José Miguel Villouta, a popular Chilean radio announcer, a young, gay, and thousands of followers in the country, appeared this week in an interview with Paula recommending young people go into the closet homosexual.
Exit out of it, he said, was "very hard."
Go you for a moment and lock yourself in a closet, to see how it goes.
is a narrow, claustrophobic and suffocating. If not a little light filters can also be frighteningly dark, a place where it is impossible to recognize even the silhouette of your own hands, perfect for hide and be alone.
But who wants to be hidden and only life?
In recent months the U.S. has been a series of tragic news about bullying and suicide among gay teens, a theme that hangs like a heavy rock in my heart and had not known until now how to play.
Well, Mr. Villouta gave me a good evening with your comment.
Being openly gay has its risks, no doubt. Villouta
account in his interview how a family moved from table to a restaurant for not completing sitting next to him and his partner. And although the episode may be humbling, I've heard stories worse.
There is the lawyer who saw his brilliant career disappear in a storm of comments and rumors in his office or the student who was expelled from his home by parents who never returned to speak to, or the man who could not be with his family in his last days in the hospital, because nobody knew who had spent more than a decade together.
Yes, there are stories. More than I'd like remember.
As a teenager in the 70's Chile was not used out of the closet. One implied that he had a natural order which determined that a gay child would be tortured during his school years, live a semi ostracism in college, and then, hopefully, find shelter in a comfortable existence where everything-alone Birthday funerals, great romances a painful break-serious lived behind closed doors.
As in a closet.
In those days there were no gay people on the radio or television.
The closest was Don Francisco, the nation's leading animator, who tore laughter every Saturday among viewers with jumps, breaks hand and fluttering of eyelashes that were part of his famous imitation of a man, "unusual."
There was nothing worse than being "weird", and therefore were not a few parents from time to time, and jokingly warning, claimed it was better to have "a child thief fag."
Add to that other indignities of adolescence, pimples, bad grades, cruel jokes, own goals, and you also be tempted to run to the closet and shut and locked inside.
But things have changed since then.
Today there are many openly gay men and women in the country, many of them, as Villouta, with an enviable platform from which to speak to others, especially younger teens especially gay.
can not forget, we can not, I should say that someone out there is listening.
In America, the stars of Modern Family Barack Obama President currently appearing in "It Gets Better", a series of videos dedicated to gay youth with the promise that, whatever the hell they are living for now things will improve in the future.
is a beautiful promise. An important promise. And, better yet, a real promise.
Things get better with time, I know from personal experience.
So put on your sunglasses, open the door and go and enjoy the light.
And if one day you meet someone who runs away from him because you are gay, as happened to Villouta, politely say goodbye and wish good luck. The will need. Homophobia always runs with a pack of prejudices, and those who rarely feel sleep in peace. Too many weird people on the street. Too much diversity.
Soon they struggle to find a place to feel comfortable and safe. A dark lonely place where ruminate their bad times.
May we suggest a closet?
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