I came across this recently and thought it was a super interesting and thorough examination of “the closet” or “coming out” of it.

  • i’ve never liked the idea of having to come out of the closet. I want to be able to say “oh, my boyfriend cooked my lunch, I don’t know what spices he used, i can ask him”, without it turning into “oh i didn’t know you were gay, thanks for letting me know, so brave” or something weird. we were talking about lunch, not who i like to sleep with

    • I tend to just note it in my head when I hear something casually dropped. I’m a type of person who is fine both not having a conversation but will engage sincerely if one is had at me. I went into a Lyft on the way to Dragoncon one year and saw a note that the driver was hiring impaired and would not communicate verbally.

      “Cool, I’ll just listen to music and/or read.”

      Then the driver started talking to me, and we had nice conversation about cons, nerd stuff, etc. He mentioned his boyfriend in a sentence but not really about his boyfriend, and all it really put in my mind is he probably had that sign up for people who could be problematic to talk about that stuff. I think I was maybe a little proud that he felt comfortable doing so so casually with me, but it otherwise didn’t affect the convo in any significant way, nor did I feel any need to comment on it with him. Just some internal thoughts.

    • I’m not sure if gay men have to deal with that more, or if it’s me specifically who’s weird for never having anybody do that to me when I mention my wife.

      The one time anything like that did come up, I was the one who brought it up and the dude was just like “Yeah, I knew you were into women before you even said anything. You’ve just got that vibe.”

      Point is somebody took the door off my closet.

    • This 100%. I also don’t like being at a new job or in a situation with new people and I don’t know if I should come out or stay stealth, both as gay and as a gender. Like I shouldn’t have to edit my language to keep on the good side of a group of people I haven’t really gotten to know or really care about yet.