I have three daughters. They are 19, 19 and almost 17. They have always been insightful and intuitive. Recently, they noticed that most all of their age cohort friends are “coming out” as either gay, lesbian, or bisexual. These are kids they have known since grade school. My daughters are not anti anything so they are not disturbed by their friends coming out but they have noticed it as a sort of trend. The sheer numbers of age cohorts here now self-identifying as either gay, lesbian, or bi is amazing. My daughters asked me, “Mom are all these kids really gay, lesbian, or bi or is it just a fad?”
I replied that if the kids say they are then we should take their word for it. One daughter said she felt it was a fad because it was now seen as cool to come out as gay, lesbian, or bi in our area. I cannot say if she is right or not. So many of her Facebook friends have come out as gay, lesbian, or bi and they are not afraid of censure it seems.
What I do know is this, if these kids are what they say they are (and I firmly believe they are) then there are far more openly gay and lesbian and bisexual people than anyone imagined and they are not as afraid to be open about it because their age cohort isn’t as homophobic as older generations have been. Both are a good thing in my book.
Even if it were a fad, that it could be a fad is a huge change from the old way of seeing gayness, lesbianism, and bisexuality as a negative thing. The younger generation has it right; be what you are and accept others for who and what they are. Life is too short to judge and condemn.
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