Sun Blogs: The Pop Culture Pill
The Day Clay Aiken Came Out of the Closet
September 27, 2008 - 10:48pm...and the day the entire English-speaking world said, “Yea? And?”
The tale is as old as the concept of quasi-celebrities themselves. Boy (or girl) is gay, boy or girl gets famous, boy or girl keeps his or her homosexuality a secret and boy or girl comes out of the closet. And time after time, the world is unsurprised and unmoved and yawns at the announcement
Aiken holds a "secret."Aiken reports that he decided to come out to the world because he simply cannot raise his newborn son with a lie, the way he has done for so many years. The now 29-year-old father decided last year that he would conceive a child with his friend Jayme Foster.
That was when the world knew. Well, it was either then or his very first appearance on American Idol Season 2, Round 1 auditions. You be the judge.
The trend is constant, though. Not quite celebrities seem to think that the American public cares about their personal lives. But even I – someone who cares more about the lifestyles of the rich and the famous more than the average Joe – remain simply unmoved by this new report. Personally, I’d rather spend time talking about what happened to Aiken’s career, because I had my own inklings that he was batting for the other team years ago, and I trust I am not in the minority.
Instead, these secret-holding celebrities make desperate attempts to prove to the world that they are straight. They take awkward pictures with anything with boobs, take hot friends to award shows and even marry Katie Holmes!
But my one wish for celebrities is that they realize either way we simply don’t care. As long as they remain on top of their respective games, keep sporting the newest styles and trends and keep giving us juicy gossip that matters, they will always keep their titles.
Good for you that you never
Good for you that you never cared!!--I think Clay Aiken wanted the rest of the media to feel that way. I'm sorry that so much of the media felt the need to keep asking him and to keep the sexuality issue the main one they were interestTed -- well really the only one--they were interested in. It was pretty hard to talk seriously about anything else, including his career. I think Clay's reaction has always been people shouldn't care, there were more important things to be discussed.
He announced it proves that--he basically said I'm a gay man, now get over it!! Being gay is only a part of this man's identity. He is now a father and no longer wanted to keep up any facade. Good for him!! I'm hugely surprised at how many in the media and on the internet have no sympathy for any person's coming out process. Like it or not, we still live in a very homophobic world--I hope for the day that a gay person has no need to worry about sharing information about their sexuality with their family, friend, community, or as in Clay's case-- the world--, without retribution. It just shouldn't be an issue.