From: adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Re: Tips for coming out to friends?
Date: 25 Jan 1993 02:02:03 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mizar.usc.edu

In article <1993Jan24.131549.1209@Princeton.EDU> 
dem@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Doron Meyer) writes:
> In article <1993Jan24.065752.2143@macc.wisc.edu>
> anderson@macc.wisc.edu (Jess Anderson) writes:
> >In article <1jrdj1INNe5a@mizar.usc.edu>
> >adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (Arne Adolphson) writes:
> >>I read these things and I wonder if I grew up on Mars.  Is
> >>being gay *such* a big deal?  I just can't believe it is.
> >
> >I read these things and conclude you *did* grow up on Mars,
> >hon.  

That must explain my antennae and greenish complexion.

> >Ava rara that you are, it seems not to have been an
> >especially big deal for you.  

No, it really wasn't.

> >But it is for most people.

So I gather.

> >Most people are miles from anyone or anything, both
> >literally and figuratively.

I suppose I really *was* lucky to have grown up in a middle 
to upper-middle class, leftist, Jewish neighborhood during 
the '60s and '70s.

> When I first read Arne's response, I was first upset at what
> I considered its insensitivity. 

Crude, maybe, but I'm never *insensitive*.

> But the more I thought about it,
> the more I realized how right Arne is.  It *isn't* a big deal.
> But it certainly seems like it, and to a lot of other people,
> it *is* a big deal.  Just ask CFV why they're going to all this trouble.

But that's other people.  That I'm gay is probably the single
most important fact about me.  But it *means* nothing.  I don't
think it's a big deal, and I never have made a big deal of it.  
I've always (and by always I mean from about the time I was 15 
or 16) just assumed that people realize I'm gay.  *Other* people 
have made a big deal of it, but I haven't.  Ever.  I came out 
in 10th grade and never -- and I mean *never* -- gave anyone
who thought to make fun of me for it any satisfaction for his/
her pains.  I don't think I'm so unusual in this regard.  I mean, 
I knew I was gay, and that was that.  If other people -- friends, 
acquaintances, family, classmates -- couldn't handle it, it wasn't 
*my* problem.  And of course I was hassled, and of course I was
taunted.  But I didn't really care.  I still am subject to
public taunting at least once a week, but it doesn't really
affect me.  (Not true: it *infuriates* me and if I had an Uzi
I'm sure I'd machine-gun dozens of people a week.)  I don't 
have nerves of steel.  I just know what I'm about, and I think 
that moronic assholes are moronic assholes.  Who the fuck cares 
what a moronic asshole might have to say?  Just ignore it.  *Know* 
what you're about.  *Know* what you're worth.  And just ignore the
shit that gets thrown your way.

> This doesn't mean everything is peachy keen.  It's not.  But, like
> a lot of changes for teenagers, it can seem like the whole world 
> has flipped on its ear.  Not everyone has known or let themselves
> know since an early age.

This is probably my biggest failing.  I've known I was gay 
forever.  I've never felt like a freak, or had a problem
admitting it to myself, or any of the other problems that
many people seem to have.  I don't understand what the big
deal is, since I don't think that being gay *is* a big deal.

> I suppose that's Arne's point.. if it doesn't go well, it's *their* fault
> and they don't matter anyways.  I can agree, but around this time
> when everything is changing regardless, to lose people who you
> thought were your friends is devastating.

Yes, that is my point.  It's better that these people get
lost now than that they hang around and pull you down to
their level.

>  I'm still
> in the closet, and will be for at least until college.  Whatever
> problems I have for now are with myself, not anyone else.

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was coming down hard on you.
But I do think there's very little sense (in most cases) of
dancing around the subject.  If you're gay, you're gay.
Some people will accept it, others can be educated, and then
there are the dregs who won't accept it no matter what.  And I
don't care what else the dregs might have going for them, 
but if they can't accept the fact that you're gay, then there's
not much there worth exploring.

Arne