Joshua Bassett and the spectacle of coming out

Carmeli Argana is tired of LGBTQI+ experiences being belittled.

Last week in an interview promoting the upcoming season of the massively popular Disney+ series, High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, actor and musician Joshua Bassett came out.

“I guess this is also my coming out video,” he said after catching himself rambling about the countless virtues of Harry Styles. It’s a classic moment of panic many queer people can identify with; after all, how many of us have either outed or almost outed ourselves when talking about Harry Styles?

More significantly, the nonchalance of his admission is a testament to the strides we’ve made in recent times in creating a welcoming environment for LGBTQI+ people to live out our truth. What was once a terrifying public affair for many, marked with dramatic declarations and emotional social media posts, has now cemented itself as another commonplace occurrence in our society where the diverse experiences of people are increasingly being recognised.

But rather than the open arms of public love and support, Bassett was met with the pointed fingers of memes and ridicule.

Over the past few months, ‘Joshua Bassett’ has become a character in what social media refers to as the ‘Disney drama’, cast as the central figure of a love triangle between two well-known Disney actresses (who I will not be naming in this article because frankly, I do not want to tarnish the experiences of a newly-out queer person with references to irrelevant details about old gossip for the sake of search engine optimisation). His coming out was received not as a moment of triumph for a young, queer man finally declaring the truth of himself to the world, but as an absurd plot twist in the internet’s favourite ongoing soap opera.

Of course, the public reaction to Bassett’s interview is an extreme case. But it is symptomatic of a wider issue surrounding the normalisation of coming out. Where it was once the norm to treat such announcements with an outpouring of love and support, queer people now face the prospect of being belittled, or having our coming out treated as anything less than the monumental achievement that it is. Whilst not every queer person will be subject to the same level of ridicule as Bassett, many of us will put up with quips such as ‘I already knew’ or ‘that explains a lot’.

Outwardly, such comments express acceptance, but they are laden with undercurrents of indifference to the individual’s queer identity. Coming to terms with one’s queer identity and relearning how to conceive of oneself with this newfound truth is a difficult, ongoing process. It is profoundly disheartening to finally get to a place where you feel comfortable enough to share this part of yourself with others, only for it to be reduced to fodder for someone else’s entertainment. Especially when that person will never know the intrinsic terror of coming out.

It’s truly amazing to think that today, LGBTQI+ people don’t have to come out in a big, emotional statement if they would prefer otherwise. But just because we don’t always act like coming out is a big deal, it doesn’t make it any less of a big deal. Allyship cannot be claimed if you are incapable of conceiving of LGBT+ people as little else than a spectacle to ‘figure out’ for your amusement. Our experiences will always deserve to be treated with genuine respect.