“why do you care so much about harry’s sexuality? it doesn’t matter if he’s gay or bi or straight.”
i care because the entertainment industry is ruthless and homophobic. and we know for a fact that young people new to the industry ARE exploited. we know how much pressure queer people go through to stay in the spotlight, not to mention someone who started off as a boybander in 2010.
i care because i saw sixteen year old harry scrunching his face and answering “freedom” to the question “what do you wish for that money can’t buy?”
i care because him not removing a part of his red nailpolish got him ridiculed and laughed at.
i care because the first tattoo he got was a black outline of a five pointed star.
i care because he, at eighteen, got “i can’t change” tattooed on his body. i can’t change. and a birdcage. and a hanger.
when closeted people do come out, they always talk about how they gave signs to fans. harry has never made attempts to hide his queerness. from unsubtle comments about being attracted to men, to actually identifying with the lgbtq community. not to mention the general awareness he brings to the concept of being openly queer, and the donations he does/has done in the past, the fans he helps come out at his shows.
i care because a seventeen year old harry got called a f*ggot to his face. made fun of for simply having a bit of nail varnish. mocked for “dating” multiple leggy models when he was merely photographed by their side. mocked for kisses he physically couldn’t put effort in—because he could not be attracted to those women. even now. fetishised for standing close to another good looking woman.
he has made every attempt to identify with the queer community. supporting queer artists. waving pride flags. donating to lgbt charities. referencing queer icons. and just because he has to play the same old game of plausible deniability and showmance to keep on existing in the industry, to keep on maintaining the image of Harry StylesTM, doesn’t mean he is the man the media paints him out to be.
harry, who has always been kind and supportive of people he’s close to, who talks about “love” like it’s a sacred topic for him, going through different women every year? never taking his “girlfriends” to important events, never mentioning them by name, never praising them, the women also never mentioning him, the stiff physical chemistry, the “candid” hd pictures? “private” outings but walking in busy streets where they can be identified and photographed by fans?
do you not see the pattern? never mentioning them at all? letting the pap pics do all the work? do you think that all the signalling he has done over the years is just queerbaiting? that he chose to play the role of a closeted gay man in a movie where he had everyone’s lines memorised, and put so much effort into said role— for what? marketing? which didn’t even happen, by the way. he received lukewarm responses, at best.
i’m not saying he needs us to let him out of his closet. we don’t even know why he is in the closet in the first place. or what exactly he identifies as. or why he hasn’t come out yet. it’s his life. his reason. but acknowledgement is important. and grown people believing in blatant lies is an odd thing to see. publicity stunts are not a new concept. fake relationships exist. closeting is a real thing. even though he is in a glass closet, he is still in a closet. the fact that you can’t see the patterns is disappointing.
This is the same Harry who liked a picture of a vagina, panicked, deleted it, tweeted “so, the weather,” and spammed cat photos. The same Harry who got caught whispering “think how much pussy you’re gonna get” on live TV at 16. The same Harry who said “I like girls” when asked the best part of being in a boy band. Pretending he’s never shown interest in women erases a whole part of who he’s always been. Ignoring that because it doesn’t fit your theory isn’t activism.
Have you ever stopped to think you’re erasing part of Harry’s personality? Being so convinced he must be gay and closeted makes you filter out anything that contradicts that belief. You’re not decoding clues, you’re filtering reality to support a conclusion you already decided on.
