For #Pride Month, I'd like to mention #Babylon5. The show ran from 1993 to 1998, and made a point of not making a point of gay relationships. Susan Ivanova (serving military officer) had a lesbian affair with Talia Winters, and no other character even blinked.
Later on two straight men on a secret mission found themselves using "newlyweds" as a cover story, because two men on their honeymoon would fit right in.
The message was clear: in the future being gay is 100% unremarkable. In the 90s!
@tokensane great points, and I'd also like to add all of the little queer allegories inherent in B5's depiction of telepaths - a small minority who are born differently than others, typically find out they're different in adolescence, aren't allowed to touch each other, and who need to either register with the government, go to jail, or take Alan Turing-style blockers that slowly kill them.
it's no coincidence that ivanova and talia are both teeps, that mundanes seem to mistrust and avoid them so much, that there's such strong "queer polycule" vibes in Byron's group in S5 (including a pair of women who are shown visibly physically close to one another and described as "closer than sisters"), or that the Shadows, a thinly veiled Nazi allegory, are depicted as previously having tried to commit genocide against teeps (including having wiped them all out from the Narn homeworld).
like, especially for a show run by a cishet guy in the '90s, there's so much nuanced understanding of queer issues and history present there. B5 seriously does a better job at that than most modern TV shows.
Jessie Gender (trans) and Vera Wylde (genderfluid) of Council of Geeks have a free weekly podcast where they break down an episode of Babylon5 each week and offer a bit of an LGBTQ+ perspective where applicable. they're up to season 3 episode 18, but you can go back to episode 1 and start there, or ever further back for a complete breakdown of Farscape
@tokensane They proceeded to make jokes when the "newlyweds" plot was concieved. And NONE Of them were about the M/M aspect; they were all about the specific two characters as a married couple!
@tokensane In token sane countries, being gay was 100% unremarkable in the 1990s. I am slightly worried that that may have been a high water mark, and that under this blizzard of right-wing bio-essentialist hatred in the media we may be starting to slide backwards; but here in Scotland (and in many other places in Europe) homosexuality had ceased to be an issue twenty-five years ago.
Which, seeing it was actually illegal here fifty years ago, is in itself remarkable.
@tokensane Ivanova & Talia was meant to be a proper relationship that shaped both characters and the show but a mixture of huge push back from the network & Andrea Thompson's (the actress who played Talia) agent demanding more money & screen time for her, resulting in her being written out of the show & the romantic storyline being removed & shifted.
@tokensane I remember the mission with Marcus and Franklin. It was just so matter of fact. Although Marcus playing the annoying spouse and Franklin annoyed at him (not the cover identity) was HILARIOUS.
We had a democratic president in the 90’s. Clinton was elected in ‘92 & served 2 terms. He wasn’t my first choice among Dems but it was Clinton or Bush. I don’t vote GOP & I didn’t like Bush. There were reasons. We can send the haters back to their basements, churches, whatever and have a truly free society if we have the will and unite for a better society for US all. The Fascists will hate it but they have nothing to offer US but pain and cruelty. No.
@tokensane It's great that they just accepted the relationship rather than have a story where one of the people used to be the opposite sex, as happened around the same time in #StarTrek#DS9.
I'm a fan of both shows and respect them both. 10 years earlier most gay people had to be in the closet. Until the past few years, acceptance of all people has improved quickly in my life.
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