Coming out doesn’t always look like the movies. As a hopeless romantic, I’ve watched Love, Simon one too many times and lamented the fact that my teenage coming-out experience didn’t involve a heartfelt moment with my wealthy parents, and me getting the guy in a romantic denouement on a Ferris wheel, with everyone we know cheering us on. In reality, I had an unrequited crush on the football player who was also in the A/V club, who used that fact to goad me into editing his reports for the school news. My dad’s face clinched, and his only response was, “Core, just… use protection.”
The night my mom met my first boyfriend, she told him it was very nice to meet him, and then somehow managed to pivot to an announcement that she was being laid off the next day.
Needless to say, no one’s making a feel-good movie about me. Honestly, I came out relatively unscathed. But so many queer kids and young adults fear their family refusing to love them anymore and leaving them without a place to live. This has happened, for sure, even though we seem to be taking two steps forward as a society. Of course, you could also argue we’ve taken a step back recently, and you’d have evidence to back that up.
Despite the similarities a lot of people have, everyone’s journey is different. For Mr. Beefcake, a photographer whom you’ve likely seen at LGBTQ events around Hudson County, the realization and acceptance that he’s gay didn’t come easily. “I was closeted until I was about 21 or 22,” he told me. “I was very homophobic. I was nasty to people. I was not a nice person.”
Finally, his mother asked what his problem was. And that was the tipping point. “I’m fucking gay,” he remembers telling her. That was a major weight lifted off his shoulders, especially because she accepted him, no questions asked.
Five years of therapy put Mr. Beefcake, who uses this alias to separate his identity and personal life from his blue-collar day job, on the right track. “I started becoming more comfortable with the idea that I’m a gay man, and this is how it is. There’s no fixing it. And I learned to love myself for who I am.”
Another turning point was his first foray into a gay bar — Feathers in Hackensack. A coworker from his restaurant job took him there. “Once I set foot into Feathers and just felt the joy, there was definitely no going back,” Mr. Beefcake said.
It was at Six26 in Jersey City where he met his partner and love of his life, Antonio Amor, whom you might know from the North Jersey drag and burlesque scene. It seems like it was fate that Amor, whose name means “love” in Spanish, inspired Mr. Beefcake to pick up a camera and become a photographer.
Amor grew up in a conservative town in South Texas, in a religious household. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he packed up his bags at 18 and headed to New York City to become a performer. Three years later, after living his life openly in the Northeast, Amor came out to his parents over the phone on a Sunday-catchup call. “They took their time to process it, especially my dad,” Amor recalled. “With that machismo culture, it just took a while for him to make that adjustment.”
Performing and being in the public eye forces LGBTQ artists to come out over and over again.
Since then, Amor has become a full-time drag and burlesque performer, living out his dream here in New Jersey, openly and unapologetically. “Unless you’re paying my bills, I don’t give a crap about your opinion,” he said.
“I had someone explain that the drag self can sometimes, for performers, feel like a shadow version of themselves,” Amor explained. “I feel like my drag character is kind of empowering me to be a version of myself that feels a little more outgoing.”
It’s not uncommon to see queer people in the arts. We grow up performing — performing heterosexuality, heteronormativity, and gender normativity.
Performing and being in the public eye forces LGBTQ artists to come out over and over again. For the years I did stand-up comedy in New England, New York and beyond, I came out every night on stage. Some audiences kiki’ed with me, snapping their fingers and laughing riotously. Others clenched their buttcheeks and refused to crack a smile until my 10 minutes were up. As queer people, it’s our job to be open about ourselves and our lives. You might reach someone who doesn’t know any LGBTQ people. Yes, there may be haters, but maybe someone will walk away thinking, “Huh, they’re just like us.” And we are.
“I think that’s probably one of the greatest things about drag, is to feel almost superhero-like,” Amor told me. “There’s something about it that just feels like armor, and you’re able to do what you want.”
For Jersey City’s Raymond Nieves, coming out “was rough.” He was 16, told his mom, “I’m gay,” and moved out with his first partner. “It was hard for [my mom] to accept it,” Nieves told me. His mother had wanted grandchildren, but she was supportive of her son and, even more importantly, proud of his independence.
Moving out and navigating the world as an out queer person led Nieves to his passions. As a member of his school’s color guard, Nieves discovered he had a knack for makeup. “I used to hate when they used to do the makeup on the girls,” he recalled. “I just started doing the eyeshadow and mascara, lipsticks and all that.” It came naturally. Then, a stint working at Armani Exchange led to his career as a hair and makeup artist. A man approached Nieves one day, wanting to hire him for a fashion show.
Despite finding his talent for makeup so young, he didn’t end up starting drag until his 30s. About 10 years ago, Zelina Duval, a self-proclaimed “artist, entertainer, and old soul,” was born. And it all started one Halloween, when Nieves’ friend decided to put him in a dress. Duval looks regal when she takes the stage, so winning Miss Fire Island in 2022 wasn’t a reach. And Duval gives back to her community, via her work with the Imperial Court of New York.
But that success story might not have happened without resilience and the right support system. Battling a substance abuse issue and hitting rock bottom could have been the end for Nieves. “I rose back up when I was sitting in a rehab room in a hospital,” he said. “I got out of it to where I am today, at 44 years old, living and breathing, working in high-end beauty, living in a beautiful apartment, and striving for more.”
These stories are just a sampling of the struggles and triumphs queer people all over the world face throughout their lives. We all put on costumes every day and perform in support of our goals, our desires, and a better life.
I look back at myself as a teenager, experiencing feelings of love and confusion, terrified that people would disown me because of the hurtful things I had heard them say in the past. I think the best advice I could offer him is that the people who love you will accept you for who you are. You’ll be a loud, in-your-face person working as a journalist in New York City, and it’s going to work out.
It’s something I think about a lot. How much different would my life have been if I wasn’t scared of saying, “I’m gay”? I’ll never know the answer, but I hope that some young person out there reading this will hear the stories from these wonderful LGBTQ folks I spoke to, and take them as that kick in the ass to be honest and live life to the fullest.
“Things would have been so much easier for me as a younger person if there was more visibility when I was younger,” Mr. Beefcake said, reflecting on his past and how far he has come as a gay man. But that journey led him to his wedding day.
“Not only was I getting to celebrate my big day how I wanted to celebrate it, but I also allowed myself to walk down the aisle as I was,” Amor added, “rather than in some sham marriage down in South Texas. That’s one moment that brings me a lot of joy about coming out.”
I spoke to a bisexual Twitch streamer known as Violet, who came out as an adult and married her wonderful nonbinary spouse. “Coming out is telling the world and yourself, ‘I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.’” Her advice for teenage Violet? “There’s a lot of great folks who will love, support, and appreciate who you are.”
Stand-up comedian and comedy festival producer Dwayne Duke lamented the fact that he didn’t really get to come out. His first day at an all-male Catholic school ended in a push out of the closet. Coming to terms with it was a journey, but looking back, he’s proud of where he ended up. He’d tell that freshman: “Travel. Get out. Explore. The world is bigger than your shitty high school in Ohio.”
Nieves would have told his younger self, “You’re not going to know who you are in the beginning. You’re going to spiral at one point.” But he also pointed out that there was a light at the end of the tunnel for him, and there will be for queer kids, too. They just have to find it.
“As someone who was married to a closeted trans partner, teaching in a working-class town, it’s not always safe to march down the street, shouting who you are or who you love,” said Caitlin Reese, a pansexual stand-up comic and writer. “I would implore you to find your people and spaces where you can be out. The truth has a funny way of nagging at you like an ill-fitting pair of undies on a long walk. The more people have a chance to know the real you, the more people have a chance to love the real you. I hope to see you on the other side.”
