"trouble"

[timandgavin4ever]

Who knows, gavin may have been the younger boy involved - he was only about 18 at the time......

[inkling]

oooo! yeah! that makes sense!!!

[Elf]

Yup, I like that theory. A young Gavin 'led astray' (cos, it would never be his fault..nothing ever is, right? )

So him getting engaged to crazy!Jenny would be perfect, because it would show it really wasn't his fault - he isn't gay! (much).

::ponders::

Elf
xx

[inkling]

i like that theory. It makes sense. And then later on after Jenny goes into the mental institution, he admits to himself that he IS, and he finds Timmy, or Timmy finds him.

[timandgavin4ever]

i feel a fanfic coming on

[inkling]

well, someone had better lol

[Elf]

timandgavin4ever said:

i feel a fanfic coming on

::ties you down...up...around...and forces you to write::

Don't tease us with such words! Just..write!!!

xx

[Elf]

If Gavin was only 19 when he met Jenny then he would have been underage for the court case etc. The age of consent for gay men in England and Wales was only reduced from 21 to 18 in 1994 - and down to 16 in 1999.

I'm also thinking...(I know..hard to believe)...about the social acceptance (or not) of homosexuality at the time. I'm crap with dates, but If Gavin was around 18/19 at the time of the 'incident', and if he really is 25 as of S4 ::snorts with disbelief:: that would put the 'incident' in the tail end of the eighties? (Someone tell me if I'm wrong) And Section 28 started off in '86 (as Clause 28), iirc. So the feeling of the time wasn't exactly supportive to homosexuality and was *definitely* against any sort of acceptance of being gay as being normal.

As was said at the time it was 'When gay became a four letter word'.

It makes me ashamed to be British to think that we only got rid of it again in 2003.

Elf
xx

[inkling]

hmn. From watching movies and shows that were made about that time I have to assume the conditions were MUCH better than in other times, and with a lot more people thinking 'meh. It's their life' or 'love is love', but with still a bunch of people very into the whole stereotype about dark alleyways/public toilets at night.

And i've tried many times to work out how old Gavin is supposed to be. I think that the whole show stuffed up so badly on timelines and ages. I always assume that he found Tim pretty quickly after Jenny got locked up, but i do like to think that they were friends first.

[timandgavin4ever]

that might have happened. But Tim knew nothign about Jenny so everything would have been a secret. I think he met Tim after she was sent to the loony bin

[inkling]

yeah, that's why i said 'not long after' Jenny. And he just never mentioned Jenny. Originally I thought that he'd have to take some time to get over her before other stuff happened (like being sure of his preferences, finding someone else, perhaps some random dating etc), mainly because i still think that he's a generally honourable guy, and i have the feeling that he LIKED Jenny, perhaps he managed to convince himself that he loved her, (which is why he never could tell her his 'news', and kept in contact) so needed to get his thoughts together first. And then he had some time to think. I'd like to think that Tim and Gavin wasn't like a one night stand thing that went on for wayyy longer, i can see them being friends first and then realising that they liked each other.

I probably have thought about this too much lol

[Elf]

inkling said:

hmn. From watching movies and shows that were made about that time I have to assume the conditions were MUCH better than in other times, and with a lot more people thinking 'meh. It's their life' or 'love is love', but with still a bunch of people very into the whole stereotype about dark alleyways/public toilets at night.

I think previously a whole lot of people just ignored homosexuality, and it wasn't exactly a 'polite' topic of conversation, so in some ways, conditions were better way back when because no one *was* thinking about homosexuality. (Well, some people were ).

Section 28 brought gays into the mainstream though - people figured that if the Government actually had to bring in a law that stopped people talking about homosexuality then it must be a fecking big problem. Also, by S28 making everyone think that even the mention of homosexuality in schools was illegal, a lot of misinformed numpties assumed this was proof that you could be 'taught' or 'catch' being gay. S28 did damage that we still haven't recovered from, and won't for a long time.

And you know you can never think about this stuff too much ;D. I too think Gavin didn't want to hurt Jenny - he is an honourable guy. I guess whatever his experiences were when he was young shaped how he is now. He keeps secrets - from Tim, from his parents, from a whole mess of people, b ut almost always because he wants, in some way, to protect the person/people he isn't telling.

I too think that Tim and Gavin somehow got to know each other first - I can't imagine Gav 'announcing' his homosexuality, so Tim might have had some work to do to figure out if Gav was 'worth' pursueing, or if he was just to be admired from afar... Or maybe Gav had to pluck up the courage to ask Tim out...and risk rejection.

Oooooh, the possibilities ::rubs hands together::

Elf
xx

[timandgavin4ever]

i reckon gavin spotted Tiom around one day and was smitten instantly and Tim knew it and probably played hard to get for a while

[inkling]

I reckon Gavin saw Tim, was attracted, stayed friends for ages, because he wasn't admitting to himself/everyone else how he feels, and then one of them took an initiative.

[timandgavin4ever]

i've worked out something:

Gavin was 19 when he proposed to jenny and 36 when he was pronounced dead. He was engaged to jenny for 5 years and with Tim for 10 so he was 24 when he "left" jenny and started seeing Tim when he was 26.....that leaves 2 years unaccounted for....hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm