People disregarding gay rights and coming out as not important anymore

I think it is slowly becoming more normal, but I wouldn't say its normal yet because if it was normal then things like coming out would be so much more easier and there wouldn't be as many people against it.

I wouldn't worry too much about what people in them comment sections say

 

I hope for a day it doesn't matter. My son had to come out to me as gay, my daughter never had to come out to me as straight...she just lived her life. I hope that happens some day, that you don't need to have an official "coming out". That you can just live your life without an official statement. That a man can hold hands with another man without anyone thinking twice about it.
I'm not out.. I'm still torn if I am bi or pan. I am figuring it out. But I am married "straight" and people assume I am just that, straight and since I have not corrected them, why would they think otherwise. I'm still torn on whether to even say anything, because at this point..does it matter?

 

I guess those comments can be seen as both positive and negative...

I like the sentiment of "Sick of this... There's bigger issues in world than two guys kissing, ugh" amen to that.

Some of the other comments I'm not so fond of.

 

I'm guessing you read this on huff post?

That's a good thing, and that's one of the good ways to react to someone coming out. A lot of gay activists and LGB people in general were sweating their balls off to get this kind of reaction, and when people are starting to think homosexuality is no big deal, you get annoyed? There are bigger issues in the world than two guys kissing. People are slowly realizing that. Maybe if everyone started realizing that there would be no need to disregard gay rights, because gay rights wouldn't exist, they'd just be grouped with HUMAN rights.

I do agree with you, the world still needs gay rights at the moment, but coming out shouldn't be a political statement. Coming out is a personal experience, and by coming out, Miller didn't commit a glorious act of activism, he just acknowledged his sexual orientation with the world, and bravely so. (However Miller is a great activist in terms of boycotting Russia.)

 

I wouldn't call it "normal". I'd say that uninformed individuals would think that "coming out" is something that's "trending" nowadays, despite the fact that being gay isn't trendy.

 

Ugh, people are weird to me. Yeah I get them saying that, how why someone would feel the need to come out in this day and age considering how we're becoming a bit more progressive-but if they looked around, they could see why coming out is still important. We're still in an unsafe world where people are risking their jobs, ties to their family, their housing and safety because of who they are.

I swear if someone calls being trans* or gay trendy, they'll get a boot up their ass.

 

If coming out was normal, it wouldn't happen because it would be so widely accepted that people would stop expecting everyone to be straight and/or cis. People deal with their feelings by doing things other than coming out sometimes, like committing suicide because they're afraid to come out. That's not really normal either. It takes a lot of bravery to come out. And like Budder said, being gay is not trendy. It's still looked down upon a lot. Coming out is not something we do to be cool or rebellious or anything like that. We do it because we have to. We do it because we want to live a life without lies.

 

Nobody's forcing them to read these articles about coming out- AND even take the time to post a comment. If I find an article boring or irrelevant to me, I simply won't waste my time reading it. But I know that obviously there is someone out there who is interested in reading it, even if I am not.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

 

As I mentioned in a comment in another thread, they simply would prefer to think gays don't exist.

 

Pretty much this. I noticed there's a thing where more people are considering being gay as a "trendy" thing to do and it's just like "Well ok. Why don't you be gay then, because it's the 'trendy' thing to do?"

I mean, it's good that people are starting to become unbothered by it, but some comments remind me that some people really don't care about others' shortcomings if it doesn't involve them. "Oh, gay people need equal rights? Well, I'm not gay so it doesn't matter to me." But gay people are just as human as you are, they're just a little different, so why don't you help your fellow human?

Being idle/indifferent is exactly why we have problems to begin with, people don't necessarily like to be activists for a positive change if they aren't "a part" of it. They don't really care, so they don't do anything. I'm pretty sure there was a famous quote about something like this.

 

They don't understand. Simple as. But who really cares? Its not like you'll bump into them one day, and have a big argument. It is getting normal, I'm glad, but its still hard. And there are Still people against Homosexuality, and people don't completely think of that. I've not really much to say apart from that, so...

Good Day.

 

Boiled down to basics, what these people are saying is that they are just as homophobic as they ever were. However, rather than mouthing the usual homophobe BS, they are using the rhetorical approach of 'it's no big deal, why can't the gays just shut up about it?'.

Really, it's no different from the people who say that we have a black president now so obviously black people should just be quiet now. Or the people who say that whatever you want to do (whatever that may be) is 'selfish' because they don't like it. The goal is to put the people they don't like on the defensive. Reasonableness has nothing to do with it.

At the end of the day, the key point (and common denominator) with these idiots is that they want the people they don't like to shut up and go away and stop fighting for their rights. They have no interest whatsoever in 'reason' or 'tolerance' or anything else of that nature. They hate us just as much as they ever did and are only interested in sowing doubt among us with their faux 'you're making too big of a deal about this' crap.

The best and only response to these...I use the term 'people' loosely, is to fight harder than ever while ignoring their useless twaddle.

Todd

 

Again, those people aren't worth paying any regard to. Discrimination is still widespread in 37 states and most countries. The stigma is mostly gone, but until we have equal rights, I won't be silenced. If they are sick of hearing it, well I'm really sick of being a 2nd class citizen, so poor them. If someone truly has no problem with gays, how can they be "sick of hearing it"? Why would it bother them? The is the new modus operandi of homophobes, to deny being a bigot while also bitching about gays.

 

Why cant they shut up about us shutting up? :dry:

 

The people who think it's no big deal are at least on our side enough not to hate us. But others' hate won't go away on its own if we sit tight and wait for the future. Nothing changes without people making it a big deal. Black people didn't get racial equality in the 60's by dealing with Jim Crow laws until they were shot down; they fought with civil disobedience and sometimes even aggressive disobedience because the injustice was too much to bear. And as for arguing for "bigger things to worry about?" That was the height of Vietnam and being afraid of nuclear annihilation.

People who are safe in their heterosexuality don't receive trouble, so they don't see any. :/

 

Eh, I don't think they are "on our side" in any way. They just don't want to hear about gay news stories because it reminds them that they've lost the war over gay rights and gay people are no longer forced by societal pressure to stay in the closet.

I think it's similar to the phenomenon we saw play out in American politics over the past decade. Up until very recently, the only politicians who would dare to publicly talk about 'gay' issues were conservatives who scored political points by bashing gays and fearmongering about "gay marriage". As recently as 2004, George W. Bush and the Republicans won re-election by constantly bringing up the spectre of "gay marriage".

The anti-gay Republicans were the ones who put constitutional amendments banning "gay marriage" on the ballots of many states to draw out anti-gay voters, it was not the pro-gay side that made a big issue out of it. (And the Democrats tried their best to run away from the issue and avoid talking about it altogether, fearful of being associated with "gay marriage", even though they didn't support it either back then). The only time anyone spoke about gays was to prove how anti-gay they were. The mere accusation of being pro-gay was a weapon to bludgeon Democrats with.


Now that the tide has turned, and support for gay rights is a majority view, suddenly the Republicans are the ones who just don't want to talk about their views on gay rights. The GOP leadership knows opposing marriage equality is a losing issue, and is especially toxic among young voters. But they've created this monster, and now its backfiring on them. Now the pro-gay side is the one that wants to have this discussion, and the Democratic Party has embraced gay equality as an official platform plank to be proud of rather than ashamed of.

It's the anti-gay side that fostered the whole toxic environment that necessitated the creation of a loud and proud gay rights movement in the first place. Gay people always just wanted to be left alone and have the same rights as everyone else. But the anti-gay side decided to launch the "culture wars" and put gay issues front and center as part of the discussion.

So all the homophobic people whining about "oh I don't want to hear about gay people coming out of the closet"...should keep in mind, it's their own fault that coming out of the closet was made into a big deal in the first place. If gay people had had total equality and integration into society, someone being gay would never have become a headline news item.

If you want to see a world where a celebrity coming out as gay is not a headline...stop contributing to an atmosphere of homophobia that keeps so many people in the closet in the first place.

 

If they'd let us be gay in peace, then they wouldn't have to hear about, would they? And I'm sure they had it so hard telling their parents that they're straight.