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With Ming's permission, I have recreated the thread on informing people about National Coming Out Day. The Human Rights Campaign is very much involved with the organization of this event; see the website linked below if you're interested in knowing more about it.
National Coming Out Day
The degeneration of my last thread on this topic clearly indicates that there are some straight people who are uneducated or uninformed about the whole basic concept of "coming out, and being out" for gays and lesbians. These straight people might think, "Why do gays and lesbians have to be out? Why can't they keep their sex life private?"
Well, let me try to explain. For straight people who do not understand the concept of "coming out, and being out," it may be that they do not understand because they take it for granted that they can be comfortably open and honest about their heterosexuality to anyone they converse or interact with. In conversations about newborns, weddings, dating, and romantic relationships, there is no forthright disclosure of one's heterosexuality because 90 percent of population (or around there) are straight. So because they take it for granted that heterosexuality is acceptable in everyday conversation and interaction, they have no perception of coming out, and being out to others.
And secondly, some straight people confuse "coming out, and being out" with that of disclosing lurid details about one's own sex life. When straight people talk about their weddings or about dating, it's acceptable; when gays and lesbians talk about the same things, some straight people accuse them of advertising their private sex life. "Coming out, and being out" is different from talking about one's private sex life. All "coming out, and being out" means, is that gays and lesbians choose to be open about their sexual orientation in the same ways that is deemed appropriate for straight people to be open about their sexual orientation. I'm out to family, friends and co-workers as a gay man but I do not talk about how I have sex with other men, what I do during sex, or anything else that is considered to be my private sex life. I talk about my dating life and past/current relationships without divulging lurid details about my sex life, in the same manner that straight people talk about their dating life and their relationships.
The reason why an increasing number of gays and lesbians choose to come out and be out is because they are finding it personally unacceptable to hold themselves to unfair, and oppressive double standards of behavior in everyday conversations and interactions with others. They want to be held to the same rules of appropriate behavior and conduct that straight people are held to, instead of the homophobic or heterosexist double standard rules.
In my first thread, I guess I did not feel the need to go into an explanation like this because most people here on Apolyton seem in many other ways to be educated and intelligent and would have some form of understanding of what "coming out and being out" means to gays and lesbians even if they themselves are straight. So, I hope the explanation I provided here helps.
National Coming Out Day
The degeneration of my last thread on this topic clearly indicates that there are some straight people who are uneducated or uninformed about the whole basic concept of "coming out, and being out" for gays and lesbians. These straight people might think, "Why do gays and lesbians have to be out? Why can't they keep their sex life private?"
Well, let me try to explain. For straight people who do not understand the concept of "coming out, and being out," it may be that they do not understand because they take it for granted that they can be comfortably open and honest about their heterosexuality to anyone they converse or interact with. In conversations about newborns, weddings, dating, and romantic relationships, there is no forthright disclosure of one's heterosexuality because 90 percent of population (or around there) are straight. So because they take it for granted that heterosexuality is acceptable in everyday conversation and interaction, they have no perception of coming out, and being out to others.
And secondly, some straight people confuse "coming out, and being out" with that of disclosing lurid details about one's own sex life. When straight people talk about their weddings or about dating, it's acceptable; when gays and lesbians talk about the same things, some straight people accuse them of advertising their private sex life. "Coming out, and being out" is different from talking about one's private sex life. All "coming out, and being out" means, is that gays and lesbians choose to be open about their sexual orientation in the same ways that is deemed appropriate for straight people to be open about their sexual orientation. I'm out to family, friends and co-workers as a gay man but I do not talk about how I have sex with other men, what I do during sex, or anything else that is considered to be my private sex life. I talk about my dating life and past/current relationships without divulging lurid details about my sex life, in the same manner that straight people talk about their dating life and their relationships.
The reason why an increasing number of gays and lesbians choose to come out and be out is because they are finding it personally unacceptable to hold themselves to unfair, and oppressive double standards of behavior in everyday conversations and interactions with others. They want to be held to the same rules of appropriate behavior and conduct that straight people are held to, instead of the homophobic or heterosexist double standard rules.
In my first thread, I guess I did not feel the need to go into an explanation like this because most people here on Apolyton seem in many other ways to be educated and intelligent and would have some form of understanding of what "coming out and being out" means to gays and lesbians even if they themselves are straight. So, I hope the explanation I provided here helps.
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