The black gang is the part of a ship's crew that works in the engine room. They were called 'black' because of the soot and coal dust that was thick in the air in the fire room/engine room. The term began usage in the days of the coal fired steam-ships. The term is commonly used in the United States Navy and United States Coast Guard to describe personnel in "M" and "B" divisions.
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“It’s perversion. Don’t you see what it is? It’s not natural. To go to great expense for something you want, that’s natural. To reach out to take it, that’s human, that’s natural. But to get your pleasure from not taking, from cheating yourself deliberately like my brother did today, from not getting, from not taking. Don’t you see what a black thing that is for a man to do? How it is to hate yourself?”
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