Two Decades of Gay Ellen

It’s been twenty years since Ellen DeGeneres made a public pronouncement about being a lesbian. She did so within an episode of her mildly amusing eponymous TV show. If you chart a timeline, with 1917 being physically dangerous to make such a confession, and 2017 as a time when female celebrities create hyped press announcements insisting they are temporarily gay, 1997 was still a pretty big deal to come out.

At the time, Ellen was on a hit ABC sitcom and beginning the build of her massive man suit media empire. Ellen was by nature a private person who merely wanted to make cash and fuck hot chick models with little notice. She took a risk at the time. There’s no doubt. It’s easy to see her present day circumstances of fame and fortune and chemically sedated blonde trophy wife and dismiss the fact she had no way to know if it might all go sideways after coming out.

Almost no male celebrities have followed suit to this day. Though every chick looking for a Google search bump is declaring herself bisexual or sexually fluid or suddenly remembering they were always gay. Times change fast. As do the fleeting moments for selflessness, versus social acts of self-promotion and virtue signaling.

It’s easy to mock present day Ellen because she’s a daytime Svengali to millions of less employed women who roar at her intentionally bland jokes. Assume she saves her off-colored runs for her private cigar and poker parties. There was a time when she did something almost nobody in her business would have had the courage to do. That was twenty years ago. So she doesn’t like dick. You can still give her a golf clap.