It’s none of my business.īut it has stirred for me this whole business of the “beard phenomenon” and the harm it does to women who assume the role of beard (unwittingly or not), the men who seek it out, and our society that colludes in the deception, rather than accept the reality that gay men and women work and love among us. I haven’t talked to them about this, and I don’t intend to.
Cruise has long denied he is gay, but the rumors persist that Cruise dates and marries beautiful women, these so-called beards, to quash speculation about his sexual orientation.Ī subtext to the Jim West story is the fact that West, who acknowledges he is a gay man, has also dated women, and married one. Current chatter at ABC.com is filled with beard comments concerning Tom Cruise’s new lady love. The term also applies to a man who does the same for a lesbian woman. One definition of the word beard is found mostly in slang dictionaries, though the New Oxford Dictionary of English added the alternative definition a few years ago.Ī beard is defined as a woman who dates, or marries, a gay man to provide cover for the man’s homosexuality.
