- Hey, it's Rowan and today I'm going to be telling you
eight facts that are super gay that you might not know.
This video is sponsored by
Penguin Platform's Pride Book Club
because half of these facts came from this book.
They sent it to me, I loved it.
I'm gonna tell you more about it later, but first,
to the facts.
Number one, one of my favourite subjects, representation.
Did you know that the first kiss between two men
on British television was in Eastenders, of all places,
in 1989 and the first kiss between two women
pre-watershed wasn't until 1994 on Brookside, incidentally,
so soap operas, it turns out, are great.
Number two, you've probably heard that it's been 50 years
since the decriminalisation of homosexuality in the UK.
And although that it's technically true,
it comes with some caveats including the fact
that when it was originally decriminalised,
the age of consent for gay men was still higher
than for straight people at 21 years old
and the fact that the age of consent was not equalised
for everyone until 2001.
Number three is completely awfully, but it didn't
actually happen, so I'm choosing to laugh instead of cry.
In the 1990s, scientists working for the US military
produced a proposal for a gay bomb, the idea being
that they would put hormones onto their enemies
who would then turn gay and start fancying each other.
And for some reason that was meant to win wars.
I don't really understand.
It's awful, but like, kind of hilarious at the same time.
Number four, which I think is my favourite
new historical LGBT fact is the fact
that the longest running LGBT organisation,
which is still running today, was founded in 1946
in the Netherlands.
It was called the Centre for Culture and Leisure,
which doesn't sound that gay, but it was 1946, guys.
So amazing.
Number five, one of the most internationally recognised
symbols for LGBT safe spaces was also the symbol
that the Nazis used in order to identify gay men.
The pink triangle has been re-appropriated by the community
in the same that some verbal slurs have been.
The use of this symbol has definitely been controversial
for some, but personally, I really like the idea
that something that was used for such hatred
has been re-appropriated, twisted, and it's now used
for the exact opposite, a celebration of safety
and community.
Number six, the first sitting politician in the UK
to come out as gay was Chris Smith.
He came out in part because he saw other politicians
who were gay being hounded by the press in an attempt
to out them.
They weren't openly out, but they would have paparazzi
waiting outside their door to try and catch evidence
of the fact.
Some people even had their homes broken into,
nothing being stolen, but papers being rifled through
as if trying to find evidence.
Incidentally, he came out in 1984 because who doesn't love
that surveillance related irony?
Number seven, you may not have heard a lot about LGBT people
when you're at school and there was actually
a legal reason for that.
Something called Clause 28 or Section 28
of the Local Governments Act meant that for decades,
teachers were not allowed to talk positively
about LGBT people as a pretended family relationship.
This clause was in effect from the 80s all the way through
to 2003, but it also had a knock on effect because it meant
that teachers who were being trained during that period
didn't have proper training, so even if you were at school
after that, you may still have felt its effects.
And my eighth and final fact is about the rainbow flag.
Now, the rainbow flag has become synonymous
with the LGBT community, but in fact, can be seen
as early as the Reformation under all other kinds of causes.
The idea of the rainbow flag being a symbol
of the LGBT community started in the 70s
when Gilbert Baker decided that this was gonna make
a symbol of us.
Each of the colours has its own small symbol or significance
to the LGBT community.
Red for life, orange for healing, yellow for sunlight,
green for nature, blue for harmony or peace, and purple
for spirit, which is why on spirit day, you wear purple.
Rainbow flag is back, I hope that you enjoyed those facts
and that maybe you learnt a little something
that you didn't know before.
As I said, half of those facts came from this book.
This is Good As You by Paul Flynn.
It is an amazing memoir, as it says, of 30 year
of gay Britain.
Good As You is just one of six books
at Penguin's Pride Book Club.
It's gonna be reading from June through to August.
So maybe you're gonna read all of them,
and I recommend that you do, but if you can only read one,
allow me to make my case.
On the back of the book, alongside these guys
it says that, "this is the definitive pop culture history
"of British gay men" and I think that that is entirely right
and when I first got the book before I'd read it,
I pitched the idea of doing a video where we talked
about facts that were in the book, and although
there were a lot of facts, more than anything,
there were feeling and memories.
This felt like a memoir, which it is, but a memoir
of a time and of a community
rather than of a specific person.
I can see how this book could be interesting for people
who don't know anything about LGBT history at all,
a kind of discovery tool through the lens
of someone who really experienced it.
But for me, as someone who's pretty familiar
with a lot of the history which is covered in this book,
it was an emotional journey.
I cried quite a lot during this book,
and not the places that I thought I would.
I knew that there would be tragedies laid out
on these pages, but I cried at the happy things.
I cried at the happy ending because there was nowhere else
for my emotion to go other than to be expressed
in the most basic and human way possible.
So, that is my case for this book.
If you do wanna read along, then you can do so
by using the hashtag #pridebookclub on Instagram, Twitter,
and of course, YouTube.
I really wanna know if you've read this and what you think
about it.
If you have read it, then I wanna ask you a question.
Do you think that it was laws or things like pop culture
which changed people's perceptions more?
Thank you so much for watching
and until I see you next time, bye.