought a waffle maker from Williams-Sonoma
'cause I love waffles.
I love waffle day.
I get excited the night before. I ask my boyfriend,
like, "You're gonna make waffles tomorrow?"
He's like, "Yeah." I get my eight hours,
and I wake up so happy, it's like Christmas.
We go downstairs and my boyfriend cooks the waffles,
and then we plate our waffles differently.
What I like to do, I take my waffles and I rip 'em up into little pieces.
And I make a little, little waffle mountain,
just like a crumbled waffle mountain.
Then, I melt half a pot of Kerrygold butter,
-and I drench the waffles... -Yes!
...in butter, and then I find the cheapest syrup I can find.
None of that, like, organic, grade-A maple bullshit.
I mean, like Log Cabin.
I like that shit.
And then, I just drench the waffles in Log Cabin.
Then, I put the plate in the microwave for 14 seconds.
You gotta let it get in there,
like, bubble up a little bit, and I go to the table.
That's how I like my waffles.
My boyfriend likes his waffles
with a dollop of creme fraiche and some berries.
Now...
That shouldn't matter. Who cares? We eat waffles differently.
But comparison sets in.
I'm sitting at the table, looking at my waffles
just shining in the light.
I look across the table at my boyfriend and his waffles.
Look back at mine.
And I look at his, and I look at mine.
And then I snap and go,
"So, I'm just a nigga to you, aren't I?
"That's all you see when you look at me,
just a high-cholesterol nigga, like my father and his father before him."
He didn't ask for that. It's breakfast.
But I'm always comparing.
I compare everything that we do all the time.
I think about how we operate.
How we communicate with each other is important.
And I'm learning what to do with anger in my relationship
'cause I'm real sensitive and I get my feelings hurt all the time.
All the time.
Sometimes my boyfriend says stuff in a way
that lets me know he's never been punched in the face before.
You know what I mean? Like, it's a tone that he uses.
Like, he's passive-aggressive sometimes and like,
passive-aggression is white violence, I've learned.
And I can't fight him.
That's not how gay relationships work. That's how I thought it would work.
I thought if I got mad at him,
then we'd just square up like men.
No cops, no cops.
First person to drop apologizes. That's not how it works.
I still have to express my feelings.
And I have to tell him when he's hurt my feelings.
And that's really difficult for me to do
because that is really gay.
Don't get me wrong. I'll suck his dick till the cows come home.
I'm not gonna tell him he's hurt my feelings.
I'm a man, goddammit!
And I'd like to. I know it's--
Look, I would like to be able to tell Michael
when my feelings are hurt, because that's the right thing to do.
But unfortunately, I'm really good
at withholding all of my feelings from the person I love.
And when you're really good at something, it's hard not to use that as a crutch.
And you can be good at withholding.
Withholding is a game that only one of you knows that you're playing.
And the object of the game is to get them to ask you what's wrong
without you ever telling them that something's wrong.
And here's what you gotta do. First of all,
you can't look mad 'cause then you lost.
You can't look mad, because then they know you care.
And everybody knows the person with power in the relationship
is the one who cares the least, so don't look mad.
What you gotta do is look preoccupied.
But really, you gotta make it seem
like there's some deep mathematical equation
that you're trying to figure out that's too deep for them to understand.
Like, you're just in your head, just like--
just some-- just-- don't say anything out loud,
but just think like, "Wait, if two and three is five..."
And at first, at first, they're not gonna notice.
They're not gonna ask you what's wrong.
They're gonna ask you some basic shit, like, "What do you want for dinner?"
And that's gonna really piss you the fuck off.
But that means you gotta take it up a notch.
You start withholding all of your affection.
All of the affection. Give them no affection.
But then, give all of that affection to anybody else in their face.
And if nobody comes over, give that shit to the dog.
I be rolling around on the floor with the dogs, just be like,
"Who's the best boy in the house? Who's my favorite boy?"
Don't laugh. Don't laugh until they leave the room.
Then you can laugh real loud at some shit.
Hopefully, they'll come running back in and say,
"What's so funny?" You just be like, "Nothing."
And eventually, eventually-- sometimes it takes a couple days--
they'll finally ask you, "What's wrong?"
And I'll be honest with y'all.
Like, sometimes it takes my boyfriend
so long to ask me what's wrong, and I'm so pissed off,
that I respond to him by going, "What?
"Babe, nothing's wrong.
Is everything okay with you?"
Because sometimes my house is illuminated by gaslight.
I wanna be better. I actually need to be better.
I feel that I wanna mature in my relationship.
I wanna be able to be expressive, and open, and honest all the time.
I know that's really important in a relationship.
And it's really important in our relationship,
because we're in an open relationship.
Which was his idea.
My idea was to cheat
and to live a secret life, and let the lie weigh on my soul,
and come home and sit quietly in the driveway
for a real long time, just like my dad.
'Cause I didn't want to open it.
I have a fear of other people's judgment, and I could--
I could feel what some of you are thinking right now,
like, "What is an open relationship, and why do it?"
And if you really love someone,
can't you just want to be with that one person?
And the answer's no. I...
I wanna fuck everybody all the time.
Really, like, I play a little game in my head
anytime I'm in a new room, called If These Doors Get Locked.
Who am I fucking first?
And I have a list, and I got reserves. I'm a very sexual person,
and I'm learning to accept that about myself.
And I can't spend my life suppressing my sexuality.
And I can't pretend I only wanna fuck one person,
because that's a lie reserved for straight people.
That's what y'all do. I see it all the time.
Like, I was at dinner with my friend and his wife the other night,
and we were talking about actresses,
and somebody brought up Sydney Sweeney who's just like a pretty actress,
and somebody asked my straight friend what he thought of Sydney, and he lied
by using a word that straight men only use when their girl's around.
He said, "Oh, oh, Sydney? She's attractive."
That's how he said it too. His voice went up an octave. He's like,
"She's attractive.
She's got two eyes and a nose and a mouth."
And I'm looking at him like, "You think she's attractive,
"or do you want to eat her asshole after the gym?
Which one is it?"
I get it, it's hard being that transparent,
'cause open relationships require a lot of transparency,
which can be a good thing.
It can be a beautiful thing to be open and honest with someone,
but it can also be very difficult to tell the person that you care about
that you want to hook up with somebody else.
That can be hard.
'Cause what that means is, on a quiet Tuesday at home,
when my boyfriend is curled up with a good book,
and we got a Le Labo candle burning,
and an NPR Tiny Desk is playing.
I have to disrupt that peace and look at him and say, "Hey.
"Instead of spending the evening here with you,
"I think I wanna go throat fuck this 23-year-old.
I'll be back before dinner."
-That's hard. -Yeah.
That's hard to say to y'all. Look at how you reacted.
What are the implications? What does that mean?
'Cause people think that you open a relationship
'cause you're bored with sex with your partner.
That's not true. That's not true for me.
It's actually very new for me having, like, sex in love.
Like, that's very new.
My boyfriend's the first person I ever fucked that I respect.
I didn't know you were supposed to do that, my bad.
Like, I respect him a lot, and it's like, really passionate sex.
You know, his arms are the safest place
in the world for me, so I, like, I really love
the sex that we have, it's real connected.
We look into each other's eyes, and we switch eyes, you know what I mean?
Like, you ever go, like, left, right, left, right,
when you fucking, like, switch eyes, and it's so meaningful?
My boyfriend's my Clair Huxtable. You know, like...
Hey, the show ain't rape nobody. What I'm saying--
what I'm saying is, I grew up watching The Cosby Show.
-Yes! -And Cliff and Clair Huxtable
were an important couple to me.
Like, they were two people who respected each other a lot.
They were professionals, they loved each other.
They raised the family together.
And that's how I look at my boyfriend, as somebody I want to raise a family with.
And I love the meaningful sex we have.
But...
sometimes I also want
a slut that I can abuse.
Just me? Fine, I'll be alone in this.
You know, just a stranger from the internet
that comes over to be dominated.
Somebody I don't respect at all. They don't respect me either.
Somebody that comes over, they ask for a bottle of water,
and I give 'em the cheap plastic shit.
I reserve the glass bottles for me and my boo,
but they get, like, the crinkly Poland Springs bullshit.
Somebody I don't even use my real voice around.
I speak a couple octaves lower. I'm like, "Yeah, what's up?"
You know, I'm a little more dom. They want to be dominated.
They want me to choke 'em. I love choking.
You know what I mean? You ever choke somebody
till it almost goes too far?
You know what I'm talking about?
Like, they start shaking and coughing a little bit.
I love that shit. I love spitting in people's mouths.
You ever do that? You know what I'm talking about?
And not a light mist either, I mean like a mother bird
feeding her young like a deep-- it's almost racist--
like a deep, like, eye-on-the-prize spit from down South, I just spit.
And I love when it misses their mouth and it gets in they eye. I'm really tall.
So, if I'm fucking somebody from behind, I like to try and take my left foot
and reach around and just step on they face,
just a dirty Nike sock on they face,
and I'm talking to 'em like, "Yeah, you like that shit, don't you?
Yeah, take that shit. Open up for daddy. Open up for daddy."
Anyway, I don't wanna do that to Clair Huxtable.
You know, she's got on silk pajamas. She's a lawyer.
She got work in the morning.
The relationship's open, so that means my boyfriend
gets to fuck other people, too.
And I'll be honest, I don't like that shit.
Don't like it at all. Think it's cool when I do it,
don't like when he does it.
'Cause we still have to tell each other
about what we've done, and I don't want to think
about my boo with a dirty Nike sock to the face.
And my boyfriend's real descriptive too.
Like, sometimes he uses words that I can't get out of my head.
Like the last guy he hooked up with,
he described that man's dick as having a lot of heft to it.
I was like, "What?"
That's not a word you hear every day. I was like, "It had a lot of heft?"
I haven't looked at trash bags the same since.
I was like, "He had a hefty dick?"
I don't like him having sex without me.
It's actually making me into the idea of being a cuck.
Look, look, look-look-look, look, look.
You know what a cuck is? A cuck is where
you got to watch somebody you love
get fucked by somebody else. Like, I kind of like that now.
You know why? 'Cause, like, if my boyfriend
is gonna have a fun sexual experience with someone who isn't me,
I don't want to be written out of the memory.
That's all.
Like, if he's thinking about it later, I want to be able to be like, "No, no, no.
"Remember I was jerking off in the corner.
Don't forget about me."
I'll tell you what's beautiful about relationships.
A really, really beautiful thing that I didn't know I would need,
this is really important to me.
I love having someone who can talk to my mom for me.
That's important. That's a cheat code.
'Cause there comes a time in all of our lives
when you realize your mom is insane.
And she is. Your mom's crazy.
The arc of your mom's life,
she goes from responsible woman who made you sandwiches
to really talkative lady with no boundaries.
The type you pray doesn't sit beside you on a flight.
Like, that's what your mom become. Your mom is crazy.
I know some of you are looking at me right now
like, "He's not talking about me. My mom's not crazy. My mom's cool."
No, what that means is your mom's an alcoholic.
That's not cool. That's a crazy, irresponsible lady.
Your mom is crazy, that's why you got a family group chat.
The family group chat is there so you and your siblings
can take turns responding to the shit this crazy lady sends.
Just pictures of strange kids you've never seen before,
or other people's Christmas lights.
Your mom is fucking crazy.
Your mom's either crazy, or she's dead
and she used to be crazy, those are the only options.
All moms go crazy. And whose fault is it? I don't know, probably your dad's.
'Cause your dad got quiet.
Your father has said fewer and fewer words every year he's been alive.
My dad now sits quietly in the corner
and only occasionally says some random shit like,
"Hm, don't feel like a Sunday."
And I'm like, "Excuse me, sir, what the fuck are you saying?"
It is Sunday.
Your dad got quiet and your mom went crazy.
All moms go crazy 'cause all moms get radicalized.
They don't know what to do with all that mom energy.
They get radicalized by something.
And if you're lucky, your mom's into gardening all of a sudden.
Congratulations, you got one of the good ones.
But your mom's probably in QAnon now.
Or if you're like me, your mom's really religious crazy.
Yeah.
Like, my mom loves Jesus now.
Like, we grew up going to church, but it wasn't like this.
Something changed with that lady.
Like, my mom loves Jesus now. She loves him.
She be wearing all of his merch.
She...
She be quoting this nigga's lyrics all the time.
Jesus is her favorite rapper. She can't wait for Jesus to return.
That's her shit.
She can't wait for Jesus to come back.
And I tell my mom all the time, "Look, I know celebrities.
None of them hang out with they biggest fan."
No, I gotta let her know.
I tell her, "When Jesus come back, he ain't gon' fuck with you."
Jesus is gonna be scared of my mom.
Jesus is gonna treat my mom like the lady who killed Selena.
He's gonna stay a thousand yards away.
Sometimes
I feel like I'm in a battle with God
for my mom's soul.
And I can't tell who's winning.
Because I keep paying for shit,
and she keeps thanking Jesus.
And it's pissing me off.
It really is.
I'm in a really specific NBA player-type situation
where I'm the breadwinner of my family.
Like, they're all on my Instacart.
I pay for everybody's groceries.
And I'll be honest with you all, it's turning me
into a Reagan-era Republican a little bit.
A little bit. Like, I see how much money they spend on food.
I'm like, can't I just send these niggas a block of cheese,
and a bag of rice
like it's the '80s? Like, they gotta eat meat?
No, you don't understand.
I got a TV show on the air, and all these niggas magically retired.
And I don't get the respect I deserve, y'all.
I don't. Like, I don't-- Really, like...
I think my family should have a photo of me by the door.
Like, I think they should pray in the direction of my apartment
five times a day. I really believe that.
I think they should start calling me the Honorable Jerrod Carmichael,
like I'm Elijah Muhammad.
I want praise, and I don't get praise, and that makes it hard for me.
Like, sometimes it's hard to be around them.
You know, it's hard for me to, like, be around my family
because, like, I can't really be myself around them,
because who I am offends them.
And they refuse to go to therapy,
so they don't really know who the fuck they are.
Really, the problem is, I'm gay and these niggas don't read.
And sometimes I'm around them for periods of time.
I was just in North Carolina for a week.
I go there for, like, a week is as long as my soul can take,
and we end up playing Uno.
You know, shit you do with people that you don't really know like that.
If one of my real friends asked me to play Uno,
I'd tell 'em to get the fuck out of my house.
But I'm doing that shit with my mom.
Just trying to find ways to fill the time.
And I got in on a Saturday night,
and my mom asked me if I'd go to church with her Sunday morning, and I agreed.
I said, yeah.
And that was a mistake. Y'all know that.
You can feel it, you know that. That's a mistake.
Like, there are certain things I shouldn't do,
and going to church is one of those things.
Like, like, me and church is hard.
Have you ever been the smartest person in a room?
That's me in church. Like, have you ever looked around
and just thought these really dark, condescending thoughts?
I'm looking at all these church ladies
and their bright colors and their big hats,
and I'm like, "Aw, you poor, sweet, stupid motherfucker."
'Cause once you know church is a pyramid scheme,
it's hard to un-know that.
I know that. My mom doesn't know that.
So, I'm sitting in the pew beside her,
and it was time for offering, which is their favorite time.
And, like, they have to put their money in little envelopes.
That's the thing in church, like, they have to hide
their money from God.
It's a little masquerade for Jesus.
And the minister got up and he said something that's--
I thought this was crazy.
The minister got up in the pulpit and he said,
"Alright, get out your envelopes.
'Cause God told me..."
Uh-oh.
It's already sounding real unverifiable, bro.
Like, God told you?
That's what he said. He said, "God told me
the seed you sow today..."
That's what he said, "The seed you sow.
"God told me he's gonna multiply that
at least ten times by Friday."
He said that, "by Friday," and I'm sitting there
trying to stifle a laugh, I'm like, really?
Like God's really just whispering in the ear
of some 80-year-old nigga in North Carolina,
like God's just-- like God owns FanDuel.
Like, "No, tell 'em I'ma flip it.
"Tell 'em don't worry about it. Don't worry about it.
"Whatever they give, I got 'em by Friday.
Don't worry about it." And I think this is crazy.
And then I look to my left. I watch my mom reach for her purse.
She grabs 20 dollars
of my money.
I watch her put that money in an envelope, that envelope in a tray,
the tray gets whisked away forever.
And I'm sitting there like-- you ever look at your parents,
just like, "Really?"
Like a little bit, like--
like, "Your sperm, your egg. Like, me? How?"
And I still gotta spend the rest of the week with these people.
And the reason I go to North Carolina
isn't really for my parents, it's because my brother
has five kids that I love very, very much
in a really specific order, if I'm being honest.
Like, it's not all equal.
I do have a clear favorite.
I'll tell you the ranks. Like, the runners-up...
The runners-up are his oldest two who I think are really, really cool.
And I want them to think that I'm cool, but I don't think they think I'm cool.
And sometimes they post pictures of celebrities
at events that I was also at, and it hurts my feelings.
I'm like, "If you don't post your gay-ass uncle..."
So, they're not my favorite. My favorite is my niece, Lourdon.
I love Lourdon very, very much.
She's eight years old, she's really smart,
she's really funny, she's really charismatic.
I love spending time with her. And I took her to a playground.
We're running around at the park,
getting on the swings and the merry-go-round,
and Lourdon wanted me to go down a slide with her,
and she took my hand and led me to the top of the slide,
and we sat down, and she sat down beside me.
Before we went down, Lourdon turned to me,
and she touched my head and she said, "Uncle Rod,
I like your hair. It's soft."
And I said, "I will take care of you financially
for the rest of your life."
And I mean it, I mean it. You know how I know?
We were leaving the park, going back to the car,
and we had to cross a busy street.
And Lourdon almost ran out into the street when a bus was coming.
And I realized at that moment, if need be,
I would have pushed Lourdon out of the way and I would have gotten hit by the bus,
because I love her that much.
And I would have done that,
even though that makes horrible financial sense for my family.
I'm gonna be real with y'all, you might as well put
my whole family in front of that bus, like...
I'm not trying to place a value on lives,
'cause she's eight and her potential is boundless.
But I'm a one-in-a-million tal-- like, it's...
It's highly unlikely that this happens twice in a family.
Like, I want her to live,
but have you ever been to a child's funeral?
It's not as sad as you think.
No, it's mostly people speaking in hypotheticals.
Like, "Oh, she could have been president someday."
And you gotta be like, "Yeah, sure, for just fucking saying shit."
I'm saying, as long as I'm alive, we grieve in Hawaii.
Regardless, she's alive. We're all alive.
And we had such a great week together. Had such a great week with Lourdon.
It made me realize how petty I was being.
Like, that I was being silly, wanting so much praise
from my family, you know?
Like, it was really, I just dropped all my defenses
and I don't know, it just hit me
that I get to take care of my family, and that's a good thing.
And I had this idea that before I went back to New York
to go be gay, I was, I stopped by an ATM
and I withdrew a couple thousand dollars,
and I was gonna hide it in my mom's sock drawer.
I just accepted my role as the Easter Bunny.
I was like, I'm gonna hide it, and she's--
and I started imagining her face when she saw the money,
I was like, she's gonna be so excited when she sees this.
And as I was placing the money in my mom's sock drawer,
it hit me.
And all I heard was the minister's voice
saying, "The seed you sow today."
And I realized God is winning. He's really winning.
Being home in North Carolina-- still call it home. Crazy, right?
It's kind of hard for me because
my parents live in the house that I grew up in.
And I'm there.
I just-- it hit-- it's like a time capsule.
Like, it reminded me of how hard I tried to be straight.
I was just like a little kid, like, just like trying
really, really hard to be straight.
Just a little teenager.
Looked at my childhood closet, at all the Rocawear.
Girbaud and some Sean John. You know, just trying to be cool.
See my parents' living room, looking at, like, the spot
where the computer used to be.
I remember it, like, when I was in middle school
and I'd come home before my parents got off of work
and I had like 15, 20 minutes to myself,
I would take my mom's Bible she kept in her room,
and I would hide it in a little drawer.
And then, she had a Footprint in the Sand poster.
And I'd take that and I'd turn it over
so Jesus couldn't see.
And then I would go to BiLatinMen.com
and jerk off, but this is how hard I was trying to be straight.
Then, I would take the Bible out of the drawer,
and I'd turn the poster back over so Jesus could watch,
and I would force myself to jerk off to straight porn,
because I know God loves pussy.
I was like, "You proud of your boy? Huh?
Look at me, God. Cumming to girls."
I tried so hard to be straight. It was challenging.
The biggest challenge occurred in January of the year 2000,
and that was when D'Angelo
released the music video for Untitled (How Does it Feel).
-Yeah! -That was a big moment.
Like, if some of you don't know what I'm talking about,
don't worry, I take great pleasure in explaining why this was important.
D'Angelo's a neo soul artist from Virginia
who in the year 2000 was the hottest man on Earth.
-Yeah. -Like, D'Angelo--
D'Angelo was so hot, it actually ruined his life.
Like, D'Angelo was so hot,
you'd forget he's 5'7".
That's how hot he was, he transcended height.
And he made a music video that was all about his body.
It was all about his body, and his body was so perfect.
It's so well sculpted. I've seen Michelangelo's David in person.
It's whatever.
Save yourself a trip to Florence. Just watch this video.
Like, the video takes place in a black void.
Nothing else matters.
And the camera moves slowly in one take
over D'Angelo's body, and it starts on his hair.
He had these perfectly braided cornrows.
You could tell a Black girl somewhere really cared about him.
Camera moved down over his face. Beautiful face, beautiful eyes.
His goatee.
Just, goatee surrounding these beautiful full lips.
Yeah.
And the whole time, he's, like, smiling and singing,
and smiling and singing, and he had a little gap.
And he had a couple crooked teeth on the bottom,
but, like, it was hot, though.
Like, he was too masculine for a dentist. It was, like, kinda hot.
And the camera moved down some more over his neck,
he was beginning to sweat.
And I remember his neck had a vein bulging and a tattoo right here.
And it moved down over his chest. I remember his chest, it was so sweaty.
-Yeah! -I remember all the sweat,
sweating just over his-- he had these beautiful pillowy pecs,
these cute chocolate chip nipples, and he was sweating over his arms.
And I remember his arms looked like yams. It was like sweat all over his arms.
And the sweat had mixed with D'Angelo's deodorant.
So, there was one white, frothy bead of sweat
that was dripping down over his abs.
Like, more than a six, more than an eight.
Like, they were just, like, contrasting when he sung.
They looked like a tray of cookies. They were so beautiful.
And he had this happy trail that went in between the V.
You gotta understand, this is the year 2000.
None of us had ever seen the V before.
D'Angelo was the first man with the V.
And the V is a muscle you can't get by working out.
You can only get that shit by fucking.
You gotta earn that shit. And D'Angelo had, like,
these beautiful cum gutters.
And the whole video...
He wasn't even standing still.
He was just glistening in the light
and slowly rotating like a rotisserie chicken,
just kinda going from side to side.
When the video went off, like...
You gotta understand, we used to watch BET together as a family.
So, I'm sitting there with basically everybody
I know in my life, and it's one of those pieces of art
that demands a response.
Like, everyone in the room had to say something.
And I'm a little closeted boy, I don't know how to respond.
I don't know what to say.
Like, I want to respond like the girls in the room.
I wanted to go up and slowly touch the TV screen
like it was a prison visit. Just like a slow, like...
But I couldn't. I had to be strong. I had to be a man.
So, I ended up repeating some dumb, masculine shit
I heard my big brother say, like, "Oh, the song was cool,
but we ain't need all that," you know.
Shit that I didn't mean. I didn't mean that.
I was trying 'cause I was raised straight.
And when you're raised straight, you know there's only one rule.
Don't be gay.
I broke the only rule, y'all, like I, like--
just the only rule, don't be gay.
And I tried so hard. I lied to myself for so long
about my sexuality and who I was.
Like, there was this weird period of time in like, 2013, 2014, maybe.
I got a TV show on the air,
The Carmichael Show, and you know, I'm like, straight in it, wearing Jordans,
trying to throw people off the trail.
And I'm as public as I've ever been. I'm very, very public at this time.
And at the same time, Grindr had just came out,
so I was hooking up with guys.
And it was crazy 'cause I had a really public life
and a really private life,
and I was trying to keep those two worlds apart.
And it made me scared.
And because I was scared, I used to do something really immoral.
During that time, I used to catfish people.
I know, I'm ashamed to say that.
Like, you should never send a picture of someone else.
Like, I justified it because, like,
the sinner changes the world to justify the sin.
Like, I know it's wrong, but I thought that I objectively looked better
than the nigga whose pictures I sent.
So, I thought people were in for a pleasant surprise.
Like, I thought people would show up, be mad at first,
and then be like, "Alright, you got me."
But I remember one night, when I was visiting New York,
I used to stay at this hotel, The Bowery,
in the Lower East Side.
And I stayed there for really shady reasons.
It wasn't 'cause the room service was good.
I stayed there 'cause you didn't need a key card
to ride the elevator.
That's so shady, I know, but, like, if I had a hook up
coming over late night, I didn't wanna have to out myself
by calling down to the front desk, making up some lie.
"My business associate is coming,
if you could send him up?" Like, I didn't wanna do that.
So, I'm at The Bowery.
It's late Saturday night, early Sunday morning.
I'm scrolling on Grindr, I'm watching Saturday Night Live,
and I'm, like, just trying to find somebody to come over
and messaging mostly white guys,
'cause I felt like white guys wouldn't know me or my work,
so they wouldn't know who I was, so I was safe there.
And there was this one white dude that was nearby.
He was leaving a club. His name's Liam.
And we're messaging, you know, just classic Grindr shit.
"What are you into? I'm staying at The Bowery.
Bet. Come over." That type of shit.
And Liam's coming over to suck my dick.
I'm sorry to put that so explicitly.
The only reason I said it like that was because
that is the one silver lining to being gay,
is that you get to be totally honest about why someone's coming over.
Unlike you straight men and your lies.
Like, straight men have to send messages like,
"You wanna get some ice cream,"
or, "There's a comedy show that might be cool,"
when really, you wanna get your dick sucked.
But you can't say that.
So, Liam's coming over to suck my dick, and I gotta put on my DL uniform.
So, I put on some basketball shorts and a wife beater
and tie my durag up.
And I changed the channel from SNL to ESPN,
'cause I like to get blown, to, like, Around the Horn
or PTI.
There's a knock at the door, I open it.
Liam's standing there, white guy, about 5'9" with a low haircut.
He's wearing a white flight jacket with the orange lining, and he's vaping.
And he blew a cloud of smoke in the air, and when it cleared, Liam asked me
the scariest question you could ask a closeted man.
Liam asked,
"Don't I know you?"
And my heart dropped,
and I thought the only reasonable thing I could think in that moment.
"Am I gonna have to murder this white boy?"
I had stayed there enough.
I knew the trash schedule, so I thought maybe I could get away with it.
But I still went through with the blowjob. That's what's crazy about being a man.
Horniness prevails even in a high-stakes situation.
Like, there are men getting their dick sucked at war right now.
Like, I went through with the blowjob,
but it was the most suspicious blowjob of my life.
The whole time, Liam's just, like, on his knees,
just like, looking up, just trying to figure out who I was.
Switching eyes,
just going back and forth. And I'm trying to enjoy it,
but also, like, contorting my face to look like someone else, just...
Doing this shit.
Nervous. It was a nerve-wracking blowjob.
Anyway, Liam finishes up, he gets up.
Puts his flight jacket back on, headed toward the door,
and I thought I got away with it,
until right before he left, he turned to me and he said--
I'll never forget how Liam said this.
He said, "I figured it out."
I was like, fuck!
Liam said, "You're Michael Che."
And I said, "Yes. Yes.
That's exactly who I am. Live from New York, baby."
I'm glad to be over that.
You know, being closeted, it was very stressful.
I'm happy I'm out. I feel a lot of pride about that.
And I will say to you, if anyone's in the closet about anything,
I really think you should come out
'cause it's really important, and you'll feel better.
And I think the world will be a better place.
I actually have this theory that hood violence will decrease
by 15% if niggas are allowed to be gay.
That's my theory, haven't run the numbers on that yet.
And the only thing that I'm kind of afraid of still
is PDA.
Like I'm kinda terrified of
something about being public.
You know, like kissing my boyfriend, holding his hand in public.
It makes me a little nervous.
I feel like I'm painting a target on my back.
I get really scared, and I'm trying to get over that.
And last summer, my boyfriend and I went to Paris
and we went to dinner,
and we're having a really good time just laughing and drinking sakÃ©.
And we left the restaurant and we decided to walk back to the hotel.
And on the sidewalk, my boyfriend reached out his hand.
And in that moment, I was like, you know,
"Let it go, Jerrod. It's okay. It is okay.
You're gay, be proud of it."
I'm in love. I, like, I want to show it.
I don't want to be scared and closeted anymore.
I want to show it. And I remember reaching out
and clasping my boyfriend's hand and kissing him,
and feeling really good about that.
Until,
there was this old white Nissan that started creeping up beside us.
And I'm from the hood, I don't like when a vehicle creeps.
Any vehicle.
I was standing on a pier the other day, and a yacht slowed down in front of me,
and I was like, "Oh, they about to start shooting."
I don't like any creeps. So, I'm trying to ignore it.
And I'm walking and I'm holding my boyfriend's hand,
trying to feel proud, and then one of the guys--
it was like five or six Parisian dudes in the car--
like, one of the guys yelled something in French.
I tried to ignore that. Just keep walking.
And then, one of the guys threw a cup of what I believe to be water,
from the car window, and it splashed all over us,
and the car sped off, and I'm pissed.
Like, my initial reaction was to just chase the car down
and fight 'em. And I can't really fight,
but I know I could beat up anybody in Paris.
But I'm mad and my ego's hurt, and I can tell my ego is hurt
because I'm thinking about money.
I'm just like, "You broke motherfuckers. I'll buy ten of your cars!"
Then, I start yelling crazy shit like,
"I'll buy your dad and fuck him," just crazy shit.
And I'm mad, and I dropped my boyfriend's hand.
I'm just muttering to myself like Joe Pesci,
like, "These motherfuckers. Somebody's gonna fucking pay.
Somebody's gonna pay." I remember saying that over and over,
"Somebody's gonna fucking pay for this."
We got back to the hotel room, and I sat on the edge of the bed,
and in that moment, I...
I cried.
It was harder than I've ever cried before in my life.
It hit me how unfair it was.
How fucked up it was.
That I'm proud and I'm in love, and they throw water on us,
and it's so unfair.
And Michael comes and he sits beside me.
He starts rubbing my back, and I'm just like,
"This is so fucked up. It's just so unfair."
Michael's like, "Jerrod." I'm like, "It's just so unfair."
I'm like, "This is so fucked up."
And Michael's like, "I know."
And I'm like, "Why would they do this?"
Michael said, "Look, I heard what those guys said.
"And while I don't speak a lot of French, I do know a little.
"And I don't know how to say this, but
I don't think they threw water on us because we're gay."
And I stopped crying. I looked up.
I was like, "They didn't?" He said, "Yeah.
"I think they threw water on you
because you're Black." And I was like, "Oh."
I get so caught up in homophobia, I forget about racism.