Many of us want to, and will: when a gay, lesbian or transgendered kid isn’t at special risk of being brutalized or committing suicide. When the federal government outlaws discrimination against people based on sexual orientation, which it still hasn’t done.
When immigration laws give same-sex couples the same consideration that they do heterosexual ones. When the Defense of Marriage Act crumbles and our committed relationships aren’t relegated to a lesser status, a diminished dignity.
Bruni is commenting on the coming out of NBA player Jason Collins, which will produce a spate of emails to Bruni instructing him and other gay folks just to shut up, to stop talking about being gay and making such a fuss about coming out. And Dan Savage adds,
A society that discriminates against LGBT people—and some in our society are working to expand discrimination against us—is, in a very real sense, refusing to "shut up" about homosexuality. Legislating against homosexuality = lawmakers refusing to shut up about it. Allowing anti-gay laws that already exist to remain on the books = refusing to shut up about it. Gay people will always have to come out to our families, friends, and coworkers. But legal discrimination and anti-gay bias forces us to speak out and fight back. Discrimination, hate, and bigotry puts us in a position of having to organize, argue, and get in your straight faces. Discriminate against us less, harass us less, hate us less and we will have a lot less to talk about.
We might even have the luxury to shut up about it.
And they're both right.
P.S. I'm sorry for the mistake in the title of my posting yesterday about Jason Collins. I had originally written "Chris Collins" and not "Jason Collins," and have just now spotted the mistake and corrected it. I'm one of the gays who doesn't follow the sports, obviously.
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