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Why Gene Hunt is gay
I just realized something.
I've watched all 16 episodes of LoM at least two times now, some of them three times. On the second rewatch, I was trying to find my ship. Because yeah, Sam/Gene is the obvious one, but I didn't see much future there, not with Gene being either an actual heterosexual with homophobic tendencies or a fake heterosexual with homosexual tendencies so deep in the Nile that even a trained team of rescue divers wouldn't get him out.
I thought about shipping Sam/Nelson - and still am, because, hey, shiny shiny ship, isn't it? The gay and the racial issue in one fic. Besides, Nelson is fun, and Sammy needs some cheering up. But while the ship is nice, it doesn't really fit into the show. I will have to think of a way to make it work, because I want the angst of Nelson getting hurt/being killed in a hate crime and Sammy desperate and unable to talk to anybody about it, but for now, I let my mind wander into a different direction.
I was thinking about writing a Gene/Sam fic in which Gene is hot for Sammy but can't admit it, and so it happens that he gets desperate at some point and tries to simply take what he can't bring himself to ask for, only to have Sam beat the shit out of him and tell him that if he wants this, fine with Sam, but he's not going to get to take it by force. After some sulking and wound-licking there would be a long talk and then some hot steamy man sex with a side dish of guilt thrown in.
Now, in the process of finding a plot that would bring Gene to the breaking point, I did some research to find out about gay society in 1973 - and this was when I had my revelation.
Gene Hunt could be a stereotypical homosexual for that day and age - closeted, but definitely out to himself.
I have this smart book -Hogwarts Homosexuality, a History - and there's a chapter in there about gay liberation in the late 60ies till the 80ies. '68 - or rather '69 - was a turning point for the gay liberation. In '69, the Stonewall Riots happened in NYC, in which the gay community protested against the police raiding the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street. '71, the Gay Liberation Front released a manifesto in Britain, and in '72, 2000 men and women marched in Hyde Park under the flag of the GLF. In the same year, the first issue of Gay News was released. However, the average early 70ies gay man wasn't all that hot on all the attention. Homosexuality had been legalized in '67, gay communities had formed in bars and bookshops and baths, and many members of the gay population wanted to rather enjoy what they had than continue to march and scream for more. Also, the female part of the GLF wasn't too happy with the prevailing focus on the male gay society and split off in '72. Many other sub-groups followed, and the GLF scattered.
Now, 1973, we have the GLF still quite strong and united, although on the brink of breaking up. The members of the GLF are mostly people between 25 and 35. So that would exclude Gene Hunt. Let's assume he is gay, and aware of that. He's married in canon, but his wife is so invisible that she might just as well be no more than a facade. By 1973, Gene Hunt has trained himself to keep a very, very low profile about his sexual life. He probably almost never practised his sexuality, until very recently when all this Gay Liberation stuff started. With a population of about 500,000, Manchester is quite a big city even in 1973, and there are a couple of gay bars and places for the gay community to meet and interact. Gene has started visiting them, but he is known there under an alias, never takes anybody home or goes with them, and his visits are rare and random. At work, he play-acts his facade of the heterosexual homophobic copper like he has done all his life. It's not even a facade to him. It's who he is in his work life. Actually, the secret visits to the gay districts feel much more like a farce to him. He doesn't know what to think of this Gay Liberation idea, all he knows is that keeping the sex life separated from the work life has worked well for him all his life, and whose business is it anyway whom he fucks and whom he doesn't?
Right. Now I've talked a lot. I think it's time now that I wrote the fic in which Sam finds all of this out and shows Gene that there can be more to a gay relationship than a quick blowjob in a toilet stall.
Because Sammy would never let Gene blow him in a toilet stall, now would he. That wouldn't be appropriate at all.
I've watched all 16 episodes of LoM at least two times now, some of them three times. On the second rewatch, I was trying to find my ship. Because yeah, Sam/Gene is the obvious one, but I didn't see much future there, not with Gene being either an actual heterosexual with homophobic tendencies or a fake heterosexual with homosexual tendencies so deep in the Nile that even a trained team of rescue divers wouldn't get him out.
I thought about shipping Sam/Nelson - and still am, because, hey, shiny shiny ship, isn't it? The gay and the racial issue in one fic. Besides, Nelson is fun, and Sammy needs some cheering up. But while the ship is nice, it doesn't really fit into the show. I will have to think of a way to make it work, because I want the angst of Nelson getting hurt/being killed in a hate crime and Sammy desperate and unable to talk to anybody about it, but for now, I let my mind wander into a different direction.
I was thinking about writing a Gene/Sam fic in which Gene is hot for Sammy but can't admit it, and so it happens that he gets desperate at some point and tries to simply take what he can't bring himself to ask for, only to have Sam beat the shit out of him and tell him that if he wants this, fine with Sam, but he's not going to get to take it by force. After some sulking and wound-licking there would be a long talk and then some hot steamy man sex with a side dish of guilt thrown in.
Now, in the process of finding a plot that would bring Gene to the breaking point, I did some research to find out about gay society in 1973 - and this was when I had my revelation.
Gene Hunt could be a stereotypical homosexual for that day and age - closeted, but definitely out to himself.
I have this smart book -
Now, 1973, we have the GLF still quite strong and united, although on the brink of breaking up. The members of the GLF are mostly people between 25 and 35. So that would exclude Gene Hunt. Let's assume he is gay, and aware of that. He's married in canon, but his wife is so invisible that she might just as well be no more than a facade. By 1973, Gene Hunt has trained himself to keep a very, very low profile about his sexual life. He probably almost never practised his sexuality, until very recently when all this Gay Liberation stuff started. With a population of about 500,000, Manchester is quite a big city even in 1973, and there are a couple of gay bars and places for the gay community to meet and interact. Gene has started visiting them, but he is known there under an alias, never takes anybody home or goes with them, and his visits are rare and random. At work, he play-acts his facade of the heterosexual homophobic copper like he has done all his life. It's not even a facade to him. It's who he is in his work life. Actually, the secret visits to the gay districts feel much more like a farce to him. He doesn't know what to think of this Gay Liberation idea, all he knows is that keeping the sex life separated from the work life has worked well for him all his life, and whose business is it anyway whom he fucks and whom he doesn't?
Right. Now I've talked a lot. I think it's time now that I wrote the fic in which Sam finds all of this out and shows Gene that there can be more to a gay relationship than a quick blowjob in a toilet stall.
Because Sammy would never let Gene blow him in a toilet stall, now would he. That wouldn't be appropriate at all.
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Pink wafers, shiny. There's nothing like food of completely unnatural color to brighten up the day ;).
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If that could be seen as your plot summary (don't worry I'm not holding you to it) then I think you'll be OK. Mikey's stories have a closeted Gene who wants Sam and a Sam who has feelings for Gene that he can't get comfortable with as he's never "been" gay. It covers some of the same territory -- a background of what a closeted Gay man's life would have been like at the time -- but is definitely a different take on it. Her Gene *knows* himself and has had homosexual relationships before it is Sam trying to align his emotional feelings with being able to express them physically that is more the problem. I think you'd enjoy them and, as I said, if your paragraph above might be seen as a potential plot summary I don't really see a conflict.
If the dangerous food colouring bothers you we could just have some Garibaldis or a nice Party 7 instead... *g*
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And lol, I should stop talking so much about this fic. If I ever get around to writing it, I'll be way too anxious to get all of this across to produce anything useful, lol.
Party 7 sounds good! Hee xD.
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Undercover (http://mikes-grrl.livejournal.com/tag/undercover):
Sam accidentally discovers Gene is gay. Gene accidentally is led to believe that Sam is gay as well, and Sam is unable to 'clear the record' before they are drawn into a murder case involving the gay community. Sam essentially goes 'undercover' and in the process, 'leads' Gene on to thinking he has a chance with Sam and also gets a first hand perspective on gay life of the era.
I personally have no stake in whether you read these now or later, but in reading this thread it does seem we're talking about a lot of the same issues. NOT to put you off writing your version, NEVER! Because as I said, this is a concept that very few in the fandom have explored and I would love to see more writers taking on. ♥
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That said, I really look forward to reading your fic. It sounds very interesting :).
this is a concept that very few in the fandom have explored
That's surprising, actually. I'd have thought it would be one of the major fic themes in this fandom, considering how complex it is. Hee, all the better, more space for me to play with ideas xD.
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Yes, I was surprised at how little this idea has been explored, overall, as a complex and serious issue. I don't think my work quite delves into some of the murkier depths -- I do try to keep the boys happy, generally -- and there is just a lot of territory than can be covered here.
Now, a lot of fics DO assume Gene is gay, but not within the larger context of what it meant to be gay in that era, I guess because it is a whole can of worms than really gets in the way PWP!! LOL! But I think it is a fascinating topic.
I think there is also a tendency to view Sam as sexually comfortable with himself simply because he is from 2006. Like you, I think his personality would lead more to repression than anything. I've written him both ways, though. I generally just make hay with assumptions when I can! *evil laugh*
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Hee, then our fics will probably differ after all. My writing is usually more of the angsty, depressing kind - don't ask me why, it just seems to mostly turn out that way, lol. Except when I'm being silly, which happens quite often xD.
Hee, yeah, if you're taking the times into consideration, PWP, especially of the fluffy sort, is not all that easy to write anymore, lol. Although I bet a fic about a meeting somewhere in the woods including hot steamy seekrit man sex in the Cortina could be hot, too xD.
Like you, I think his personality would lead more to repression than anything
Hmm, actually, I think that if Sam had any gay tendencies, he'd be aware and accepting of them. He does repress a lot, but he's also very anal about his principles, and I think denying his own gay tendencies wouldn't really agree with those principles. He wouldn't be one of those people who shove their bi- or homosexuality into other people's faces, but I think he'd be aware of it and would stand his ground if confronted about it, because he'd have this grand idea of having to defend gay rights for the better of society. Lol xD.
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That's surprising, actually. I'd have thought it would be one of the major fic themes in this fandom
Well, I have a theory on that. I haven't been in any other fandoms, but it seems to me that a lot of the writers in this fandom - myself included - have never written anything before, never even wanted to, until LOM in general and Gene/Sam in particular just grabbed them by the heart and demanded to be written.
So you're talking people who don't know how to write, have no history or experience of writing, and therefore I think the tendency is to go for the simple and obvious stuff, leaving the more complicated things for when you have a little spare capacity outside of the mechanics of the actual writing. None of this is meant to denigrate anyone's work in this fandom, because I definitely count myself as one who just goes for the simple, obvious stuff, despite Mikey's very kind recommendation of Signals.
(I'd just like to clarify, btw, that my LJ is just used for archive purposes in the main. The "public" copy of Signals is at Signals Part 1 (http://community.livejournal.com/lifein1973/689869.html), Signals Part 2 (http://community.livejournal.com/lifein1973/690163.html) which is where you will find the comments).
For the sake of completeness, Signals follows on from my first ever posting, What Do Girls Do (http://community.livejournal.com/lifein1973/480606.html)
I'll look forward to seeing your fic when it's done, and - more importantly - welcome to the comm!
And I'd like to second Drayce's rec - Mikey does complicated very well indeed, and she also does detailed header notes so you can avoid anything that might be too close to what you're planning to write until after you're done.
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But LoM is such a small fandom, so it's probably just that in this fandom this subgroup is much smaller than in other fandoms.
I've read Signals and was going to comment as soon as I've read the prequel. Thanks for linking me to the other site; I'll leave my feedback there together with the other comments :).
And I am definitely planning on reading Mikey's fic. LoM might be small, but it's all new to me, so yay, loads of shiny new fic :D.