Singer George Michael was the subject
of persistent rumors about his sexuality until he was forced to come
out in 1988.
That year, the British singer was
arrested for lewd conduct in a Los Angeles men's room.
In an interview with CNN, Michael
explained that he felt “stupid” about the circumstances but added
that he wasn't ashamed of his sexuality.
“[I've come out] in a way that I
really didn't intend to,” Michael
told CNN's Jim Moret. “And I think having done something as
stupid as that – you know, I'm a very proud man, I want people to
know that I have not been exposed as a gay man. I don't feel any
shame. I feel stupid and I feel reckless and weak for having allowed
my sexuality to be exposed this way, but I don't feel any shame
whatsoever. And neither do I think I should.”
In a 2009 The Huffington Post
interview, Michael said that his depression as Wham! ended was due to
his increasing awareness that he “was gay, not bisexual.”
“I used to sleep with women quite a
lot in the Wham! days but never felt it could develop into a
relationship because I knew that, emotionally, I was a gay man. I
didn't want to commit to them but I was attracted to them. Then I
became ashamed that I might be using them,” he told GQ in
2013.
One of Michael's major relationships
with men was with Brazilian dress designer Anselmo Feleppa. The men
met in 1991. Feleppa died two years later of an AIDS-related brain
hemorrhage. Michael had a long-term relationship that lasted more
than a dozen years with sportswear executive Kenny Goss. Michael
said in 2011 that the relationship had ended two years earlier.
In a statement given to the Dallas
Morning News, Goss said that he was “heartbroken” to hear
of Michael's sudden death.
Michael's boyfriend Fadi Fawaz said
Monday he had discovered Michael's body. “I will never stop
missing you xx,” he said in a tweet.
(Related: Adam
Lambert, Elton John, Ellen DeGeneres, George Takei react to George
Michael's death.)