Will Sutton: Choosing love is better than disdain or indifference – NOLA.com
Tuesday is National Coming Out Day, and I hope you’ll make it a positive experience.
As I reflect, I have a confession and a plea.
I confess that I was a guy who once snickered and laughed at people unlike me. As a heterosexual teenager and young adult, my indifference and disdain for gays and lesbians was, in hindsight, pitiful. It’s not that I was outwardly hostile. It’s that I wasn’t accepting or understanding — until I realized some friends were gay.
We played games. We played music. We watched entertainment, news and sports. We laughed. Some of us cried. We were friends, mentors, mentees.
As I progressed in my career — and grew as a person — I met a lot of different people, including Tony Lone Fight, Patrick Riley and Tony Betton Jr.
For years many of us guessed and whispered about people like them, people we thought might, or must, be gay.
In July 2021, sexual orientation and gender identify data started being collected by the Census Bureau. Just more than 88% of U.S. adults identified as straight, 4.4% were bisexual and 3.3% classified as gay or lesbian. Another 1.9% identified as something else and 2.1% said they don’t know. Though most of us are straight, those numbers mean it’s quite likely that family, friends, coworkers are part of our nation’s LGBTQ communities.
That doesn’t necessarily mean more LGBTQ people are populating our communities. It’s more likely that more people are more comfortable publicly acknowledging who they are.
Depending on who our LGBTQ citizens are, their family and other circumstances, “coming out” or revealing their sexuality might be life-altering in some negative ways. For some, it’s not a risk worth taking. For others, the decision is like removing a huge weight.
I met Tony Lone Fight, a member of the Arikara Hidatsa Mandan tribe, decades ago when we were leaders in our respective journalism organizations, he with the Native American Journalists Association and me with the National Association of Black Journalists. He was younger and he considered me a mentor. He sought my counsel on some rather sensitive professional challenges. I listened, encouraged him and offered ideas. He shared his sexuality as a part of helping me understand him. It was a matter of trust, he told me recently.
Years later, when I was attending a NAJA conference, he and his mother asked me to join them as Lone Fight was honored. They gave me a special tie, one I still wear today. “It was the act of giving,” Lone Fight said. “It meant a lot to my mother that I trusted you and you had helped her son.”
Patrick Riley was a founder of NABJ’s LGBTQ Task Force, recently honored with the group’s Visibility Award. He was on the NABJ board when I was president. We agreed on some things and disagreed on others. I asked him to consider a career opportunity, and he did. He’s now a successful freelance producer in New York City.
Tony Betton Jr. was a college student when we met. He was bright, talented and he had a big personality. He didn’t need much from me. When I asked him about our relationship, he shared that he appreciated my help and he suspected that I knew about his sexuality but I never said anything. I didn’t. It was his business.
Last year about this time, Betton, a morning anchor at ABC21 in Fort Wayne, Indiana, decided that National Coming Out Day was his moment.
“I gotta get out of this claustrophobic, shameful, lonely, regretful, embarrassed and hurtful closet of mine,” he wrote on Instagram. “My journey has definitely been a battle, I realize the way to win this battle is to love me for all of me.”
Tony Betton Jr., an ABC21 morning anchor in Fort Wayne, Indiana, is a friend of columnist Will Sutton’s. He came out as bisexual on National Coming Out Day in 2021.
Betton has been even more delightful this last year. “I was tired of not being honest with myself and I just wanted to be able to openly be myself,” he shared with me.
My LGBTQ journey was nothing like those of my friends, but I’m glad they and others helped me live a more full life that includes them.
Don’t be surprised if someone you know — perhaps someone you love — comes out Tuesday. You’ll be better off opening your arms and offering your heart.
Rather than disdain or indifference, I choose love.