1) You don't know what position he's in: It's no secret that potentially queer artists are often hassled into signing contracts or being forced to vow to keep their sexuality identity on the mum in order to secure a recording contract. When you are faced with the opportunity to do what you have perhaps always wanted to do -- to sit down in a professional recording studio and record your own music (well, at least your own voice for newly minted "Idol" alums) -- you cannot understand how alluring that opportunity is. You also can't understand what its like to have authoritative figures all around you asking or demanding that you do not officially claim a gay identity publicly. He may well be in a situation where his contract or his opportunity to record an album depends on that silence. He may also simply feel on his own that it is best to keep mum in order to preserve a future career in the recording industry -- and we have every reason to believe that this is not misguided thinking.
2) Fuck off, self-righteous bitches: As if! Don't you remember that publicly declaring being queer is, like, not always the easiest thing to do? In this case, it seems like Lambert has a very public history of acting queer, but we really at the end of the day don't know what's up with his personal life. So get over yourselves. It's his prerogative and his life at the end of the day, and it's not like all these whiners have proven themselves to be gay martyrs for the cause their entire lives. We all make difficult decisions at one point or another which may entail compromising our political commitments because we believe that compromise will further our opportunities in life. That might mean trying to butch it up for a job interview, or conveniently leaving out our queer activism in our application to a prestigious scholarship.
3) It's not his responsibility to be a role model: I know that we all want every famous lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or otherwise queer person to step up and be a "role model" for young people. But if you think young queers everywhere can't respect or look up to Adam Lambert simply because he has not declared his sexuality, you fundamentally misunderstand the nature of how this shit works. Sure, coming out publicly could be a powerful political message that could impact people who respect and/or idolize him -- but at the end of the day: 1) Not "officially" coming out is not a hindrance to him being a role model, for realz; 2) And even so, it's not Lambert's responsibility to come out. Being queer doesn't come with some responsibility that you must adopt a pristine, pure politics 24/7. There is no such politics to adopt. We can certainly want him to come out of the closet, but being gay is not sufficient a reason to obligate him to do so.
Just a few words. It's been on my mind.
If it is an open secret that a celebrity is gay, then does his refusal to be open about it harm gay people as a group? I say it does harm the gay community, but agree it might also be harmful to apply pressure on the celebrity to come out and therefore it may be unjust. However, I think it is reasonable to call on closeted gay people who are in positions of power to come out. If they don't like the heat, they can become private citizens again and get out of the kitchen.
For over forty years, I have heard each new generation of gay college students cite the reasons you give for not coming out of the closet. I point out to them that butch gay males and lipstick lesbians are some of the few minority groups who can hide from discrimination against gays. I ask them to consider if living a life in fear of being outed is worth any anticipated future gain. In my experience, most gay men choose to have a partially open closet door depending on the situation. Clearly, Lambert has chosen this path.
The increasing demand for celebrities to come out is a new twist on the old ethical debate about outing closeted gay hypocrites, in positions of power, who were harming gay people. (For example, Assistant Defense Secretary Pete Williams, who served under Dick Cheney in the first Bush administration. Since then he has been an NBC White House reporter.) The ethics of outing was well documented in the 1993 book by Michelangelo Signorile, "Queer in America: sex, the media, and the closets of power," Univ of Wisconsin Press, 2003 (Tenth-anniversary edition, I read the original 1993 edition).
Signorile's basic thesis is that coming out is an individual lifelong process and journey. A section "Helping others to Come Out" (p.157 click here for Google Book image) is in a later book by Michelangelo Signorile, "Outing yourself: how to come out as lesbian or gay to your family, friends, and coworkers," Simon and Schuster, 1996 (I read the first edition published by Random House 1995).
I hear what you're saying. But I disagree entirely. Again I just think we're expecting these new celebrities to be somehow better than we expect each other to be. I do not believe it is incumbent upon him to publicly declare his sexual identity. And Michelangelo Signorile is an asshole. I'm not buying his thesis or his politics. The slandering he did against Andrew Sullivan is case in point for his disgusting brand of personal politics and sex-shaming that I cannot promote or endorse.
I've been a neutral party in the catfight between Michelangelo Signorile and Andrew Sullivan ever since the 1990s, when I first met both of them and started to follow their gay activism work. I think both have made very important contributions, but both men have Achilles heels.
For example, Sullivan has apologized for his role in promoting the election of President George W. Bush -- Sullivan's conservative essays and endorsement convinced me to vote for Bush in 2000. I would have never forgiven Sullivan if he had not apologized. Likewise, Signorile's streetwise liberal viewpoint makes him blind to Sullivan's more sophisticated analysis of politics.
I don't know what you base your opinion on that "Signorile is an asshole," but even Signorile would agree he is an asshole on purpose sometimes. Signorile and the whole theory of the ACT-UP type of gay AIDS activism in the 1980s was led by the anger of Larry Kramer (who unfortunately is still angry unlike Signorile). Signorile's confrontational theory of outing was a logical extension of this type of anger.
I am hearing that what you are opposing is the use of confrontational techniques that are potentially harmful, such as the forced outing of celebrities, because this may be counterproductive and any potential political gains from doing it are too small to justify being an "asshole."
However, I wonder if you think confrontational political techniques were ever valid or useful in the history of gay liberation or AIDS activism? Can you envision any situation where confrontational techniques are valid or ethical?