Shawn Mendes opened up about his sexuality as he performed before fans at a concert in Colorado on Monday evening.
The singer-songwriter, 26, started his address by telling the audience gathered at Morrison’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre that he had “thought about this for a minute today, if I was gonna say something tonight at this point.”
After a lengthy pause, Mendes was cheered on by the crowd as he spoke about his early start in the music industry and how it affected his personal life.
“I was really young when I started. I was 15 years old,” he said in his address, footage of which has been shared on social media. “The truth is that I didn’t get to do a lot of 15-year-old things and discover parts of myself that you do at 15.”
“There’s this thing about my sexuality, and people have been talking about it so long,” he went on, adding that it was “kind of silly, because I think sexuality is such a beautifully complex thing, and it’s so hard to just put into boxes.”
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“It always felt like such an intrusion on something very personal to me. Something that I was figuring out in myself, something that I had yet to discover and still have yet to discover it,” he continued. “The real truth about my life and my sexuality is that, man, I’m just figuring it out like everyone. And it feels really scary because we live in a society that has a lot to say about that. And I’m trying to be really brave and just allow myself to be a human and feel things. And that’s all I really want to say about that for now.”
He then spoke about his unreleased track “The Mountain,” which includes the lyrics: “You can say I’m too young/ You can say I’m too old/ You can say I like girls or boys, whatever fits your mold.”
“Writing the song felt really important to me because it felt like a moment where I could address it in a way that felt close to my heart,” he explained. “And I guess I’m just speaking freely now, because I just want to be able to be closer to everyone and just kind of be in my truth.”
Mendes, who previously dated fellow singer Camila Cabello, has addressed speculation regarding his sexuality on a number of occasions over the years.
In an interview with Rolling Stone back in 2018, the Canadian-born star spoke about “this massive, massive thing for the last five years about me being gay.” At the time, there were a plethora of social media posts speculating about his sexuality.
“In the back of my heart, I feel like I need to go be seen with someone—like a girl—in public, to prove to people that I’m not gay,” he said. “Even though in my heart I know that it’s not a bad thing. There’s still a piece of me that thinks that. And I hate that side of me.”
He told the publication that after reading YouTube comments from people further discussing his sexuality, “I thought, ‘You f****** guys are so lucky I’m not actually gay and terrified of coming out.’ That’s something that kills people. That’s how sensitive it is. Do you like the songs? Do you like me? Who cares if I’m gay?”
Mendes answered those probing into his private life in 2016 by sharing Snapchat story in which he told his followers: “I don’t usually do this and bring up problems, but I was on YouTube just watching some of my interviews and I was going down the comments and I noticed a lot of people were saying I gave them a ‘gay vibe.’ First of all, I’m not gay. Second of all, it shouldn’t make a difference if I was or if I wasn’t.”
“The focus should be on the music not my sexuality,” he added at the time.
“I just want you guys, before you judge someone on the way they speak or act… I want you guys to think, Hey, maybe I shouldn’t be judging someone or wait, it actually doesn’t even matter. They can do or be or feel however they want to feel,” he went on.
“I’m not frustrated because people that I was gay at all,” he clarified. “I have no problem with that, because it wouldn’t make a difference to me. I’m frustrated because in this day and age, people have the audacity to write online that I’m gay as if it were a bad thing. That’s all they really have to say about that. I just wish those 1 percent of people [speculating] would grow up.”
Speaking with The Guardian in 2019, Mendes discussed his Rolling Stone interview and the long-running focus on his sexuality.
“For me it’s hurtful,” he told the U.K. newspaper. “I get mad when people assume things about me because I imagine the people who don’t have the support system I have and how that must affect them.”
Update 10/29/24, 5:40 p.m. ET: This article was updated with additional information.