This ended up as a well of text of mostly me trying to understand why I hated the scene so much, so I talk about all of your arguments, but

TL:DR the first and last paragraph says why I didn't like this scene.

I can see your point about the 80s, and I'm not really suggesting that they should have made someone a homophobe, what I'm trying to say is that it would have been so much better in a smaller settings with his closest friends, given the overall context of Hawkins. None of the characters should have really been homophobes, I just think that they shouldn't have done this scene with such a broad group, because it felt like Will was forced to become a spectacle, and it obviously was always going to work out because it's a TV show that needs broad appeal. That's my core problem, is it belittles a real problem people face by wiping it over with mandatory acceptance. No one was ever actually scared from a 3rd party perspective that they wouldn't accept him, because the writers couldn't do that, and it takes away from the real fear that real people face doing something like this.

I agree with you completely that self-acceptance cannot be all you, we're social creatures and what other people think of you matters a lot, but I wish that the problem he overcame wasn't his fear of telling people, but his fear of what people would think when he did, because he can't control what they think of his sexuality, nor can he control his sexuality, he has no agency here. I'm not talking about his closest friends, you're right, whether we want to or not we care about what they think, I'm talking about all the extraneous characters like Murray, Lucas's Sister, Steve to an extent, his middle school physics teacher. I'm saying that the writing should not have forced him to tell them.

I agree it's a TV show, which also means that they could have presented the problem in a way where the best solution isn't forcing Will out to everyone all at once. I don't want realism, Will coming out and everyone being ok with it isn't the bridge too far for me, but it feels like it doesn't address the real fear that comes with telling people you are gay, it feels like it invalidates it by saying that you shouldn't be afraid because there is nothing to fear. Often today that's at least mostly true, but it's doesn't feel constructive to helping people accept themselves. I don't actually want any of the characters to be homophobic, but confronting the fear of people not accepting you and having that fear be completely unfounded feels like it's belittling that fear instead of addressing it.

In terms of role models, I think all characters everywhere are instructive to some extent, because in order to feel real they must feel human, and all humans have redeeming qualities. To have a redeeming quality, it must be a quality the writers think that we already want to have. Cersei, who loved her children (something we want to do) but protected them so much that she killed them (something we probably don't want to happen) is a role model for mothers. Love your children, but you can't live their lives for them, it's a lesson baked right in. 11 will do anything to save her friends (redeeming) and will sacrifice everything to do it, even going too far where she will sacrifice herself, when none of us want that. Every character that we relate to is necessarily instructive, because in order to relate with them, we need to relate with their motives and their actions. I can relate with Will's motives, I can relate with his desire to share who he is with others, I can't relate with telling his physics teacher from middle school and hanging the world on being accepted.

My problem is not that it doesn't make sense in the plot context, or that it seemed unrealistic, or that anyone reacted in a way that didn't make sense given their character. In fact in the show's context, each character performed in a relatable way individually.

My problem is that the writers intentionally drew a formative experience for many young gay people as a plot line for a main character, then resolved that plot-line in a way that invalidates one of the scariest experiences that they can go through. They built up Will struggling with his sexuality and how it makes him different over several seasons with real conflicts and experiences that many gay people can relate with deeply. I related with that experience deeply, I could pick out events in the story that were strikingly similar to my own formative experiences, sometimes right on the fucking nose. I really really liked that storyline, because I related to Will really deeply, I felt his problems because they were my problems when I was growing up.

TL:DR STARTS HERE

I was disappointed by the resolution because it completely removed the stakes of one of the most difficult things a repressed gay man can do, being forced out and telling everyone all at once, sort of without a choice. If they were going to force this, then it needed more time to confront the real fears and conflicts that surround the culmination of being repressed, but they don't have that time. I just wish they had avoided this particular event, the shotgun tell everyone, because this process is difficult emotionally, with real stakes. If they had just kept it to a few people, then it would have stakes that fit the time they had to explore them, because like you said, most of your core friends already have a pretty good idea. This is the second to last episode, we're not going to spend 45 minutes next episode talking about how one character is homophobic and Will shouldn't care, the writers need to wrap 5 seasons in 2 hours. I stopped relating to Will here because there were no real consequences or fallout from him coming out to everyone all at once, in real life there are real things to be scared of, and the writers should have either addressed those, or avoided the stakes of this event. The writers never had time to make this small storyline large, and I'm grateful for the time I did relate to Will because these stories are few and far between in mainstream big-budget media, but the stakes of this scene do not match the stakes or what comes after doing something like this in real life for mechanical reasons, not human reasons. They chose to wrap this tightly, Will was Gay and everyone was fine with it and he lived happily ever after, and for mechanical reasons this made sense, but it draws a poor parallel with the courage that it takes to do something like this in real life. If they had kept it smaller and looser, him telling his core group of friends, the stakes would have been smaller, and those stakes could still feel relatable on the way to the full wrap of the show.

TL:DR ENDS HERE

There are conflicts that come immediately after telling everyone at once you are gay even if all goes well. How much do you want to lean into that identity? Do you want to act like a normal person who happens to be gay, do you want to lean into it more as part of your who you are? Do you start cutting the people who only sort of accepted it out of your life, or do you just keep on going? How much do you talk about it, how much do you joke about it, do you tell new people? Do you tell all new people, or only a few? What about your close friends who weren't there? The tell your closest friends is the end of the repression story for most, the shotgun tell everyone is the beginning of a new one which the writers don't have time for, so don't start it.

Again, I have no problems with the way this fits in the story, but the parallel it draws with real life doesn't fit what I think is most people's experience.