Guest: Nigel Ashford

As a young, gay African American male from a Christian background, Nigel Ashford believed he would have to marry a woman to make his family and God happy. He didn’t think about the potential wife in the scenario: “To be honest I wasn’t thinking about the other person. I hate to say it, but the only thing I was thinking of was ‘how do I make my family and God happy? What do they  want me to do? What do I need to do to make sure I’m pleasing them?’ ” Through representation and visibility, Nigel saw examples of other gay men living fulfilling lives, and decided he could do that as an out gay man too.