Come on Out!

By this time you are all very well aware it’s National Coming Out Week, and if you aren’t aware: Guess what? It's National Coming Out Week! If you are fashionably late to the party, my sexy ally friends, here are some ways you can shake it up, dust it off, and come on out of the closet in style, along with your LGBTQ friends and family.

Whut whut? Come out of the closet? Hell yeah, all of us have closets we hide in (and let me tell you, mine is filled with fashions from the Seventies), not the least of which might be hiding acting our ally status in places in our life that seem difficult or scary. So, if it’s scary to be out as an ally at work, imagine how hard it might be to be fully out as LGBTQ in the same space. It’s up to all of us to stand up for each other and make it known that we are all in this together.

The Virtual Things You Can Do This Week:

Change your Facebook profile picture through Count Me Out.
Post a FB post with links courtesy of the HRC, and do the same thing for your Twitter, Formspring, Foursquare, Gowalla, etc., et al, social media sites. Socially network that shizz, y’all. You're on the computer anyway, make that coordinated, styley, connectedness happen. Show your online friends and neighbors that you won't tolerate your LGBTQ brethren and sistren being disrespected.

One Important Real Life Thing You Can Do This Week:

Go be present and bear witness.

The UT Gender and Sexuality Center: Serving Women and LGBTQA Communities, Queer Students Alliance, Queer People of Color and Allies, and StandOut will be hosting a vigil tonight, Wed., Oct. 13, to commemorate the losses that the community has experienced this past month. There have been several suicides of LGBTQ youth, and this is an amazing way to show up, listen, and support, as well as honor the grief the community is feeling from the tragedies of the past few weeks.

Vigil
Wednesday, October 13, 8pm
South Mall, UT Campus

(FYI, the UT Gender and Sexuality Center serves LGBTQ students across campus, with a groovy library, classes, peer support, and just a safe place to hang out and connect. Très awesome.)

Next week, I’ll be spending some time focusing on Ally Week and a very special organization right here in Austin is all about allies to support the LGBTQ community in a major, major way, but for now, get bizzzay!