How deep in the closet can you be?

I have often wondered about closeted people, though I'm not in the closet myself. People often talk about how much progress LGBT people have made and it's true. Even in my lifetime I have noticed a significant evolution of the way gay people are received. I can remember being a young kid and seeing gay people in media talked about in pretty negative and taboo terms. Nowadays there are many gay characters on T.V. though there are still a lot of stereotypes that annoy me.

It makes me wonder if being deep in the closet is a thing of the past. There was a movie I was watching on LOGO in which a gay character speculates that a man may be in the closet, to which a female friend responds "no ones in the closet anymore since Neil Patrick Harris came out!"

I have a cousin much older than me. He's 60ish, though I'm not sure exactly how old. Anyway, we recently met each other for the first time and he's aware that I'm gay. We met recently and there was an instant recognition that we had that in common. We've talked about the subject over the phone and he revealed that he was married and had three children before he divorced his wife and began dating men.

I also have a friend who says he's straight but for some reason I've had my doubts. I told my cousin about him and he said that when he himself was younger he "just wanted to be a good little boy and good little boys married girls". This reminded me of my friend. He told me he's surprised by how much things in our society have changed since he was young but that he thinks a lot of people are still closeted or just in the process of coming out.

I wondered if even today a lot of gay or bi men are still closeted and very uncomfortable about their sexuality. So uncomfortable that they actively suppress their feelings and attempt to be heterosexual. I suspect that those who are are often religious (my friend is a Baptist in a rural area). Religious people tend to be behind in their thinking. The outlook of a deeply religious person hasn't changed much.

In addition I think masculinity plays a role. I can imagine how a masculine guy could see the stereotype of a feminine gay man and not put 2 and 2 together. The logic there being that if he's masculine and gay men are feminine ergo he's not gay. I'm not saying it's not a naive conclusion but understandable for some people.

I was wondering what other peoples thoughts are. I'm not saying there aren't closeted people but are there still deeply closeted people?