Ronan Farrow comes out
Ronan Farrow (Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP/Getty Images)
Influential journalist Ronan Farrow, who helped expose Harvey Weinstein, has come out.
Farrow was one of the first journalists to expose allegations of sexual abuse by Weinstein in The New Yorker last October.
The former NBC News personality, who is the son of Mia Farrow and director Woody Allen, quietly came out this week as he accepted an honour from the Point Foundation, which supports LGBTQ students.
Ronan Farrow (Stephen Lovekin/Getty)
Farrow, who has also written extensively on transgender issues, spoke about his own identity in his speech.
He said: “Each and every LGBT person who has to go through a process of accepting themselves and turning rejection and isolation into strength is richer and more creative and more determined for that journey.
“Being a part of the LGBT community … which recognised that reporting I was doing early on and elevated it, and has been such a stalwart source of support through the sexual assault reporting I did involving survivors who felt equally invisible … that has been an incredible source of strength for me.
“LGBT people are some of the bravest and most potent change agents and leaders I have encountered, and the most forceful defenders of the vulnerable and voiceless, because they know what it’s like to be there.
“In embracing these young people, the Point Foundation is making people who felt invisible and alone feel seen.”
Ronan Farrow receives his award as Point Foundation hosts Annual Point Honors New York Gala Celebrating The Accomplishments Of LGBTQ Students in New York. (Dia Dipasupil/Getty)
Speaking to The Advocate, he added: “I spent a long time reporting on trans issues and I know in the course of that reporting I saw how deeply adversity runs.
“I saw that the LGBT community is one of the most powerful resources we have. These are the most important leaders we can harness. These are the strongest people with the greatest sense of ingenuity, who in the process of facing that kind of adversity become powerhouses.
“What Point Foundation does is make these people feel seen and facilitate them in being part of the solution, instead of being just another number, and another tragedy.”
Farrow was publicly outed by Vice in 2013, in a piece penned by writer Christopher Glazek.
Ronan Farrow at Annual Point Honors New York Gala Celebrating The Accomplishments Of LGBTQ Students in New York. (Dia Dipasupil/Getty)
The piece said: “[Farrow is] gay, according to friends of mine who have slept with him, but you wouldn’t know that from reading either Vanity Fair or the New York Times. Why the reticence?
“Neither publication seems very interested in protecting Farrow’s privacy (…) why a veil of secrecy for this particular detail? Is ‘outing’ even a thing that publications worry about anymore?”
The piece then attempted to build a case for ‘outing’ celebrities, claiming that journalists should out people because it is “primarily obligated to the truth.”
It added: “Do we discover something pertinent about Farrow and his motivations when we learn that he’s gay? Does it reveal something about his character – whether slipperiness, self-loathing, a knack for grand strategy, or simply immaturity – that he chooses to hide it? Maybe, maybe not. But those are determinations that readers deserve to make on their own.”
Farrow did not respond at the time, though the piece attracted criticism from parts of the LGBT community.
