Queer Eye's interior designer
Bobby Berk says his devout Christian family rejected him after he was
outed to them.
Berk and the rest of the show's cast –
Antoni Porowski (food), Tan France (fashion), Karamo Brown (culture)
and Jonathan Van Ness (grooming) – shared their coming out stories
in a recent video.
France, who was born in England to
Pakistani parents and currently lives in Salt Lake City with his
husband, Rob France, a self-described Mormon cowboy, said that he
feared he would be disowned by his family.
“There's a lot of negativity towards
being gay in the Middle-Eastern culture. It's not a lifestyle that
is common,” France said in the video.
(Related: Queer
Eye's
Tan France says he's experienced racism, homophobia his whole life.)
Berk said that he decided to run away
at 15. When he returned, his mother had learned her son was gay.
“I get back to my parents' house and
I remember my mom just looking at me and she's like, 'I know and it
disgusts me.' And I picked my bags up and walked right back out the
door,” Berk said. Later in the video, Berk shared that his parents
have since “broadened” their minds.
Van Ness said that growing up he was
asked “17 times a day” whether he was gay.
“Every day was so full of slurs and
verbal abuse,” Van Ness said. “My strength and my truth came
from when I realized that the ones with the issue was not me.”
“You can be 7, you can be 30, you can
be 60 years old. Just continue on the journey,” Brown advised
people struggling to come out.
(Related: Fab
Five make over first female, transgender subjects in second season of
Queer
Eye.)