Caroline Cavanagh responds to 17-year-old footballer Jake Daniels coming out as gay, reflecting on why authenticity still feels dangerous for many. She explores what real inclusion means and calls for a world where kids can be themselves without fear of judgment.
Chapters
If I get wound up about something, I've learned over the years to sleep on it. If I wake up the next morning still feeling triggered, then it's time to take action. In most cases, I wake up and think, ugh, you Muppet, what an overreaction. But something happened yesterday that triggered me, and this morning I was still feeling a high level of emotion, so I'm here recording this. To take action. The event that happened yesterday was 15— sorry, 17-year-old footballer Jake Daniels coming out to say that he was gay. Congratulations to Jake. One of the comments that I read was him saying that he can now be confident in who he is, be his true self. And hopefully he has also inspired other youngsters. to be confident in being themselves too. The reason, however, that I felt very triggered is that we are still living in a world today where people being their true authentic selves is newsworthy, where it takes a vast amount of courage for someone to say, this is me, Take me as I am, because that is a fearful place to be, where acknowledging that you are different in any way, whether it's sexuality, religion, colour of skin, or even just your beliefs, cannot be expressed for fear of some form of retribution, backlash, animosity, judgment. There is a lot of work going on in diversity and inclusion, but wow, we are such a long way from being in the world that I would love to live in. A world where we can all be our true, genuine, authentic selves. Where saying, I'm gay, is met with just a, yeah, great, or, brilliant, tell me more about it. Where we can genuinely not fear from being a— from having the ability to express who we are. So please, what I would love you to do is to now comment. Don't just like this post if you agree with it or thumbs down if you don't. Comment, because unless we start taking this topic out into the world, discussing it, making it okay To talk about who you are. Fear will always stop people like Jake, who felt he was gay from the age of 5 or 6, living in that place of fear for over 10 years. I want the world to be different for my children, one of which is about to turn 17. I want them to be in a world where they can just be themselves, with no judgment. Is that what you want too? Let me know.
