Ellen Page comes out as gay

[BlueSoxSWJ]

Anonymous sources in team front offices have suggested that this speech could drop Page's draft stock by as much as a full round in the upcoming draft.

[Sasha Distan]

my hubby showed me this, and hey, good for her. bandwagon or not, she feels secure, safe and comfortable enough to come out, and that should only ever be applauded.

[B1ue]

Getting back to the original post - no, I don't find a by-product of Hollywood coming out is courageous, inspiring or triumphant. It also sends a pretty terrible msg to those who are not able to come out due to life inconveniences. There are far better things people do that do move humanity forward. Ellen Page is not one of those things

 

Against my better judgment, why do you think this sends a terrible message to that particular group of people. Wasn't the point of her speech that she was one of those that felt forced into the closet, and that now she's at a point where she can be free to live openly? I didn't really get the message from her speech that people needed to come out, just that she felt she needed to, as well as needing to thank the people that she felt were making it possible for her to do so.

 

I can understand you not being impressed by her words and action, but I am a bit confused about why you seem angered by them.

[Y_B]

I didn't really get the message from her speech that people needed to come out, just that she felt she needed to, as well as needing to thank the people that she felt were making it possible for her to do so.

 

I can understand you not being impressed by her words and action, but I am a bit confused about why you seem angered by them.

 

The need to come out can be satisfied by coming out to your family and friends. The need to thank those who made it possible can be satisfied by thanking said people in-person. The decision to use your celebrated status to elevate your platform so your coming out can extend its reach to millions of your fans, knowing full well that in our PC and liberal-washed social media you will be showered with media compliments, thumb-ups clicks and supporting tweets, is an extravagant level of merit-less self-indulgence. Which is pretty innocuous, if not just slightly annoying except for the fact that there are thousands, if not tens of thousands of closeted folks out there who see it and know they are utterly and helplessly incapable of ever getting similar treatment from those who know them.

[TetRefine]

I think that both sides in this thread are coming from fundamentally different experiences and current situations, and its to the point where they will probably never agree or convince each other. 

 

Yang has a point. Coming out in Hollywood is not brave when you know exactly how the reaction is going to play out. As he mentioned, she knew full well that she was going to get flooded with compliments from anywhere and everywhere, and her career most likely wouldn't suffer. I totally agree with Yang that it definitely was not as courageous as the media is hyping it up to be. 

 

Now, I disagree that all well-publicized coming outs are a play in self-indulgence. What Michael Sams did took a huge set of balls. He was a football player for a big time DI program, and we all know how football culture treats homosexuality. He was a legit prospect in the NFL draft, and he knew that coming out could seriously effect his draft status and the way he could be treated by future teammates in the pros. Yet, he did it anyway, at massive personal risk to himself both professionally and socially. Unlike Page, he ventured into the unknown with his decision, and I have massive respect for that. Doing something when you already know the outcome is by no definition courageous (Page). Doing something when the outcome is unknown and has a strong possibility to backfire, but you did it for the betterment of yourself and others, that is courageous. 

 

Seriously, I wish there had been a Michael Sams around when I was in high school and a Grade A closet case football player. I honestly believed I was the only homo football player to have ever existed, and being what I thought was the only one in the group made me angry and depressed. It actually started to make me resent a sport I loved playing and watching. Having a Michael Sams around when I was playing wouldn't have in any way helped me to come out, but I could of at least taken comfort in the fact that I knew I wasn't the only one. 

 

Ellen Page, good for you, you aren't in the closet anymore. But you didn't make much of an impact because gays in Hollywood are a dime-a-dozen. Michael Sams, you have balls of steel and what you did took true courage. You are a first, a trailblazer, and you did it all at great personal risk to yourself. You have inspired me, and most likely thousands of other athletes who feel alone and the need to be deeply closeted because of the sports culture. You are only one man, but you have opened the door to what I hope will be a shifting culture in sports, especially football. 

Edited February 20, 2014 by TetRefine

[Y_B]

The conversation is about Ellen Page's coming out. Actually, I posted this topic because I thought her coming out speech was really good. If you'd listen to some of the things she's got to say to people who work with helping LGBT people accept themselves, who help prevent suicides, help people with depression and anxiety, you might realise that.

 

I think you derailed the convo because you are now questioning crazyfish's qualifications as a scientist in a sort of backhanded ad hominem attack rather than discuss the issue.

 

I feel like I had relevant input because I posted this thread to celebrate an actress I admire, not to give people a forum in which to bash her because they don't think she matters enough.

 

And I thought you might be a decent enough human being to care when people feel like you're disrupting the thread and behaving in a troll-like manner. 

 

On the contrary, you started a discussion about something in which you thought you would get unanimous likes on a gay website where you thought everybody thinks the same as you and you can all gather around to sing the omgs and oh-la-las, but it didn't turn out that way. You found it difficult to accept that somebody on here possessed a totally different point of view than you and presented it in a passionate manner. You somehow also seem to think that because you started the post, you have an inherent right to steer the conversation (even if you were not part of it) in the direction you'd like and tried to puff out your non-existent cyber chest by threatening to report me if I didn't kneel at your mercy. Not to mention when you tried to accuse me of attempting character assault on Crazyfish, you forgot that you had already ignored the fact that Crazyfish's 1st response to my 1st post already included some pretty obvious mockery towards me. But of course that's irrelevant to you because you're not exactly the "on-topic police" that you are trying to play here as long as any "inappropriate" behavior is coming from someone on your side aiming towards someone who is not, right? So on the contrary, this conversation never derailed. You just couldn't find the "dislike" button and wanted to cry about it. So I repeat again, not sure why you thought you had relevant input between exchanges I was having with someone else because your pointless interruption was...well...pointless AND disruptive AND the very thing that ACTUALLY "derails" this conversation. All I did was call out on the video you posted and the reactions it received as I found the content of both to be supremely stupid. If you don't like having to see that someone disagreed with you in "your" discussion thread, then write a blog. I can assure you I'd have no interest following you there. 

Edited February 20, 2014 by Y_B

[rustle]

I celebrate her personal journey in coming out, and believe it takes some courage. Perhaps more in her private life than her public one,  since gay actors have been an open secret for hundreds of years, and are tolerated in their careers. This was not groundbreaking, but it helps the 'gay cause' somewhat, in that numbers of openly gay persons help desensitize society and make this less of an issue.

 

Since it was not groundbreaking, and since her professional risk is not so great as Michael Sam's, for example, it may be valid to label it grandstanding. Unlike Tom Daley's public coming out, this was not an attempt to set the record straight (I couldn't find a better way to say this, despite the obvious pun. Sorry.). Not sure it merited a speech. It certainly didn't merit the media attention, IMO. But I've never seen Juno, and don't know the woman's work at all.

 

All things considered, this event is less than. Media coverage became the real story, rather like the exchanges in this forum.

[Thorn Wilde]

I celebrate her personal journey in coming out, and believe it takes some courage. Perhaps more in her private life than her public one,  since gay actors have been an open secret for hundreds of years, and are tolerated in their careers. This was not groundbreaking, but it helps the 'gay cause' somewhat, in that numbers of openly gay persons help desensitize society and make this less of an issue.

 

Since it was not groundbreaking, and since her professional risk is not so great as Michael Sam's, for example, it may be valid to label it grandstanding. Unlike Tom Daley's public coming out, this was not an attempt to set the record straight (I couldn't find a better way to say this, despite the obvious pun. Sorry.). Not sure it merited a speech. It certainly didn't merit the media attention, IMO. But I've never seen Juno, and don't know the woman's work at all.

 

All things considered, this event is less than. Media coverage became the real story, rather like the exchanges in this forum.

 

You've overlooked the fact that this wasn't actually a coming out speech. It was a speech during which she came out. I'm assuming that she, as an LGBT-friendly celebrity, had been asked to speak at this event. She wasn't speaking to the media, or her fans, or anything like that. She was speaking to an organisation that works for the equal rights and treatment for all LGBT people. She chose that moment to come out publicly, because it felt important. Because this concerns her too. She's not just an ally. I don't understand why people have a problem with this.

 

If there is something Ellen Page is definitely not, it's a media whore. She's never been one to grab the spotlight, make scenes or whatever. Her twitter is utterly benign, mostly random musings, a few pictures, stuff about what she's up to right now. I think she'd be sad to know that so many LGBT people think of her disparagingly for this.

 

I also don't understand why everyone feels the need to compare her to Michael Sams, or why we're even talking about Michael Sams here. There's a thread in the Sports Bar to talk about Michael Sams in. Surely a person's situation ought to be judged independently? 

Edited February 20, 2014 by Thorn Wilde