With his debut album Channel Orange receiving both critical and commercial praise, alternative R&B talent Frank Ocean has become the talk of the music industry. The singer recently revealed the motives behind his bombshell announcement that detailed his onetime love affair with a man.  

According to Ocean, coming out was never a risk.

“I won’t touch on risky, because that’s subjective,” he told the Guardian. “People are just afraid of things too much…Sure, evil exists, extremism exists. Somebody could commit a hate crime and hurt me. But they could do the same just because I’m black. They could do the same just because I’m American. Do you just not go outside your house? Do you not drive your car because of the statistics? How else are you limiting your life for fear?”

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Ocean said that his rationale behind making such a public statement was not a product of publicity but a natural progression.

“I suppose a percentage of that act was because of altruism; because I was thinking of how I wished at 13 or 14 there was somebody I looked up to who would have said something like that, who would have been transparent in that way,” he explained. “But there’s another side of it that’s just about my own sanity and my ability to feel like I’m living a life where I’m not just successful on paper, but sure that I’m happy when I wake up in the morning, and not with this freakin’ boulder on my chest.”  —Keith Murphy, CBS Local