Identity Issues
See also: Identity (social science) and Personal identity (philosophy)When coming out is described as a gradual process or a journey, it is meant to include becoming aware of and acknowledging one’s same-sex desires or gender identity. This preliminary stage, which involves soul-searching or a personal epiphany, is often called “coming out to oneself” and constitutes the start of self-acceptance. Many LGBT people say that this stage began for them during adolescence or childhood, when they first became aware of their sexual orientation toward members of the same sex. Coming out has also been described as a process because of a recurring need or desire to come out in new situations in which LGBT people are assumed to be heterosexual or cisgender, such as at a new job or with new acquaintances. As Diana Fuss (1991) explains, "the problem of course with the inside/outside rhetoric...is that such polemics disguise the fact that most of us are both inside and outside at the same time."
Read more about this topic: Coming Out
Famous quotes containing the words identity and/or issues:
“An identity would seem to be arrived at by the way in which the person faces and uses his experience.”
—James Baldwin (19241987)
“The universal moments of child rearing are in fact nothing less than a confrontation with the most basic problems of living in society: a facing through ones children of all the conflicts inherent in human relationships, a clarification of issues that were unresolved in ones own growing up. The experience of child rearing not only can strengthen one as an individual but also presents the opportunity to shape human relationships of the future.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)