’90 Day Fiancé’: Big Ed Forcing Rose Vega to Come Out Is Life-Threatening
Erika Owens and Stephanie Matto on this season’s 90 Day Fiance: Before the 90 Days made headlines for being a fan-favorite couple. Matto traveled all the way from New York to Port Augusta, Australia to meet her girlfriend Owens for the first time. The show follows Americans on their international journeys to meet their long-distance love. They have all kinds of couples, including homosexual ones. It turns out Owens and Matto weren’t the only members of the LGBTQ community on the show this season.
Big Ed Brown forced Rose Vega to come out as bisexual
Big Ed Brown and Rosemarie Vega were one of the most controversial couples on the show this season. Fans didn’t like the way Brown treated Vega, who was more than 20 years his junior. He demanded she get an STD test at the beginning of their relationship, then requested she shave her legs, and handed her a toothbrush and mouthwash, and told her she had bad breath.
Fans thought that he was trying to drag her down, and possibly damage her self-confidence. Plus he lied to her a number of times, including about his height, and wanting more children.
Vega and Brown have since broken up, but he’s not done dragging her down. During the Tell All episode, Brown outed Vega as a bisexual. He claimed that Vega had invited him to return to the Philippines despite their breakup, but he declined when he saw pictures on her private social media of her holding hands with a woman.
When asked, Vega did admit to having a relationship with a woman after Brown but claimed that she and the other woman had since ended things. Vega admitted she was bisexual.
No one should be forced to come out
Vega never mentioned her sexuality while being filmed for the show. It’s not clear whether or not she was okay with coming out on national television, and fans were pretty upset.
People thought that Brown was wrong for forcing Vega to reveal her sexuality, but they were also mad at the network. Some fans felt that TLC should not have outed Vega if she wasn’t OK with it, and it seemed like a surprise to Vega.
Hopefully, the network checked with Vega before airing the episode, especially considering Owens and Matto’s journey. The two ladies were in a long-distance relationship, but neither had come out to their parents. The show recorded Owen’s emotional revelation to her parents, who were happy that she and Stephanie were happy together, no matter what.
Owen’s parents’ reaction was ideal. It’s exactly what people hope for when coming out to friends and family. But not everyone is so lucky, and that’s why outing someone is never okay.
Not only was it not Brown’s place to out Vega, outing someone can be dangerous. Vega doesn’t live in the US. She may not have felt safe being out in her community.
Rose Vega may not have felt safe coming out
Although the Philippines is one of the most gay-friendly countries in Asia, that doesn’t mean that Vega was totally safe when Brown outed her. Vega is from a small village, and it’s not clear how accepting her family and community would be of her sexuality.
Plus, just because the Philippines is gay-friendly doesn’t mean LGBTQIA+ people are never bullied or harassed there. In fact, the government had to address the bullying of LGBTQIA+ students through legislation in 2013. Considering Vega is only 23 years old, she obviously grew up in a time without those protections.
