Photo by Kathy Belge

After work today while I read the news I came across the video below of Washington state congresswoman Maureen Walsh explaining why she supported gay marriage. She is a Republican and I’m always interested to hear the Republican viewpoint on such things, especially when they align with mine, so I watched. Her speech boils down to an important point: if you know a gay person, how can you deny gay marriage? In the case of Walsh, her daughter is gay. She speaks about wanting to give her a wedding, about not wanting her to feel like a second-class citizen relegated to a “domestic partnership” and about how it is impossible to argue that this isn’t about equal rights.

All other arguments fall flat. The religious argument fails because religion shouldn’t be a part of any government institution, ever, marriage or otherwise. That, and individual churches can choose not to participate in gay weddings. Domestic partnerships as a compromise falls flat because that is clearly a “separate, but equal” policy, something the U.S. has stated is unacceptable. Not all children are raised by biological parents, not all straight couples can procreate, there is no evidence that people with gay parents come out inferior to others.  It doesn’t even matter if you’re born gay or choose to be, as some people think; it simply boils down to a pervasive fear of the unknown and an assumption that gay people are defined by sexual activity alone. And the best way to remove that fear is to be friends with a gay person and see, first hand, that we are much more than gay.

I say this to those, supporters or not, who think that coming out is nothing more than a grab for attention. Sexuality may be a private thing, but coming out is the most important thing a gay person can do to help other gay people around them and to open the minds of the straight people who hate due to ignorance. If homosexuality remained a private thing for everyone, we would be decades behind in our struggle for equal rights. So if you are gay or bi, then I say come out now. Right now. This goes doubly so for those who are influential or popular. It may not be easy, you will lose friends and maybe family, and it can be dangerous, but collectively it will change more minds than any commercial, billboard, constitutional amendment, or news story.

I am tired of hearing about how its “a personal struggle” or that a person can’t make a difference unless they’re famous. Maureen Walsh’s daughter made a difference, which has helped lead to another state legalizing gay marriage. And I know it’s a struggle. If I can come out in Summerfield, North Carolina as a teenager and change friend’s minds than so can someone in Mobile, Alabama or Houston or Cheyenne or New York City or anywhere. It is not a personal struggle, it is a public one. It is a civil one. How many more kids have to kill themselves because they don’t have any gay role models to tell them its ok? How many married men and women have to feel compelled to cheat on their spouses with someone of the same sex and feel overwhelmed by guilt, whether they do it or not? How many elderly folks have to go their whole lives without ever being with the person they love because it “isn’t right?”

You may tell me I’m insensitive, that what happens inside your bedroom is no one else’s business but this issue exists far outside of the bedrooms of America. We are and have always been all around you in every walk of life and the sooner this is fully realized, the sooner it will be legally recognized. So to those in the closet: be strong, be proud, and come out.