The harm caused when homosexuals stay "in the closet"

The closet for most gay men is a safe and secure place where no-one can hurt you and no-one can hate you for the people you love. It would be a lovely place if not for the harm and pain it causes for other people.

I will now tell you the story of Martin, when he was a teen he loved the usual music and really loved Duran Duran and the way they dressed and looked. He was very cool and very popular, with the girls.
He always knew that he liked boys in his year and some of the boys in older years, but he hid these feelings inside so that none of his friends would know. As the years went on his family started asking when he would be getting a girlfriend. Every time he saw a relative they would ask this, one day one of his uncles asked if he was queer, Martin didn't know how to answer but he father piped up with "of course he's not queer, we would have beaten that out of him"

Martin was scared by this and so started looking for a place to live and someone to live with.
He found Claire a very crass and brash woman who was a female version of the men he liked. She was very nice to him though and their friendship blossomed. After only a very short while they were married and so silenced his family.
Martin found a local spot where he could explore his hidden sexuality and never be found out. So Martin and Claire's marriage lasted for a few years until Claire wanted a baby, now Martin knew that he wanted to be a father and knew that both he and Claire would make wonderful parents, however there was a but to his thoughts, how would he be able to live with Claire and their baby knowing that he was gay? How could he ever hope to be truly happy if he had a child with Claire?
He took the only option that was clear to him; he left Claire and told her everything.
She hated him for that, she hated that he had lied to her, that she had loved him with all her heart. Martin was driven out of his home town because of the shame and the hurt that his family felt and the shame he felt. Three weeks later his body was found in a bed-sit, he had hung himself.

Not all situations are the same however, if a man is married and has no idea that he might be gay or bi-sexual he just has these feelings that he ignores. Children are then in the picture, and one day the man finds another man that fills the gap in his soul. Two men find each other and pow, there's a spark. The spark! Now he must rip his world apart because he has found what he has always wanted. What he has always missed and his poor wife can't even begin to contend with that.
Being in the closet is a very cowardly thing and in many cases a very cruel thing to do. There is no need for it and in this day and age it is a bout time we took that closet and threw it on the bonfire. It has no place in our modern society, it once did, and protection was the only way to survive but not anymore. The hardest thing a gay man or indeed a gay woman can do is to come out, most of your friends will embrace you and say that they always new. Some might turn their backs on you but if they do that they were never your friend in the first place.

By
Peter Mills

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