Anderson Cooper comes out

Anderson Cooper, the CNN news star, finally came out as a gay man. Long rumored to be a “member of the family,” he finally came out to Andrew Sullivan in an e-mail that was published.

I’ve been underwhelmed by it all. First, Cooper really wasn’t fooling anyone who had a shred of gaydar. Second, I found his REFUSAL to speak his truth to be creepy. Think about it. By not being out, he was passing as straight, since “non-queer” identity is the cultural assumption in the US.

Today, there is a GREAT essay by Daniel Mendelsohn in the NY Times that lays out the problems with Cooper’s approach to queer-dom and then coming out.

But my bottom line is that too many queer Americans confuse privacy with secrecy–which is what the homophobes want you to do. (I’m looking at you Anderson Cooper, Lindsey Graham, etc. etc). If you will NOT speak the name of the person you love in public, that’s pathology–not privacy. And, you are NOT being a responsible adult.