I’d just finished posting a blog item about Anderson Cooper’s coming out on my Facebook page when the phone rang. It was George Osterkamp, a producer in the CBS News Bureau in San Francisco. I’d met George in my previous life as press secretary to then-San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos.

He wanted to know if I was interested in talking about Anderson Cooper for the CBS This Morning show, and what it was like for an out gay journalist (that’s me). He also wanted to know whether there were any inherent career risks to coming out. (My view: There might be in places like Mississippi, Alabama or Utah, but not here. And certainly not at a national network like CNN.)
I agreed to do the interview then wondered, “What the hell am I going to say?” Everyone seemed to know or assume Anderson was gay –- and surely he was out to his friends, family and CNN colleagues. So technically, he was just acknowledging something we all more-or-less knew.
I came out 34 years ago, in college, long before I was a journalist, and I didn’t see any reason to “come out” on the air — what difference would it make? But then in 2004 my partner and I got married at San Francisco City Hall – and while I wasn’t covering the same-sex marriage issue, I was going to interview others about it. So KQED management and I decided that I should disclose my marriage on-air. Which I did, in passing, during a question to a legal scholar.
The reaction was muted. A few emails, almost all positive — “thanks for being honest,” that kind of thing.