But while Jonathan is grateful for that specific friendship, he remembered a less positive experience when he came out to a group of friends in grade school.
“It was a conversation I really, really wanted to have, to see if everyone else was on the same page,” he shared. “But everyone went quiet.”
He also recalled a slight from a former teacher in those years, adding, “I was having trouble with my work and he said, ‘Well, if you weren’t so busy being a fairy you’d understand.’”
In spite of the difficulties he’s faced, however, Jonathan has come to be proud of his identity, even launching The Shameless Fund to protect LGBTQ+ people from oppression in earlier this year.
