Coming out
Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBT people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation or gender identity.
"Come out" redirects here. For other uses, see Come out (disambiguation) and Coming out (disambiguation).
This is often framed and debated as a privacy issue, because the consequences may be very different for different individuals, some of whom may have their job security or personal security threatened by such disclosure. The act may be viewed as a psychological process or journey;[1] decision-making or risk-taking; a strategy or plan; a mass or public event; a speech act and a matter of personal identity; a rite of passage; liberation or emancipation from oppression; an ordeal;[2] a means toward feeling LGBT pride instead of shame and social stigma; or a career-threatening act.[3] Author Steven Seidman writes that "it is the power of the closet to shape the core of an individual's life that has made homosexuality into a significant personal, social, and political drama in twentieth-century America".[4]
Coming out of the closet is the source of other gay slang expressions related to voluntary disclosure or lack thereof.[5] LGBT people who have already revealed or no longer conceal their sexual orientation or gender identity are out of the closet or simply out, i.e., openly LGBT. By contrast, LGBT people who have yet to come out or have opted not to do so are labelled as closeted or being in the closet. Outing is the deliberate or accidental disclosure of an LGBT person's sexual orientation or gender identity by someone else, without the first individual's consent. By extension, outing oneself is self-disclosure. Glass closet refers to the open secret of a public figure widely thought to be LGBT even though the person has not officially come out.[6]
Effects[edit]
In the early stages of the LGBT identity development process, people can feel confused and undergo turmoil. In 1993, Michelangelo Signorile wrote Queer in America, in which he explored the harm caused both to a closeted person and to society in general by being closeted.[41]
Because LGBT people have historically been marginalized as sexual minorities, coming out of the closet remains a challenge for most of the world's LGBT population and can lead to a backlash of heterosexist discrimination and homophobic violence.
Studies have found that concealing sexual orientation is related to poorer mental health,[42] physical health,[43] and relationship functioning. For example, it has been found that same-sex couples who have not come out are not as satisfied in their relationships as same-sex couples who have.[44] Findings from another study indicate that the fewer people who know about a lesbian's sexual orientation, the more anxiety, less positive affectivity, and lower self-esteem she has.[45] Further, Gay.com states that closeted individuals are reported to be at increased risk for suicide.[46]
Depending on the relational bond between parents and children, a child coming out as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender can be positive or negative. Strong, loving relationships between children and their parents may be strengthened but if a relationship is already strained, those relationships may be further damaged or destroyed by the child coming out.[47] If people coming out are accepted by their parents, it allows open discussions of dating and relationships and enables parents to help their children with coping with discrimination and to make healthier decisions regarding HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.[48] Because parents, families, and close others can also reject someone coming out, the LGBT individual may not always enjoy positive effects from the decision.[49] For example, teens who had parents who rejected them when they came out showed more drug use, depression, suicide attempts, and risky sexual behaviors later on as young adults.[50] Some studies find that the health effects of coming out depend more on the reactions of parents than on the disclosure itself.[51]
A number of studies have been done on the effect of people coming out to their parents. A 1989 report by Robinson et al. of parents of out gay and lesbian children in the United States found that 21 percent of fathers and 28 percent of mothers had suspected that their child was gay or lesbian, largely based on gender atypical behavior during childhood. The 1989 study found that two-thirds of parents reacted negatively.[52] A 1995 study (that used young people's reactions) found that half of the mothers of gay or bisexual male college students "responded with disbelief, denial or negative comments", while fathers reacted slightly better. 18 percent of parents reacted "with acts of intolerance, attempts to convert the child to heterosexuality, and verbal threats to cut off financial or emotional support".[53]
If rejected by their families, many LGBT youth can become homeless during the coming out process. LGBT youth are among the largest population of homeless youth; this has typically been caused by the reaction of others, especially parents, to self-identification and acknowledgment of being gay, or identifying with the LGBT community.[54] About 20 to 30 percent of homeless youth identify as LGBT.[55] Native and Indigenous LGBTQ youth make up the largest population to suffer homelessness: 44 percent, compared to any other race.[56] 55 percent of homeless LGBTQ and 67 percent of homeless transgender youth were forced out of their homes by their parents or ran away because of their sexual orientation or gender identity and expression.[55] Compared to transgender women and non-binary youth, transgender men have the highest percentage of housing instability.[56] Homelessness among LGBT youth also affects many areas of an individual's life, leading to higher rates of victimization, depression, suicidal ideation, substance abuse, risky sexual behavior, and participation in more illegal and dangerous activities.[57] A 2016 study on homelessness pathways among Latino LGBT youth found that homelessness among LGBT individuals can also be attributed to structural issues such as systems of care, and sociocultural and economic factors.[58]
New data was collected by Amit Paley, the CEO and executive director of the Trevor Project, in regards to how the COVID-19 pandemic affected LGBTQ youth. The 2021 National Survey on LGBTQ Youth Mental Health shows that COVID-19 had made 80 percent of the LGBTQ youth housing situation much more stressful due to economic struggles, initially affecting their ability to have safe and secure housing.[59]
Jimmie Manning performed a study in 2015 on positive and negative behavior performed during the coming out conversation. During his study, he learned that almost all of his participants would attribute negative behaviors only to themselves during the coming out conversations, and positive behaviors to the recipient of the conversation. Manning suggests further research into this to figure out a way for positive behaviors to be seen and performed equally by both the recipient and the individual coming out.[60]
In/out metaphors[edit]
Dichotomy[edit]
The closet narrative sets up an implicit dualism between being "in" or being "out", wherein those who are "in" are often stigmatized as living false, unhappy lives.[61] Likewise, philosopher and critical analyst Judith Butler (1991) states that the in/out metaphor creates a binary opposition which pretends that the closet is dark, marginal, and false, and that being out in the "light of illumination" reveals a true (or essential) identity. Nonetheless, Butler is willing to appear at events as a lesbian and maintains that "it is possible to argue that ... there remains a political imperative to use these necessary errors or category mistakes ... to rally and represent an oppressed political constituency".
Criticisms[edit]
Diana Fuss (1991) explains, "the problem of course with the inside/outside rhetoric ... is that such polemics disguise the fact that most of us are both inside and outside at the same time". Further, "To be out, in common gay parlance, is precisely to be no longer out; to be out is to be finally outside of exteriority and all the exclusions and deprivations such outsiderhood imposes. Or, put another way, to be out is really to be in—inside the realm of the visible, the speakable, the culturally intelligible." In other words, coming out constructs the closet it supposedly destroys and the self it supposedly reveals, "the first appearance of the homosexual as a 'species' rather than a 'temporary aberration' also marks the moment of the homosexual's disappearance—into the closet".
Furthermore, Seidman, Meeks, and Traschen (1999) argue that "the closet" may be becoming an antiquated metaphor in the lives of modern-day Americans for two reasons.
However, when understood as an act of self-disclosure, coming out (like any self-disclosure) cannot be accomplished once, and for all. Eve Sedgwick writes in Epistemology of the Closet:
As Tony Adams demonstrates in Narrating the Closet, meeting new people makes for a new time to disclose one's sexuality.[63]
Extended use in LGBT media, publishing and activism[edit]
"Out" is a common word or prefix used in the titles of LGBT-themed books, films, periodicals, organizations, and TV programs. Some high-profile examples are Out magazine, the defunct OutWeek, and OutTV.
Non-LGBT contexts[edit]
In political, casual, or even humorous contexts, "coming out" means by extension the self-disclosure of a person's secret behaviors, beliefs, affiliations, tastes, identities, and interests that may cause astonishment or bring shame. Some examples include: "coming out as an alcoholic",[100] "coming out as a BDSM participant",[101] "coming out of the broom closet" (as a witch),[102] "coming out as a conservative",[103] "coming out as disabled",[104] "coming out as a liberal",[105] "coming out as intersex",[106] "coming out as multiple",[107] "coming out as polyamorous",[108] "coming out as a sex worker",[109] and "coming out of the shadows" as an undocumented immigrant within the United States.[110] The term is also used by members of online body integrity dysphoria communities to refer to the process of telling friends and families about their condition.
With its associated metaphors, the figure of speech has also been extended to atheism, e.g., "coming out as an atheist".[111] A public awareness initiative for freethought and atheism, entitled the "Out Campaign", makes ample use of the "out" metaphor.[112] This campaign was initiated by Robin Elisabeth Cornwell, and is endorsed by prominent atheist Richard Dawkins, who states "there is a big closet population of atheists who need to 'come out'".[113]