Actress Shannon Purser hopes her coming
out helps young people struggling with their sexuality.
Purser, who is best known for playing
Barbara “Barb” Holland on the Netflix hit Stranger Things
and Ethel Muggs in The CW's teen drama Riverdale, came out
bisexual on Twitter last year.
(Related: Stranger
Things
star Shannon Purser comes out bisexual.)
Speaking with PEOPLE, Purser,
21, said that a person's sexuality should be irrelevant.
“I would love for us to get to a
point in society where it doesn't really matter what your
sexuality is, but right now there is a lot of turmoil around that
issue, a lot of controversies where there shouldn't be,” Purser
said.
“[I want to be] somebody [young
people] can look up to.”
“I just always think about what would
I have needed as a kid, what would have meant a lot to me? If
somebody can see me and feel less alone and more understood, then
that's it,” she said.
“That's what matters most to me,”
she said about receiving messages from fans about coming out.
“That's the best compliment I've ever received.”