Frank Ocean talks about coming out in his GQ Men of the Year interview:
Whatever I said in that letter, before I posted it, seemed so huge. But when you come out the other side, now your brain—instead of receiving fear—sees "Oh, sh*t happened and nothing happened." Brain says, "Self, I'm fine." I look around, and I'm touching my f*cking limbs, and I'm good. Before anybody called me and said congratulations or anything nice, it had already changed. It wasn't from outside. It was completely in here, in my head.
I had those fears [it would derail my career. In black music, we've got so many leaps and bounds to make with acceptance and tolerance in regard to that issue. It reflects something just ingrained, you know. When I was growing up, there was nobody in my family—not even my mother—who I could look to and be like, "I know you've never said anything homophobic." So, you know, you worry about people in the business who you've heard talk that way. Some of my heroes coming up talk recklessly like that. It's tempting to give those views and words—that ignorance—more attention than they deserve. Very tempting.
When asked if he is bisexual, Ocean shuts the conversation down:
You can move to the next question. I'll respectfully say that life is dynamic and comes along with dynamic experiences, and the same sentiment that I have towards genres of music, I have towards a lot of labels and boxes and sh*t. I'm in this business to be creative—I'll even diminish it and say to be a content provider. One of the pieces of content that I'm for f*ck sure not giving is porn videos. I'm not a centerfold. I'm not trying to sell you sex. People should pay attention to that in the letter: I didn't need to label it for it to have impact. Because people realize everything that I say is so relatable, because when you're talking about romantic love, both sides in all scenarios feel the same sh*t. As a writer, as a creator, I'm giving you my experiences. But just take what I give you. You ain't got to pry beyond that. I'm giving you what I feel like you can feel. The other sh*t, you can't feel. You can't feel a box. You can't feel a label. Don't get caught up in that sh*t. There's so much something in life. Don't get caught up in the nothing. That sh*t is nothing, you know? It's nothing. Vanish the fear.
