I was an 18 year old freshman at UMass/Amherst, and I saw a screening of Word Is Out offered by the gay student group. One of the people interviewed in the film is a UMass student, and he is shown outside of the Student Union building, a building which we all saw every day. When that shot appeared, a great cheer went up in the movie theater. I felt for the first time the tremendous power of coming out, and how as more and more people came out of the closet it would change our world forever.
I also remembered that the student interviewed in the movie was carrying on a long distance relationship with a man he had met off campus. I had just had a wonderful sexual experience with a man from Boston, and the film inspired me to have the courage to call him up and tell him I'd like to continue seeing him.
David Finkelstein, lakeivan@earthlink.net
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