As staff members of The Daily Eastern News, we stand with and support the LGBTQA+ community.

There are several people in the world today who still do not support people of this community, whether it be due to their religious beliefs and/or personal beliefs. We, however, do not fall into that category of people.

For years, people of the LGBTQA+ community were not even allowed to speak of their sexual orientation because it was considered “wrong” and even thought of as a mental illness.

It is now 2018, and times have changed drastically throughout even the last 10 years.

We feel that anyone who does not identify as heterosexual should not be ashamed of who they are and should absolutely feel comfortable living their life openly.

We understand and do not judge anyone who still has not come to terms with their sexual orientation, or feels that it isn’t the right time to be open about it. The choice to come out is their own, and we feel they should be the ones to decide when the right time is.

Sadly, there are several people in the world today who would gladly “out” someone and ruin that person’s chances of ever having control of this.

It is also still common for people to make derogatory statements towards people of the LGBTQA+ community, causing these people a lot of hurt and sadness.

We feel that this is absolutely unacceptable, and we as a world should make members of the LGBTQA+ community feel completely welcome and comfortable in life instead of bullying them and judging them just because of their sexuality.

We also feel that a person’s sexuality is NOT a choice, but rather a simple part of that person.

We feel that even if a person did not accept their sexuality or come forward with it until much later in life, this does not mean at all that they chose this. This is who they were, and it takes some people a long time to realize that.

The world is a place full of diversity, and people should be more respectful and understanding of that.

We should not judge anyone based on their sexuality, because if we were all the same, what would be so fun and unique about our universe?