Today is National Coming Out Day in the UK, I understand that National Coming Out Day was actually yesterday in the US; apparently an International Coming Out Day is hard or something.

I am gay.

That doesn’t really count as coming out though, if I am anything it’s openly gay. In fact a friend once joked that I manage to include a reference to my sexuality in every blog post or e-mail I write, and that every Twitter post of mine ends in “still gay”.

Maybe he’s right, but if it is, it’s probably subconsciously deliberate.

I confidently predict that there will be no surprise coming out statements this year from anybody in the public eye. Not even from those who don’t exactly do a good job of hiding it, yet deny it every time they are asked. You know who they are.

I think that’s quite sad.

I strongly believe that is the duty of those in the public eye to be open about their sexuality.

Firstly from a positive point of view, everybody needs role models. A young man or woman coming terms to their own sexuality will be able to do much easier knowing that there are public figures they respect who are comfortable with their own sexuality and open about it.

And from a negative point of view, every public figure who’s denying their sexuality is reinforcing the idea that you should not be comfortable with it and that being open about your sexuality will cause you problems.

Many celebrities, for example, claim that the reason they haven’t come out is because they’re afraid of what it will do to their careers. This is not only ironic, since they’re just perpetuating the problem, but clearly nonsense since there are a number of extremely well known and loved figures who are openly gay.

So this is why I’m open about it.

I want to make sure that any new members of our community who are coming to terms with their own sexuality can be assured that this is not going to cause them a problem.

(Still gay)

The ongoing debate about Mark Shuttleworth’s keynote at the Linux Plumber’s Conference has been bothering me for a little while now, but I’ve been avoiding posting until now.

Before I do, let me make one thing clear (as if it wasn’t already), I am a gay man.

Mark is a heterosexual man. In his LPC keynote he is accused of sexism because in his keynote he said that making Linux easier to understand would make it easier for him to explain what he does to girls.

Now, let’s pretend for a moment that I’d gave that keynote. Let’s pretend that I’d said that that making Linux easier would make it easier for me to explain what I did to boys.

Would there be this uproar?

Oh they’d be an uproar alright, but it wouldn’t be about sexism – the homophobic right of our community would be throwing their bibles out of their prams with vigour!

But nothing about sexism!

In fact the very people who are currently attacking Mark would be defending me as a gay man for right to say things like that. And if they didn’t I could cheerfully accuse them of homophobia.

And that’s why this bothers me.

If Mark was sexist, than he’s sexist for only being attracted to women and understandably caring what they think of him. That’s not sexism, that’s biology!

Sometimes a spade is just a spade.

Sometimes when a man says that he likes girls, HE LIKES GIRLS!

If your complaint is that he uses “girls” to mean “women” then you need to get (a) in touch with some mystical arbiter of the colloquial English language & (b) a grip.

I suspect this has ended my chances of ever being offered a Keynote (not that I ever have) and that Linux Today will now claim I should resign (I don’t work directly for mdz, but I have a tremendous amount of respect for him) then so be it.

And this is why the outcry bothers me.