The $10,000 from Ellen isn’t the story. What the straight half of this pair said is.
When the story of the straight guy asking his gay best friend to prom broke, the internet got all happy. And why not? It’s the perfect teen movie…kid sees a tweet from his buddy that says he doesn’t have a prom date. Guy arranges a date. School rallies behind the unlikely outcome. The millennial twist is that the (straight) guy asked his (gay) friend to the prom. John Hughes never saw this one coming.
Two weeks later, the young men are guests on Ellen, where she asks them how they got to be friends. And here is there the straight kid – and these are not highly practiced media-star boys – blurts out something so honest that, while it may not be PC, reflects reality better than many people want to admit, and opens up the chance for a conversation about teen lives.
When the boys first met, they were in student council together. Jacob had been made aware that Anthony, who was openly gay, had a crush on him. Jacob says that he was a little scared and not sure if he should be friends with him, and he says that being a straight high school student, it was kind of weird to think about. He had not really supported gay rights but not been against them either. But as he got to know and listen to Anthony, who he calls a great speaker and a very convincing person, he began defending them more and more. Ellen acknowledges that yes, he was scared, but getting to know someone can change your mind.
And this gets to the heart of why what Jacob was willing to say was so important. It would be nice to pretend that everyone who hears that someone is gay is fine with it. We allow a teen who finds out about an opposite sex crush to be uncomfortable with it, or being around that person, but to say the same thing about a same-sex crush is taboo. Ellen says, “You feared an attack, but he just had a crush on you. People have crushes on people all the time and it doesn’t go anywhere.” And Jacob did what we really hope people would do…if they think the person seems interesting, get to know them rather than write them off because of fear or predjudice. It could have easily turned ugly or indifferent.
Instead it turned into something we need more of, one person willing to give another one a chance – and they both took a chance at first, because let’s face it, admitting you have a crush on someone is taking a chance, especially in the proving ground that is high school. And it morphed into something more than that; one friend who sees another in need and does something unexpected to make them happy.
h/t Queerty