When it comes to our sexuality, is it better to shock or fly under the radar?

By Roland Taureau

I was sitting in a bar the other day at a random get-together, when all of a sudden a friend turned to me and asked a very perceptive question.

“You’re a confident man, Roland” he began, “Do you ever encounter homophobia these days?”

His question intrigued me. My buddy was dead right: I am a confident man. In fact, I have no doubt that some people find me overly confident on first meeting. I’m opinionated and outspoken and probably a bit of an alpha. But how did that relate to the instance of homophobia I encountered? Well, I pondered, bullies are less likely to pick on those who stand up for themselves, and my particular brand of confidence includes a proclivity to walk into new social dynamics and assert myself, pre-emptively warding off snide, homophobic behaviour.

The way I go about this is by ensuring that everyone I’m socialising with knows that I’m gay, right from the get-go. I’m not subtle about it – I lay everything on the table. I shock and awe.

I guess the reason I’ve developed this strategy is that the social default setting has long centred upon the assumption that everyone is straight unless they announce otherwise. Basically, gay people must continuously engage in a process of coming out, in order to let everybody else know they exist outside the default.

When people ask about my coming out experience I know exactly what they mean, but I always counter, “Which one?”. I told my parents years ago, but I still have to come out fairly regularly.

Obviously, there’s that first, big step: telling your family, friends and anyone else who’s important to you. Even for someone like me, whose parents would have been DEVASTATED if they didn’t have a gay child, it was a very difficult and emotional conversation.

After that first, big episode it’s all kind of down hill, but there are definitely other, smaller ones. Telling your new colleagues or boss, for example, or even just meeting new people at pretty much any non-gay social setting in which your presence as a homosexual hasn’t previously been announced or explained. It never really ends and, although we all develop a thick skin, there’s often still a small moment of awkwardness or insecurity during each coming out that makes the experience a little confronting, and evokes the memory of that first time. By employing my shock and awe strategy, I manage to get the announcement out of the way early, and in one fell swoop.

When my buddy quizzed me on the situation though, I had to wonder what the alternative would be.

To say nothing? To fly under the radar?

I guess that could work. After all, you’re probably not likely to encounter direct homophobia if people don’t know you’re gay, although I’m not sure I could escape the constant feeling that I was telling a lie by inadmission. Flying under the radar, it seemed to me, had the potential to provoke far more social discomfort than shock and awe.

Just as I was making my mind up about the situation, my boyfriend returned from the bar, accompanied by a couple of fresh beers and a friendly looking woman. Unlike me, my man has a calm and collected persona. In fact he’s often so relaxed and subdued it’s sometimes difficult to ascertain a sexuality at all, least of all that of a flaming homo….that is, until a Minogue track hits the airwaves.

My man introduced his new friend (let’s call her Kylie) to the group, at which point she cast him a flirtatious smile and invited herself to sit with us. I immediately got the feeling that my boyfriend had spent a little too long flying under the radar in this instance and, briefly catching his eye, I could sense that he knew it as well. Kylie had assumed my man was straight, and he needed to salvage the situation. Unfortunately, despite his calm and collected exterior, my boyfriend sometimes exhibits all the charm of Donald Trump with a bad case of irritable bowel. All of a sudden, before Kylie’s ass had hit the chair, he barked “Full disclosure: I’m gay. Gay! That’s my boyfriend.”

Eternity filled the gaps between the Dubstep rhythm, after which Kylie and I exchanged forced smiles and she said something like ‘Oh, great!’. We all sat there for a minute or so, staring into our beers as if they would give us glimpses into the future, then Kylie made an abrupt goodbye.

My man looked miserable. Only one thing was going to salvage the situation: shots.

Analysing our approaches, while my shock and awe strategy may well be confronting for others, it at least allows all and sundry to quickly adapt to the dynamic. Homophobes know to keep their distance, for example, and members of the opposite sex can better determine who to set their sights on.

Nonetheless, people treat you differently once they know you’re gay. Sometimes they favour you, sometimes they discriminate but, on the whole, it’s usually different. They’ll ask you different questions and share different aspects of themselves. They’ll make assumptions, and expect you to be flattered at their pleasant surprise if you don’t fit their stereotype. Or they’ll feel put out by it, and disappear into the night, wary and embarrassed by their failure to see past the sexual default.

Ultimately, a person’s sexuality is their own business. They shouldn’t need to shout it from the rooftops if they don’t feel like it, and if they do, and find that others have a problem with it, those others can fuck off. But the coming out always continues, and people develop different strategies to deal with it. Often we adapt these strategies to what we think will make everybody feel most comfortable. Sometimes we fail miserably.

Personally, I would argue that we shouldn’t try to placate the sensibilities of the mainstream, although I’m certain it’s always a consideration. No matter whether we prefer to shock and awe, fly under the radar or somehow manage to tread the middle ground.