Word: closet
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...Great, Shakespeare, Willa Cather and James Dean, with hundreds of others cited along the way. This name dropping is defended as a way of giving the gay community role models and a sense of continuity. When the rumors involve living people, however, discussion about who is "in the closet" has generally been held to a discreet murmur -- partly in deference to libel laws but mostly in defense of privacy. That consensus is fast breaking down with the spread of a phenomenon known as "outing," the intentional exposure of secret gays by other gays...
Frustrated at the slow pace of gay civil rights legislation and what they consider governmental indifference to the AIDS epidemic, growing numbers of gay activists now claim a moral right to "rip people out of the closet" -- either to force them to help the movement or to nullify them as opponents. The main targets are elected officials and religious leaders who may enjoy a gay life in private but who endorse antigay measures to safeguard their careers. Radical gays go further, pointing the finger at entertainment and media figures and even ordinary citizens...
...outing, even if used only against the movement's avowed enemies. Says Sarah Craig, an associate editor of Chicago's gay-oriented Windy City Times: "Really, you're only using the same bludgeon used to injure you to injure someone else." As a practical matter, moreover, if outing a closeted gay ends his or her career, there is rarely any reason to believe that the target's successor will be more sympathetic to the gay cause. Nonetheless, some prominent gays favor forcing every closeted person to come out, holding that being gay is nothing to be ashamed of and that...
...serious! We are the Society of Nerds and Geeks (SONG), we're out of the closet--and we certainly have an agenda. Better yet, we have two agendas...
...activities, such as our weekly Saturday dinner meetings in Mather House, SONG is trying to show that the pursuit of knowledge can be both cool and fun. Come out of the closet and join SONG! Even though SONG may not be able to change the world, we stand a realistic chance of helping to focus national attention on education...