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sereneThere's a conversation about outness on a list I'm on. I'm excising other people's comments (but the gist was that it could hurt people if you were out to them, and besides, maybe people don't *want* to hear about your personal life). I thought I would post my thoughts on this here. Feel free to read, ignore, comment -- whatever.
Note, please, that I'm not saying anyone else should come out -- other people's closets are their own business unless they're asking me to maintain them. People in my life can attest to the fact that that's something I refuse to do, even for those I love.
[snip something to the effect of telling people who want to be out that it could cause harm and that it's not all about them]
If my relationships aren't about me, I don't want them. Sure, they're not *all* about me, but I can't have -- no, make that I am not interested in having -- close relationships with people who don't know me, or are unaware of the people who are most important to me. And I'm not interested in being put in situations in which I'm expected to conceal who I am to the people I love, or who they are to me.
If someone knows me well enough to:
* ask me what I did this weekend
* ask me to coffee
* tell me what they and their partner(s)/family did this weekend
* be a guest in my home
* have me as a guest in their home
then it's very likely they will meet or hear about my partners pretty quickly. I don't walk up to the mail carrier and tell zir "Hey, we've never met, but I'm serene and I'm poly". I often get the impression in these conversations that those of us who are completely out, or who advocate being out, are advocating outing oneself to strangers -- that's never been my position. My position is that I refuse to take more care in concealing who I love than the mono-het person in the next office at work, or the people in my family, or whoever. Why should I? What I'm doing is not wrong or shameful, and I absolutely refuse to behave as though it is.
Note, please, that I'm not saying anyone else should come out -- other people's closets are their own business unless they're asking me to maintain them. People in my life can attest to the fact that that's something I refuse to do, even for those I love.
[snip something to the effect of telling people who want to be out that it could cause harm and that it's not all about them]
If my relationships aren't about me, I don't want them. Sure, they're not *all* about me, but I can't have -- no, make that I am not interested in having -- close relationships with people who don't know me, or are unaware of the people who are most important to me. And I'm not interested in being put in situations in which I'm expected to conceal who I am to the people I love, or who they are to me.
If someone knows me well enough to:
* ask me what I did this weekend
* ask me to coffee
* tell me what they and their partner(s)/family did this weekend
* be a guest in my home
* have me as a guest in their home
then it's very likely they will meet or hear about my partners pretty quickly. I don't walk up to the mail carrier and tell zir "Hey, we've never met, but I'm serene and I'm poly". I often get the impression in these conversations that those of us who are completely out, or who advocate being out, are advocating outing oneself to strangers -- that's never been my position. My position is that I refuse to take more care in concealing who I love than the mono-het person in the next office at work, or the people in my family, or whoever. Why should I? What I'm doing is not wrong or shameful, and I absolutely refuse to behave as though it is.