The Double Closet: Homosexuality and Immigration Status

Jose Antonio Vargas is an openly gay, award-winning journalist who
 came out as an undocumented immigrant in the New York Times today

An absolutely stunning admission, made by Jose Antonio Vargas in a beautifully written op-ed editorial published today in The New York Times: he is an undocumented immigrant.

Here's an excerpt:

I decided then that I could never give anyone reason to doubt I was an American. I convinced myself that if I worked enough, if I achieved enough, I would be rewarded with citizenship. I felt I could earn it.

I’ve tried. Over the past 14 years, I’ve graduated from high school and college and built a career as a journalist, interviewing some of the most famous people in the country. On the surface, I’ve created a good life. I’ve lived the American dream.

But I am still an undocumented immigrant. And that means living a different kind of reality. It means going about my day in fear of being found out. It means rarely trusting people, even those closest to me, with who I really am. It means keeping my family photos in a shoebox rather than displaying them on shelves in my home, so friends don’t ask about them. It means reluctantly, even painfully, doing things I know are wrong and unlawful. And it has meant relying on a sort of 21st-century underground railroad of supporters, people who took an interest in my future and took risks for me.

Last year I read about four students who walked from Miami to Washington to lobby for the Dream Act, a nearly decade-old immigration bill that would provide a path to legal permanent residency for young people who have been educated in this country. At the risk of deportation — the Obama administration has deported almost 800,000 people in the last two years — they are speaking out. Their courage has inspired me.

There are believed to be 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. We’re not always who you think we are. Some pick your strawberries or care for your children. Some are in high school or college. And some, it turns out, write news articles you might read. I grew up here. This is my home. Yet even though I think of myself as an American and consider America my country, my country doesn’t think of me as one of its own.

It really is a must-read about what I call "the double closet," the experience of gay immigrants. Go read it now!

NYT Announces 1st Openly Gay Op-Ed Columnist

Frank Bruni

The New York Times has announced that Frank Bruni, its one time chief restaurant critic, will become an op-ed columnist:

Andrew Rosenthal, editor of the opinion pages, said in an e-mail to the staff on Monday that Mr. Bruni would write a new column in The Times’s redesigned Sunday Op-Ed pages.

“This column, which will be a new anchor feature of the section, will be a sharp, opinionated look at a big event of the last week, from a different or unexpected angle, or a small event that was really important but everyone seems to have missed, or something entirely different,” Mr. Rosenthal said. “It will fast become a destination for our readers with Frank at the keyboard.”

He said Mr. Bruni would also write a column one other day of the week, most likely Thursday.

Mr. Bruni, 46, is the first openly gay Op-Ed columnist in The Times’s 160-year history.

He said he would take on a wide variety of subjects.

“I’m excited and really grateful. At The Times and beforehand, I’ve been lucky to be able to write about many different topics, and I’m eager to take on a job that will allow me to range across most or all of them in a reflective, analytical and sometimes — I hope — spirited way.”

Congratulations to Frank Bruni!

WATCH: Don Lemon Discusses Being Gay On CNN HLN

As I mentioned on Monday, CNN anchor Don Lemon has come out as openly gay. He is currently making the media rounds promoting his book Transparent. Below is his appearance on Joy Behar's nightly talk show which airs on CNN's Headline News.

CNN Weekend Anchor Don Lemon Comes Out!

Don Lemon, CNN's Weekend Anchor, is revealing in a new book coming out this week that he is a gay man. The 45-year-old African-American television celebrity reveals in Transparent that he was abused as a child and never knew his father.

The New York Times reports:

Few national television news anchors or hosts have publicly acknowledged being gay. Rachel Maddow is perhaps the best known. Her MSNBC colleague, Thomas Roberts, has also come out as gay.

Mr. Lemon has not made a secret of his sexual orientation in his work life; many of his CNN co-workers and managers have long been aware that he is gay. But he still acknowledged that going public in his book carries certain risks.

“I’m scared,” he said in a telephone interview. “I’m talking about something that people might shun me for, ostracize me for.”

Even beyond whatever effect his revelation might have on his television career, Mr. Lemon said he recognized this step carried special risk for him as a black man.

“It’s quite different for an African-American male,” he said. “It’s about the worst thing you can be in black culture. You’re taught you have to be a man; you have to be masculine. In the black community they think you can pray the gay away.” He said he believed the negative reaction to male homosexuality had to do with the history of discrimination that still affects many black Americans, as well as the attitudes of some black women.

How long does Anderson Cooper think he can stall before affirmatively answering the question that everyone already knows the answer to?

Response to Jerome Robinson's Letter to the LA TIMES

In the Los Angeles Times a few days ago I came across this letter to the editor which was published:

Lessons on gays' contributions 

Re "A fight over gays in textbooks," April 2 

I am a black male Democrat. I believe homosexuals are born as such because of factors beyond their control. So I don't view homosexuals as wrongdoers who chose to be different. 

That said, I disagree with gay rights activists supporting legislation to require teaching on the contributions of homosexuals in our society, extending recognition to gays that has been historically given to racial minorities. The experiences of homosexuals simply aren't extensions of those of racial minorities. There's no comparison between race and sexuality. 

I'm sick and tired of gay rights activists and radical liberals attempting to hijack the struggles of racial minorities to advance their agenda. It's insulting to me, and I suspect the vast majority of racial minorities feel the same.
Jerome RobinsonLos Angeles

Where to begin with a response? First, I, too am a "black male Democrat." So the first point to note is that clearly all Black male Democrats do not share the same views. Just as the views expressed in the published letter merely reflect one Black male Democrat, so do my published views here.

I'm glad that Mr. Robinson doesn't "view homosexuals as wrongdoers who chose to be different" so at least we know he's not  some ignorant, raving homophobe. That said, he clearly is lacking in information when he says that requiring teaching the contributions of homosexuals to society is "extending recognition to gays that has been historically given to racial minorities." The presumption here is that requiring teaching of certain groups has been restricted to racial minorities, which is clearly false. The contributions of women and other previously neglected groups has been a basic tenet of curricular reform for decades. Including LGBT people is just the next step.

But it is these next two sentences that set my hair on fire: "There's no comparison between race and sexuality." and "I'm sick and tired of gay rights activists and radical liberals attempting to hijack the struggles of racial minorities to advance their agenda."

There's no comparison between race and "sexuality"? (I presume he means sexual orientation.) What about the fact that until 1967 there were laws on the books preventing people from marrying because of the race of the participants? And there are currently laws on the books preventing people from marrying because of the SEX and SEXUAL ORIENTATION of the participants.

Race is a theoretical aspect of identity which has been reified by society, i.e. it is a social construction. Is there any doubt that sexual orientation is also a social construct? What does it even MEAN to be gay? One could define it using sexual attraction, sexual activity, self-identification. But the difficulty in defining either race or sexual orientation does not make their impact on the actual lives of individuals any less real. It is absolute nonsense to say "there's no comparison between race and sexuality."

"I'm sick and tired of gay rights activists and radical liberals attempting to hijack the struggles of racial minorities to advance their agenda." This is such an old canard I don't know where to begin. My usual response is to quote Dan Savage and say that all LGBT activists acknowledge The Civil Rights Movement of the 60s to end racial segregation, but that the movement for full LGBT equality is also a civil rights movement. See the difference? My friend Craig Konnoth, has written an award-winning article entitled "Created in its image: the race analogy, gay identity, and gay litigation in the 1950s-1970s" which eloquently and brilliantly illuminates how much all other civil rights movements (for women's rights, gay rights, etc) that were contemporaneous with the Black Civil Rights Movement were influenced and impacted by the historical precedents set by racial minorities. This should not be a surprise! This is not about hijacking another groups struggles in order to advance another agenda, and by choosing an oppositional frame between racial minorities and other groups one assumes that there is no overlap, which is FALSE.

I'm still trying to decide whether I should formally write a response to Mr. Robinson's letter to the editor and send it to the Times. What do you think, dear readers?