Is It <i> Outing</i> or <i> Attacking</i> ?

Re “Public Good--Or Private Matters?” (April 13): I experienced the same coming-out traumas that most gay people experience: fear, confusion, resentment, uncertainty, compounded by the feeling that there was no one I could turn to.

But as I cracked that closet door, I learned what most gay people of my age learned: that my gay brothers and sisters would be there to help me and would respect my decisions as to when and how to come out.

I--like Armistead Maupin and Michelangelo Signorile and Jeff Yarbrough--was allowed to come out when I was ready, not when it was politically beneficial.

Maupin, Signorile and other gay journalists have taken it upon themselves to throw this time-honored tradition of silence and support onto the altar of political expediency. They call it outing. I call it attacking .

By pretending they out only celebrities and those whose closeted behavior hurts the gay movement, these traitors have made it more difficult (not easier, as they claim) to come out.

Maupin, Signorile and others have sacrificed a tradition of support and respect for the individual and for privacy that has served our community well, and they have done it not to advance the movement--they have set that back--but rather for their own self-aggrandizement.

THOMAS ROGILLIO

Glendale