There is a reason visibility is needed. Because LGBT+ is not about telling people about the kind of sex you like to have. It's about equality.
Straight couples who are in love can get married. They can announce to the world their love and nobody tells them they're going to Hell for it. They can visit each other in the hospital when they are sick. They can hold hands in public without being in fear of judgmental stares or harassment. They face no limitations on adopting children. Cisgender people never have to worry about what restroom to use or face people who refuse to treat them as their gender. LGBT+ people can't do these things, not everywhere. And we'll never be accepted if we hide and don't let people know we're here.
Also, a much smaller percentage of the population is LGBT+ compared to straight. If we are single and lonely and longing for companionship, labelling ourselves and letting people know about it helps us improve our chances to find people we may be be romantically and/or sexually compatible with in our daily lives, rather than just asking anyone out and facing rejection (or worse, an extremely negative and homophobic reaction) much more often than not.
I do understand your story and I agree that if you live somewhere where its not accepted, it is important to educate people by standing up as a community for what you need and deserve. However, for me it is baffling, because where I live all the things you mention seem really only a marginal issue.
Don't get me wrong, you still will find people who disagree with the gay lifestyle or could turn out abusive either physical or vocal. But its a very small part of the population.
My comment wasn`t really aimed at the people who shout out the message, but more to those who receive it. Those are the people I don`t understand. I myself have been bullied for about 7 years for example. So I feel a deep need to speak out now, to help in any way I can people who have to deal with it now. What I don`t understand, is why people need me to speak out, without understanding the consequences of their actions by themselves. And when I say I don`t understand it, I probably am lying to myself. I do understand, I just don`t want to. Because the truth is more hurtfull then the denial of the fact that people are to selfabsorbed, uneducated, lacking in empathy and ability to place themselves in someone else, etc. Its just painful.
Therefore the problem for me is not the message, but the fact that the message is needed. From a personal viewpoint, I don`t need the message, that was also hiding in my post. So when I read all this it tires me out. I recognize it to much maybe from the bullying. As someone who is speaking out, I suffer from exhaustion for constantly having to explain to people as a representative why it is so damaging for a person. Its not that I am not committed to spread the word, it is the emotional impact of the constant reminder people still don`t get it.
I`m a big believer in standing up for yourself and fighting for a just cause. I`ve seen documentaries about homosexuality in Russia and heard terrible stories about homosexuality in the middle east and Africa for example. But as GameLaxer said, the labelling does bother me. You see it everywhere, people have to be brought down to simple labels so we can categorize them for easy judgement. I`m not saying this thread builds that further up, but I am saying that by reading all this, I can`t help but feel that everybody here is so much more then this. For some reason that bothers me, I also have it in the mental illnesses thread btw. Thats probably a personal thing. I guess its confronting that a onedimensional label like your sexuality can have such a huge impact on your life, for example with adopting a child. The most loving people on the face of the earth can be denied the opportunity to raise a child. That just baffles me. But a lot of things baffle me.
Maybe you didn`t aim your post directly at me, I don`t mean it as an offense or whatever, but I just had to write this anyways.
I`m weird that way.
Guess thats one of my labels.
