Steven Thrasher: What Apple's Tim Cook does for LGBT culture

Tim Cook, Apple's chief executive, came out as gay in Bloomberg Businessweek last Thursday.

"While I have never denied my sexuality, I haven't publicly acknowledged it either, until now," he wrote. "So let me be clear: I'm proud to be gay, and I consider being gay among the greatest gifts God has given me."

Steven Thrasher, columnist for The Guardian, said it's important to keep the news in perspective:

But let's not fall all over ourselves with unmitigated joy.

Cook is just the latest gay man or lesbian to come out long after he got his - and that's not "courage", and it's hardly even pride. We all come out, often repeatedly, at the time that is right for each of us. But when clearly powerful people understand their sexuality and stay in the closet, even by omission, it is no reason to bust out the confetti - especially while there are so many queer people out doing the hard work of achieving equality and liberation at great risk to themselves.

Like Ricky Martin, Anderson Cooper, and Robin Roberts most recently before him, Cook came out long into a career that is secure, and with a fat bank account and a legion of lawyers and supporters to protect him from any blowback. For someone like Cook, who chose to "pass" for years, to now ask the LGBT community he's been unwilling to publicly admit he's a part of to celebrate the "brick" he's added on "the sunlit path toward justice" feels to me like a black person parading around in white face, taking all the benefits of whiteness, getting rich and then scrubbing off the makeup and saying, "Surprise! I'm proud to be black!"

Thrasher joins The Daily Circuit to discuss the issue.