Danny Hernandez (He/Him)

My name is Danny Hernandez and I grew up in Paradise, Texas, outside of Dallas. Fort Worth. I moved to Philly for school and it was the first time in my adult life that I felt like I didn’t have to come out to anybody.

Being a gay Latino man in Philly is a lot different than being a gay Latino man in Texas. I think it’s the same for a lot of major cities in the Northeast We live in this bubble in which things are pretty great for us. We take some of those things for granted like being able to hold your partner’s hand in the street, the legal protections we’re given in a lot of places in the Northeast, especially in the cities that we live in. Where in Texas, a lot of those comforts aren’t necessarily available. 

There’s still a stigma, you know, whatever it is in the South and the Southwest of being out and being gay. I still feel like there’s a closet that even as out as we are with our friends and family, we kind of take steps backward. We live in places like that. Still a lot of work to be done there.

Danny Hernandez (He/Him)
Interviewed in 2015 by A. Leon /Photographed by louie ortiz-fonseca