Phillip Schofield has come out as gay

[catinb0oots]

Blimey. Married for 27 years.

blondie did he or Holly say she was sat at home watching or are you just imagining that she was?

I thought he was gay... I mean, I didn't know it wasn't a public thing, I thought it just wasn't mentioned because it's a known thing and not a big deal. I did not know that he had a wife though.

Perhaps when he met Steph he hadn't accepted he was gay.

If so it would have been better not to marry someone of the opposite sex, while he came to terms of it.

blondie did he or Holly say she was sat at home watching or are you just imagining that she was?

They said she was.

He would have hugged Eammon but he wasn't having any of it!

I don't see the need for the interview. All the back slapping and telling him he was brave was unnecessary. So disrespectful to his wife.

Mostly I wish in this day and age it wasn't headline news that someone was gay.

He's the one who put out a grand statement and devoted a segment to it on the most watched daytime show. He could have got divorced and dated whoever he wished in a low key fashion.

Itwas mentioned that his family were at home watching.

You just have to read some of the comments on this thread to understand why he didnt come out sooner. Of course his wife and children should get sympathy and support which I am sure they are. As for him telling her sooner/ not getting married etc if only it were that simple. Sexuality is fluid in many cases and even if he always was gay there is a high chance he didnt want to admit it even to himself. Look at how many people in the USA still try gay conversion therapy. A lot of assumptions have been made about what his wife did or didnt know, about cheating etc. I'm hopeful that nowadays someone wouldnt have such a inbuilt shame that it takes them over 20 years to admit who they are. It doesnt matter what the situation it is brave to come out esp in the public eye, you just have to look at twitter to see why. His statement and interview mentions his wife and children numerous times, he is not forgetting them and being gay doesnt change who he is as a father.

Sexuality isn't always straight forward and many people might think they're straight but struggle mentally for years to reconcile their own sexuality in their heads.

Thank you . I tried to convince myself for years and years that I was straight . As a Catholic growing up in rural Scotland , in an area that’s renowned for being very Christian - I couldn’t accept any different . I went as far as going on dates with men . I was so very anxious all the time and self harming and all sorts to cope .

I was in my late twenties when I finally got very drunk and admitted to my best friend, then my aunt, through WhatsApp, that I was a lesbian . I’ve managed to tell some of my family since - and friends, colleagues etc - but never my father or grandparents .

I genuinely felt if I told anyone before that I’d have been banned from working in most jobs, kicked out of home ... I don’t have any gay relatives and I was told at sixteen if I was one of ‘those people’ I wouldn’t ever be welcomed back to my grandparents - and was ultimately going to hell for eternal punishment anyway .

Of course when I told everyone they already knew apparently . Life just carries on as normal largely . Most people were immediately accepting . Two or three you can tell weren’t totally comfortable or didn’t know how to handle it .

But I never felt I was lying, or trying to deceive anyone - just that I couldn’t understand myself and couldn’t allow myself to accept it . I don’t think Philip has lied either - it’s very, very difficult to feel you ought to be a certain way and to try and shut out any differing version of yourself . I can easily imagine myself having married if a man loved me because I think that in a twisted way, that would help me to convince myself that I wasn’t gay, that to marry a man might have been easier perhaps .

Agree with pp who have said

• he was probably going to be outed so decided to "come out"
• the use of the public arena seems rather insensitive to his wife and kids
• yes its fucking shit he will be considered brave and inspirational whilst his wife and kids won't get a look in
• it's a terribly kept secret and a very unsurprising announcement

Hmm, funny how this bit of info emerges just weeks after rumours begin swirling that he's Not Very Nice. Now we all have to love him again because he’s so brave

This. Egotistical Philip Schofield. Be gay or don’t be gay, I don’t mind which, but don’t co-opt us into your self-indulgent ‘being truthful with myself after all these years’ circus.

I find it quite disingenuous that he actively played on his "family man" image with his wife on shows with him

i think thats a bit mean. Im sure he still loves her if you see what i mean, it makes me think of Freddie Mercury and Mary Austin. He obviously cared for her a great deal even though he was gay.

Him being gay has no relevance on how much of a good parent he is, either imo.

x3 threads on 'Trending'!

@zen1. Omg that video!! Who else were in the audience? Michael Jackson? Was that Prince Edward too?

I hope his wife did know.
I hope she knew when they got married & agreed to be in an open relationship.
I hope she's been totally fine with him sleeping with other people.
I hope she's fine with the attention now.
I hope their children are completely relaxed about it all too.

I don't really care about PS. He'll be fine.

Not really a shock but don't see why he had to make a big announcement about it...
I feel for his wife and kids 27 years is a long time to hide something from someone and dare I say a bit selfish actually.

This old interview is interesting

www.carolinephillips.net/articles/archive/newspapers/evening-standard/love-and-the-man-who-gets.html

It goes into some detail about gay rumours and having a girlfriend as a cover up. And it was from 27 years ago!

Watching Holly read the statement was seriously cringeworthy.

Perhaps his wife knew for a long time and they've dealt with it as a couple in whatever way they saw fit for their kids.

Or even right from the start of their relationship. Maybe she knew she was a beard and happy about it.

Has Andi Peters come out yet?

For those calling him names for being married - what do you expect him to do? Back in the 1980s and 1990s it was far far less acceptable to be gay, and many men (and women) hid those feeling from themselves and had heterosexual marriages (because they thought it would make them straight / because it was expected of them or whatever). Maybe he didn’t even know himself fully or at all.
Now the world is a much more tolerant place (except for some corners of MN it seems) and what is he to do? Continue to lie to his wife and family for the rest of his life? Or do this? He was stuck between a rock and a hard place and yes, I’m sure his wife is upset that her marriage is effectively over but..... would she have wanted to continue to live a lie? I wouldn’t want to, in her situation:

I don't know who he is and don't care, but this thread is really disturbing.

For an awful lot of people, it is not simple to know you're gay. They might not know. They might convince themselves they're bi. They might convince themselves they're straight.

Of course, it's perfectly possible this one individual is simply deeply unpleasant, always knew, deliberately lied to his wife, and shagged around with gleeful abandon. In which case, yes, poor wife.

But it's homophobic bigotry to insist he 'must' be bi, or he must have 'lied' or had a 'sham' of a marriage.

It's also incredibly naive to say he could have come out at any time, and he wouldn't have been judged. We've no idea about that. And even if the wider public would have accepted him, for all we know, he might not have felt able to accept himself.

There are plenty of people, in 2020, who know that if they come out a family member they love will no longer speak to them, or they'll risk physical violence, or they'll feel disgusted with themselves.

It's not trivial, and IMO this thread is perpetuating a lot of nasty myths about sexuality.

Or even right from the start of their relationship. Maybe she knew she was a beard and happy about it.
*

Do you believe this is likely with two kids?

Frenchfancie.......it was the 80s/90s not the fucking 50s!!!
I had loads of out gay friends in that time!!