Photo: TikTok
People are loving her "who cares" approach to coming out — and they're loving her take on dating boys even more.
By John Sundholm — Written on Apr 27, 2023
Teens coming out to family is delicate business—or, it used to be anyway. For many young people nowadays, it's thankfully become no big deal. So much so, in fact, that a teen girl and her aunt's hilariously blasé interaction about the girl being gay has TikTok equally feeling grateful for how times have changed and howling with laughter.
A teen girl forgot she hadn't come out and began telling her aunt about her girlfriend.
The girl, Lele, seems to have just never gotten around to having the conversation with her favorite aunt, TikToker @jaja8220. The look that briefly flashes across her face as she realizes her omission is priceless, but it also highlights how teens coming out *should* go—easy-peasy, no big deal and drama-free. Her reaction to realizing the omission, however, was priceless, and it only got funnier from there.
The teen casually told her aunt about how she'd gotten broken up with at school.
The video is hilarious practically from the first second. "Here she come, y'all" the aunt says as Lele walks up to the car, and sure enough she gets into the car with her personality on 11. "I got broken up with today, and I'm really just not in the mood," Lele says, apropos of nothing. "Let me tell you what happened," she continues, going on to talk about the "funky girl" who "likes my girlfriend."
"Wait, what?" the aunt says, and there's a moment where Lele's face shows she's only just remembered that she hadn't shared with her aunt the fact she's gay. But she wasn't about to get into it right now, either—she has a story to tell, dang it!
So instead of having the conversation, she rolls her eyes and soldiers on with hilarious exasperation as if nothing had even happened. "You heard me," she says, "I'm not gonna keep on repeating myself, I'm already irritated!" Good for you, Lele! Tell your story, the coming out can wait!
The teen then gave her reasoning for liking girls that has people on TikTok howling with laughter.
Of course, coming out may be no big deal to Lele's generation, but it still is to us adults. After all, most of us grew up in a time when coming out was unearthing a fairly game-changing secret. So naturally, her aunt wasn't quite ready to let it go.
But when her aunt pressed her on the issue, Lele couldn't muster much more than a shrug. "Like wait, your who?" the aunt asks, to which Lele just says, "My girlfriend—I didn't tell you." But then just soldiered on once again.
But when her aunt pressed the issue one more time, Lele finally gave a full answer—and it was every bit as headstrong and clear-eyed as everything she said. When her aunt asked, "You're gay?" Lele responded, "Yes! What you mean?! You think I'm finna be liking on boys and they only want to do one thing?! What you know?!" As if being queer were the only choice that even remotely makes sense. Now that's progress!
Lele still didn't care to discuss it further, moving on instead to ask her aunt whether she should "bop-bop-bop" the girl who stole her girlfriend, to which her aunt could only shake her head and say, "Oh God" in amusement.
People loved Lele's hilarious take on coming out and dating boys, and many felt like it was a major step forward.
Of course, being LGBTQ is anything but easy for young people, even as advanced and accepting as many people are nowadays. Aside from the all-out legislative assault on LGBTQ kids in many parts of the country, especially against transgender kids, recent data gathered by LGBTQ youth advocacy organization The Trevor Project found that nearly 40% of queer young people reported living in a community that is unaccepting of LGBTQ people.
And just 37% of LGBTQ kids reported living in homes that were "queer affirming." These experiences in turn have been found to exacerbate LGBTQ youths' elevated risks for mental health conditions like anxiety, depression and suicidality—45% of queer youth studied reported considering suicide in 2022, in fact.
Still, kids like Lele show just how different the landscape is, even from a few years ago. It's only been eight years that same-sex marriage has been legal, after all! And people on TikTok absolutely loved Lele's way of approaching things.
"She came out the closet swinging, fighting and telling no lies," one commenter quipped, while another added "I love that she’s comfortable enough to just COME out like dat!" Another person couldn't believe "there’s no coming out anymore," adding that they "love it" that this has changed.
People also loved her take on dating boys, of course. "She said 'you think I’m finna be liking on boys?' Period!" one woman commented. "Her logic as to not liking boys was solid and valid," another wrote.
And people were definitely moved by the way the process of teens coming out seems to have changed for so many queer young people nowadays. One user summed things up perfectly—"The way she just came out without coming out, we millennials could never!"
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, LGBTQ issues and human interest topics.