Comment on Who came up with the phrase "coming out of the closet" to describe homosexuals admitting they are gay? Why not coming out of the kitchen or coming out of the bedroom?

bitteroldcoot@piefed.social ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

• hoshikarakitaridia@lemmy.world ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  To add to that, phrases like “monster in the closet” or “cleaning out the closet” all relate back to this.

  The idea is a closet is a great way to hide things quickly but also not really the way to deal with things long term. You just stuffed it away, you didn’t properly think about it and remedy the issues. That’s why people who have something to hide metaphorically speaking stuff these things in their closet. And that’s why when you’re a child the closet is the big unknown, as in you might find things in there you didn’t expect. For example, maybe there are monsters in there.

  I would also say there’s a chance that’s why to get to Narnia, in the books, they would go through the closet. But there might be other reasons too ofc.

  So yeah the closet has a deep connection with hiding secrets. And if that secret is your homosexuality, which is a common story that’s why it said “coming out of the closet”, which means finally addressing something publicly. And now we’re shortening that to say “coming out”.

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  • someguy3@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Also skeletons in the closet.

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