Lez Keep It Real

Today’s Come Out & Play post spotlights Dani Campbell.

You know Dani Campbell from A Shot at Love, the dreadful MTV reality dating show with My Space slut and phony bisexual, Tila Tequila. I’ve already voiced my opinion on the show itself. And I can honestly say that I have never sat down and watched it. But, I have heard about a certain “futch” lesbian from the show who seems to be garnering quite the following. Enter Dani Campbell. She’s a firefighter from Florida, rescuing damsels in distress, and also easy on the eyes. Not so much my cup of lesbian tea, but I can appreciate her appeal.

I did a little research and found an interesting Q&A article about her on After Ellen. Upon reading it, I stumbled upon Dani’s coming out story and thought, what better place to post this than on this installment of Come Out & Play?

So, without further ado, here’s it is.

AE: How did you come out? And what kind of advice would you give people about that?
DC: Well, I guess it was easiest in the worst way — I was busted. Let’s cut through this bulls—, Mom. Just watch me, catch me making out with somebody. That’s what happened. I didn’t know she was home. She was at home. I was upstairs just kinda kissing my girlfriend —

AE: How old were you?
DC: I was 17, I think. Yeah, 17.

AE: Had you always known that you were gay?
DC: Pretty much. I wasn’t able to identify it until high school time. But when I look back, yeah definitely. I’ve always had a thing for girls.

AE: So your mom caught you?
DC: So my mom caught me, yeah. She busted me, and she cried, and I was like: “Mom, it’s just a phase. Don’t worry.”

And then I was totally in love with this girl, so I ended up telling her, “Yes, I am gay, and this is the way it is.” And you know, parents usually want to blame somebody, so she blamed one of my good friends who was gay. You know, like she touched me and gave me the gay cooties.

But now my mom … is trying to learn from it with this show and everything. It’s been a good step in our relationship. She’s really embraced it, and now she just wants to learn and know more about it, and she sees that it’s OK. She’s a high school teacher, so the kids in her classes, they’re like … cause I really look like my Mom, so these kids are asking her, “Do you have a daughter on TV?” They’re just asking her, “Can she come in and visit us?” So you know, she’s getting a positive response from this as well. So this is all a good thing, this whole show.

For the entire interview with Dani, go here.

To be honest, Dani sounds like someone I’d hang out with on a regular basis and although the show itself sucked, at least we got to see someone represent the lesbian community who wasn’t a buxom blonde, dressed to the nines and who’s idea of athletic activity is running around the house searching for a nail file.

In the immortal words of Deniece Williams, “Let’s hear it for the boi!”

If visibility is what we want, I’d like to see it diversified at the very least. Lesbians come in all shapes, sizes and categories.

Tune in every Friday for the Come Out & Play series, featuring coming out stories of celebrities, every day people, personal reflections, advice, tid bits and everything else concerning the complicated world of coming out!

Got an interesting coming out story to tell? Contact me and I will feature it in an upcoming post of Come Out & Play.

coming out, come out and play, dani campbell, tila tequila, a shot at love with tila tequila, mtv, reality television, lesbians on reality shows