Whitney's mom kind of a homophobe

As for rumors about Whitney's alleged romantic relationship with her creative director Robyn Crawford, Houston wrote, "I just didn't want her with my daughter. I know nothing about a romantic relationship. That's what everybody said but they didn't know either." Winfrey addressed the rumors head-on on Monday's Oprah's Next Chapter, during which Houston admitted that she never cared for Crawford. "Would it have bothered you if your daughter, Whitney, was gay?" Winfrey asked. "Absolutely," Houston stated.

http%3A//www.tvguide.com/News/Cissy-Houston-Tell-All-Whitney-Houston-Drug-Use-Lesbian-Rumors-Oprah-Winfrey-1060042.aspx%3Frss%3Dnews



• I never quite believed the Whitney Houston lesbian rumors. Until now. Cissy Houston isn't "kind of" a homophobe. She is a homophobe. And a cunt.

• Not surprising - most people over the age of 65 are.

• Black woman

• How come Robyn has never said anything?

• What was interesting was the whole thing about Whitney not telling her she loved her that often. In interviews she acted like her mom walked on water, I wonder if that was a front, now, and if she didn't resent her mother.

• I meant to add, and maybe that has something to do with her rift with BK. You'd think if Whitney and her mother was super close, she'd, out of respect for her mother, keep a close eye on her to see how she's doing. But she doesn't seem to feel obligated to do that, why?

• She's old school religious, that's why. This was not a good thing for Whitney and probably kept her in the closet as much as anything. But JEEZ, how could she not know Whitney was gay growing up?

  http://sandrarose.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Whitney_Houston_throwback.jpg%3F42e305

• I've heard from 2nd hand sources many times that Cissy could understand with Whitney being a drug addict (substance issues run in the family), but in no way would tolerate her being a lesbian. She's a sick, sick, sick woman who destroyed her daughter in the name of Jesus.

• Understated title of the year. She is a BIGOT. Period.

• Cissy always struck me as a stage mother of the worst kind.

• Call me naive, but it astounds me how someone who's been in the music industry all her life could be a homophobe, regardless of her religious beliefs.

• [quote]Black woman. Don't even start with that shit. Look at the mostly white Republican party and tell me there aren't plenty of white homophobes. It has nothing to do with race, it has to do with being old and/or super religious.

• R6, who is BK?

  Clearly%20not%20in%20the%20know

• [quote]As for rumors about Whitney's alleged romantic relationship with her creative director Robyn Crawford, Houston wrote, "I just didn't want her with my daughter. I know nothing about a romantic relationship. That's what everybody said but they didn't know either." Isn't this the long form of "show me the receipts?"

• BK = Bobbi Kristina, Whitney's daughter.

• Good grief OP, you and plenty others need to learn what the term "homophobe" means, and quit using it as a catch all for anyone who doesn't understand homosexuality. Hell, most gay people with children (if they told the truth) would prefer for their children to grow up straight because they're smart enough to know it would make their lives much easier. Whitney's mother displays absolutely no signs of homophobia, which is an unnatural fear or homosexuals or homosexuality. She just said she'd have a problem if it was true Whitney was gay. I think many, if not most straight parents would feel the same way.

• R16= freeper fundie cunt

• oh stfu r16.

• Isn't her son a raging 'mo?

• R17 and R18, typical silly queens who can't fathom that not everyone understands the queer lifestyle. Their posting #'s are probably there ages as well. Silly bitches.

• It's interesting that these rumours were publically adressed at all. I'm pretty sure the truth will become public record at some point, either via Crawford or someone else. Unfortunately a lot of people will still deny it because it didn't come from Whitney's own mouth.

• R20= freeper fundie frau cunt

• Insipid hets that can't understand that being attracted to and loving someone of the same sex isn't a 'lifestyle' and is no different a relationship than any other couple, are bigots. Period.

• R16, you are a complete ignoramus. Not your fault, perhaps, but if you think fundamentalist Christians are loving and kind towards gay people (who they INSIST on calling "homosexuals"), then you really have nothing constructive to add here.

• OP why did you say "kind of"??

• Robyn Crawford DID give an interview, right after Whitney's death. She kept a lid on whatever it was that existed between them, for the most part. I think it was in Rolling Stone. She made a promise, as I recall, to Whitney that she wouldn't betray her. If you think in those terms, then Robyn was faithful to Whitney, and I respect that.

• I think it's interesting that Cissy even mentioned Robyn in her book, and with that cryptic sentence. Maybe she was hurt that Whitney was close to Robyn and probably confided in her more than her mother. Either way after watching, my eyebrow is definitely raised in that subject. Never had been before.

• homophobia, the worst disease. you can't love who you want to love in times like these.

• Cissy was okay with the drug use so long as Whitney was selling out arenas and winning awards and praising cissy as if it was she who gave her the voice she had.

• Exactly R29. She sat there and watched her meal ticket kill herself. Not too bright that Miss Cissy.

  Psychic Friend

• she killed her kid

• Wasn't Whitney's father said to have been gay? I remember reading that in one of the threads after her death.

• Her mom & the ''church'' wouldnt accept her being gay. She also couldn't be out because it would ruin her good girl all-American image. The pressure isnt why Whitney turned to drugs. Whit was into coke even before fame. She was into weed & coke since her early modeling/teen years. I think her brother introduced her to coke. Her use was always recreational but it became more frequent after she & Robyn broke up in 1992. She switched from coke to crack in 2000 after her father fell ill & it only got worse after her father died in 2003. Unlike Cissy, her father accepted her for who she was and Whitney has always held him in high regard. Nippy was the childhood nickname he gave her. She is buried next to him in NJ.

  Whitney%20Fan

• Religion kills.

• [quote]Her mom & the 'church' wouldnt accept her being gay. Is that the same 'church' that allowed Tyler Perry to speak at Nippy's funeral?

  Alex Crossssssssss

• [r32] John Houston as even more agressive about Robyn ~ he maneuvered her and another member of Nippy, Inc (Whitney's) into an offshoot business and then cut them loose.

  Macchiavelli

• John Wesley Shipp is very close to the Houston family, particularly Cissy. They even sang together many many times.

• "Wasn't Whitney's father said to have been gay?" Yeah, and I thought Cissy and the Warwick girls were gay too. "BK = Bobbi Kristina, Whitney's daughter." ALWAYS believed the rumor that BK is not Whitney's biological daughter. She's one of Bobby's from another woman.. They used her as "Whitney's & Bobby's" to confirm Whitney's heterosexuality.

• R32, There are claims he was a crossdresser. Dont know if it is true. He loved Robyn dearly but he loathed Clive. Clive arranged the bearding arrangment/marriage btwn Whitney & Bobby. Clive's 1st choice was Eddie Murphy but Eddie rejected the offer. John was chairman of Nippy Productions & he gave Robyn an exec position even after their breakup because he wanted Robyn to keep a close eye on Whitney. Robyn left the job in 2000 a couple of months after John became sick.

  Whitney%20Fan

• R36, No, he wasnt. Whitney explained it during her infamous interview with Wendy Williams on her radio show in 2003. John was apparently manipulated into doing shady business deals by someone he trusted while he was senile & sick in the hospital. According to Whitney, it all was settled before he died.

  Whitney%20Fan

• It was very much in the interest of Clive, Arista, Cissy, John AND ROBYN to keep Whitney in the closet. THEY ALL BENEFITTED from here maintaining her all American Girl image.

• She ugly, her mama say she ugly!

  the Wildcats cheerleaders

• [quote]her all American Girl image. If the image is that of a coke-sniffing, crack-smoking dope fiend.

  Nippy, Inc.

• Her records and image always made me wretch, so sappy and contrived. I sensed a rat with her first album, although I listened to "You Give Good Love" once on the radio with headphones and did like that song. But the rest, her so-called dance songs, just not funky or danceable at all! I also didn't like her "Star Search" oversinging, she ruined that Dolly song! I agreed with Elvis Costello who said she dresses like a 50 yr. old soccer mom.

• I'm surprised that Oprah "went there." She certainly had plenty of things to talk about that she didn't need to bring up the gay stuff. I'm also glad that we got to see Cissy's reaction to O's question and O's moment of shock and disbelief at Cissy's hatefulness. It was a truthful moment that you don't see too often on TV these days.

• The one thing I will give Cissy is that she didn't straight up lie and pretend that it wasn't true or that she would have accepted her if it was. She also admitted that Robin was the one who came to tell her that Whitney was doing drugs and encouraged her to intervene. Sad how homophobia and denial can kill.

• Why do you think she did so many drugs? She was successful, loved by millions, had a decent family? Was she ashamed of her lesbianism?

• Didn't you people get what Cissy was really trying to say about Robyn? She didn't like Robyn because she perceived her to be too 'masculine.' And that meant she may try to turn Whitney into, you know, one of THOSE.

• What's interesting is, she sung background music for a famous R&B singer. But hey if she feels that way, then whatever.

• Sung background music for a famous gay musician. Maybe she accpeted his homosexuality because she was being paid.

• [quote] Sung background music for a famous gay musician. Maybe she accpeted his homosexuality because she was being paid. There is a HUGE difference between working with a gay man and accepting that your daughter is a lesbian.

• R47, social science studies over the years have shown that gay people are MUCH more likely to engage in self-destructive behaviors - drugs, alcohol, etc. Even if one wanted to give Cissy the benefit of the doubt and suggest that she did try her utmost to help Whitney flower into a super-talented artist, it's likely that there were others in her community that were not only not supportive, but openly hostile.

• R51 No shit

• For what it's worth, plenty of rumors about Clive Davis's sexuality also.

• [quote]Don't even start with that shit. Look at the mostly white Republican party and tell me there aren't plenty of white homophobes. Republicans aren't a race, and you need to break down the white people by community. Certain communities are way more anti-gay than others. Cissy has nerve to say this to another gay woman -- Oprah.

  GAYle

• Clive Davis is bisexual. He was married and has kids but now has a partner.

• I really appreciated Cissy Houston brutal honesty. "I made Whitney into what she was." " I don't know if Robin and Whitney were more than friends." "I didn't like Robin. She talked too much." " Yes, I would have a problem with my daughter being gay." If you want to be around Cissy you really need to know who you are.

• Who is Clive's partner?

• Cissy forgot to say "Yes I would have a problem with my daughter being gay, but now I would do anything to have her back-gay or straight"

  What%20a%20bitch

• r16 has a relationship with someone hateful and homophobic which is why he/she has been on this "everyone doesn't understand queers" crusade to make themselves feel better about keeping them around (i.e. keep their self-respect). That much is transparent.

• [quote]How come Robyn has never said anything? She probably signed a confidentiality agreement and was paid to go away...Didn't she go to law school? Probably where she got the tuition money from....

• I TOLD you Cissy is deranged and should have all that money taken away from her and given to someone in the family who is smarter then she is and not subject to shitting on people who matter in public. Like a superstar soul pop diva icon I could name. I may not want my secret girlfriends to be gay, but that doesn't mean I go blabbing it. And I have to say that R16 needs to break off that stick that's up her ass just shy of her hemmies and go do a couple hundred hard sit-drops on a trampoline. Quibbling is the devil nibbling. (Copyright that!)

  Miss%20Warwick

• R[17] you're a simpleton who can't come up with anything but "cunt" as a response to a logical post such as R[16] No, I'm not R17 but troll-dar for yourself half-wit.

• I agree with R16.

• If someone would rather their child was a junkie than gay, I think it is pretty clear they are a homophobe. And heartless.

• r45 this is the realest Oprah has been in a LONG time. [quote]The one thing I will give Cissy is that she didn't straight up lie and pretend that it wasn't true or that she would have accepted her if it was. I agree, in the other thread. I never liked Cissy before this, but now I have some respect for her. It takes huge, huge balls for her to say publicly that she sometimes questioned if Whitney really, truly loved her as much as other people told her she did. Its heartbreaking for her to be left in her old age still not knowing for sure, and not ever being able to speak to Whitney again.

• Cissy was being honest. You don't find that anymore. They all just lie because there is so much backlash if you don't shout from the lungs how accepting you are of lesbianism. It's not strange at all for someone like Cissy to feel the way she does. She seems like a great lady. I'm a gay man but I don't get lesbians either. You go girl!

• She comes across as a church-tard cashing in on her daughters death. Yet another religious idiot twisting her religion to suit her own agenda.

• [quote]If someone would rather their child was a junkie than gay, I think it is pretty clear they are a homophobe. And heartless. And that's exactly why Whitney was so fucked up. Too bad for Cissy that her daughter was gay and a junkie.

• [quote]I'm a gay man but I don't get lesbians either. You go girl! Oh dear.

• R16 -- Of COURSE she's a homophobe. She's the walking definition of a homophobe. Fear of 'something/anything' often comes out as anger, hatred, or as in this case FIRM DISAPPROVAL, based on her religious background. Cissy Houston is indirectly responsible for her daughter's death.

• That's pretty harsh, R71.

• I agree with R71, although Cissy could have chosen to move on from her particular type of religious background. She didn't, and she hasn't.

• Would it have bothered you if your daughter, Whitney, was gay?" Winfrey asked. "Absolutely," Houston stated. THAT'S harsh.

• Bothered doesn't mean she would have absolutely hated it, or hated her for being gay. It means that she was raised a certain way, and that she wouldn't have been comfortable with her daughter's sexuality if, in fact, her daughter was gay. It doesn't mean that she would have never come around, either. Not everyone is automactically accepting. Sad, but true.

• "kind of" More like totally, the bitch. Strange too, because didn't she fag hag it up with gay men? Maybe the insanity about lesbians had to do with some self-hating issue with herself, or control over her daughter.

• Cissy Houston is responsible for her daughter's death. Fucking homophobes like her destroy the souls of their gay children.

• I agree, R77.

• So this is the second lesbian Clive has killed. Will Kelly Clarkson be next?

• [quote]didn't she fag hag it up with gay men? Probably furthered her shitty career, and they fit the stereotype, so she could cope with it just fine in that context.

• She comes from a time of decency and morals. I think she's to be forgiven for wanting to protect her daughter from being a lesbian.

• A time of decency and morals? You mean when black people weren't allowed to vote?

• I thought it was interesting that both of her kids turned out to be hard core addicts (Michael is clearly a mess). Makes you wonder what their upbringing was like for both of them to be so messed up. Second, it's interesting that she doesn't have a close relationship with BK, especially if (as she claims) she and Whitney were close. Makes you wonder if her mother was someone she feared more than she loved.

• (R66) Why do you have respect for her? I can see having empathy for her because it's horrible to lose your child, but respect? Cissy claims she didn't act when Robyn Crawford came to her worried about Whitney's drug use because she "didn't have proof" of it. She mentioned that Whitney was making all her deadlines for recordings and gigs and therefore didn't seem to be in trouble. So if Whitney was being a good girl by being the entertainer that everyone expected her to be, that meant it was fine to look the other way? She also claims that she was unaware that Whitney was being abused by Bobby Brown. She seemed to be missing a lot about Whitney. Who knows what the truth is about their relationship but Cissy Houston comes across as only loving the image of Whitney that she herself created. It doesn't seem that she took time to know or love Whitney for who she really was. Does she wonder if Whitney loved her because love for her means someone someone towing the line-in this case being the perfect all American girl singing sensation. Makes you wonder if Whitney was Cissy's superstar proxy.

• Can people, especially from the same gene pool, have addictive tendancies? You like, a father that is alcoholic hence one or more of his children are also. Maybe this addictive gene ran in Whitney's family.

• Would someone,(even[16]!), PLEASE tell me why straight people spend their free time on The Data Lounge! Seriously!.....Did you REALLY fucking say, that gay parents ("if they wre honest"),would rather their children be straight?! Now I'm talking to you. What are you doing here? I am absolutely sure you are an unkempt ,filthy person who lives in squaller. Now fucking answer me!

  Stephen%20Bright%26Dark%2Chas%20had%20it%20with%20this%20shit%21%20Clean%20your%

• Cher threw her daughter out on the street when she came out as a lesbian

• R81, the time she is from is not the current time.Lesbian/ gay and morals really are not mutually exclusive.

• Clive Davis's first pick to beard for Whitney was Eddie Murphy. Now that's an interesting choice, no?

• "She seemed to be missing a lot about Whitney. Who knows what the truth is about their relationship but Cissy Houston comes across as only loving the image of Whitney that she herself created. It doesn't seem that she took time to know or love Whitney for who she really was." Maybe it was easier for Cissy to look away, less painful. I am a functioning alkie yet no one in my family knows. Really, they don't know. If one is showing up on time, doing what they are expected to do, no one wants to think somehting is wrong even if someone (like Robin who Cissy didn't like) says something. Whitney may have convincingly denied it. I don't think Cissy was homophone I think she's from a time when folks are conditioned to assume people are hetero. Homosexuals were not common. Parents didn't assume their babies and think they would grow up homosexual. Like all parent/child relationships, especially one such as their with a stage mom and highly talented daugher, there is no cut and dry understand here. Oh and Oprah's disbelief in Cissy's was a bit overdramatic.

• Gee, I wonder (not at all now) why her daughter might have avoided her. [quote]"In my darkest moments, I wonder whether Nippy loved me," she writes. "She always told me she did. But you know, she didn't call me much. She didn't come see me as much as I hoped she would." She was gone off during the Bobby Brown period, apparently numbing her pain with constant drugs, and according to her sister in law living in a filthy drug den and coming on to women. Good job Cissy, steering her away from her girlfriend back to the lord.

• The rumors didn't come from Whitney's own mouth but Robyn sure did.

  Ba%20dum%20bum

• That's true, R87. Cher didn't take to kindly to Chastity's reveal about her sexuality either.

• R89, that's too bad Eddie turned them down. Could have been a great bearding arrangement that might have worked out better for Whitney. The impression I got from all the SNL books though was that Eddie always had a pretty oversized ego. I'm sure he thought he could do better in his bearding prospects, as crazy as that sounds.

• R84, Cissy didn't know her, probably because she was not part of Whitney's inner circle as an adult. Cissy knows teenage/young adult Whitney.

• I thought that maybe Eddie turned them down because he was aware of some drug issues or he couldn't deal with someone who was as big or bigger than he was at the time. You have a good point, R94. He probably wanted a beauty queen with bigger tits.

• Whitney's tits were fake so they could be enlarged.

• I'm closeted but not fucked up. I don't do drugs or abuse food and alcohol. What gives???

• If she had stayed with Robyn, Whitney would have been alive today.

• Which one of Whitney's brother is gay Michael or Gary, who was the molester?

• R[99] you don't know that. Whitney's drug problem could have been more complex than possibly being in the closet.

• Two Closet Cases Present Their Latest Star! Merv Griffin and Clive Davis introducing Whitney back in '83. As soon as she opened her mouth in church her whole fucking family saw dollar signs. They were all involved. When Mariah hit, Dionne accused her of copying Whitney. They are all still managing and living off her voice today. It's a once in a lifetime voice. The real Whitney was no pushover but she was addicted to fame. Robyn was the one person who didn't have an agenda. They needed her out of the picture. But was she? Totally?

  http://youtu.be/6TjOSbqreXQ

• R81, decency and morals??? Ain't no decency and morals ANYWHERE to be seen in that family! And gays are a decent and moral as straights, if not moreso, DL excepted.

• It sounds/seems like Whitney had a fairly sad life. Like so many other addicts, she used drugs as an escape from reality. She was not able to deal with the pressures of her enormous fame and her alleged sexuality. After Whitney passed many of her friends came forward with stories of Whitney always feeling she was not good enough, that she would disappoint people. A lot of this obviously stems from the tenuous relationship she had with her mother. Whitney always said that she wanted to be a singer but not necessarily a star. As she grew older it appeared that she grew to resent her success and all the trappings that came along with being an international celebrity. I had always assumed that her relationship with Cissy was much different than what it now appears to have been. Watching the Oprah interview, Cissy came off as resenting her. Like others have stated in this thread, Cissy seems to have viewed her daughter as Whitney Houston and not Nippy her little girl from Newark. As with many big celebrities, Whitney became a meal ticket for her family, friends and the record label. As long as she was making money and her issues were under control everyone looked the other way. More recently as her drug addiction began to effect the bottom line, I can only imagine the pressure she must have been under to continue to put herself out to make money even though it may have been to the detriment of her physical and emotional health. Whitney can only blame herself for her addictions but her family and those around her certainly played a part in getting her to the point she was at when she died in the bathtub of a hotel room. Very sad...

• To me Cissy lived in denial. She denied that Whitney was a lesbian tough people told her that she was and she denied Whitney's addiction until she could no longer deny it. Whitney and Cissy had a strained relationship like so many mothers and daughters. I wonder if Whitney "respected" her mother's "head in the sand" tendency by hiding her true self from her mother. Unfortunately, Cissy now realizes that she did not really know her daughter and never will. This will probably haunt her until her last breath.

• R99, I absolutely agree. 100%. she loved Whitney, she was concerned about the impact was potentially having on her health - I kind of wonder if Robyn now is wondering about that herself. Not that it's her fault, but in terms of if she had been able to be a part of Whitney's life.

• [quote]I don't think Cissy was homophone (sic) I think she's from a time when folks are conditioned to assume people are hetero. Homosexuals were not common. They were in the music business, even way back when. Whitney is just one in a long, long line of AA, lesbian songstresses.

  Big%20Mama%20Thornton

• Robin had some things to say about Whitney's death and loss. I have posted it. What she said is a bit between the lines and around the edges of many things, yet she was very deliberate and she makes some very clear statements. She is not protecting a drug addict, she is protecting her own memories as we all do and she sounds at pêace with them. She does not want Whitney to be viewed only as a drug casualty, yet she seems to say that it is random world, which it is. As many who are saved, that many will drown. There is cool and cold love in her remembrance. She is loyal and is keeping her secrets for herself, so far. Everyone did coke in the eighties,(don't argue) but crack came from the devil's ass. Whitney loved the lord, and believed in temptation. She was in love with Robin too. Later Bobby, but it was a darker companionship that they shared. I don't think that Whitney Houston was in the middle or at the end of her life a victim, but she was set up to be. Cissy Houston stood clapping in deep denial and rode her daughter's triumphs while Whitney supported everyone around her in great style. There is no reason for Cissy Houston to write a book even if she spilled all that she knew. It is despicable. The Miss Warwick thread about putting Nippy's dead body on tour is not only darky funny and vulgar, but the prescient truth of it all. Pimping a corpse. A wonderful black comedy if you haven't read it. It is not heartless but the talented and wise writer of that thread stays in character and remains heartless. A better book. Garland and Elvis had very similar lives to Whitney. Their talent was so huge, the remaking of the persona was so calculated and so many people were benefiting from the money and the reflected glory, that the artist could only rebel in ways that were not only addictive, but with blatant determination and a fatal sense of invincibility. They all had the stamina of their great talent, and the heady and subversive desire to test it. Spoiled and lied too as long as the accolades and money kept coming in. Then sheltered, rehabilitated for no other reason than the thrill was gone. Whitney Houston is a legend and don't fuckin oh Mary me. If she had only her voice, it will always be so. She was a crack head. Her vocal and personal decline were not from snorting coke or smoking weed. She went bigger and darker. More, now, again. She must have been a terrible mother. Her talent and her awesome display of it, make her a legend. Awesome in the truest meaning. A voice to tumble down walls and the most gorgeous sound to thrill. She was high most of the time, but she was the best for a long time too. The Cissy Houston book and the ones that will follow donèt even cause anger. They are predictable revelations. Watch Whitney sing at her best to restore some dignity for everyone involved. She thought Jesus loved her. She loved her mother. As an adult she did what she wanted to do. She sang pretty well.

  http://www.esquire.com/the-side/music/whitney-houston-6654718

  a%20fan

• Well, it's just sad all around. If Whitney felt her mother wasn't going to accept her or love her if she knew she were gay then that supports why she didn't come out. I think most parents don't want their kids to be gay because they don't want life to be difficult for them. But in this case I get the impression that the mother just doesn't like gay people anyway.

• As an adult, she wasn't even capable of taking a bath without killing herself. PATHETIC

• R81 I really hope you don't put these sick twisted moral ideals onto your children. The Houston family was always pretty sick. Dionne endorsing the psychic friends network for money is a dead give-away. Bobby Christina appearing on Oprah just weeks after her mothers death is another one. Sick family indeed!

  anonymous

• OP, I think it is religious belief rather than being a "homophobe". Of course it is a very dysfunctional family, and they fail in their religious beliefs in many different areas of life. But the word "homophobe" must mean literally "fear of the same", but has come to mean fear of homosexuals. It is an abuse of the language, and people call me that even though I am homosexual myself. I hate being homosexual, and I would change that about myself if I could. But I do not have any fear of homosexuals.

• My next door neighbor was Whitney Houston's assistant for 25 years. Should I knock on her door across the hall and ask her if Whitney as a lesbian?

• Well said R72 and R71. And true.

• 10 minutes of Whitney, at the top of her game - blowing the roof off the dump. Porgy and Bess, Dream girls, I Have nothing.

  http://youtu.be/w-aFYdG87wE

  a%20long%20time%20ago

• That woman's judgement drove me to crack!!!!!!!!!

  Whitney

• [quote]So this is the second lesbian Clive has killed. Will Kelly Clarkson be next? Who was the first lesbian Clive killed, Phyllis Hyman?

• Sounds like Whitney avoided her mother because she didn't like being around her. Smart girl.

• r115 - her rendition of & I'm telling you is amazing! TY! I'm not really a fan but she brings down the house with that.

• Want to add that Whitney, Cissy, Dionne, BK are all related to Leontyne Price through Cissy's mother - a Drinkard sister (last name, yes ironic).

  its%20in%20wikipedia

• Speaking of "And I'm telling you", did you guys see this on The Voice - Trevin Hunt? Wow.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DGgV88lNbRFM

• [quote]Whitney's mother displays absolutely no signs of homophobia, which is an unnatural fear or homosexuals or homosexuality "An unnatural fear of homosexuals or homosexuality" very well might be the technical definition, R16. But, you can't be that stupid. You must know that there is a widespread popular definition of "homophobia" which means that someone hates or disapproves of gays and lesbians, not simply that they have some "unnatural fear." In fact, I'd argue that the vast majority of references to "homophobia" are in relation to this popular definition, not the "unnatural fear" definition.

• A phobia by definition is having a fear of something, R122. If Cissy found out that Whitney was gay, I highly doubt she would have been "afraid" of her or her sexuality, hence the term "homophobic" is incorrect in describing her. She may have disapproved of it, but disapproval is not fear. To hell with "popular" definition.

• Actually, R122 and R16, the word "homophobia" is slang, and poor English in the first place. "Homo" is a prefix which means either "the same" or "man, human, or mankind". If anyone with a reasonable knowlege of English had coined the term, it would mean an unnatural fear of sameness, or possibly an unnatural fear of humans. The latter use is less likely because when "homo" is used in that context it usually stands alone as in "homo sapiens" rather than as a prefix as in "homogenous" or "homosexual". Somehow, the word has gone into mainstream usage, even though it is based on colloquial slur of "homo" as a perjorative for "homosexual". I simply will not say "homophobia" or "homophobe". If I refer to a bigot who hates homosexuals, I say that he or she is a bigot who hates homosexuals.

• [quote]To hell with "popular" definition. Right. Popular definitions are never valid. Ever.

• I know this is DL and OWN and Oprah are Public Enemies #1 and #2, but you should seek out the interview. Cissy is remarkably cold but you could see that anger and bitterness bursting through her demeanor. I felt uncomfortable even watching her for the hour. She's like Dionne. Just a tad special.

• Cissy and her homophobia played a major role in Whitney's dysfunction. Let her pay the price for it.

• R96, Eddie was shocked by how rough around the edges Whitney truly was. Whitney was very hood. Eddie hates cigarettes & drugs but Whitney loved her smoking. It would have been interesting if they did end up together. The media would have hyped it up as bad boy meets good girl when honestly the opposite would be true. I think they went out on a couple of dates but nothing came out of it. Whitney has alluded to it on an appearance on Arsenio where she was high out of her mind.

  Whitney%20Fan

• Whitney briefly dated a (married) Jermaine Jackson in the mid-'80s. They recorded several songs together.

  http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-A-y9p4Dnql8/T1Sv6ehnAOI/AAAAAAAAKxo/6bHRgbXz9SI/s1600/whitney houston jermaine jackson .jpg

• When people get to be Cissy's age they will say what they mean and have NO regrets about it. Currently dealing with someone like that. Cissy is from another generation but damn I would think your child's happiness would be most important. Cissy is on that other level religious.

• Since Whitney was a lesbian, they didn't "date" r129.

• You don't know that Whitney was a lesbian, R131. All you know is hearsay. La Toya Jackson confirmed that Whitney and Jermaine had a year-long affair back then.

• yes r117. Clive Davis has a thing for talented lesbians. Poor Phylis and Whitney didn't stand a chance.

• LaToya confirmed an affair between Jermaine and Whitney? Now there's an unimpeachable source.

• When Cissy says she taught Whitney everything she knows, she's not lying. Here they are dueting for Nelson Mandela in London. Who's better?

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9i-HmNJq0U

• I am pretty sure she knows WH's "going straight" is what spiraled her to her destruction. I suppose by staying firm in her resolve that gay is not ok, CH convinces herself that she didn't do her daughter any wrong and her hands remain clean. Imagine if that crumbles, that she's finally accepted being gay as ok when it is a life too late, the regret would be most unbearable.

• Cissy sounds like a classic narcissist who saw her children only as an extension of herself; never feeling loved enough by her own daughter while denying her beautiful and supremely talented daughter the love she deserved (the classic homophobe expression of "needing to 'protect' her family from homosexuals," etc.). You can't protect a lesbian woman from being a lesbian - you can only repress them and it's the repression of the self that is so deadly. Whitney was obviously doing all those drugs because she was so dead inside, like most addicts, they are overwhelmed with so much pain they just go numb and the only way to feel anything that the can control and therefore feel pleasure from is drugs and other methods of self-harming. It's just a relief to have some control of the pain and not be overwhelmed by it. Of course Cissy resented her, which is not the role of the mother. A mother's love is meant to be unconditional not resentful. When Whitney's second album was a huge smash, back in the '80s, I worked a benefit in Chicago for some social service or church thing related to black people. It was all those prominent Chicago types from Jet Magazine and the like. The benefit was at Spiaggia, in the event rooms. Cissy was the featured entertainer but Whitney was the draw. Even though she wasn't on the bill, in this provincial city (just north of Indiana, remember) amongst these people, the hope was that Whitney would appear in aid of their cause. The room was buzzing with that kind of excitement. Cissy took to the stage, sang a few songs that I can't even remember, said a few words and it was all over. After a few moments when people looked around, thinking that couldn't be it, an air of dejected disappointment filled the room as everyone realised that was it, kind of looking at each other wondering what they were so excited about in the first place. And that's the curse of bring Cissy Houston. She's not Whitney Houston. She's just Whitney Houston's mother.

• R16 is so stupid. So I guess racism isn't an unnatural fear of black people then?

• R124, you're stupid. You're trying to reframe homophobia as some rational opinion expressing a rational disapproval. But what do you think that disapproval (i.e., hate) comes from? Irrational fear and ignorance. Duh.

• Cissy had a great voice but she was not the great interpreter Whitney was. The girl could sing live like the best of them. Breathing life, guts, soul, sorrow, pain and joy into a song like not many others. I think she was natural addictive person - she could not get enough of sex, drugs and rock and roll (in her case Gospel, R&B and Soul). I always find it sad she had to go so early. Unless the rest of her family she was not driven by the greed for success or wealth, but by the desire to sing for people. She was phenomenal live, gave all she got and loved being with her audience. That was taken away from her in the last years, because crack had ruined her voice and maybe this is what ultimately killed her.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DyW-S4gF8seY

  Anonymous

• R136, that's about the most brilliant observation about WH's life I've seen. Thanks. Additionally, I think it applies to lots of Christian wannabe's who are so vociferous in their condemnation of gay people - guilty consciences for having contributed to the psychological torture of people in their lives who they either once loved, or still do.

• Many of you are speaking like it's the gospel truth (no pun intended) that Whitney was gay. No one knows for sure.

• [quote]Many of you are speaking like it's the gospel truth (no pun intended) that Whitney was gay. No one knows for sure. I agree, although it's clear that her mother is a homophobic cunt.

• R142, the rumors about her were/are so loud and come from so many different sources, that it's very unlikely she was straight. Especially when you consider the years of inept photo-ops and bearding with Eddie Murphy(!), all the while living with a butch lesbian. Of course, it's possible she was bisexual.

• It baffles just how Cissy could be friends with many gay musicians and was, by all accounts, especially close to Luther Vandross and Paul Jabara, yet would rather her daughter be a junkie rather than gay even after touring with Elvis and seeing firsthand the effects of substance abuse.

• I love pre-fame Whitney, r102. When Paul Jabara put a then relatively unknown on his 1983 album (Paul Jabara and Friends) with the song he'd written for her, 'Eternal Love', people couldn't believe it was a 19-year-old singing. She's always sounded so mature, older than her years. From then on, her superstardom was considered inevitable.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DUDwyRr-tNok

• If Whitney was so desperate to beard, then why did she reject and embarrass Robert DeNiro the way she did? Apparently, DeNiro was in lust with Whitney aggressively in pursuit deluging her with flowers and gifts. He even sent her a diamond-encrusted teddy bear when he read she collected them. But Whitney (and her people) promptly sent everything back. [quote] "Her parents with whom she lived, advised her not to get involved with a man who, besides being white, was almost twice her age. Record executive CLIVE DAVIS echoed this advice. For a young black singer such a relationship would have been suicide." If she was gay, Cissy would have welcomed any man, even if he was white, right?

  http://www.contactmusic.com/news-article/de-niro-biography-reveals-all

• Wrong, R147. Being seen as authentic in the black community was hugely important to WH and her family. She always talked about how hurtful the Soul Train incident was for her and how it changed her forever. Why beard with a white man, when she could do it with a black one? De Niro was also older than her. An older white man just didn't fit with the image she and her management cultivated. Besides, why would De Niro want to be somebody's beard/merkin? What Whitney was after at that time was a photo-op partner (see Randall Cunnungham, Darryl Strawberry etc.). De Niro was after something much different.

• R142, are you charlie? Or just another deluded lesbian-phobic Datalounger?

• Yeah, R148. R147, DeNiro always played a maniac in movies. Personally, I bet Cissy would have to hold her tongue if Oprah asked her if it would be okay if Whitney dated white. IT WAS NOT. God, if this was a male celebrity, you guys would bite the head off anyone who suggested he wasn't gay. Deal with it -- Whitney was GAY.

• Are you all denying the veracity of her destructive relationship with Bobby Brown? She was obsessed with that man, to the point of telling industry, media and public to fuck off if they didn't like it. What kind of lesbian does that? She met him the night she got booed at the Soul Train Awards and made a very blatant play for him. At the time, he was dating both Janet Jackson and one of the girls from En Vogue but he dropped them and started dating her. Why would a guy like him leave two hot pinups in the black community for WHITEney Houston? At the time, Bobby Brown was the biggest male star in R&B and had his street cred to protect.

• Janet Jackson never dated bobby brown!

• I remember you, r151, the obsessed with Bobby Brown troll. She was fixed up with Brown by Clive Davis. He made her blacker. He also cheated on her, fathered children by other women when they were married...etc. I don't think bk is W's biological daughter. Whitney wanted very badly to be straight - for her family, for her career, for herself. But she wasn't. Lots of lesbians and gays behave like that when they're so deeply in the closet. Whitney was obsessed with trying to be straight, not with Bobby Brown.

• Cissy Houston and Katherine Jackson are two peas in a pod. Family music matriarchs who misguidedly raised their children, domineering, judgmental and dumb as posts. Neither of them can barely string complex sentences together much less have a complex thought. I know both of them are uneducated but good god, there doesn't even seem to be a double digit IQ between them. Are they friends?

• Shit like this is why I don't understand why people still want to "be famous."

• r153, Clive hated Bobby Brown. And you discredited yourself when you said Bobbi Kristina isn't Whitney's biological daughter.

• I wish Whitney took a stab at recording this kind of music: Live tribute to Lena Horne singing "Stormy Weather". Awesome!

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DtnpNoAoYRrc

• Here's her live tribute to Aretha Franklin. Her voice wasn't at its best that night but she's the only singer I've heard do the Queen's songs justice.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DtLB4l2ivaKU

• [quote]Are you all denying the veracity of her destructive relationship with Bobby Brown? She was obsessed with that man, to the point of telling industry, media and public to fuck off if they didn't like it. What kind of lesbian does that? Uh, a closeted self hating one? Of course we're starting (most of us are well beyond that point) to doubt the veracity of her attraction to BB. The rumors she's gay have been around strong, and forever. There have been credible people (i.e. that SNL lady) who actually met the woman who say she was gay. Her sister-in-law and Bobby Brown himself fed the rumors. And if you can't read between the lines when the woman's own homophobic mother can't say she was straight, I don't know what to say except enjoy your leisurely drift down the Nile.

• R159, at the Datalounge, that's normal.

• R159, like many on the Houston threads, are undiagnosed hysterics/ and or very lonely lesbians. That's right R159 EVERY woman is really a lesbian. No matter how much she loves men and cock they're all just closeted, self hating lesbians. LMFAOROTFL. Keep telling yourselves that you pathetic losers.

  I%20thought%20the%20fags%20were%20delusional

• I've worked with many girls who were gay one minute and straight the next and went on to have babies and get married. Are we all forgetting Anne Heche? I think Robyn did sample Whit' s vagina but Whitney was a bad girl who wanted street cred, loved drugs a lot and liked bad boys. She also fucked a married Jermaine Jermaine and only went out with him cause he was Michael's brother.

• R161 - renew your meds before you embarrass yourself again in public.

• [quote] I thought the fags were delusional Hi Cissy!

• r161, maybe it's time to stop being so jealous and bitter and get out of Mommy's basement? Mmmm?

• I agree with you R151. It just dcoesn't make sense. I just can't see Whitney being into cunt. No way. Not angel voiced Whitney. I can see where her mother is coming from on this one.

• r159 = r163,r164,165.

  Whitney%20Houston.

• Choosing Bob-bay will show everybody.

  Nippy

• Tip for the probable homophobe at R167, so you can stalk me efficiently: click the trolldar link for the person you are trying to stalk. As you can see I am R159 and R164, and I am not R163 and R165.

• [quote]Choosing Bob-bay will show everybody. The drug den days!

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DUj45k-XvUrc

• r169 = undiagnosed hysteric with sand in her vag that Houston would have never touched!

• Gurl...my favorite part of Mother Houston's sit down with Sister Oprah was when she told Oprah she did NOT like the interview she did with Pat and Bobbi Kristina. I dont think Oprah has had anyone throw shade right in front of her face in a long time!

• I honestly don't think we will ever know for sure. There is too much need for clear cut lines and conspiracies out here. I think Whitney was in a lesbian relationship and I know some people who knew her in the years before Bobby. But she did not avoid men. This is not so hard to understand. I also think that she was pressured to marry, but no one ran Whitney Houston, and I know Bobby was her own choice. He was another act of rebellion, and crack is a lot like meth, a hyper sexual drug. I think they had a pretty wild time together, apart and with others. I am a huge Whitney fan, and I am a gay man. I don't think one closet fits all. Whitney wanted children, god help that child and she loved her some Bobby, even if a lot of it was entangled with their drug use. I am not saying that there was not some kind of closeted denial. I am saying that she had something real with him too. Fucked up. I don't buy into the argument that self-loathing turned Whitney into an addict. There are plenty of out and proud gay and lesbians who are addicts. Many factors come into play. Whitney was deep into drugs before she met Bobby Brown, and maybe that was part of their attraction ? Drug addicts don't get clean together, and she never did. Nope. Or after him. Whether a man or a woman, Whitney was only going to be within her race. That is fine too, no? Too many conspiracies and we forget the tragedy of her depleted talent and lost life. Whitney Houston ran her own show and payed everyone's way, whether it was to come along with her, or to stay away. We know some tried to help. Why she was this way, her mother should have more insight and knowledge of. Cissy Houston's level of denial requires a lot of upkeep and deception, to self and others. Whitney's family is still making a buck off of her great talent and peoples memories. It is despicable, predictable and very sad. I know someone is going to come after me for my thoughts, so I have one other. Whitney Houston's fame was not a gay creation. She was deeply loved by so many. She was dressed as a Diva, but their is no counterfeiting her kind of talent. I am a musician, in a world class symphonic orchestra, and I accompany in cabaret lots of fine singers too. Most everyone I know was deeply upset by Whitney's death. Weeping. Her glorious voice was destroyed before her body, and her behavior made for some very funny jokes, but when she died, the loss was immense. People really do love her, as most peoples fans do I guess, but if all you know of her is her eighties videos and I, yi, yi, will always love you oo oo, then you don't know what that woman could do and did. She was exploited by many, but not by Bobby Brown. She was in charge of her own personal destruction. If she loved pussy, I am positive she got some. The idea that if only Whitney were allowed to be in a lesbian relationship all would be different is facile and shows little understanding of addiction, musical genius, ambition, parental jealousy and love, the black community or the randomness of the world. I don't know. She is for sure gone though.

  iconoclast

• Yea i agree. Cissy is da bomb.

• I love what you wrote R173...

• r173 that is beautiful, seriously. I agree for the most part. Though no one knows what would have happened if Cissy accepted her and loved her unconditionally. Unconditional love towards children is imperative imho, otherwise we get totally screwed up and fucked up.

• When the first bio on Whitney came out, Cissy came across as an overpowering bully towards the other members of Sweet Inspiration, and she bullied Whitney also. I didn't see a grieving mother at Whitney's funeral, I saw the architect of her destruction. No sympathy for Cissy.

• I don't think she wanted to be with DeNiro because he IS a total fucking nutjob & asshole to every single woman he's been with, plus a constant cheat. Plus it would have been him with all the cards in the relationship. No, she wanted to be with a black man that she could hold the cards with, DeNiro never would have put up with the things that BB put up with. Even though he's constantly in lust/love with whomever the new famous black chick is at least WH saw through his bs. The women he's been with are women he had the complete power over.

  Diane%2C%20Grace%2C%20etc

• DeNiro's black girl fetish is so tiresome and insulting.

• [quote]You'd think if Whitney and her mother was super close, she'd, out of respect for her mother, keep a close eye on her to see how she's doing. But she doesn't seem to feel obligated to do that, why? This sentence lost me - too many pronouns and I can't tell who's who/her/she/her mother, especially since the previous sentence was talking about three different generations of ladies, daughters and mothers(Whitney, Cissy, and Bobbie). Anybody care to explain it to me? Thanks! [quote]Hell, most gay people with children (if they told the truth) would prefer for their children to grow up straight because they're smart enough to know it would make their lives much easier.Whitney's mother displays absolutely no signs of homophobia, which is an unnatural fear or homosexuals or homosexuality. She just said she'd have a problem if it was true Whitney was gay. I think many, if not most straight parents would feel the same way. There's a HUGE difference between prefering your daughter to be straight and HAVING A PROBLEM with her being gay. The latter is homophobia. You're the one who needs to learn your terminology. The term is not defined by its apparent etimological roots. If it were, it would mean "fear of the human race," which it clearly doesn't. It was a term coined to mean dislike/hatred/fear of homosexuals.It was made up in the 1960's for chrissakes!

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophobia

• "I know some people who knew her in the years before Bobby. But she did not avoid men". Really? Her avoidance of men before Bobby Brown was talked about loudly. There weren't any men until she was almost 30 (!) and this was a topic of gossip (Outweek) since beautiful Whitney could have had any guy before, and certainly after, fame. But there were none. Until... She's on Arsenio Hall in 1991 exclaiming that she dates Eddie Murphy, and sometimes, they are "intimate." WTF? Is that the way people talk? then she's denying that Robyn is more than a friend and they start sitting at different tables at public functions (Outweek). Whitney says people only think Robyn is a lez because she used to play basketball, that she isn't "a man." WTF? Then she's Bobby Brown's wife, and you know the rest. I don't buy it for a second, never did.

• r181, Jermaine Jackson and Randall Cunningham are the two she dated before Bobby Brown.

• [quote]but if all you know of her is her eighties videos and I, yi, yi, will always love you oo oo, then you don't know what that woman could do and did. Amen. I keep telling folks I've never cared for her bigger hits and watered down soul/pop whitewashed for the mainstream. When Whitney did what she loved i.e. singing live or dabbling soul and gospel, she was something else.

• Am I the only one who thinks that Clive wasn't the sweet, caring mentor he's been made out to be? I personally think that he couldn't have cared less about Whitney's happiness, only that she made him money. There's something about him I never liked.

• I think her mother was not homophobic but really hated that WH, her baby girl was a lez lez. Not unlike many people. The difference is that she never seemed to accept that about her. Look at what CH says. That WH did not call or come over often. That's because WH was distancing from her mother. She loved and respected her mother but not being accepted for who she really was tore into her, and thus the drugs/alc issues. This makes me very sad. RIP WH, you were too delicate for this life.

• This video, including the little speech at the end, shows what a unique and outrageous talent she was and encapsulates every facet. She looked and sounded like a goddess. She had such awesome stage presence she didn't need dancing or gimmicks, the audience would be transfixed no matter what. She had a bit of Ella, Billie, Streisand and Aretha in her, she would stay true to the music and knew not to oversing. She'd throw in her own soul/gospel riffs and even though she doesn't move much, there's a bit of drama to her and her performances that I've seen in few others. With the industry going the way it is, I honestly don't think we'll see another Whitney Houston ever.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Dr8DMDW_ZkrY

• r186 I think we won't see another Whitney because black people have evolved away. Sure there's still AA's going to church but WH is the product of her mother and the church, and I don't think the church and church singing have as much of a hold on people, not even AAs anymore. The black church has given America and the world AMAZING voices that the UK tried to duplicate in their Northern Soul thing but could never duplicate it. And I think we're seeing the decline. So many people with amazing voices, I feel sad we are losing or have lost the greatest American black singers for the future. We will never get those soulful people back. Ever. As Bettye LaVette said in the NYT, "there is no R&B anymore there's black people and they call that R&B but it's not real R&B." Listen to Bettye LaVette sing on Knights in White Satan for instance. It will blow your mind.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DK6raFWDBZLI

• [quote]The black church has given America and the world AMAZING voices that the UK tried to duplicate in their Northern Soul thing but could never duplicate it. That the likes Adele are being called "soul" by the British media is a travesty and actually an insult to the genre. She's more Celine Dion than Whitney. And there's an Amy Winehouse video where her fans are trying to claim she sings a certain jazz standard better than Ella Fitzgerald. Do those children even know who Ella fucking Fitzgerald is?

• Cissy didn't deny that Whitney was gay or at least bi. That says it all to me. I wonder what Oprah thought of Cissy's answers.

• [quote] I think her mother was not homophobic but really hated that WH, her baby girl was a lez lez. Pet, that is homophobic.

• r189, Oprah didn't ask if Whitney was gay but if Cissy would have had a problem with it if she was. A hypothetical.

• How is Cissy homophobic if, as has been pointed out here, she was friends with many famous gays? As a favor to Cissy, Luther Vandross let the Whitney open for him in concerts. Paul Jabara gave her one of her first recording breaks. When Cissy had her nightclub act, a significant part of her audience was gay. Surely this isn't a normal case of homophobia?

• R192 If the money was right Cissy was friends with gay folks. Luther must have paid her very well, since she was his favourite backup singer. He adored her voice.

  Anonymous

• R192, all those gay 'friends' are people who could advance her daughter's career. The gays in the audience were paying to see her. All about money. Plenty of homophobes claim to have 'gay friends', but if you view them as not equal to you, then what kind of friendship is that?

• I sort of get Cissy[s bitterness as she watched her friends and family, like Aretha, Dionne, Gladys and Robeta Flack, recording careers go from strength to strength while hers got stuck. She even recorded and released "Midnight Train To Georgia" first before Gladys Knight and the Pips made it a hit. She must have felt aggrieved knowing she was as good, or even better singer than her big star friends. Cissy was such a badass soul singer but I think she was too soulful to croossover. Check out this TV performance of "Be My Baby" in her prime, she was fantastic.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DySZNLzo9Mew

• [quote] Cissy was such a badass soul singer but I think she was too soulful to crossover. No, she didn't cross over because she didn't get good enough original material and/or arrangements. "Too soulful" doesn't make sense, as if to say Aretha, Gladys etc were less soulful.

• Gladys just stole other people's work

  Marvin%20Gaye

• Oh, really, Marvin?

  The%20Isley%20Bros

• I get the sense that Cissy was controlling and very critical. And obviously homophobic. And yes, she should could talk to some gay people if money or business was involved, but would not want her daughter to be seen that way for controlling/shame/money reasons. I don't think Whitney could be herself in any way around her.

• This thread is making me wonder if the many pictures of Whitney and Cissy together were just that, photo ops. Was Whitney afraid of Cissy? The warmth between them seems so genuine.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Ffeature%3Dendscreen%26NR%3D1%26v%3D1D6ffcTHnC8

• R182, The Randall Cunningham "date" was a set up so the National Enquirer could catch Whitney with a guy -- they were photographed sunbathing in a yacht. Randall real girlfriend spilled the whole deal and THAT'S what made news. Did you not know this?

• From Cissy's book: [bold]1. Whitney met Robyn Crawford—and Cissy didn’t like it one bit.[/bold] Whitney often kept personal details from her mother and because of this, Cissy was often totally in the dark about Whitney’s personal and drug problems. But she was aware of how the fighting at home between herself and her husband, John, was affecting Whitney during her last few years as a teenager—her grades dropped and she became more distant. Later, through watching interviews, Cissy learned that this was also the time that Whitney began experimenting with drugs ... “I had a bad feeling about that child (Robyn Crawford) from the first time I saw her,” writes Cissy. “There was something about the way she carried herself, a kind of arrogance, that I didn’t like. [bold]Though she was a pretty girl, in my opinion Robyn wasn’t as bright as Nippy. She also seemed abrasive and unapologetic about that.” Cissy also later learned that Robyn was gay, though she insists “that had nothing to do with why I didn’t like her.”[/bold] And no, Cissy has no idea whether Robyn and Whitney had a romantic relationship. [bold]2. Robyn told Cissy about Whitney’s drug problem.[/bold] Cissy does have this to say about Robyn: she respects her for being the first to come to her about Whitney’s drug problem in the late 1980s. “Robyn said that both she and Nippy were doing it on occasion, but that ‘Nippy likes it a little too much.’ Apparently, if they had it in the house, Robyn could do some and stop,” Cissy writes. “But Nippy would keep on doing it until everything was gone.” [bold]3. No man could sweep Whitney off her feet—until Bobby came along. Cissy didn’t much like him, either.[/bold] After Whitney became a star, lots of famous men took an interest in her—including Jermaine Jackson (“But he was married, so I wasn’t too thrilled when Nippy went out with him a couple of times”),[bold] former NFL quarterback Randall Cunningham (Cissy says he wanted to marry Whitney),[/bold] and Eddie Murphy—though he and Whitney were always just friends, says Cissy. None held her interest for very long, until one night at the 1989 Soul Train Awards, when she met Bobby Brown. “I’ll be honest—I tried to tell Nippy from the beginning that I didn’t think Bobby was good for her,” Cissy writes. But she says that even though Bobby had “done his share of bad things, and I didn’t like the way he sometimes treated Nippy, I thought deep down he was a good person. I still believe that.” [bold]4. Whitney did NOT pull a Beyoncé at the Super Bowl. (But she did at the World Cup.)[/bold] The 1991 Super Bowl’s organizers asked Whitney to make a “safety tape” as a precaution, but she never used it, Cissy writes: “The producers had wanted her to lip-sync it, but Nippy was like me—she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t keep time with a song unless she was really singing it, and at the Super Bowl, you could tell looking at her that she was singing the whole time.” The 1994 World Cup was a different story, though. Whitney’s voice was shot—a doctor diagnosed her with an ulcerated throat—and she used the safety tape she’d made for that performance. [bold]5. Bobby had a major inferiority complex while he was married to Whitney—and was jealous of Kevin Costner and Denzel Washington.[/bold] Bobby really, really didn’t want Whitney to star in The Preacher’s Wife. Seeing how he walked out of a screening of The Bodyguard after watching Whitney and Kevin Costner kiss, [bold]Cissy figures it was because he was intimidated by Denzel Washington, who was “handsome, accomplished, and one of the most beloved actors around.” Bobby, “like many men, might have been too insecure to want his wife around that.” [/bold]He also simply “had a hard time living in Nippy’s shadow. She was one of the biggest stars in the world, and he was just never as big as she was. For a man like Bobby, it’s not easy to be called ‘Mrs. Whitney Houston.’” There's more at link, by why would Bobby be jealous if he thought Whitney was gay?

  http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/01/30/speed-read-juiciest-bits-from-cissy-houston-s-remembering-whitney.html

• "She couldn’t keep time with a song unless she was really singing it, and at the Super Bowl, you could tell looking at her that she was singing the whole time." Cissy, you really blew it with that one. Whitney was one of the best lipsyncers that ever LIVED. Watch her old vidoes: lipsync perfection.

• It seems like she tried to have relations with men but she was happiest in her relationship with Robin (weren't there other girlfriends later). So she was either bisexual who liked sex with men but felt love with women or she was repressed. She probably enjoyed being with a married man like Jermaine Jackson because she knew it couldn't get serious. The sex with Bobby was probably fueled by drugs but also she must have known he would never be faithful so it wasn't a full commitment. Bobby has said himself that part of the reason she married him was to get away from the gay rumors.

• r203, link please. Whitney always sung live. The Super Bowl was supposed to be the one glaring exception because of organizers' requirements but now Cissy says she singing that too.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DwupsPg5H6aE

• She met Bobby Brown the night of the soul train awards, where she was booed rather loudly by the audience. The atmosphere in the air that night was that she was seen as being too white and not worthy of being put in with real soul artists. She lost out to Anita Baker. Bobby no doubt met her in a very low moment (Whitney has said she was near tears that evening) and they struck up a friendship. Who knows what else she was also dealing with at that moment. Maybe she saw someone who could take her away from what was ailing her. Then she got in over her head.

• r184, the man partied just hours from when WH died, your assessment couldn't be more correct.

• "Bobby no doubt met her in a very low moment" What do you not understand about Whitney and Bobby Brown being set up by Clive Davis precisely because he made her look more black and heteosexual? "So she was either bisexual who liked sex with men but felt love with women" Falling in love with a member of the same sex is called homosexuality. A woman doesn't have to like sex with men, she can be passed out and have se with men.

• I lived in NYC at the time Whitney's career was just blowing up. I've written about this before and I'll share it again. I was well known in lesbian circles that Whitney accompanied by Robyn would frequent gay clubs. They were often seen at a club called SheScape. I never asked my lesbian friends if they were making out or all over each other or other women at the clubs. But they were always excited to tell me who was famous they saw out at the clubs. Madonna was also spotted at lesbian bars at the time, this was when she was running tight with Sandra Bernhart. Just like friends told me about Jodie at Yale and just like the rumors I heard about Gomer Pyle way way way back in the day (which have been confirmed just this past week) rumors about Whitney were on fire among the common folk long before the press started sweating her in the tabloids. Whitney Houston was gay. From the start. Always.

• I believe Whitney was a lesbian but I also believe she had a deep attachment to Bobby Brown. The strange thing is that Bobby was often her caretaker. I do believe had they still been together she would not have died alone in a hotel.

• r191 And that was kind of a genius question. You don't "offend" the mother by asking if her daughter is gay you ask instead if she would have a problem if she were and by the mother's answer you find out what you need to know. So very sad, Whitney knew her mother would not accept her as she was. Her own mother did not see her. The real Whitney did not exist for her family only the version that they would accept, which was not really her. I can't imagine how painful that would be, to have to be an image to your own family and not your true self. The thought of that makes me sick to my stomach. It must be very painful and I can see why someone might wish to destroy themselves or at least destroy their feelings. The closet does kill.

• R208 I said either she was bisexual or repressed (meaning a repressed lesbian). Bisexuality does exist and its more common in women than men. No one has a way of knowing if she in fact enjoyed sex with men (which would make her bisexual) or was trying to repress her feelings to save her career.

• R210, THEY WERE DIVORCED by the time Whitney died. They would not be together if she was still alive. Duh.

• I agree R184 and R207, Clive was no prize from what I can tell. Who knows, maybe he cared about Whitney underneath it all, but the evidence isn't flattering. Isn't he gay himself? Poor Whitney had to closet to please him, while he supposedly enjoyed all the gay he wanted. Then there was the whole shaping of her image to hide her rough edges. The partying just after her death was disgusting. At her funeral all he talked about was $ and success. I know it was largely a business relationship, but that really blew away the fatherly image I had of him. Sounded like he was talking about "yeah my prime filly was great, won me a bunch of races". That other lesbian who killed herself hated him, I think she read him well.

• Wasn't it quoted in another thread that in Bobby's book he talks about Whitney not wanting to have sex with him and that he himself stated that he thought she preferred women? Why are so many on here trying to make her straight? If we were talking about a guy with this kind of background there would be a lot less questioning about the fact he was gay.

• Bobby is ugly enough to turn some women gay.

• I don't think it's many DLers R215, I think it's likely 1 or 2 straight "Whitney Houston" superfans who googled her name and want to defend her. Like someone mentioned a few pages ago, there's some "Bobby Brown n' Whitney 4ever" troll who says the same type of things over and over.

• Why are people responding to threads that could not possibly have been posted yet?

• Why are so many trying to make her straight? Because many DL gays are so insecure that they're being rejected when a pretty woman does not "crave cock" like some porno queen. David Ehrenstein was a prime example of this.

• This must have been a tad awkward for Oprah.

• r215, Whitney IS straight in the eyes of the millions worldwide. It's you who's trying to make her gay. All we're saying is, it's highly unusual for a lesbian to have such an unhealthy obsession with a man, especially if that relationship met with such strong disapproval from her fan base.

• She was drunk, not obsessed.

• I definitely see a biopic in this.

  Beyonce%2C%20making%20room%20in%20her%20cabinet%20for%20the%20Oscar

• As I said, Whitney was too good a singer and too pretty to have been a lesbo. I feel for her mother and her feelings. Leave Cissy alone.

• Beyaki, bitch, you KNOW you ain't going to play Whitney! That part is mine and I'm gonna win that Oscar and whip my hair some more.

  Willow%20Smith%2C%20Academy%20Award%20winner%20for%20Best%20Actress

• F&F asshole r224,

• R208 Clive Davis would not fix her up with someone who had already had a reputation for being self destructive. Bobby Brown already had a less than stellar reputation in the biz as a hothead with substance issues when they met. With all the money and time Clive Davis had put into making her a star, you think he would gamble all of that away just like that? I'd imagine he tried getting more respectable black men to date her, but I call bullshit on Brown being an arranged beard. It makes absolutely no sense from a PR and business standpoint.

• Think so? I don't. The more thug the better. It makes plenty of sense from a PR standpoint -- prissy, non-experienced Whitney with blacker than black thug. A respectable guy wouldn't go for it uness he was gay and that would have presented more problems. Plus, this is not a new story -- it was around in 1992.

• r221 Well you are labeling it an obsession. She was gay and in the closet so it would make sense that she would invest her life in him an her daughter. The point of being in the closet is that your life appears to be heterosexually "normal" in all respects. From what her mother wrote, Whitney was not close to her at all so Bobby was her family. She was a drug addict and she was keeping the story she was forced to live, going. I do not see any thing strange given all circumstances.

• Of course it's not a new story. That doesn't make it any less ridiculous. Of course Clive wanted her to court the R&B market. And you got that with I'm Your Baby Tonight. But if you notice, the artists she works with are older and already established. Luther and Stevie Wonder singing with her. No Keith Sweat, Al. B. Sure, Bobby Brown with her on any of those tracks. Now I could totally see Whitney dating Brown to piss people off. But a PR move? No. Current PR is a totally different breed than it was back then. No way were they going to gamble with the top star of Arista records like that.

• R230, He's doing the same with Alicia keys and that male whore she married.

• [quote][R230], He's doing the same with Alicia keys and that male whore she married. True tea!

• Alicia Keys was always an R&B artist, first and foremost. Whitney was pop's princess who reached a much broader, mainstream audience. And how many years is there between them?

• Clive and her mother desperately wanted her with a man. Whitney wanted to be straight to please them, but the choice of Bobby Brown as her punishment was hers. A drug addict picks a drug buddy, big surprise. Also no shock someone supposedly sensitive to criticisms about her "black street cred" would pick a popular black guy with "cred".

• For R182. Whitney denying she ever dated Randall.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoC-pwEwfkM

• So you cherry pick what to believe from Whitney, right? She denies dating him while saying she dated Eddie Murphy? Cissy says Randall Cunningham wanted to marry her.

• r220, my second reaction to that moment was just that. The more I think about it the more I find it funny that Oprah of all people asked that question.

  but%20back%20to%20Nippy

• Whitney did "date" Eddie Murphy but the Randall Cunningham situation was a publicity stunt. Randall Cunningham had a girlfriend during that time.

• People hide behind church so they can be homophobic (among other hateful things). If you are gay-positive- how could you ever follow a religion? To me, the existence of homosexuality DISPROVES all religions. I like that.

• Bullshit, R239. BULL and SHIT--to the nth degree.

• I take Bobby Brown's stupidity for part of the reason he took the job and that he was chosen for it. Clive may have thought it wouldn't become a legal marriage at the start.

• The only thing I get from this is that Clive Davis is obsessed with black lesbians.

• R241, not necessarily.Until Whitney got pregnant she and Bobby lived pretty separate lives. He was here in Atlanta whoring it up and partying big time and she was in NJ. I suspect it was the happiest times of his life. I remember when Whitney foreclosed on Bobby's mortgage forcing them to live together in Atlanta.

• I do not believe Whitney was ever pregnant. Bobbi K was Bobby's from another woman.

• I can believe Whit was a lesbian, but there is no way that child isn't hers. Bobbi K looks too much like Whitney in the T zone to not be her daughter.

• Are you serious, R245? Bobbi K looks nothing like Whitney Houston. It's difficult to believe they are part of the same species, let alone the same gene pool.

• Right on, r246! R245 - you're fucking nuts!!!

• Whitney didn't much like her mother. Didn't sound much like her either.

• [quote] Whitney didn't much like her mother Whitney didn't look much like her mother

• Please R29. How the hell can you make that statement?

• Whitney never really resembled Cissy, and Bobbi K. doesn't look like Whitney--at all. She has Bobby Brown's face, but she did grow up to have her mother's thin figure.

  http://hiphophoney.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/bobbi2-copy-e1277050731800.jpg

• Yeah, plus she's two feet shorter than Whitney...

• R249/251/252 please read a book on genetics.

• Come on now bitches, dont act like BK isn't a crack baby!

  MISS%20Dionne%2C%20Hussynator

• R252, please read a book on bullshit. Then read a book on closet lesbians.

• The lesbians here are showing their utter craziness with their conspiracy theories. Here's a picture of a pregnant Whitney Houston at The Bodyguard premiere in 1992. Unlike Beyonce, the weight gain is not just visible on her tummy area but all over her body including her face. She was just 29 years old at the time and went back to being stick thin after Bobbi Kristina was born.

  http://img.ibtimes.com/www/data/images/full/2011/12/06/200378-costner-and-houston.jpg

• Whitney was no lesbian. She may have had a fling or two with women, but that was it. Women are like that. They can experiment with their sexuality, and oftentimes don't have the same hangups as guys do. Their sexuality is more fluid, I should say. But, at the end of the day, Whitney liked dick.

  The Peanut Gallery

• Wrong, Peanut Gallery

• "That other lesbian who killed herself hated him, I think she read him well." Who is R214 talking about?

• [quote]Who is R214 talking about? Phyllis Hyman

• is this going to repeat on OWN anytime?

• thank you, R260

  R259

• R256, read a book about large pillows. Then read a book about eating too much lasagna. Then read a book about how only children use the word "tummy."

• Bobbi Kristina thinks Cissy's book is disrespectful and is urging fans not to buy it? I swear this family is more interesting than the Jacksons.

  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2272614/Its-disrespectful-Bobbi-Kristina-urges-fans-boycott-grandmothers-tell-book-dead-mother-Whitney-Houston.html%23axzz2JfXBL8mv

• Agree R256

• Well, nobody likes lesbians except lesbians. I too would hate to have a dyke for a child.

• Same with me and fags!

• F&F both of you.

• I went to look at pictures of Bobbi K and Whitney together to see if I thought there was a resemblance. I think there is a resemblance in the "T zone" area as someone else pointed out. Bobbi K could be Whitney's daughter easily. But more than that, it is sad how much they genuinely look bonded to each other in all the photos. Their body language shows a deep love. So sad for that girl to have her mother die in such a way.

• She was a lesbian, or at least far from being straight. She had sex with men, maybe even enjoyed it. But, she was primarily attracted to and fell in love with women. Bobbi Kristina is her child. That doesn't mean she's not a lesbian or at the very least, bi.

• And what makes you so sure of that, R270? Did you know her personally? Were you around when she slept with whomever she slept with? No? I didn't think so. Whitney was straight.

• Like a woman has to sleep with a man to have a child.

• Looks like some Lipstick Alley straights have found datalounge? Whitney Houston would not have lived with a butch lesbian for all those years, just the two of them, if she was a straight woman! At the very least she was bisexual. And furthermore, even Cissy stated in the Oprah interview when asked about Robyn Crawford that she was not sure what type of relatinship Robyn and Whitney had. It's there go back and watch it. If Whitney's own Mother cannot absolutely say what kind of relationship that Robyn and Whitney had, how the hell then can the public proclaim that Whitney was straight?

• The Houstons have a ton of issues. Michael, the brother who introduced Whitney to drugs, has only been clean since October. I definitely think Whitney was into women. She seemed very unhappy.

• BK needs to drop Nick Gordon and get her life together.

• [quote]And what makes you so sure of that, [R270]? Did you know her personally? Were you around when she slept with whomever she slept with? No? I didn't think so. Whitney was straight. You know, the exact same questions can be asked of you. What makes you sure she was straight? Did you know her personally? Were you around when she slept with whomever she slept with? No? I don't think so. Whitney was a lesbian.

• Thanks, R276, but you still didn't answer the question. Why do you and so many others assume (which is the operative word) that she was a lesbian? Because you WANT her to be? I think that's it. What's unfortunate for you is that you have no proof.

• [quote]Thanks, [R276], but you still didn't answer the question. Why do you and so many others assume (which is the operative word) that she was a lesbian? Because you WANT her to be? I think that's it. What's unfortunate for you is that you have no proof. Thanks, R277, but you still didn't answer the question. Why do you and so many others assume (which is the operative word) that she was straight? Because you WANT her to be? I think that's it. What's unfortunate for you is that you have no proof. But, honestly, i don't care, so if it will make you feel better, Whitney WAS, without doubt, straight. OK. Whitney was straight. I'm saying it. You're right.

  Straight

• Yes r113

  I%27ll%20be%20waiting

• yes!

• Whitney was married to a man for 14 years.

• so what? Travolta's been married to a woman for as long and he's GAY GAY GAY GAY GAY!

• My mommy says being a mother's the toughest job in the world.

• BK's twitter y'all

  https://twitter.com/REALbkBrown

• R257-True. She had a fling or whatev with Robin. But she loved Bobby Brown and dated Ray J. If she really wanted to be with a woman after divorcing Bobby she very well could of. There was nothing holding her back.

• There was EVERYTHING holding her back - Cissy, Clive Davis, the Church, the homophobic public that expected her any every superstar to be straight, assorted hangers on profiting from her career, etc etc

• Cissy knew Whitney had a relationship with Robyn. She's lying to keep the church off her back and to make herself look good. Cissy is a seasoned liar and has made up most of her daughter's life.

• Did Whitney even go to church as an adult?

• Don't feed this "straight" troll. It's wants you to take the bait.

• After talking with Oprah, I have no idea who or why anyone at the publishing company thought sending Cissy Houston on a press tour was a good idea.. She's really isn't preenting her own book in a positive light.. Case in point - her excruciating interview this morning with Jian Ghomeshi on CBC Radio. Aparently Robyn Crawford was "too progressive."

  http://music.cbc.ca/%23/blogs/2013/2/Cissy-Houston-on-Q

• pardon me, 'presenting' and 'apparently'..

  R%20290

• "Straight" troll? What straight troll, R289. Nobody has any evidence that Whitney Elizabeth Houston was gay.

• I also heard the interview on CBC. Cissy isn't exactly the most articulate interviewee that I ever heard.

• r292, if someone thinks Whitney Houston was gay, who the fuck cares? I mean "evidence" really?

• BK is a total mess. And why does she have so many followers? What has she done other than the reality show?

• If Whitney was gay, and I am not saying she was not, she probably denied it herself due to her religious upbringing. She adored her mother and she adored Jesus. I always thought that was one of the biggest problems in her life. She may have forced herself to life in denial all her life, because she thought being gay was not what Jesus wanted her to be.

  Anonymous

• Very true, R292. It's character assassination to accuse any celebrity of being a homosexual. There should be a law preventing such slander! There needs to be conclusive evidence and there is none.

  John%20Travolta

• But she thought Jesus wanted her to smoke crack? Well okay.

• I do know that in the Catholic church you can smoke and drink and gamble all you want -- it only sex you can't have. And you must go to mass or go to hell.

• Cissy ripped Clive for inviting her to his Grammy Party. She called it obscene.

• The notion that a true artist, as beautiful and expressive as Whitney could be a lesbian is laughable at best. There is no evidence that she was even bi.

• R301 You really sound like a poor sucker! If you eliminate all the true artist who were gay from the cultural landscape, today's museums would only be half full.

  Leonardo%20Da%20Vinci%20

• [R302] And if you eliminated all the artists who were lesbians, you would still have just as many works. Because lesbians unlike gay men contribute nothing to the culture except maybe a deep study into vaginal repression in womyn's literature.

• Only a rabid lesbian hater like you would think that. Drop dead, you bitter faggot

• R303 I contradict your assumtion with my tender smile

  Mona%20Lisa%20

• r301 You are SO right.

  Mary%20Isobel%20Catherine%20Bernadette%20O%27Brien

• DON'T FEED THE TROLL

• Whitney Houston and Robyn Crawford lived together for several years, just the two of them, even after Whitney was worth millions and some idiot thinks that they just had a "fling."

• F&F for R301 and R304

• Agree R301 and 303. No way that beautiful woman with the angelic voice was a lesbo. No fucking way.

• Webmaster, please step in and ban these trolls!

• Cissy is a trip. Whitney must have felt an enormous amount of pressure from her.

• What was Whitney's cousin Dionne like on this topic. She sure must be OK with Whitney being gay, when she is still friends with OJ and her having no problem selling her soul for the psychic friends network.

  Anonymous

• Oh for crying out loud, Dionne's bi or gay, Cissy's bi, the whole family is living down at the corner of Blind and Denial.

• R301, short of someone explicitly coming out and saying they are gay, what would you accept as 'evidence'? Pictures of them performing oral on a member of the same sex? Liberace never admitted to being gay nor did Rock Hudson. Are you of the opinion that neither of them were gay? What we do know for a fact is that Whitney Houston was extraordinarily close to Robyn, a woman she had known since she was about 16 and Robyn was 19. Also, we know for a fact that Robyn is a lesbian. She is and has been married to a woman for several years and they have children together. We also know for a fact that Whitney, despite being a former model and successful singer with a significant fortune, had not had any significant romantic involvements with any members of the opposite sex all the way through her late 20's. Additionally, Whitney and Robyn were attached at the hip to the point that Robyn actually lived with Whitney as her 'roomate' for several years during the height of Whitney's success and fortune. Also, a multitude of people including people like Terry Thatchell, Nora Dunn, Bobby's sister Tina, and even Bobby Brown himself have explicitly stated that Whitney had been involved in same-sex relationships. Now, I don't know how many more pieces of a puzzle you require in order to see what it's a picture of, but just using common sense, I don't think it's a stretch to state that Whitney was at a very least a self-loathing bisexual.

• I wonder if Whitney was not born into such a fucked up family if her life would have gone a different direction. Sometimes the family of those people are their biggest problem. I hate those religious bigots.

  Anonymous