Conan Gray’s sexuality — The details behind his lifestyle choices explained

Dubbed the “prince of sad songs” by GQ Magazine, Conan Gray received worldwide recognition for his melancholic songs. The Texas-born pop artist originally began as a YouTuber who created vlogs in 2013 and uploaded cover songs on his channel.

But in a few years, Conan’s songwriting abilities heralded his rise to popularity as the success of his self-released songs landed him a record deal with Republic Records in 2018. With his gender-neutral love songs, it is no wonder that fans have been wondering about the person of Conan’s interest and his orientation.

Conan Gray took to Twitter to disapprove of the rampant speculations surrounding his sexuality

Conan Gray’s gender-defying aesthetic and fashion became the talk of the town after the singer-songwriter gained worldwide popularity for his heartbreak tunes. Social media in particular became rife with curiosity and speculations about his sexual orientation.

But Gray is private about the matter and keeps his sexuality ambiguous. Moreover, in light of constant queries about it, he finally put the discussion to an end on February 11, 2018, as he tweeted;

“Y’all are so annoying, all y’all ever wanna do is place a label on me, just let me fcking exist what the fck.”

The 23-year-old popstar further expressed his aversion to being conveniently labeled as a particular orientation in his subsequent tweet, writing:

“Here is the fcking deal. If labels on sexuality and gender and beliefs and all that great stuff are helpful for you, I’m all for it. You do You. But the second you start trying to shove everyone else into a neat little easy-to-understand box, I get mad. Stop! Please! Fcking stop!”

Conan has been open about his struggles with masculinity growing up and now embraces that he is a “girly boy”

Though Conan prefers to keep his sexuality under the wraps, he has been open about his struggles with conforming to traditional masculinity. In a YouTube video posted on his channel on January 4, 2018, he said:

“For the longest time, I was so afraid of not being manly enough. It was just like a very deeply ingrained fear inside of me that I wasn’t enough of a man and it is still kind of like a thing that pops into my head quite often. And that’s something I want to change, as soon as I can,” said Conan.

Since he grew up with a “very manly father” who was a professional arm wrestler, Gray struggled to come to terms with his masculinity when he realized that he was not like his dad. He explained:

“Growing up, masculinity was such a big part of who I am because I am not manly at all. People always told me “You are such a girly boy”. No one ever looked at me and thought “that dude…that’s a man”. I just never exuded that aura.”

Initially, when he was growing up, Conan did not warm to being told that he was a “girly boy” and said that the phrase was hurtful to him and that he “really hated it”. However, he has now reached a point in his life where he does not mind the comparison at all as he said:

“Being compared to a girl…I finally thought, girls are incredible and freaking amazing. So why would I be hurt by being compared to a girl? I’m just not like that anymore.”

Conan has been praised for “redefining masculinity” but he feels that he is not being “radical” in his expression and says that he simply wears what he feels like wearing, just as he writes songs that he feels like writing.

“There are so many people – trans rights activists, queer people, and people of color – who’ve done so much more for history than I have. I only get to wear skirts and paint my nails because of them. So, it’s not something I think about, and that’s a privilege. That’s something that needs to be recognized by the internet. Maybe that shows how much progress has been made!” Conan told GQ.

Conan says that he has never been in a relationship despite being heartbroken before

In an interview with GQ, Conan described the tales of his unrequited love over the years and said that he had been heartbroken when the people he loved never loved him back. But in a surprising tidbit, he admitted that he had never been in a relationship, saying:

“You will probably be surprised to learn that I’ve never actually dated anyone. It’s embarrassing! Dating makes me nervous. All my best friends are dating people, though, so I live vicariously through them.”

He reasoned that he does not date anyone because a person he had loved in high school, who was the inspiration behind his hit song “Heather” and his debut album, “ended up destroying” him. Although he did not disclose the gender of his crush, he confessed to still writing songs about them.

Conan said that he is attracted to people who “know everything you could ever know about them” and who are “open to still learning about themselves”. But when it comes to actual dating, his anxiety over the fear of being heartbroken holds him back as he said:

“I make mistakes with dating constantly. I get so freaked out by the idea of dating someone that I will drop people because I’m terrified that they’re going to hurt me.”

Nonetheless, Conan is now “almost ready” to be in a real relationship as he has grown to accept his fears and reconcile with the notion of casual dating.

“You don’t have to marry every single person that you’ve ever had a crush on! That was a big realization for me this year. I’m still working through it,” he said.