'I never had a problem wh beg gay': Gee Michael, LGBT rights champn, remembered | Gee Michael | The Guardian

Contents:

• WHEN GEE MICHAEL ME OUT AS GAY ON LIVE TV AND SPIRED A GENERATN
• THE NTROVERSIAL MOMENT THAT LED GEE MICHAEL TO PUBLICLY ACKNOWLEDGE HE WAS GAY
• 'I NEVER HAD A PROBLEM WH BEG GAY': GEE MICHAEL, LGBT RIGHTS CHAMPN, REMEMBERED
• GEE MICHAEL HELPED A GENERATN REALISE WAS OKAY TO BE GAY
• WHAT MAK A ‘GAY IN’?

WHEN GEE MICHAEL ME OUT AS GAY ON LIVE TV AND SPIRED A GENERATN

Gee Michael appeared on televisn 1998 revealg he was gay for the first time and spirg the world wh the words: "I don’t feel any shame whatsoever. ""I thk people like to thk they n spot a gay person as opposed to a straight person bee mak them feel somethg … a ltle more fed themselv.

Watch: Gee Michael's last ncert - his fal words were heartbreakgly poignant"I spent the first half of my reer beg acced of beg gay when I hadn’t had anythg like a gay relatnship. I want people to know that I have not been exposed as a gay man any way that I feel … I don’t feel any shame for... And neher do I thk I should, " he Gee Michael's heartbreakg poetry at 11-years-old prov the star's early talentJim go on to ask Gee about his life-changg reveal, sayg: "Was a difficult cisn for you to e out publicly about beg gay?

He adds: "I fe my sexualy terms of the people that I love and my life right now is very happy livg a gay relatnship. "And I’m perfectly prepared to believe that as long as I am tthful to myself and tthful to the people who are out there wh my mic then I have nothg to fear, " he Moret has sce said of the famo terview: "Gee Michael believed the Brish tabloids were gog to out him as gay and he wanted to beat them to the punch and he me out to me, his own words, his own way, "After g out as gay, Gee Michael beme a public activist for HIV and AIDS, shg a light on the plight of sufferers worldwi and donatg lns to charable throughout his life.

THE NTROVERSIAL MOMENT THAT LED GEE MICHAEL TO PUBLICLY ACKNOWLEDGE HE WAS GAY

Michael: "I spent the first half of my reer beg acced of beg gay when I hadn't had anythg like a gay relatnship".

When Gee Michael me out as a gay man an exclive terview wh CNN April 1998, public attus about homosexualy were far different om how they are today.

'I NEVER HAD A PROBLEM WH BEG GAY': GEE MICHAEL, LGBT RIGHTS CHAMPN, REMEMBERED

Same-sex marriage was illegal, vlence agast gays or lbians was not classified as a hate crime, and HIV and AIDS still rried a heavy stigma. Michael, then 34, told CNN’s Jim Moret that he did not have his first gay relatnship until he was 27 and that he had cid to keep his sexualy private bee of the way he was publicly sctized earlier his reer. “I spent the first half of my reer beg acced of beg gay when I hadn’t had anythg like a gay relatnship, ” Michael said the terview.

Michael told CNN that by the time he realized he was gay and stopped havg relatnships wh women, he was so angry at the way he had been publicly treated that he cid to keep his sexualy to himself. Over time Michael beme one of the world’s most regnized gay-rights activists. A look at Gee Michael's three- reer pop, and how he found unparalleled pop succs as a gay artist by hidg pla sight.

GEE MICHAEL HELPED A GENERATN REALISE WAS OKAY TO BE GAY

To be gay requir watchg for hts. When nearly 100 percent of pop songs aren’t about or for the queer life, gay fans learn to study shifts emphasis, to stay alert. Dpe the pleasure wh which Michael and Ridgeley flnt their washboard abs and toned legs, the homoeroticism is the sexls kd, of swimwear ads men’s talogs.

WHAT MAK A ‘GAY IN’?

Fe wh queerns so long as the artists didn’t ask or tell, the 1980s were the last time pop stars uld wear fgerls kchen glov whout dienc assumg the stars were gay.