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Stories
Daniel G. Taylor
When I was six or seven, I stood in a queue with my Grandma
to see a shopping mall Santa. Before us were troughs full of
toys, divided into boys' toys and girls' toys. Looking through
the boys' trough, I decided I didn't like any of the toys.
What I wanted was one of, the fake Barbies from the girls'
section. They had the coolest accessories. I was in tears as
the attendants refused to honour my choice, and made me choose
an inferior boys' toy.
Despite such early Obvious Gay Traits, I took the cheat's
way out of coming out when I was 18: - I waited till Grandma,
who I lived with at the time, was on a six week holiday overseas,
then came out to all my friends. When she left on her holiday,
life was normal for her; when she came back, everything had
changed. She had nothing to prepare her for the announcement
I made.
The road that led to my decision to come out was paved with
bricks of self-hatred, fear, and negative religious messages.
At 14, I'd joined an ultra-fundamentalist Christian church.
Homosexuality was condemned. Supporting the church's views
were my own negative experiences at beats. I thought all gay
men were old guys who slunk around toilet blocks having sex
with anyone who happened along. It was only while Grandma was
overseas that I met someone my own age at a beat and he introduced
me to others my age. Suddenly my eyes opened. You could be
young and gay. There were places gay people could go to meet
each other besides beats. The night I first went to a gay pub
and a gay club, saw guys kissing and dirty dancing, I felt
like I'd found the place where I belonged.
Coming out to Grandma was a challenge - what if she didn't
accept me? I would have been crippled and most probably would
have taken my own life. But my coming out didn't start with
Grandma, it was a process begun years earlier. I see coming
out as a three-step process: coming out to yourself; coming
out to others; coming out publicly.
I knew I was gay as far back as I can remember. In Grade One
I had my first boyfriend. We'd go out to the school oval so
we could be together in private and hold hands. We didn't know
the word 'gay' or what being gay meant in the adult world -
though I did get my first taste of homophobia when his father
found out what was going on between us and broke us up. Other
coming out experiences were a mix of good and bad.
Throughout my childhood my sister was my ally. I came out
to her when I was 14, not long after I'd discovered beats.
She didn't let me down when I told her, and she has supported
me as her gay brother in the same way she would have if I had
been straight.
My mother was a different story altogether. She knew I was
having sex from a young age, but she always assumed it was
with girls, and she didn't have a problem with that as long
as I used a condom. She discovered I was gay when she came
out to the front lawn at about 2am and found me pashing Matthew,
my first love, when I was 17. It took half a slab of beer to
calm her down. Though she still loves me, even today she has
trouble with me being queer.
So it was against this backdrop I came out to Grandma. At
first I had to clear up a lot of misunderstandings she had.
She thought at first that I was saying I wanted to be a woman.
Next she thought a good dose of hormones would fix me. Despite
all this, Grandma's motivation is love for her family, and
since then she has come to accept me as I am, without trying
to change me. These days we even compare notes on which guys
are cute and which are not.
Following my coming out to Grandma, I started my professional
writing career in the gay press. Within three months of having
struggled to come out to one person, I'd come out nationally
in OutRage. It was because I was writing for gay and straight
publications on queer issues that I decided it was time to
come out to my father, in case someone he knew saw my name
and outed me to him. Dad was disappointed, but said while he
didn't agree with me being gay, he'd accept me for who I was
because I was his son. I felt happy with his response because
I knew it could have been much worse.
Now that I was out to all the important people in my life,
I took the next step: being out publicly. Being out in public
can mean choosing to be out to everyone you meet, choosing
to be yourself wherever you go. It can mean things like holding
hands in public. The downside of this approach is that every
time you meet new people, you have to come out all over again.
Another part of being out in public is being out in the media.
Through my writing I've been published under my real name for
eight years in gay and straight media on queer issues. I have
appeared on a TV talk-show talking about how gay people use
the internet. I recently published an article in a Melbourne
paper, complete with a photo, talking about what it's like
being gay and living with a mental illness.
Of course being publicly out can bring you face to face with
homophobia. I feel that if you are out and you hear someone
make a derogatory comment, you should challenge their statement.
Homophobic comments are the seed of gay hate crimes and murders;
they need to be stopped at the source. But speaking out is
scary- you don't know what could happen- and I still struggle
with standing up to homophobes.
Recently I cam out publicly in a new way for me- on Centre
Stage at Marion Shopping Centre. I was asked to perform some
of my writing by the SA Writers' Centre, which by the nature
of my body of work meant choosing something queer. I chose
a piece first published in Outrage, and later republished in
a high school text book, about the factors that make life tough
for gay and lesbian youth. In the lead-up to going on stage
I was nervous, unsure how the crowd would react. I needn't
have worried. The crowd consisted mainly of elderly men and
women, probably sitting down because they were tired, not because
they were interested in the talk, who listened and applauded
politely when I was finished.
The day after the Marion performance, a journalist from the
Messenger newspapers rang me up and asked to interview (and
photograph) me to promote my next performance. I'll be outing
myself in the piece the journalist writes, simply because my
sexuality is so intrinsic to my life and is weaved into almost
everything I write.
The coming out process continues ...
Copyright(c) Daniel G. Taylor 2002
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