My approach to coming out so far is to be casual and as nonchalant as possible, so only when it comes up in conversation. It's been a few months since I decided to do this, and I've only gotten into two situations. One was at a restaurant with close friends, and we were talking about how one of our teachers came out of the closet and being gay, etc, so I said "I'm gay" bt I think only one other person heard and said "really? cool" before the conversation turned to my two straight male friends joking that they were a gay couple.... the second scenario was with a really close friend, and we were talking about the stereotype of femenists automatically being lesbians when I said "well, I happen to be both" and then she aked me if I just came out and we high fived (?). Another time I was talking with an international student about the college I wanted to go to (a womrn's college) and he asked me if I was worried I couldn't get a boyfriend if I went there, but for some reason I wimped out and sidetracked. Both coming outs went ok, but the whole thing is going kind of slow. I'd really like to come out to my school's GSA because there's someone in there I have a crush on, but in all of our meetings, amazingly this has never come up. it might be because we just haven't gotten to it yet, or it might just be the incident that happened last year where someone felt pressured to come out when they really didn't want to, or that I cant get a word in edgewise, but if anyone has some advice to make a setup for a casual coming out, that would be appreciated.
Ooh, this is a really good way of doing it. I guess I'm taking a similar approach now (with friends only) where I'm treating it as common knowledge, so you could do that now that you've told some people. Or you could see if they joke about it and work with that. Also, congratulations on coming out to those people!! It's very awesome to hear (!)
I came out non-chanlantly to my sister and it worked really well lol also to my best female friend also worked great
this is what I also have decided to do from now on, if anyone asks if I'm gay I'm just gonna be like 'yeah...'
Well, a setup isn't very casual lol, but I understand what your goal is. Like AyaLou, I treat it as common knowledge. If it fits into conversation then that's fine. Before you decided to come out to others had you recently come out to yourself?
Hmm... This is interesting. Once I came out to a friend of a friend by showing her my rainbow purse. My friend sort of outed me... He sort of blurted out that I'm a lesbian and then he got quiet. She didn't understand what he meant, so I showed her my purse. The purse says: "Rise up!! Say 'NO' to homophobia!"... So she was like: "Oh... I see. Cool. So you support them???"... And I was like: "Yeah... I'm actually one of them". I also came out by making statements like "Oh... Geezus... Will Smith. I'd totally go straight for him". So, people would give that "Huh?? Really??" look... and I'm like: "Yep. I am". And, I recently just came out to one of my friends and her husband. We were gossiping about this friend's boyfriend who we totally think he's closeted gay and my friend was "He's not gonna be happy marrying her. They'll both be miserable... He needs to come out"... and I was like "Yeah. Totally... You know, I came out to parents a while ago. But I think he's still in denial"... I personally prefer to come out casually. I don't like the idea of making a big deal out of it. Oh, yeah... The common knowledge thing... That's the best way in my opinion. Talk about girls just like you'd be talking about guys if you were to like them... IDK...
Thanks for the responses everyone! I came out to myself about a year ago btw. I think I got the idea from how my advisor/art teacher does it with students at school (like saying things like "my partner..." and "(insert partner's name) did/said something") but I'm guessing for her its more of a don't talk about personal life to students sort of thing, which seems to be what all teachers are like. lol I'm pretty sure the three coming out approaches I've witnessed have been super official, really casual word slip, and I have one friend who made out with a girl in public.If I had the choice I think I might have done the latter but I guess I'll have to start small. Also, where can I buy that rainbow purse? lol
opps. i totally missed this thread and made a similar thread here: http://emptyclosets.com/forum/support-advice/78389-passively-coming-out.html i'm intending to come out the same way using pride bracelets to initial conversation (see other topic). like The Queen Bee, i don't want to make a big deal out of it. i dont see who i'm attracted to as being anyone else's business anyway. i want to come out out of Pride as well as for more political reasons. lmao, that is so awesome.
I almost came out to two friends this way, we were in the car on way home from bowling when my two other friends started talking about how there wasn't that many girls in their classes and how it was full of guys and there was a moment where I almost said "there's something I wouldn't mind" but I didn't since I hadn't come out to anyone at that point and I didn't want them to be the first to know.
haha this is what I did when I came out to most people as trans and gay. I just strolled in my house in a suit like 'Yeah, I'm a guy (trans) and I like guys therefore I'm gay. What's for tea?' Lol it went down really well.
