National Coming Out Day

I have a confession to make – I think that holding National Coming Out Day in October is stupid. I always have. No, I didn’t say that coming out is stupid, just designating October 11 as the day to do so is. I have never liked its placement since it first appeared in 1988. My fellow cronies and I criticized the decision to put it in October when I was producing the GLBT public affairs show “Alternating Currents” in Cincinnati. I should add that I am also unhappy with the decision to designate October as LGBT History Month. In my mind, there is only one month that these observances logically belong, and that is in June for the obvious reason – Stonewall.

Now I know that, at least as far as National Coming Out Day is concerned, the rationale for holding it in October was to follow up on all of the energy from the National March On Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights that was held on October 11, 1987. That march couldn’t be held in June because it would have messed up everyone’s gay pride celebrations. And, lest we forget, the first March on Washington was also held in October (October 14, 1979). All well and good. But I can’t for the life of me understand why they couldn’t set the date for National Coming Out Day in June when we already have the benefit of our species’ notoriously short attention span, what with the pride rallies, and pride parades, and pride dinners, and pride concerts, and pride ecumenical services going on across the planet. I mean, what could be a more obvious demonstration of pride than standing up and declaring, as Gloria Gaynor sings, “I Am What I Am.”

And my fellow Cincinnati cynics and I couldn’t help but notice that the folks who seemed to wax most rhapsodic about having National Coming Out Day placed in October were also the same closet cases who refused to go to the pride rally on Fountain Square in June unless disguised by dark glasses and floppy hats (if they went at all) for fear of being recognized by friends, family and co-workers at a “gay thing” – especially in the company of drag queens and the like (you know, those undesirables who were instrumental in the Stonewall riots to begin with?). In other words, it looked suspiciously as if the decision of when to place National Coming Out Day was being made by the same people who had no intention of ever coming out. But that was our take on it in “Censornasti,” a city known for warping reality in many subtle (and not so subtle) ways.

Nineteen-eighty-eight was an angry year for the gay community. We were awakening from an 8-year-long nightmare, and heading into a time of uncertainty as the Bush and Dukakis campaigns slithered into the November election where we would select “the evil of two lessers” (as we referred to it then). The brain-rotted Ronald Reagan was at the helm of the ship of state for his final months in office, assisted by an administration best described in the words of Obi Wan Kenobi as “a wretched hive of scum and villainy.” Up until the Presidency of George W. Bush, the Reagan administration had represented the worst prolonged threat to the gay community’s freedoms since the start of the modern gay rights movement in 1969 (if we had only had the precognition to realize just how lucky we were by comparison). AIDS had devastated our community, taking from us many leaders, as well as artists, business owners, lovers, friends and family members. Demonstrations by members of ACT-UP disrupted health conferences, took over pharmaceutical offices, and challenged government officials to do something to stem the deaths and suffering. The immorality of the federal government’s non-response to the plight of people with AIDS was on par with that of Christian conservatives who, crowing gleefully over the “proof” of God’s judgment on homosexuality, worked day and night to increase the suffering of those infected by the disease by actively seeking to deny them jobs, housing, insurance and compassion. They were spurred on in their cruelties by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1986 Bowers v. Hardwick decision [478 U.S. 186 (1986)] which upheld the remaining sodomy laws throughout the country by “reasoning” that consenting adults had no right to privacy when it came to practicing oral and anal sex behind closed doors.

It was in this time of uncertainty and outrage that the community got together and marched on Washington to demonstrate that there were large numbers of constituents who were tired of being taken for granted, and of being treated as the whipping boys for the failures of church and state. But most of all, they were tired of being invisible and, ignored and dismissed by those who were in office allegedly to serve the needs of the people. Of course, the problem was we weren’t visible, and so we weren’t people. We were an “abstraction.”

But after this march, rather than waiting another eight years to follow up, a few smart folks said that the community needed to encourage folks to come out of the closet, and to keep doing so until far more people were out than in, until being out was the norm, rather than the exception. This is because when people come out to friends and family, neighbors and employers, government officials and service providers, then it becomes harder to say, “I don’t know anyone like that.” It puts a face on the issue. It’s always easier to ignore or, worse, hurt an abstraction than it is to do so to someone who can look you in the eyes and challenge your humanity.

And this is where I really think that those planners in 1988 made a tactical error by setting October 11 as the date for National Coming Out Day. Because when all of the hoopla surrounding the pride rallies and parades and what-not is taking place in June, there are still a significant number of people who look upon those celebrations and sneer with disgust at the “freaks on parade.” It’s at that point, not three or four months later, that a person needs to come out. It’s at that point that a person needs to challenge the ignorance and judgment of their friends and family, neighbors and employers, government officials and service providers, and say “I may not dress like that, or walk like that, or behave like that, but the thing that sings in their heart and moves them to stand up there and risk your scorn also sings in my heart. And I will not provide cover or comfort for your ignorance or hatred any longer.”

 

©  2007 by Garan du. All rights reserved.