Puzzled - Philip Schofield

[howwillthispanout]

Sorry if this has been covered already but I’ve been offline all day - has there been any discussion re PS’s announcement today on this board? Especially in relation to wife and daughters

I'm starting to think the tears were genuine now, but not for the reason he would've had us believe. He's shitting himself if those twitter screenshots are to be believed.

Yep, apparently known the lad since he was 15. Helped him get his big break into tv. Took him under his wing. Grooming, essentially.

I am really angry about the manipulation of this. It utterly stinks. No wonder Ruth, eamon, fern et al are furious. Anyone decent would be.

I think it's possible to both understand that it can be hard to come out as gay, even in 2020, and to undersand that it could be devastating to find out that your husband is gay after so many years of marriage.

One doesn't negate the other.

We aren't yet in a society that fully accepts that LGB people exist and are allowed to love who they love - I know I was shocked when a 19 year old I worked with told me that he'd dated a girl because he was so terrified of the reaction if people realised he was gay. This was only a couple of years ago. (To his credit he was deeply ashamed of using her in this way, and had apologised to her for it, thankfully it was very short lived.) So I think it can still be a brave thing to come out.

But it doesn't change that, if she wasn't aware of this prior to marriage and kids, it's likely to be an awfully painful shock. I know I'd be broken up about it, it would taint a lot of good memories for me. And create a lot of self doubt.

I wonder if he's been reflecting on what befell Derek Mackay over the past few days.

James O'Brien not thinking about things from a woman’s perspective

Oh second big shock of the week

Wow that runner is very young! 21 or 22....to PS’s 57! I wonder if his side of things will come out or not

For a while now I've assumed James O'Brien claiming "not to have seen it like that" is simply an act. He can do the beardy woke bro thing to earn points, then play the "not seen it like that" card when it's pointed out how he disregards the rights of, say, women, and does a performance of open mindedness to earn more points.

The notable thing about O'Brien's "not to have seen it like that" is that even when he says "oh, I see now", within a short time he's back to his previous beardy woke bro-compatible views.

Agree nauticant

He is a bully on the radio especially towards women our voices are not as important as a man’s

I'm still struggling to see how announcing you want to have sex with men instead of your wife, is brave.

It isn't. Especially as he seems to have also announced that he isn't seeking a relationship. PR machine in overdrive.

There's going to be a lot of egg on faces if the rumour mill turns out to be correct

www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainment/news/dancing-on-ice-will-honour-phillip-schofield-in-this-emotional-way/ar-BBZN3op?ocid=spartanntp

Have a look over in AIBU:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3762687-what-s-happening-to-phillip-schofield

There is no way the comments made on that thread would be allowed to stand in FWR. Reflect on this: comments having a safeguarding character are often not permitted in FWR.

Not everywhere on fb is ignoring his wife. Check out Red magazines fb page Comments similar to here.

The Telegraph has a couple of articles from wives who've been through this. This one is good: www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/like-phillip-schofield-my-husband-came-out-gay-wont-recover/

When I heard the news that Phillip Schofield had come out as gay, after 27 years of marriage, my reaction was not to feel happy for him, or to admire his bravery and honesty, as so many others seem to have done. Instead, I felt physically, violently sick.

His confession took me back to the moment, a decade ago, that my entire world came crashing down when the husband who had supposedly loved, honoured and cherished me for 30 years, told me that he was homosexual and had been living a lie throughout our relationship.

It was the ultimate betrayal and humiliation. It made me feel that I had lived half of my adult life in someone else's closet, as his ‘beard’. Those are years that I can never get back.

When gay men marry straight women, hoping they can repress their sexuality, they’re not only fooling themselves, but ensuring future heartbreak for those they claim to love. It ruins families.

Schofield states that his wife and daughters are being supportive, and he’s clearly getting plenty of support from the public, but I suspect his overriding emotion is one of relief. It’s his wife and daughters who really need the support. In fact, the praise my ex-husband got for his lies only added to my own pain.

This was posted on another thread. Its the only interview he will do.

www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/10923868/phillip-schofield-admits-he-knew-he-was-gay-when-he-wed-27-years-ago-in-his-only-interview-on-coming-out/

I think ITV have a lot of questions to answer on safeguarding, and how it was an open secret that a major talent was effectively grooming a young man. Ruth is alleged to have made a formal complaint against PS. As such, she will have been obliged to keep quiet whilst an investigation was conducted. I wonder whether the PR company PS hired put out the rumour that the complaint was due to him cutting her off abruptly in a studio handover, as a cover. I think there is a moral in this. LISTEN TO THE MIDDLE-AGED WOMEN WHO PUT SAFEGUARDING FRONT AND CENTRE.

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/feb/08/phillip-schofield-and-jameela-jamil-two-tales-of-coming-out?CMP=share_btn_tw

That Guardian article is very flawed.

1. It entirely avoids saying what Queer actually means
2. The assumption that nobody knew PS was gay. Purrleese!

You mean the runner person? He was in his 20s though. Or someone else?

From that Sun interview:

TV golden boy Phil, who hid his secret for years from his beloved wife, admitted struggling with suicidal thoughts and to having therapy as he tried to put the issue to the back of his mind.

And he said: “If you ask anyone who is gay, they know — there is no confusion.”

And

Phil, who shared the news with the nation on Friday’s show, also confessed he did not know if his marriage would last — and refused to say if he was in a relationship with a man.

The brave This Morning host has admitted he was “naïve” to think he could suppress his sexuality when he wed wife Steph.

And while he battled his emotions for years, he says “amazing” Steph has known he was gay “for a while”.

And

While the news would devastate most marriages, Phil credits Steph as his closest ally throughout his battle. And he says there was never a dramatic showdown over his sexuality.

This doesn't get better the more I read.

The idea that his wife is supposed to react in a dramatic way and if she does its all OK and she's amazing. The idea that he can somehow still stay married boggles me.

It's utterly devoid of any thought for her even now and it's very much all about him.

It's appalling.

The runner was in his mid teens when the contact started. Ps was in some kind of mentoring position at his theatre school (gets better this, doesn't it?)
Twitter then shows ps followed him on there when he was just 15, then got him his break into itv. Looks like it then played out over several years.

Derek Mackay sprang to mind. Can’t quite figure out why...

Agree it sounds very like Mackay and I don't see why having an affair and leaving your spouse for a much younger man whose boss you have been and who you started being interested in when they were a teenager is OK if it's a same sex relationship and not if it's opposite sex. Hetero men are prick orientated and abusing their power, gay men are brave and stunning. Boris got much more stick for leaving his wife for a 30 year old woman and he's 2 years younger than Schofield.

No surprise that one of the other PS threads has just been zapped.

Posters expressed concerns over (a then) 15 year old boy - the runner.

We also expressed that he was not stunning or brave and that our support is for his wife, daughters, colleagues and the aforementioned young man who Philip mentored.