JoJo Siwa Comes Out as 'Technically Pansexual,' Covers 'People'

JoJo Siwa is an absolute, certified mogul. And now, she's also a People magazine cover star.

Earlier this year the teen come out as LGBTQ+ in what ended up being a week-long process. After hinting by uploading a video lip-syncing to Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" and doing a video at Pride House LA, she posted a photo wearing a shirt that proclaimed "Best. Gay. Cousin." After, she introduced the world to her girlfriend Kylie Prew, and more, even going on to shut down tho who disavowed her as a result of coming out. But while she presented a brave face to the world, apparently all was not well. After coming out, she Googled herself expecting to see a lot of support and praise.

"I never should have done that. I was thinking that all the comments were going to be nice and supportive, and they weren't," she told People. "A lot of them were: 'I'm never buying your merch again. My daughter's never watching you again.' I couldn't sleep for three days." But after some time, Siwa came to terms with it all.

"My thing is, I don't want people to watch my videos or buy my merchandise if they aren't going to support not only me, but the LGBTQ community," she said.

According to the interview, Siwa has always known she was queer but never felt the need to put a label on it.

"I don't know, bisexual, pansexual, queer, lesbian, gay, straight. I always just say gay because it just kind of covers it or queer because I think the keyword is cool," she said. "I like queer. Technically I would say that I am pansexual because that's how I have always been my whole life is just like, my human is my human."

Prew and Siwa met on a cruise ship and began a friendship that turned romantic in late 2020. Siwa told the world about the pair's relationship on the one month anniversary of them beginning to date. The star also noted that she had a lot to lose by coming out.

Siwa is the face of a billion dollar brand according to her. She has released music, tours, and has a massive deal with Nickelodeon that includes a robust licensing arm (that covers accessories, toys, bedding, and more) and that will see a musical film inspired by her life titled The J Team, out this summer.

"I think something that's really cool is I came out to not just my family, not just my friends, not just my circle, but to the world," she said in a video. "I had a lot to lose. It's kind of crazy because in my head I'm like 'I've got nothing to lose. I found love, it's awesome, I'm happy.' But in the big grand scheme of things there was a lot to lose. There's a lot of people that still maybe are scared of it or not accepting, or unsupportive. So it can be very scary and I think in my case I had a lot that could have gone away because of my love life and my happiness."

"And if it was to all go away because of that ..." she continued. "So be it. I also think that if somebody in your life that isn't going to accept you for who you are, who isn't going to support you for loving who you love, you might not want that person in your life."

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