Censored! – Queer moments of ’90s TV that changed history – with Scott Bryan

Talk ’90s to me

This episode explores how 1990s British television served as a vital lifeline for queer youth growing up under the restrictive Section 28 law. Host

Key takeaways

• Scott Bryan grew up in a conservative area during Section 28, relying heavily on TV to navigate his queer identity due to a complete absence of school education or internet resources.
• The BBC pulled the educational film Two of Us from its daytime slot due to fears over Section 28 and tabloid backlash, eventually airing it at 11:30 PM with an ambiguous ending after pressure from creators.

Main topics

• Section 28 and media censorship
• LGBTQ+ representation in 1990s British TV

Notable quotes

"TV, being one of the only places in our culture where you could, like it had a responsibility that it didn't know it had."

Conclusion

The episode underscores how 1990s television, despite political and media

Transcript preview

Speaker 5 (0:05) Hello and welcome to Talk 90s to Me, where we move through teenage crushes on Blue Peter presenters, wonder about gay kisses on Biker Grove, miss out on Queer as Folk entirely before coming back to it as an adult. understand that Doctor Who is, at heart, the gayest show ever, and generally work out our life as a queer kid through watching a lot of TV. I'm Miranda Sawyer, and this week on Talk 90s, I am delighted to be discussing 90s gay television with the excellent writer, broadcaster, and podcaster, and... What a TV head, Scott Bryan, whose new book out now is here. You can see it. Weaves telly and life together and is an absolute delight. Hello, Scott. Speaker 1 (0:49) Oh, thank you for that lovely introduction. Thank you. Speaker 5 (0:51) Although I realise I think your crushes on Blue Peter presenters started younger than teenagers. Speaker 1 (0:56) Yeah, I sort of had a... I think I got fascinated by kids' TV presenters just growing up. TV just felt so big that I once wrote a letter to Katie Hill when I was about seven or eight saying, can you come round to my house for three days and two nights? And that there's nothing happening was my explanation. It looks like a threatening ransom note. And then my parents just never sent it. I think they kept it just to tease me as an adult, really. Yeah, you're like, I'm Speaker 5 (1:24) bored, Katie. Come round, entertain me. But that was my Speaker 1 (1:27) relationship with TV. I just thought that people could just come round to my house. They're Speaker 5 (1:31) already in your house. What's wrong? Speaker 1 (1:33) Exactly. Speaker 5 (1:34) So, look, you are our youngest guest ever on Tall Nighties, I think. Because you were born in 1989. I was. So you were literally a baby in 1990. But because you were born to do this job, which is being a telejournalist, your life has been... maybe marked, maybe even shaped by the shows that you watched on television. And you, because you were also a brilliant journalist, sent me a long list of various shows that were important before the 90s. Yeah. Some of which we'll kind of touch on. You essentially have used TV shows as kind of beacons that shine a light onto different stages of your life, haven't you? Speaker 1 (2:16) Yeah, massively. I mean, I think TV has always been... a core part of my life. I sort of write about it as a journalist, but it has felt for me that I've been heading this way throughout my whole life to be writing about it. It's something I think about all the time. And I think I grew up in Dorset in a lovely area, but somewhere that was quite conservative, quite far away from queer scene and anything. So I relied on TV, I think heavily in terms of trying to find out my own identity. Like I have a really supportive family. But there was nothing really anything else like the internet was not really a thing. Yeah. Endorse it until 2018. So, so I think you had to, I was using TV a lot about trying to work out who other people were, work out where I was fitting in with it. And I think like when I was a storyline and a soap that touched on queerness, I think I really, really, really relied on it as a form of guidance. But also, I was growing up in the generation of Section 28. Speaker 5 (3:24) This is like absolutely, I think it's so important because Section 28 was like 1988 and essentially lusts. throughout the 90s, just into the kind of early 2000s, because it's repealed in Scotland in 2000 and then in England and Wales in 2003. But the 90s is a Section 28 decade. Speaker 1 (3:42) It is, yeah. And what that did... Do you want to Speaker 5 (3:45) explain what Section 28 is, just in case people don't Speaker 1 (3:47) know? So essentially it all comes from, I think, sort of two things. There was the HIV and AIDS crisis in the 1980s, which, of course, was awful. At the same time, there was a lot of moral panic in the tabloid press. And what that caused, I think, is a lot of fear about the LGBTQ plus community at the end of the 1980s. Thatcher and the moral right really picked up on it. And they basically introduced a sort of very like wide, but very vague law, which banned... the promotion, in inverted commas, of homosexuality in local education. So it meant that for a generation of really anyone who grew up in the 1990s into the early noughties, there was nothing that told them in school that their queerness was OK. Speaker 4 (4:40) And Speaker 1 (4:40) I think what that, but also at the same time, I wasn't told that that law even existed. It's Speaker 5 (4:48) just like the ether that you're in. Speaker 1 (4:50) A hundred percent. So like teachers couldn't really give you any positive encouragement. And I didn't really receive any in school. There was also nothing educational in the library that was talking about all of, you know, about shaping your identity. And there was an absence that I think let homophobia thrive. Like it really, it really did. Because, of course, the bullies would not be seeing anything done in place. Like my school didn't have any. rules against homophobia. So it just led that culture to thrive. I therefore used, I think, TV in terms of trying to find a bit of guidance. And I think a lot of other queer kids did as well. But TV, being one of the only places in our culture where you could, like it had a responsibility that it didn't know it had. So you have these big seminal moments, you know, Queer as Folk and Brookside and Biker Grove too, but... That happened to be if you were watching TV that day. Like queerest folk passed me by because I was quite young, but also it was past the watershed. So you were very much, I think, relying on something to happen. When it did, you had nothing really to compare it to. So those moments were important. But I think essentially my belief is like a whole generation's worth of queer storytelling. Speaker 1 (6:09) just didn't exist on TV because it had been taken away from us by the law, essentially. And it's only when I look at the next generation coming through now that there is a little bit of envy because I feel that they've got a lot more. It's not perfect by any stretch, but they've got a little bit more than our generation. had. Speaker 5 (6:28) Yeah, I mean, you quote, which I had completely forgotten in your book, what Thatcher said. She said, this is, I mean, I kind of feel like I can't believe that I grew up through this as well, you know what I mean? Children who need to be taught to respect traditional moral values are being taught that they have an inalienable right to be gay. So you're choosing. Speaker 1 (6:48) Yeah, but also at the same time, she was reflecting wider public view. I mean, she was Speaker 5 (6:55) She Speaker 1 (6:55) was Speaker 5 (6:55) reflecting a certain public view because obviously I grew up, you Speaker 1 (6:58) know, drawing Speaker 5 (6:58) Thatcherism. And we like, you know, me and my friends did not have that view. Like you were against that at all times. But it's just I think sometimes it's good to be reminded that actually that's what everybody was operating under. Speaker 1 (7:10) Yeah, I think also I think there were studies around that time saying like an attitude survey that did say that it was a vote winner to be supporting those views. You know, I think there is a... a difference according to where you are in the country and your circumstances. Of course, a lot of people and a lot of activists rallied against it. But it was something that I think the Tories at that time really kind of capitalized on because it knew it would help them. And it did in terms of the election. And I think that when the law was lifted in 2000, 2003, according to whether you're in Scotland or England, it wasn't like they were like... great, let's make everything inclusive. Let's bring in a lot of rules. Like Speaker 5 (7:51) nobody, things didn't shift. Things Speaker 1 (7:53) didn't shift straight away. It had been repealed and thankfully so. But I was also living in that sort of absence still, really. I think it's only probably like in the mid 2010s that I think more inclusivity has started to be baked in. But even then now, I think. is not enough. Like in even things I find like sex education. All the heterosexuals were told how to do it and we had absolutely nothing. And that might seem not that much to think about. Of course, we could just Google and go on the internet and find out. But Speaker 5 (8:25) that's not the same. But Speaker 1 (8:26) it's not the same. And it's kind of like... It makes it Speaker 5 (8:28) all secret. Speaker 1 (8:29) Secret and you can't be told about it and that leaves a mark. It's all of those little bits I think adds to a life. Speaker 5 (8:35) Yeah, definitely. OK, look, in your book, obviously, as I said, at the beginning of the 90s, you are one. However, you do your research because you are you, which is really great. And one of the things that you talk about was a show that I really had no recollection of or, you know, it just passed me by. And it's a show called Two of Us, which essentially. you say, and from your description, is a teenage show very much like Heartstopper, meaning that it's about two boys who fall in love. It's a sweet story, but it was pulled by the BBC and it was actually shown around the time of the introduction of Section 28. Do you want to talk about two of us? Yeah, Speaker 1 (9:22) of course. Because Speaker 5 (9:22) I find it so interesting, this. Speaker 1 (9:24) Yeah, I stumbled across this story too. I had not come across it before until I started researching this book. And I wanted to look at what the environment was like when I was born in the early noughties. And it was made for like a, it was an educational strand called scene. It's a bit in the day when the TV would get taken out of the cupboard with the little wheels to in class. Yeah, exciting. Speaker 5 (9:50) Exactly, Speaker 1 (9:51) the best part of the day. Speaker 5 (9:52) The massive telly. The massive telly with the little wheels. We're Speaker 1 (9:55) there Speaker 5 (9:55) on Speaker 1 (9:55) the Speaker 5 (9:55) tea trolley. Speaker 1 (9:56) Wonderful. And then the idea would be, it's a 60-minute film. It explores a social issue. They had done ones on feminism, on live aid, on the HIV AIDS crisis. And this was to explore kind of the... the issues that a lot of homosexual men were facing at that time. So it was a lovely, sweet film, 60 minutes. The film was also shown on BBC Two in the early evening. So that allowed screenwriters to come on board. And it was devised and directed by Roger Tong. And he brought on a writer called Leslie Stewart. And it's a film on which two boys, one is essentially excluded, a bit like Heartstopper because of his sexuality. The other sort of he likes boys and girls and he's sort of navigating that. They fall in love. All very heartwarming. So then to find out from the research that it had been pulled, like you can see this film on YouTube. It's tame. There's nothing that really happens. There's a single kiss between the boys. There's a happy ending where they go to the seaside. Essentially what happened was it was filmed during sort of Section 28 was coming into force. media environment was becoming incredibly toxic. It then got pulled from its airing. And essentially it was around the idea of, okay, well, let's wait until after the election. Maybe everything will die down and it will be okay. The election comes along. And of course, the Tories then introduced Section 28 afterwards. And to be fair to the BBC, like there's a senior executive, Alan Rogers, who really did want the film to air. But they had accepted that there would have to be changes made. And Roger and Leslie were fiercely protective in trying to keep as much of it as possible. So essentially, they said, well, we can't have the happy ending between the two boys. We're going to have to make it ambiguous. Because Speaker 5 (11:55) gays cannot be happy. Speaker 1 (11:56) Yeah, well, Roger and Leslie accepted it because they said, well, the message of the film, the bits of dialogue are so important. And also, bizarrely, if you don't have a happy ending for them, you'll still feel sorry for them and you'll still have a lot of empathy for them. Yeah, Speaker 5 (12:12) so Speaker 1 (12:12) it's Speaker 5 (12:12) like the journey. You're telling the story and the ending is... Whatever that ending is, you're still invested in the characters. Speaker 1 (12:17) Yeah. And Roger told me he was in his late 80s. He said that he had heard from a classroom discussion with a kid who was confused by the ending, asked her teacher about it. And the teacher was like, well, what did you want to happen? And then that started a thoughtful conversation. So they didn't mind so much about that. They also had a single kiss in the film removed. which is a great shame. I think it's also worthwhile pointing out that back then the age of consent was much older for homosexuals. It Speaker 5 (12:48) was Speaker 1 (12:48) 21. It didn't get reduced until 1994. And even then it didn't match. No, it got reduced to 18. Yeah, reduced to 18. So the film ended up being shown, bizarrely, they didn't want to air it in the middle of the day because of fears that somehow that would be implicated in Section 28 and it would be aimed for kids. So it ended up airing very late at night. 11 Speaker 5 (13:10) .30 at night. 11 Speaker 1 (13:11) .30 at night on a Friday, which is, I think, the first time that has ever happened and ever will for a show that is aimed at kids. But Roger... just gave me a pack of letters that they had received. And it's some of the most heartbreaking correspondence ever. I think a lot of people highlighting just... And it's Speaker 5 (13:28) from kids that have seen it. Speaker 1 (13:29) Kids who have seen it. Some say that they were thinking about taking their own lives. And this was the first time that they had seen something. A lot of people who are older, who had just never seen that, I think, vulnerability between two male leads ever. And they would have said it would have made a big difference to them if they had seen it earlier. What I find the most staggering thing is what happens... two years later. So the BBC then decided to air it during the day in the original time slot around that