Does YouTuber Onision give out the worst advice for gays, or what? Last week he was telling gay guys who want to ask someone out on a date to prepare to get their asses kicked (under the guise of “be safe, everyone!”). And now he’s telling youth that might be questioning — or rather, discovering — their sexuality to shut up about it, lest your friends and family ditch you in droves.
The worst part about Onision isn’t his advice; it’s that he actually means well and thinks these tips are worth taking.
He doesn’t want gay kids to get their faces bashed in by the intolerant. That’s a nice sentiment, and one we share! But here he is, an openly heterosexual straight man, telling young people who think “you’re bisexual or gay may just be a part of that process [of confusion]. … But to tell everyone that you’re interested in the same gender, to me, is incredibly premature, and it’s unwise. Especially when telling them could change your relationship with them for the rest of you life. Please, think about it for awhile. Really reflect on whether this is really your development. Or it’s actually legitimate. Either way, you probably should wait until you’re at least living on your own.”
Know what message that sends? Stay in the closet until you’re fully miserable and living a lie.
Yes, sexuality is something we experiment with, especially young people. But pulling the curtain over your questions and curiosity is, any psychologist will tell you, damaging. Not every kid will grow up in an accepting home, and there’s reason to shield your sexuality if it will leave your homeless or with a black eye from dad. But we’ve always found that being honest with the people you trust — i.e. your friends — will help identify which relationships are worth keeping “for the rest of your life.”
Take Onision’s advice about your safety. Don’t take Onision’s advice about feeling shame.
terrwill
Excuse me, did you say he was straight???
Cam
After watching that I’m guessing that he is taking his own advice and is closeted.
Mike in Asheville, nee "in Brooklyn"
Come on all you Davey Wavey detractors, here is your chance to diss a real YouTube dolt.
Borrowing loosely from Lewis Black — so a kid has the difficult task understanding their sexuality, and here is Onision giving advice on how to make things even crappier.
jimmy
Even Dan Savage advises young people to consider their safety and security when coming out. And, if their security, like their home, is threatened by such revelation, it is a good idea to wait. I agree with that.
David Ehrenstein
We know everything about them.
They know nothing about us.
Tommy
His advice is good if your family and all your friends are a bunch of violent fundamentalist Christians who hate gay people.
But for most people, I doubt every single person they know is like that.
badluckshadow13
You guys weren’t this agressive to him last time… oh fickle Queerty.
Stop perceiving everything as a slight. It’s a valid point, do any of you remember beimng a kid confused and experimenting with your own sexuality?
He’s not saying to stay closeted forever, he just suggested you think before your go on outing yourself. You have to acknowledge that yeah, “this is who I am and who I will always be, not just adolescent curiosity.”
Because frankly, telling all your family and classmates that your gay isn’t something easy to retract. Not that you should have to, not that anyone should give a damn to begin with, but they do.
Besides, what if you end up being pansexual, etc? As a child you might not have even come across such terms much less given thought to the possibilities. “I like penis” doesn’t always equate gay. I have to imagine it’s pretty damn hard for a person to get people to take them seriously about one after they’ve claimed to be the other.
Heh… didn’t David Bowie do that at some point? Say he was bi in the 80’s then retract it?
Mike
at least he is trying as a straight dude to be sympathetic, and he’s not bashing anyone, i think a more appropriate reaction would be to reach out to him, not dissuade him from speaking, last thing we need is for him to be offended and change his tune to one of opposition because of him having a negative response by the gay community, he is a potential ally, let’s not make him a potential enemy
Bill
It always amazes me that it has never seemed to occur to any heterosexual that this entire issue is THEIRS.
What a bunch of fucking pansies.
tikihead
This rant has no relation with reality whatsoever.
Michael
This guy is so gay.
Cam
No. 7 · badluckshadow13
You guys weren’t this agressive to him last time… oh fickle Queerty.
Stop perceiving everything as a slight. It’s a valid point, do any of you remember beimng a kid confused and experimenting with your own sexuality?
______________________
Would you respond the same way if he was advising blacks not to buy homes in certain neighborhoods because they might “Get their Asses kicked” because racists live there? I’m all for being careful when people are young, but his thing seems to be much more about “Don’t ever come out! It’s scary out there!” And their comes a point in time when you can’t make everybody elses’s problem yours.
TheAwfulTruth
I am always amazed at how people think that by talking to a little camera in their bathroom at home they can spew whatever they want. People like this guy or Davey Wavey, who are they? What credentials do they have? Are they licensed psychologists, therapists, counselors? No.
This man Onision ends by saying “I am here to help, not to make you feel ashamed.” Umm, gee, thanks, but, who really gave you the experience, the clarity, the authority to talk about delicate issues that pertain to one’s life or homosexuality?
This kind of talk is very dangerous coming from people who are obviously Internet narcissists, who are addicted to YouTube and sit at home thinking of way to be “web famous”, while at the same time designing T-shirt with sayings of them that they believe will envelop the world and at the same time make them a quick buck.
Stop the psychobabble. Work with teens, go to college, get a degree in the field you pretend to be offering advice in, join an organization, and THEN maybe you can have some weight to what you say.
In the meantime though, you’re nothing but an attention-seeking grabbing dude sitting at home and bound to make inane arguments, like the one presented here.
In other words: get a life.
robertplattbell
I enjoy some of Onision’s YouTube videos, although he seems to be developing a cult of personality that is a bit disturbing.
Also, his aggressive Veganism is a bit over the top as well.
While I think some of his videos are funny, he is a bit strident and also doesn’t seem to feel there is any room for debate or alternative views in his world.
The cult of personality and his opinions on everything are a bit of a shame, because it sort of locks him into this YouTube/Internet personality that he will have trouble breaking out of. He could morph this thing into an acting career, but I think he has painted himself into a corner.
It’s like RedStateUpdate – where do you take these things – past YouTube, that is?
I used to run the Gay Student group at S.U. back in the 1980’s and for the most part, what he is advising was what we would have said *back at that time* to callers to our “GayPhone”:
1. If you are a teen (particularly a minor) we did not advocate “coming out” because of the potential problems back then. You were very *very* likely to encounter violence in high school if you tried to be “out”. It was the era of Matthew Shepard, remember? It also seemed inappropriate to us to be advising minors to declare their sexuality at an early age.
2. If their parents were homophobic, it would probably be best to broach that subject once you are an adult, no longer living at home, and college is over (and presumably paid for). Back then, it was not atypical for teens to be thrown out of the house by homophobic parents if they declared themselves to be “gay” – and what happens to throwaway gay teens living on the street isn’t pretty.
(Incidentally, as TheAwfulTruth points out, Onision does not appear to have any credentials to be advising Gay teens, but then again, neither did we at the “GayPhone”).
Now, times have changed, and perhaps that advice is dated. Bullying and violence in schools isn’t what it used to be. But if a teen asked me today, I am not sure I would give different advice. I guess it depends on their particular situation. If you live in San Francisco and go to Harvey Milk High School, that’s one thing. If you live in a small homophobic town in Nebraska, perhaps another.
Things were different back then.
BTW, I did not “come out” until I was 25 years old.
Gregory Onision is only 24.
Maybe he’s waiting to finish that graduate degree? 😉
robertplattbell
I was reviewing some of his other videos, and this one is really, really disturbing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gvgdtrDHuo
For some reason, this kid thinks that “Marrying a Woman” (an odd phrase) means you are automatically straight (oh, please tell that to all my married gay friends!).
He then goes on a rant that is very, very disturbing. You have to watch it, before you have to look away in shame and disgust. Sounds more like some frat boy than anything else.
This is another video which is basically just all about himself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdg4XjdPUwI
What is going on here?
Scientologist?
What?
Freaky weird. He has a couple of funny videos but there is a real dark side here. A *LOT* of his videos have degenerated lately into him answering so-called “attacks” from other people.
It is a real cult of personality. Narcissistic.
A real shame, too. Because some of his videos were funny, and he could have morphed this into some sort of professional career. It seems he is painting himself into a corner, though, with more and more divisive videos.
Perhaps he needs to take the advice of his “bullying” video, and tone it down a bit.
FWIW.