Tuesday, April 26, 2005

Gay in Real Life

My wonderful friend Kevin from work has been working very hard on this website in his spare time - www.gayinreallife.com. An extended quote from the website (I'm sure they wouldn't mind!):

Tony observed, with his dry sense of humor, that 'Gay In Real Life' spells GIRL. And wouldn't it be nice to have a T-Shirt that told everyone?
We thought, 'How cool would that be, a T-Shirt that tells everyone that I actually am Gay. In real life!' But then we thought about it some more. It was more than just a cool slogan on a t-shirt. We thought, why does it matter if someone is gay or not? Why is there a distinction placed on someone who's out rather than not.

We realized it was much more. Just the fact that you could say someone is Gay In Real Life, and that it actually meant something, told us we were really talking about a powerful idea. The idea that each of us, individually, has the ability to influence society, to promote diversity and tolerance. We believe that we're not alone, that others out there must feel the same way.

And it's about respecting diversity within our community. Whether its sexual orientation, gender, race, abilities, we all need to lead by example and demonstrate tolerance and acceptance. We need to challenge intolerance whenever and wherever we find it. From homophobia in the workplace, to racist and sexist jokes, its our obligation to stand up and name it. Let the person who made the comment or joke know it was offensive and why.

My buddy Kevin is one of favourite people ever. He is unfailingly courteous, has loads of integrity, and is so much fun!!! I always love chatting with him. It must be hard sometimes to be open about his sexual orientation (particularly in the workplace), but he has so much integrity and courage, and people respect him a great deal as a result. I really admire his efforts to make GIRL a way to promote tolerance, diversity, and respect (boy, aren't those qualities desperately needed in the world today????). Kudos, Kevin darlin'!!!


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

What a wonderful acronym! I have a friend who I've known for almost eight years and who has just 'come out' and hadn't done it sooner because he was afraid he would be judged because of it. We definitely need more people in this world with tolerant attitudes, but I think the ultimate goal is acceptance. I don't think tolerance goes far enough. Acceptance is the key.