CNN anchor Don Lemon steps forward as gay news reporter
”People are going to say: ‘Oh, he was molested as a kid and now he is coming out.’ I get it…. It’s about the worst thing you can be in black culture. You’re taught you have to be a man; you have to be masculine. In the black community they think you can pray the gay away.”
Don Lemon, 45, a CNN news anchor who made headlines last September when he unexpectedly made the very personal admission that he had been “a victim of a pedophile.” Lemon had been discussing the odd case of Eddie Long, a black and gay preacher who had been accused of engaging in inappropriate sexual relations with several young men at his mega-church.
Now, Lemon tells the New York Times that he’s scared of being shunned despite reassurances that his news company plans to support him. He says he’s coming out in a new book, Transparent, because he believes gay youth need more role models; and he thinks that if he’d had some to look up to, he would not have taken 45 years to come out. Of the personal material in his book, Lemon tells the NYT:
“I abhor hypocrisy. I think if you’re going to be in the business of news, and telling people the truth, of trying to shed light in dark places, then you’ve got to be honest. You’ve got to have the same rules for yourself as you do for everyone else.”
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