To #gay or not to #gay, that is the question.  Or at least that was the question that occupied my mind for an extended period of time after I “came out.”  Once I came out, I was forced to grapple with learning how to accept my identity as a gay man, without allowing my sexuality or the stereotypes associated with it, define me.  And I had to do all this while navigating the relatively new (to me) age of social media and hashtags.  I am ashamed to confess that I did not even understand the import of the omnipresent #hashtag symbol until approximately three years ago.  #facepalm

I started experimenting with hashtags in my social media posts around the same time I had determined that I was ready to live openly on social media.  It was at that time that I began to notice that most of my gay friends’ posts incorporated hashtags that included the word “gay” in them:  #musclegay #gaynyc #gaydaddy #gayginger #beardedgay #instagay #gayinked, #gaytwink, etc….  Part of me was resistant to joining this trend, as I did not want to wear my sexuality on my sleeve or be defined by something that, in my mind, was only a small part of my identity.  I was also afraid of making my straight and Christian “friends” uncomfortable.  Straights generally don’t #straight on their social media posts, so why should I #gay.  On the other hand, I also wanted my social media posts to reach other gays.  I wanted to participate in and be part of the gay community–to exist in spaces, both real and virtual, where I did not have to hide who I was,  but instead could be free to celebrate my whole self.

For longer than I care to admit, this internal debate played out inside my head. To #gay or not to #gay, that was indeed the question–a question that I could not bring myself to answer.  But more than anything else, I did not want to have to be constantly on guard about whether I looked or sounded too gay.  And why should my daily existence be fraught with the angst of whether my very presence would cause others to be uncomfortable?  I wanted to be free, to live like other non-gays live, without giving a second thought to whether someone might be made uncomfortable because I dared to breath free.  A straight man never has to agonize over whether its okay to hold his girlfriend’s hand in public or whether he will get beat up for slapping his straight teammate on the ass during a sports game.  Why should my entire life be consumed with hiding who I am?  That’s not living.

So much of the closeted experience revolved around figuring out how to act “straight” in order to avoid being called a faggot or having to deal with gossip.  I cannot even remember a time in my life where I wasn’t constantly on guard about how I was being perceived by others.  Even as a small child in kindergarten, before I had any concept of sexuality, my daily existence was obsessively preoccupied with what I needed to do and how I needed to act so that other kids would stop calling me a “sissy” or a “pussy” and use that as an excuse to hit me or pull my hair.  By the time I entered my thirties, my gonads had finally dropped enough for me to gather the courage to shout to the entire world, and to God:  “fuck you, I’m gay, so get over it!”   

And now, not only was I ready to defiantly declare my queerness, I wanted to embrace and celebrate this terrible, blasphemous thing that I am now quite happy to be.  Hell, even the word means happy.  And I am happy, happy that I am gay.  #GAY, #GAY, #GAY, I’M SO GAY ABOUT BEING #GAY!!!

So I took the plunge.  Did I notice that a lot of the people who usually liked most of my social media posts did not like any of my posts that had a #gay on it?  Yes.  #honeyiseeyou #dontgiveadamn #sorrynotsorry…  But so what?  This world is full of people who do not have the courage to think for and be themselves, so they go through life never truly living.  Such people will always be uncomfortable around those who have the courage to defy social pressure and step outside of the norm.  But I’m done allowing the fear and shame imposed by others dictate whether or not I live my life.

To #gay or not to #gay, to be or not to be, to live or not to live?  It is, I think, a question everyone faces.  It is a question that I am ready to answer in the affirmative.  And every time I am tempted to allow social pressure to cause me to turn back, I hear Jesus speak to me the same words he said to his would-be follower who wanted to first go back and fulfill the burial customs imposed by their culture:  “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”  (Luke 9:60)

Yaaass, honey!!!  You betta preach, Jesus!!!  The dead can go fulfill their dead works. The God I worship is not the God of the dead, but of the living, because “I get wings to fly, oh, oh… I’m alive…”  (Mark 12:27 & Celine Dion)

#gayginger #nycgay #gaydaddy #gaymodel #gayaspirations #gaygaygay 😝

To be, or not to be, that is the question:

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles

And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep,

No more; and by a sleep to say we end

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;

To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there’s the rub:

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause—there’s the respect

That makes calamity of so long life.

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

Th’oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,

The pangs of dispriz’d love, the law’s delay,

The insolence of office, and the spurns

That patient merit of th’unworthy takes,

When he himself might his quietus make

With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,

To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscovere’d country, from whose bourn

No traveller returns, puzzles the will,

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,

And thus the native hue of resolution

Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,

And enterprises of great pitch and moment

With this regard their currents turn awry

And lose the name of action.

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet