8asians:

laughingsquid:

Phagwah 2010 Parade in Richmond Hills, Queens

Richmond Hills!

daveholmes:

So I have some thoughts about this.

A few months after I moved here, Brian Graden invited me to sit at his table for the Los Angeles GLAAD Media Awards. He was getting a special award, as he did about twice a week. I jumped at the chance, since I’m gay and in the media, and I didn’t really get invited to things like this very much. Still don’t. I took my best black suit (slimming!) to the fancy dry cleaners in West Hollywood, got a haircut, shaved, and eagerly waited an empowering night for the gays. I was young.

Halfway through the night, the creators of “Will & Grace” got a special award, as they did about nine times a week. Sean Hayes presented it to them, and the beginning of his speech went something like this:

“Folks, it’s great to see so many gay and gay-friendly people here tonight. And I’ve chosen this occasion to share something with you. You may have suspected this, and I’ve kept it to myself for years, but now feels like the right time. You see, ladies and gentlemen, I am…really happy to be here.”

The crowd roared with laughter. I winced and did the thing where you put your index finger under your collar and pull on it. The rep from GLAAD said, “Why?”

At the reception afterwards, I pulled the GLAAD rep aside: “What was that?”

“What was what?”

“What was the crazy rich closeted gay actor making a joke about not coming out of the closet at the GLAAD Awards?”

“Oh! He does that every year. It’s his thing. Isn’t it funny?”

Like Eric Stoltz in “Kicking & Screaming,” I’m going to paraphrase myself here:

“No. No, it isn’t funny when the guy playing the gay Stepin Fetchit on the network show that’s in its seventh season looks out at a bunch of gay people who aren’t all zillionaires living in a city where it’s relatively easy to be openly gay- gay people who saved their pennies and closed their salons and antique stores, and got their weird blue tuxedos out of storage and bought a bolo tie and drove in from Needles or whatever, and who take actual risk with their actual lives being actually out EVERY DAY in those places, and who come here to feel proud and powerful for a night- to not only stay in the closet, but to make a joke about it. No, that’s not funny at all, and it might be the kind of thing that you, since you are the Gay & Lesbian Alliance AGAINST Defamation, might want to be AGAINST.”

Guess which one of us got invited back the next year.