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[INPAQ]

For the folks who still can't seem to grasp the magnitude of this, I think Dream Hampton put it best...

Thank You Frank Ocean. It’s true, we are a lot alike… “spinning on blackness. All wanting to be seen, touched, heard, paid attention to.” In your opening few lines, you simultaneously established your humanity, a burden far too often asked of same sex lovers, and acknowledged that in this age of hyper self awareness, amplified in no small part by the social media medium in which you made your announcement, we are desperate to share. You shared one of the most intimate things that ever happened to you—-falling in love with someone who wasn’t brave enough to love you back. Your relieving yourself of your “secret” is as much about wanting to honestly connect as it is about exhibition. We are all made better by your decision to share publicly.



You and Anderson Cooper have the same coming out calendar week in common, but in many obvious ways, you couldn’t be more different. Anderson Cooper is an heir to one of American’s great Industrial Age fortunes and a network professional whose maleness and whiteness backed by his considerable accomplishments guarantee him work. You are a young Black man from New Orleans who fled your still struggling city. You didn’t arrive in Los Angeles with generational wealth and privilege, only the beautiful lyrics and melodies that danced through you and your dream of making it in a music industry whose sand castles were crumbling.



You are in fact, connected to one of hip hop’s great cadres, in the tradition of Oakland’s Heiroglyphics, The Native Tongues and The Juice Crew. Your music family, like all the rest, will likely grow apart, but in this moment Odd Future bends hip hop’s imagination with utter abandon. You fulfill hip hop’s early promise to not give a fuck about what others’ think of you. The 200 times Tyler says faggot and the wonderful way he held you up and down on Twitter today, Syd the Kid’s sexy stud profile and her confusing, misogynistic videos speak to the many contradictions and posturing your generation inherited from the hip hop generation before you. I’m sure you know a rumor about Big Daddy Kane having AIDS and with it, the suggestion that he was bisexual, effectively ended his career. You must have seen the pictures of pioneer Afrika “Baby Bam” from the Jungle Brothers in drag and read the blogs ridiculing him, despite the fact that he’s been leading a civilian life for nearly two decades. I know as a singer you love Rahsaan Patterson and bemoan the fact that homophobia prevented him from being the huge star his talent deserves. Only last month Queen Latifah unnecessarily released a statement denying that her performing at a Gay Pride event meant she was finally affirming her identity for thousands of Black girls. Imagine if Luther had been able to write, as you closed your letter, “I don’t have any secrets I need kept anymore…I feel like a free man.”



But you’re not an activist. You’re a Black man in America whose star is on the rise, working in hip hop and soul, where gender constructs are cartoonishly fixed. Your colleague Drake is often attacked with homophobic slurs when he simply displays vulnerability in his music. He seems to respond by following those moments of real emotion with bars that put “hoes” in their proverbial place. But you’re a beautiful songwriter (your question to Jay and Kanye, “What’s a King to a God?” on their own song on an album about their kingdom, was brilliantly sly). Your letter is revolutionary not least of all because it is about love. It is about falling in love and feeling rejected and carrying both that love and rejection with you through life. The male pronoun of the object of your desire is practically incidental. We have all been in a love that felt “malignant…hopeless” from which “there was no escaping, no negotiating.” Your promise to your first love, that you won’t forget him, that you’ll remember how you changed each other, is so full of love and grace.

You were born in the 80’s, when gay rights activists were seizing the streets of New York and other major world cities, fighting for visibility and against a disease that threatened to disappear them. The cultural shifts created from those struggles in some ways make your revelation about your fluid sexuality less shocking than it would have been decades before. Still, there are real risks with coming out as a man who loved a man. I hope you hear and are reading the hundreds of thousands of people who have your back.

We admire the great courage and beauty and fearlessness in your coming out, not only as a bisexual Black man, but as a broken hearted one. The tender irony that your letter is to a boy who was unable to return your love love until years later because he was living a lie is the only truly tragic thing about your letter. A million twirls on this spinning ocean blue globe in this vast endless blackness for you my love.

 

[The Abominable Snowman]

Frank and I are getting married. Should I send a GAf-wide invite?

 

[el retorno]

For the folks who still can't seem to grasp the magnitude of this, I think Dream Hampton put it best...

thats a great post.
I love frank and i really think things like this and obama's "evolution" (among other things) are really opening possibilities for young black men (Among others) to really be themselves.


Also I think its awesome wen you see youtube comments that you expect to be hateful but instead are sympathetic and defending.

 

[blame space]

So you saw a post in another thread, and instead of confronting the poster who wrote the post in the original thread it came from, you quote it in another thread he hasn't posted in yet?

isn't this standard protocol here? what if the song was called "homos are evil", would it be treated the same way?

 

[Vivalaraza]

This will be really interesting.

He's very popular at the moment since his music is brilliant. Hope that not only does this not affect his potential success, rather his success manages to overcome some of the attitudes towards non-straights in this particular genre of music.

Really not sure how it'll go down though. I know there are a lot of stupid people on the Internet but saw some pretty tasteless thing on twitter today about him. Think as long as his music continues to be good people will be fans. Hopefully anyway.

 

[Shiggie]

Man I love franks music. Proud of him coming out. Hip Hop needs to grow up and its been slowly but surely moving in the right direction.

 

[Curtisaur]

I think a few people misunderstood my post. I understand that it matters to bi/gay people... I just wish it didn't matter and didn't have to matter, y'know? Sometimes I have trouble expressing my thoughts.

Sorry if I upset anyone.

 

[Meadows]

Frank Ocean is awesome and this is an important day for Hip Hop.

 

[ghstwrld]

IT'S OFFICIAL . . . FRANK OCEAN ADMITS TO BEING A DOWNLOW BROTHER!! HE CLAIMS THAT HE 'FELL IN LOVE' WITH A DUDE!! (IS HE TALKING ABOUT A RAPPER WE KNOW???)

olol

Mediatakeout is the best.

 

[MWS Natural]

well I would consider it so

Yes, why wouldn't it be?

Why wouldn't it be?

Just asking, didn't know if the phrase applied to bi-sexuals.

 

[Dead]

Had no idea the Bloc Party dude was gay, guess Ive been living under a rock or something.

Can't wait for their 4th album :3

 

[MWS Natural]

Anyways, good for him I've always liked his music. I wonder how much of this is timing to get publicity for his new album though.

 

[KibblesBits]

More to come soon hopefully.

 

[PorkChopSandwiches]

isn't this standard protocol here? what if the song was called "homos are evil", would it be treated the same way?

Stay out of the thread, your contributions here are frankly embarassing, an ocean of silence until your next bombastic display of foolery is what we all hope for.

 

[blame space]

thanks porkchopsandwiches youre the best!

 

[charsace]

This honestly is a far bigger thing than people are acting like.

While he is an R&B singer, Frank has almost universally been linked only with hip hop artists/figures and has basically been a part of the hip hop community.

Now name an even remotely successful artist in that community who has come out. You'll be looking forever.

It's going to force some hip hop artists to have to confront it head on.

Yep. What he's done is huge.

 

[Kyon]

Only HALFWAY counts as "coming out" now I guess, he didn't even step out the living room. ch.. Nevertheless Congrats gurl. We will be watching

 

[Mystic Theurge]

Only HALFWAY counts as "coming out" now I guess, he didn't even step out the living room. ch.. Nevertheless Congrats gurl. We will be watching

I hope you're not perpetuating the whole "Bi now. Gay later" idiocy.

 

[Kyon]

I hope you're not perpetuating the whole "Bi now. Gay later" idiocy.

I hope you aren't an idiot because that's not it at all. Frank is a flawless Queen and I would love to see him fully come out. My sources aren't wrong. I will be watching closely

Oh and for your information the bi now gay later thing exists whether you like it or not hun. We won't go there tho so you can have several seats.

 

[Kosmo]

And?

Who?

My thoughts as well.

Feeling old.

 

[Equus Bellator Apex]

My thoughts as well.

Feeling old.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFNaFeIm4bU

 

[codhand]

My thoughts as well.

Feeling old.

See..., the "and?" crowd, I get it, I get what they are saying. They are saying, "meh, I am already accepting of the LBGT community." And that's great!

But they are ignoring the bombshell that this is. Anyone who grew up with 90's RnB knows the significance this announcement will have. Tevin Campbell coming out, this is not...

I think Stump's response is best reserved towards those that think "there's nothing to see here, move along".

But even he undersells it imo...

I couldn't figure out a way to convey in the title that the significance of this is that the hip-hop community, as well as the African-American community more broadly, has in the past struggled with perceived or actual homophobia, and that people who have more contact with or who are closer to LBGT people tend to have more progressive opinions on LBGT issues, and so someone in this community coming out might have a positive effect on the community as a whole.

As maligned as his comments were, I think when Kanye called-out homophobia in rap, he really changed the game, and this OP is a continuation of that paradigm shift.

 

[Mystic Theurge]

I hope you aren't an idiot because that's not it at all. Frank is a flawless Queen and I would love to see him fully come out. My sources aren't wrong. I will be watching closely

Do you have any proof or are you spouting nonsense?

Oh and for your information the bi now gay later thing exists whether you like it or not hun. We won't go there tho so you can have several seats.

Some gay people do test the waters by coming out as bi, but it's not nearly as common as people think. Bisexuality does exists.

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Never heard of him, but good on him I guess.

 

[PaleFolklore]

Kind of surprised, I definitely didn't pick up on it. But good on him for being honest about it. Hopefully the rest of the OF guys stop throwing around the word "faggot" so much now. Channel Orange DAY 1.

 

[Yoshiya]

Oh and for your information the bi now gay later thing exists whether you like it or not hun. We won't go there tho so you can have several seats.

This sentiment is almost as destructive and unhelpful as telling people they should stay in the closet. People should not feel compelled to align down either side of a false binary.

 

[Meier]

nostalgia.ULTRA is one of the top 5-10 albums of 2011.. easily. Channel Orange is going to crush it.

Frank's two songs on Watch the Throne are among my favorite on the album. Love this guy.

 

[J2Dumb]

Fuck. That Dream Hampton post. That's fucking perfect. & Frank Ocean is too awesome for coming out like that. Haha. Like a boss. Except more like a really awesome poet.

 

[deejay8595]

How did Neyo's music career go after he came out?

 

[mescalineeyes]

nostalgia.ULTRA is one of the top 5-10 albums of 2011.. easily. Channel Orange is going to crush it.

Frank's two songs on Watch the Throne are among my favorite on the album. Love this guy.

I am going to have to forgive you for Heavy Rain, aren't I?

 

[Majmun]

How did Neyo's music career go after he came out?

Neyo isn't gay.

Well, he never came out, that is.

 

[Kyon]

How did Neyo's music career go after he came out?

He hasn't come out yet. And his career WENT because he is a certified flop. No one is here for her

 

[The Abominable Snowman]

He hasn't come out yet. And his career WENT because he is a certified flop. No one is here for her

Gerl... so Miguel is "depressed" now and going through. He probably will be coming out soon. Kid Cudi and Lil B too we need some gay rappers, since there were rumors about them, separately. Lil B gives those "Repressed, Special Needs" waves, so i could care less.

Now if Omarion, John Legend, Trey Songz and Bruno Mars could come out to play with us, we'd be one big ole happy family.

 

[Kyon]

Gerl... so Miguel is "depressed" now and going through. He probably will be coming out soon. Kid Cudi and Lil B too we need some gay rappers, since there were rumors about them, separately. Lil B gives those "Repressed, Special Needs" waves, so i could care less.

Now if Omarion, John Legend, Trey Songz and Bruno Mars could come out to play with us, we'd be one big ole happy family.

I'm here for that sis. Oh and Marques Houston still need to come out and play gurl

 

[Pulka]

I'm high and I'm bi, wait I mean I'm straight

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzi24Nssiow&feature=player_detailpage#t=312s

 

[Meier]

I am going to have to forgive you for Heavy Rain, aren't I?

Hahaha, I'm sure you like something that some other folks don't care for too! I think it was brilliant -- definitely got its hooks in me. To each his own though.

Frank Ocean and Dark Knight Rises on consecutive nights. The next 2 weeks is gonna be a torturous wait!

 

[PhoenixDark]

I don't think this hurts him at all - in fact his twitter following increased by half a million since the announcement. The fact is that most of Frank Ocean's fans were white before this, and most will be white after this - he'll be fine. If he was some actual major "urban" artist I could certainly see this hurting, but he has always been more in tune with the hipster/alternative scene. This isn't TI coming out the closet for instance, or another more urban artist who would most certainly lose a lot of black support/respect, be open to attacks, and most likely not receive much support from the gay community (moreso because of differences in music taste, not spite or anything like that). His music is already attractive to multiple demographics, basically.

This has received a lot of positive response from many in the hip hop community, which is good.

 

[mambadragon]

I don't think this hurts him at all - in fact his twitter following increased by half a million since the announcement. The fact is that most of Frank Ocean's fans were white before this, and most will be white after this - he'll be fine. If he was some actual major "urban" artist I could certainly see this hurting, but he has always been more in tune with the hipster/alternative scene. This isn't TI coming out the closet for instance, or another more urban artist who would most certainly lose a lot of black support/respect, be open to attacks, and most likely not receive much support from the gay community (moreso because of differences in music taste, not spite or anything like that). His music is already attractive to multiple demographics, basically.

This has received a lot of positive response from many in the hip hop community, which is good.

I'm sure he'll be "fine" after this in terms of sales, the disappointing thing (full disclosure: I'm caucasian and probably in that hipster demographic in terms of music) is that it doesn't seem to be as big of a story as some of the articles like the Washington Post, CNN, LA Times says it is. Russell Simmons is the only one who's really spoken out - it would be great if some of the current hip hop stars spoke out in support directly. Even with Tyler it would have been nice to see one fully sincere tweet... It's only 160 characters.

 

[roosters93]

Obviously it's not bound to be a big seller since I (and I presume many others) had no clue who he was. However, I still wonder if what sales the album were to muster are going to be impacted in any way. There's really not way to tell unfortunately.

Eh I think you're wrong. frank is pretty popular and this will probably increase the sales.

How about The Wkend, He sounds better to me.

There's always one.

We'll always have the Goofy movie, though

haha love this movie.

I don't know why anybody gives a good goddamn about anyone's sexuality. He makes music. Music that you either like or you don't like. The end. And fuck him too for feeling like he had to announce it. Who gives a shit, shut the fuck up and keep making good songs.

I think a few people misunderstood my post. I understand that it matters to bi/gay people... I just wish it didn't matter and didn't have to matter, y'know? Sometimes I have trouble expressing my thoughts.

Sorry if I upset anyone.

Whoa, that first post. Settle down man.
It matters to me. One day it won't matter but we're certainly not there yet so don't be telling people who are making positive impacts to stfu.

As maligned as his comments were, I think when Kanye called-out homophobia in rap, he really changed the game, and this OP is a continuation of that paradigm shift.

when did he do that?

I don't think this hurts him at all - in fact his twitter following increased by half a million since the announcement. The fact is that most of Frank Ocean's fans were white before this, and most will be white after this - he'll be fine. If he was some actual major "urban" artist I could certainly see this hurting, but he has always been more in tune with the hipster/alternative scene. This isn't TI coming out the closet for instance, or another more urban artist who would most certainly lose a lot of black support/respect, be open to attacks, and most likely not receive much support from the gay community (moreso because of differences in music taste, not spite or anything like that). His music is already attractive to multiple demographics, basically.

This has received a lot of positive response from many in the hip hop community, which is good.

Nah, I think I'm gonna come out as black now.

 

[666]

Dudes now doubled his sex, good work!

 

[Pinko Marx]

im bisexual and make beats too can i be brave

Can you make an album as good as Nostalgia/Ultra?

 

[Cheddahz]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT5x...eVFVy-T6Zjuhcp1JWrVkqPs0Fpa9MSw&feature=inbox

Well he does say "I'm high and I'm bi, no wait I'm straight" on his verse on Oldie (The video is for his verse only, so you don't have to listen to the whole song to get to his verse)

 

[Pinko Marx]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT5x...eVFVy-T6Zjuhcp1JWrVkqPs0Fpa9MSw&feature=inbox

Well he does say "I'm high and I'm bi, no wait I'm straight" on his verse on Oldie (The video is for his verse only, so you don't have to listen to the whole song to get to his verse)

Yeah but Tyler frequently talks about snorting coke and raping girls. Should that mean we need to arrest him?

 

[Cheddahz]

Yeah but Tyler frequently talks about snorting coke and raping girls. Should that mean we need to arrest him?

Totally not, kids are into that and Hot Topic shirts are selling like crazy, I think society is fine with it

 

[Conciliator]

Not sure if I love Frank but Novocaine is fuckin' bangin. Also he has so much swagger in that Oldie verse.

Frank will be OK. Actually it will probably be fuel for some pretty funny Odd Future lyrics somewhere down the line.

And other rappers, like ASAP Rocky, have recently come out against homophobia in hip hop too. Ultimately you just can't hold the 'id' of hip-hop lyricism up against whatever rapper penned those lyrics; it doesn't work that way. Rappers can, and do, frequently say something in one song that contradicts something in another song, and then a third verse elsewhere will contradict them both. That's hip-hop...as Jay-Z put it, 'Right or wrong, just what I was feelin at the time'.