I think that the two contexts are quite different. In the roommate situation, discovery of sexual orientation is almost inevitable (barring intentional celibacy). If potential roommates are openly hostile to homosexuality then it’s worth knowing that up front.
Work is another story. There’s no reason for people at work to know that you even have a sexual orientation, let alone that it’s different from theirs :-P.
In theory, yes, but in reality, I disagree. At any rate, I’ve always eventually known all my co-worker’s relationship statuses. (If they were single and never mentioned having a crush on anyone, I guess I did not know their orientation.) It’s just human nature: “Hey Joe, what did you do this weekend?” “My girlfriend and I went skiing – it was great.” If you’re gay and in a relationship, and want to discuss it at work as freely as any heterosexual does, then it will quickly become known that you are gay.
Yes, but if you’re living with somebody and are gay and having sex, then the situation is different because plenty of people are *not *going to tolerate that. And the question is not whether they should feel that way, but whether they will.
Valete,
Vox Imperatoris
Roommates and employers are entirely different animals. There are reasons why a roommate has a right to know you’re gay, but no reason why an employer should. I have never come out during a job interview (neither as the interviewer nor the interviewee), but have always eventually come out to coworkers, just in the natural course of workplace conversation.
Of course – a gay person sharing your home is more immediate than a gay person in the next cubicle. But I can imagine that there are also plenty of people who don’t like the idea of a gay person in the next cubicle.
If you don’t mind my asking, was it ever a problem for your co-workers? (Or boss?) Could you notice them treating you different any way after you came out to them?
But there are less of them, and you don’t *have *to tell them if you don’t want to. However, your roommate is going to eventually find out, and it’s better to get rejected before you move in than to find you’re stuff out in the street one day.
Valete,
Vox Imperatoris
Work is not the same as home.
People are allowed to deny you the right to be their roommate because of your sexual orientation (or because you’re short, or because you’re old, or because you like Star Trek but not Star Wars). If you don’t tell them up front and problems arise because of it, it’s tough shit on you.
In America, at least, people are not allowed to not hire you because you are gay. As someone else says, you do not have a sexual orientation at work. If people gossip when they find out or if you get fired, that is tough shit for them.
Yes, but rarely. Sure, there were comments behind my back, and the usual jokes, but very little to my face (where I would have preferred it). I have worked with/for some people who were real all-around jerks*, not merely homophobic . . . but overall, they’ve been the minority. I sing in our local gay men’s chorus, and many of my coworkers have been to our concerts . . . but there are a few who always seem to be busy on those dates. Their loss.
*I worked for one guy who felt it necessary to tell me every single gay joke that he heard, especially if it was AIDS-related. Of course, this was the same jerk who brought in a video of his wife giving birth, and wanted all of us to take it home and watch it. When his wife found out, she left him.
I think you’ll find there are several states in which sexual orientation is not a prohibited grounds of discrimination, and that, indeed, you can be fired or not hired because you are gay. Also, the military comes to mind.
Complete hijack, but that might not be to do with you being gay, it might be that they can’t imagine anything worse than spending an evening listening to a bunch of people singing, regardless if one of them happens to be a colleague… 
Is there some sort of protection for people who rent (i.e., if you have a lease and the landlord finds out you’re gay, can he evict you?)…seems to me there’d have to be some sort of protection.
In Spain students and young people usually stick to same-gender. In the case of students, it’s usually the parents who are paying the rent after all, and parents have a way of freaking out at the notion of their li’l one using the same shower as someone of the opposite gender and a different family. I can only come up with two cases I know where students below the Doctorate level were in mixed-gender arrangements. Note that this doesn’t “protect” li’l snookums from a roomie with Teh Gey :p.
People 30+ are a lot less likely to care. You want people who will pay bills on time, keep standards of cleanliness which don’t clash with yours, not bring the cops in and refrain from hogging the fridge. What underwear they use and what porn they download is their own business (so long as it doesn’t involve the internet cops knocking on the door).
I would mention it, as it is something which does freak out some people. I’m not gay, but I do mention my computer habit and that I’m liable to go on a rampage if someone leaves less than a full glass in my carton of fruit juice.
In the major cities I’ve lived in (big cities tend to favor the tenant), the landlord can only evict you for a lease violation, such as non-payment of rent or noise violations. Otherwise they have to honor the lease they signed. And it’s come up here before, that even if you have a guy rent out the 2nd bedroom, cash only and no lease, it’s generally still illegal to just change the locks one day while he’s at work.
But I think the point is that roommate shares are a much more personal relationship than landlord-tenant. It’s not the end of the world if your landlord hates you, so long as he keeps up the repairs you’ll get by fine. But your roommates hates you, that’s going to be a pretty miserable living situation. And there’s nothing to stop him from putting your stuff on the curb anyhow, tenant law be damned.
In Canada, beyond the rules concerning evictions (which vary from province to province), it is forbidden by the relevant legislation of all provinces and territories to discriminate in housing (and employment, etc.) on the basis of sexual orientation. Actually, Quebec was the first government higher than municipal level in the world to ban sexual orientation discrimination, in the Charte des droits et libertés de la personne in 1977.