fajrdrako | The Making of Me... (Reply)

maaseru this evening. That's the show in which John Barrowman sets out to learn why he is gay and what made him that way. He specifically hopes to show that the cause of homosexuality is genetic or prenatal.

With John Barrowman, we had a unique situation: a celebrity who is gay, and interested in such a study, and who lives in the spotlight; TV producers with the resources to make such a show, which involved scenes in Cambridge, Chicago, London, California, and various other far-flung locations; and the cooperation of experts in orientation research in top universities in both the UK and the US.

Of course there are limitations on what the answers will be: nobody has definitive answers yet. But this show was far more interesting than I thought it would be. It'll have you staring at your fingers, for sure.

Perhaps of necessity - and the desire to stay on topic - sexual orientation was presented as an either/or thing: you're gay or you're straight. It's an easy dichotomy, but being bisexual, I am well aware that it doesn't reflect reality. Orientation isn't necessarily so cut and dried. I'd have liked to see the word 'bisexual' used somewhere... But then, they can't cram every aspect of a huge subject into one short TV show. Barrowman isn't bisexual, so it's beside the point.

Favourite details:

I love the way, as soon as he starts to talk to his parents, John immediate switches to his Scots accent.
The scenes with Scott were great. Endearing. It was fun to see their house in (I believe) Cardiff - yes, I'm an incorrigible fangirl, hadn't you noticed? There's a wonderful scene where Scott goes to the airport with John. "Where are you going this time?" Scott asks. "Toronto? Chicago?"

"You have a copy of my schedule," said John.

"You think I read that?"

...Too bad we didn't get to see the dogs.
The whole Barrowman family seems so nice. Good people. Good-hearted.
I turn the map around when I'm trying to read it in transit, too. Seemed natural to me!
John gets nervous before a concert? Who'd have guessed? And going by the evidence of this show - he's even more gorgeous than usual when nervous.
I was a bit surprised how much he wanted to prove that gayness in innate. I would add that I don't believe there is any plausible alternative: all the evidence implies that sexual orientation, like personality, is with us from birth and before. And extremely complex. A matter of biochemistry. masseru mentioned that fear that if a certain gene or hormone can be shown to cause sexual orientation, then people will try to manipulate that to change their children.

Alternately, I was reminded of a story I heard at a convention: How a speaker had talked eloquently how if we could prove that being gay was a matter of genetic biology, no one could be prejudiced against gays. A black man in the audience muttered: "Good luck with that."
I most enjoyed the bits about childhood personality: male twins in the same environment who have diametrically different personalities - the one likes trucks and guns, the other likes dolls and teddy bears.
There was a horrific bit about a man named Paul who had once gone to a mental hospital to be 'cured' of homosexuality. He suffered badly, was given drugs that made him horribly sick, and then was going to be given electroshock therapy. He refused, and left. Then some years later, met his psychiatrist again - at a gay bar.

A story almost as awful was of an ex-gay man who had married and now had children. He said he did it to be a good Christian, and because he saw how his parents had suffered when he was gay. Had he really changed? No. But like a smoker can given up smoking, or a sweet-lover can give up chocolate, he'd given up homosexuality for the sake of others.
John said that until 1980, homosexuality was illegal in Scotland. That's... shocking. Sometimes I forget how close the past is. But then... gays still can't marry in Scotland. And don't even get to have civil unions in most of the US.

Funny world.