In celebration of National Coming Out week, several Cal State Long Beach organizations will place banners and posters across campus displaying the names of those who have signed this year’s OutList.
According to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Student Resource Center on campus, the OutList will enable members of the campus community, both past and present, to come out as LGBT individuals. It will also enable heterosexual individuals to come out as supporters of the LGBT community.
The organizations behind this week’s series of events include the Gay Straight Alliance, the LGBT Student Resource Center and Student Life and Development.
National Coming Out week has broadened this year in CSULB with signage being displayed more publicly on campus. In past years, the names from the OutList were published only in the University Student Union, GSA President Daniel Luna said.
“The general sense of [National] Coming Out Week is that we are here to promote our community that we have, establish our community and really celebrate [National] Coming Out Day on Friday,” Luna said.
This year’s National Coming Out Day will mark the event’s 25th anniversary.
“This year we have an active membership with GSA and Delta Lambda Phi, the gay-bisexual progressive fraternity on campus, and the [LGBT] Resource Center, and we are all collaborating together to make this week really something big in our own individual ways,” he said.
In addition to the OutList, Luna said there will be a parachute social, which involves a large tarp and a group of people, on Tuesday “to bring communities together without labels and without obligations.” A parachute social was held on Monday as well.
Luna said the event on Tuesday will also include a photo shoot that “is more for intersectionality.”
“We don’t necessarily come out as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or whatever, but rather as feminists, as chefs, as a mother, as whatever you want,” Luna said.
On Wednesday, the organizations will host an open mic night to allow the community to speak out, and on Thursday there will be a screening of “Too Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar,” a movie about drag queens whose car breaks down during a cross-country road trip.
According to the LGBT Student Resource Center website, students signed up to appear on the OutList free of charge. Faculty, staff and alumni, however, were asked for a $5 fee, which went toward the cost of the banners and posters.