National Coming Out Day Urges Gay Discussion

[davidinalameda]

http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/10/101005comeOut.htm

Tuesday marks National Coming Out Day, but events are planned throughout the week in many communities nationwide, with the theme this year: 'Talk About It'.

"Talk About It,” encourages gays to talk openly and honestly about their lives and the inequalities gay , lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans face under law .

“Every single time we talk about it , we are one step closer to equality,” Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese told 365Gay.com

[TallahasseeGrannie]

1. I'd like to see some folks

talk about it right her. How does being gay affect your life, your family relationships, your finances, your profession, your self-image, your life? If you want to talk I sure need the education. I am presently without one single local gay friend, after years of best-budding with my organist-choir director and his friends.

[DJ MEW]

2. I have been with the same guy for 8 months

and I can tell you that things are a lot different. I can't introduce him most of my family, although everyone knows that I am gay. Most of them just don't know to be confronted with the issue and so choose to ignore me as much as possible and don't want to know anything about what is going on with me, although my parents are pretty good about it.

Most of the family members that have started ignoring me are the ones that I really never liked hanging out with anyway so it really is not a big loss but it was a change.

Being gay doesn't effect my finances, except that shopping at the GAP costs more then shopping at Wal Mart. There is a pressure in the gay community to be trendy and buy expensive clothes and just look like you have lots of money, so being from a poor rural family does effect your social status within the gay community.

It has not really effect my profession at all. I am weird for a gay guy in that respect though. I have been to the Midwestern Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender College Conference a few times and I have noticed that most GLBT people choose to study social, art, or political things. Me being a Chemical Engineering / Environmental Engineering person has made me different in that respect. Like I said once, "It's easy to write a paper for your political class that is also pro-gay-activist but I can't do calculus in a GLBT friendly way."

As for my self image, I never used to care about it until I came out. Now I strive to find that balance of being sexy and yet powerful at the same time. Sexy power, something like John Edwards had. I actually spend a lot of time and money worrying about my image now and trying to constantly lose more weight.

As far as how it effects my life... I love my life, for the most part. I wish I was done working on my degree at college and had a good job doing what I want to do, but that is it.

P.S. Since I came out to my parents my dad has changed from a blatant anti-gay advocate to more of there is good everyone type of person.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

6. Thanks for helping me

understand better. It is sad that you can't introduce your boyfriend to most of your family. And it's a pain that you have to worry about keeping up appearances in the gay community, but I know that is correct from my own friends' experiences. And yet... gay man are so very kind to overweight, older women and their appearance. My gay friends always notice what I wear, my make up, etc., in a way my women friends never do. And it is like they are REAL about it. Like there is nobody so old, so heavy, so ugly that a little of this or that won't just fix it up right away! I think that is one reason gay men make great hairdressers.

I am happy for you that your father has come around. I am convinced that "anti gay" people are railing against an abstract concept and not real people. Once you put a face on it, your mind set changes so much.

Now I bet you really could do calc in a GLBT way but you just haven't figured it out yet!

[dickthegrouch]

3. I came out at 16, 32 years ago

This was way before Gay/Straight alliances or anything else in my hometown. I was not (still am not) flamboyant but I was radioactive as far as any of my school friends was concerned. I ended up being very much the loner until I went to college, where I started the Gay student group.

My parents started off with my Mom being very anti and Dad being very supportive, they switched at one time and are now both supportive. They've met my partner and now regularly ask as his well-being at the same time as mine. Partner's parents denied our relationship fpr a while, but are now very supportive of our relationship.

Telling the truth has always been more important to me than my image or what other people think. I've caused awkward silences and walked out of work meetings where homophobic "jokes" were being told (by someone who, although they were wearing one of my company's badges, was actually a customer); refusing to go back in until I got an apology.

I am a computer engineer (unix, kernel, device drivers) and, since the demise of High Tech Gays in San Jose, don't have very many like-minded friends either.

I start a new job next Monday, so I'll have to see how quickly I can make my mark. They already have DP Benefits, so it's hard to see how to take them to the next level. Maybe I take me to the next level, whatever that is. Any suggestions?

[TallahasseeGrannie]

7. Wow, you were a pioneer

The next level? Well... the thetans.. (just kidding, I'm not a Scientologist!) The next level is keep on loving and doing and living your life. Also, make a lot of money and retire early.

I once wondered if my son was gay. He had a lot of girlfriends, but he had some behaviors that I always thot of as feminine, like shopping, cooking, dressing up a lot, etc. How stupid is THAT? And I have to admit I was a bit worried. It wasn't that I would have loved him less. but it would have been a surprise to me and he was close to 30 and I think I would have felt left out...like he was a different person. But he isn't. I also think that I would have been concerned about the difficulties a gay person has in life today. I guess like your parents I would have adjusted pretty quickly and been supportive. My husband would have, as well.

But you know, it is a big change for the older generation, as you well know. We were taught as kids, that it was wrong, unnatural, perverted, and then boom! We get real. The gay community really had an uphill battle there and will until, probably, the Boomers die out. It was a huge cultural shift.

Thanks for talking to me about this. Nothing interests me more than human stories.

[kweerwolf]

4. I'm still coming out ... it's a life-long process

For me that process started in my late teens when I realized I wasn't going through a "phase."

I'm surprised any of us who came of age back then made it through until now. There were no role models (unless you count Paul Lynde ... LOL!), no "Will and Grace," no positive images of any kind. The first time I found information about homosexuality in a book was David Ruben's "Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex." I can look back on it now and wish I could slap the shit out of that guy. From his book I "learned" that if I wanted sex I should hang out around rest rooms ... that when I couldn't find a partner I could shove light bulbs and cucumbers up my ass ... and that as a homosexual, I would have a lonely life because I was incapable of forming real bonds because I must continue to look for the "perfect penis."

Of course it didn't help that I grew up in a small, rural town and felt like I was the only person who felt "that way."

College was a revelation for me. I remember looking up the New York Times articles on the Stonewall Riots on old microfiche files and suddenly realized that not only was I not alone, but I had a history (and gay history is still a subject I read frequently). By the time I was a junior in college, I had amassed quite a library - for that time anyway - on gay issues and shared them with friends. Together we planted the seeds that would become the first gay organization on campus two years later. My library also "outed" me to my mother who found several of my books. Her words to me were: "If you are gay, I don't want to know ... and your dad wouldn't either. That would kill him." From that point until my mother's death there was always a boundary between us and I find myself still feeling anger today that she never wanted to really know me. Ironically, far from killing my father, he has been very supportive (even if he still has problems saying "gay" ... but then he's in his 80s).

As for my profession, I "knew" that there would be professions that would forever be closed to me. Ironically, I picked a career that made me at least a quasi-public figure, while at the same time "distancing" myself ... I became a journalist (though later I switched to public relations).

My self-image has gone through much evolution. Early on, when I realized that I wasn't destined for the American Dream of a wife, 2.3 kids, a station wagon and a white picket fence around a charming Cape Cod-style home, there were times when I considered ending my life rather than bringing shame on my family. I still have the faint scar on my wrist from a feeble attempt at suicide. But probably the biggest change in my self-image occurred when I read (wish I could remember where or who the author was) a statement about how being gay was a "gift." I couldn't bring myself to believe that at the time, but the more I wrestled with the concept, the more I understood it to be true. From being gay I received the gifts of being able to empathize with the underdog and the oppressed and how to look at the world in a completely new way.

Hope that help, TallahasseeGrannie ... and by the way, I've seen your postings on so many threads here and just wanted to say that it's a pleasure to have such wonderful straight allies! :hi:

[TallahasseeGrannie]

8. Oh, God...I remember that book!

I was just becomming sexually mature then myself and that guy was just FULL of Freudian crap and I believed every word of it!

I had never thought of being gay is a gift, but every gay person I know is very gifted so if one leads to the other, I'll agree.

I am very overweight, 300 lbs, and I see that as a gift because I have learned who is phony enough to care about that. And I also understand the underdog and oppressed.

I do wonder a lot why evolution has led to homosexuality. If you consider that everything about our species has developed because of survival of the fittest, what is the purpose? Perhaps it is provide the species with that gift. Or maybe to keep the population down! But that's changing too! I have a number of kids in my classes with gay parents.

Thanks for the kind words and thanks for sharing your life with me.

[kweerwolf]

11. One possible evolutionary reason for homosexuality

I've been trying to remember where I've read this and/or find a link on the Internet, but haven't come up with anything yet.

I do recall reading a theory that homosexuality is part of a "altruistic" gene. Gays and lesbians exist because they are far less likely to have children, so they are free to be caretakers for others ... either the children in a society or the elderly and disabled. I can't speak to the scientific basis of that, but I know from experience that I do much more "caretaking" for my elderly parents than my sisters who are married and have families of their own.

Then in some tribal/shamanistic societies, gays are seen as having special powers because they walk between the "male" and "female" world, so they are considered peacemakers ... thought that's not exactly scientic reasoning.

And thank you for sharing your life, TallahasseeGrannie! :hi:

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. I like that idea

Don't wolf packs have babysitter females who never have their own pups? That would be the same thing.

I just noticed your name, kweerwolf..ironic I should mention the wolf pack!

You know, I have an unmarried sister. I think she might be gay but she has stayed celebate all her life. She is also, sadly, in the final stages of alcoholism but that is a genetic issue and I don't think has anything to do with her lifestyle. However, she was definitely the nurturing one with my parents, always remembering to buy their socks, for example, their toiletries, when they were in a nursing home. I had my own kids to care for.

So I think you might be correct.

Now, the gay men I am friendly with are definitely NOT peacemakers! At least with each other, that is. But they are loving to a fault and totally accepting and forgiving.

[dsc]

10. I am open to my family, my friends but in the closet at work

I teach in a Southern school and don't have tenure so I really don't think I can be out at work. I have a long term plan that once I get tenure I will tell my district that I want to be out with my staff or I will look for a job in a place such as Chapel Hill. I don't like lying by implication but without some protection I really don't have much choice.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

12. I live in the South and I hear you

now, oddly, Tallahassee is fairly liberal. I do know of a couple gay teachers, men, who are vaguely out. Faculty know, maybe not parents, probably not kids (elemenetary)

There is a charter school that has a gay couple (female) or did...working there. I don't think there were any problems with that.

Get that tenure and then go for it. How sad you even have to think about it. Your generation is truly groundbreakers and very gutsy. Someday it won't matter.

[dsc]

14. Hardly brave

It is the generation behind mine which is the brave one. I intend to have an out lined up if it goes badly. There are several districts down here that don't discriminate on that basis and they often need math teachers.

[mitchtv]

15. I beg your pardon

The brave ones were those of us who came up in the late 60's.Who got arrested and ridiculed. On TV and the press. There was no out before our generation. The kids today take an awful lot for granted. No teargas necessary , No getting thrown off the dais by fellow protesters, we are accepted by the left(Feinstein notwithstanding)
I came out in '68 , and never looked back. This december I am bringing my partner of 28 years to my sister's 50th anniversary. We are out to the entire family. Only question is : do I wear my marriage equality button?. I love my family, I owe them nothing.

[dsc]

16. I was born in 67 which makes you the generation behind me

At least I think it does.

[mitchtv]

17. sorry for the umbrage- semantics

I like to think we came first,"before" you

[dsc]

19. I guess I can see that.

[soleft]

5. I'm finally going to come out to my boss tomorrow

Will let you know how it goes

[TallahasseeGrannie]

9. Please do. and good luck to you. n/t

[soleft]

18. Looks like I'll have to wait for next year

Not really, it just didn't happen. Damn, this is harder than with my parents.