The phrase Silence Equals Death may mean nothing to you, but it sure means a lot to me. It means a lot to any gay man who survived the first decade of the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and 1990s. The expression Silence Equals Death meant that by hiding your HIV status you were complicit in the rapid spread of the disease throughout our community. it also was used by many as a call for members of the gay community to come out of the closet and join the fight for equal rights and fair treatment under the law.
As a young man who was driven to attempt suicide rather than have his sexuality discovered by others, it meant to me that by remaining silent about my sexuality - by not being truthful about who I was to my friends and family, too - I was slowly and silently killing my very soul. Not only that, by pretending to be straight among heterosexuals and living my gay life in the shadows, I was becoming the same kind of hypocrite I grew up in the church being wary of. Those wolves in sheep's clothing who would come at my innocence, taking advantage of my own ability to understand myself and my place in the world at such a tender age.
For many like myself, coming out took a lot of guts, especially at a time when people were not shy about hating gay people publicly. I remember in college lots of fraternity guys wearing the popular t-shirt, "Silly faggot, dicks are for chicks". It was a slap in the face, as the core of it was understandably hilarious and touched on the 70s nostalgia that Generation X was heaving during that time, the Grunge era of the early 90s.
But the phrase and the wearing of the shirts were a passive aggressive way to voice that they as straight people were normal and gay people were abnormal. Fine, believe what you want. But it was also communicating to some that violence and verbal hate attacks against gay people was okay, even laughable.
When I chose to come out publicly at that time I was met with a lot of aggression but also some curiosity. I rose to curiosity's call and agreed to meet with fraternity members to take back the curtain on what it was like to be a gay, closeted college student in their generation. Many listened and took these messages to heart. Within a few years, the "normalization" of homosexuality fully set in, and many more people felt comfortable to come out.
But still there are those who hide in the shadows. They do it not only because they fear the repercussions in their life, but often because there are people they love who still carry the antiquated viewpoint that homosexuality is an unspeakable sin - because if it is indeed a sin, it is the lust of homosexuality that is sinful, but in equal proportion to heterosexual lust. Not different. Not worse. But equally despisable in front of a sinless creator.
Anyway, I'm not here to preach any message. But I do want to let you know that if you do decide to be completely honest and transparent about something in your life, do not be foolish enough to believe that those who claim to stick by your side also consider you to be their equal. To many "normies", anyone they consider different is a perversion of their limited beliefs. Still, it is best, in my humble opinion, to live in honesty even if the policy of truth has burned you in the past.
NOTE: The photos used here include artwork by Keith Haring and by the Act Up movement.
