Ocean’s gay admission

Frank Ocean doesn’t think he’s brave, said Rebecca Nicholson in The Guardian (U.K.). The R&B singer was recently hailed as a gay-rights hero after he wrote on his blog about falling in love with a man—a rare admission in the often-homophobic urban music scene. “People are just afraid of things too much,” says the 24-year-old, “afraid of things that don’t necessarily merit fear. Me saying what I said on my [blog]? Sure, evil exists, extremism exists. Somebody could commit a hate crime and hurt me. But they could do the same just because I’m black. They could do the same just because I’m American. Do you just not go outside your house? Do you not drive your car? How else are you limiting your life for fear?” Even so, surely it was courageous for a man in the R&B world to come out as gay. “I don’t know,” he demurs. Partly, he says, it was altruistic. “I was thinking of how I wished at 13 or 14 there was somebody I looked up to who would have said something like that.” But he also did it for himself, so that he could be not only “successful on paper, but sure that I’m happy when I wake up in the morning, and not with this freakin’ boulder on my chest.”

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up