Thoughts on Clay - and being gay...

Exactly two years ago today I wrote a blog post entitled Is Clay gay or straight? It's none of your business! It's still one of my most-visited posts, and I suspect that won't change any time soon.

It was written with passion and quite a bit of righteous indignation, and I'm happy to say that everything I wrote is as true today as it was then.

Exactly two years ago today I wrote:

If Clay came out next week and told the world that he's gay, I would shrug my shoulders and say "Oh well, good for him, I'm glad he feels that the time is right for him to come out, and I hope he's found a good man who will love and cherish him forever"... and then I'd go back to enjoying his music and admiring his character and integrity.

And if he announced next week that he's fallen in love with a beautiful woman and they're planning to get married and have dozens of babies, I would say "Oh well, good for him, I'm glad he's found the girl of his dreams who will love and cherish him forever - so when's that CD of lullabies going to be released?"... and then I'd go back to enjoying his music and admiring his character and integrity.

I would never have expected that a combination of both those scenarios would turn out to be the case - but then 5 years of being a member of the ClayNation has demonstrated to me that Clay doesn't always take the obvious or easy road! :)

What I do know today is that I'm enormously happy for him, and I'm hugely impressed by the decision he's made to be open about his homosexuality - as a gift to his baby son Parker. Wow. And what a cutie he is! (Parker I mean - though his dad's not bad either!)

Two years ago, Clay said that it was no-one's business whether he was gay or straight. He said he was so sick of people assuming he was lying when he said he wasn't gay, that he had decided to simply stop answering the question at all.

Exactly two years ago today I wrote:

How would you feel if complete strangers insisted on speculating publicly about your love life, asked you intrusive questions about whether you preferred men or women, and then completely ignored your answer and carried on believing what they believed in the first place, regardless of the answer you'd given?

I believe that everyone has the right to self-identify in terms of their sexuality - and that they also have the right to have that self-identification accepted and supported by those around them. Sadly, Clay has not been afforded that right by many people over the past five years.

No-one has the right to go burrowing into the private life of someone else without asking - and it doesn't matter whether that person is famous or not - in my opinion it's still not OK. Your sexuality, or mine, or Clay's, is nobody's damn business but our own.

It's clear that Clay has reached this point in his journey in his own time, and in his own way. It's not for me to speculate how long he's known that he is gay, and whether or not he was telling the truth two years ago. It's none of my business whether he's been in the closet for years, or in denial, or whether he has arrived at his current definition of his sexuality through a gradual process of self-understanding. That's his business, and the business of those who love him and share his life.

I have many gay friends, some of whom are out and have been for years, others of whom have only come out recently. Some are out in all aspects of their life; others are out with their friends and family, and remain in the closet at work. I know gay people who have come out after years of being in heterosexual relationships, and I know people who have come out after years of marriage.

Some people take years to understand who they truly are (heck - I certainly don't "get" myself half the time!) - and this can include a definition of their sexuality. Each of us is unique, and our paths in life are our own. It shouldn't be this way, but it's true that being openly gay can have some seriously bad repercussions for some people in some situations.

Although all my gay friends are happy with who they are, and who they love, I can't say that it has always been the case for all of them. And I also can't say for sure that I have no "straight" friends who are actually gay but unwilling to come out. Who knows? I do know that I would love every one of them just as much if tomorrow they told me they were gay (and vice versa!)

When Clay said he was straight, the fandom as a whole accepted that, and (mostly) didn't question it. Why? Because it was the right thing to do - the polite and respectful thing to do. Now that he's said he's gay, the fandom accepts that too. And the vast majority of the ClayNation will go on loving Clay just as much as they did yesterday, if not more.

Exactly two years ago today I wrote:

Why would a person's sexual orientation affect the way I feel about them? I have straight friends and I have gay friends - and their private lives have nothing to do with our friendship. I love them all, regardless of whom they choose to make love with. It's the same with the artists, musicians, actors and performers whom I admire - why would the gender of the people they love have any effect on the fact that I love the way they paint/sing/dance/act? I just don't understand why some people might think that it would make a difference to the way I respond to their art.

...and I feel exactly the same way today.

It's a nice synergy that my top three male voices of all time are Freddie Mercury, George Michael, and Clay Aiken. Each has a voice in a million, legions of fans, and each has taken his own journey to self-discovery - which has included, for each of them, a moment when they knew that it was the right time to be open about their sexuality.

I feel a huge amount of respect for Clay. I am incredibly impressed that, deeply private person though he is, he has decided to come out because he doesn't want to bring up baby Parker "to lie or to hide things". That is an incredibly brave decision to make, in my opinion, and I imagine a very emotional one. I'm so happy for him that he's decided to make it - and I know he will find it to be the right one.

This Clay Aiken fan ain't going nowhere - but you knew that already, didn't you?


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