A Youth Leader's Guide to Building Cultural Competence 

may still engage in same sex behavior, in bars or public places, but they live lives as heterosexual, 

married men. In addition, Latinos who would define themselves as heterosexual sometimes engage in 

sexual behavior with other men, but as long as they take the  active  male role of inserting the penis, they 

are not considered to be gay. 

Marianismo is the term for the traditional ideal of the submissive Latina who centers her life around her 

family and is generally obedient to the men in her life. This view of Latinas does not include the reality 

that within the home, in the arenas of childrearing and family matters, Latinas have much power. 

Marianismo is an obstacle to safer sex and condom use, however, because a  good wife  is one who 

submits to her husband's wishes. If he refuses to use condoms, even if he has extramarital affairs, it is 

very difficult for a Latina wife to insist on protected sex. In addition, motherhood is highly valued in 

Latino/Latina cultures and women are taught from childhood that their proper role is to be a mother. 

Condoms prevent disease, but they also prevent conception, and are often resisted on those grounds. 

An important fact about the African American community is the high rates of incarceration for African 

American men. Unemployment of African American men is rampant and too few African American men 

can financially provide for their families.  

The results of these inequities are several: many African American men are prevented from carrying out 

traditional functions of providing for a family and gaining self respect through work. African American 

men from lower socioeconomic classes may try to fulfill these roles in other ways, including through their 

sexuality. Thus, men who are powerless in many other arenas may cling to patterns of behavior, including 

sexual risk taking, that are traditionally male. 

African American women, it has been suggested, might be willing to tolerate objectionable behavior from 

the men they are involved with because there are not enough men to go around, given how many die 

early, spend years in prison or are undereducated and unemployed.

30

Sexual Attitudes and Behaviors 

Homosexuality 

Homosexuality is stigmatized, to at least some degree, in all racial and ethnic cultures in the U.S. Lesbian, 

gay and bisexual people of all colors face rejection from family, church and community. All must struggle 

for self acceptance in a world that tells them that who they are is bad.  

African Americans and Latinos/Latinas are no different from other Americans in being fearful and 

ignorant of gay, lesbian and bisexual people and issues. In many African American and Latino/Latina 

communities, homosexuality is viewed as a  white thing  and denial of African American or 

Latino/Latina homosexual behavior is common. African American and Latino/Latina gay/lesbian/bisexual 

people face at least two struggles: for acceptance as gay people in their own communities, and for 

acceptance as people of color in the gay community. Finding complete acceptance and understanding in 

either can be difficult. African American and Latina lesbians face a third struggle against sexism in their 

own and in larger communities.  

There is a huge difference between sexual identity and sexual behavior. Researchers who have focused on 

Latino/Latina cultures in particular note that many Latino men who call themselves  heterosexual  in fact 

engage in homosexual sex. The reasons for this are many. First, being gay is so stigmatized that some 

Latino gay men choose to live  in the closet,  getting married but also having sex with men. Second, 

other men do not admit their homosexual feelings, but act on them only when under the influence of