How "Sex Education" (Almost) Subverts the Closeted Homophobic Bully Trope
Warning: spoilers for the first two seasons of “Sex Education.”
In recent years, a certain problematic trope has proliferated in popular media: the “closeted homophobic bully.” The widespread notion that people who exhibit homophobic behavior are secretly gay themselves is not an entirely false one, but it doesn’t speak to the systemic and cultural thorniness of homophobia either. Pop culture’s perpetuation of the idea that repressed sexual desire is the main root of homophobia ignores other real factors, particularly the environment-based social ignorance that results in deeply entrenched misconceptions about masculinity and power.
The trope has manifested in multiple TV characters, usually teen jocks, in the past decade: Dave Karofsky on Fox's “Glee,” Monty de la Cruz on Netflix's “13 Reasons Why,” and Nate Jacobs on HBO's “Euphoria.” There are countless other examples of this trope that exist in TV, film, and literature—and the fact that it is such a prominent motif in pop culture is worth recognizing and critiquing.
These kinds of depictions invite the reductive idea that homophobic behavior always stems from homosexuality, that homophobes are just projecting their own sexual insecurities onto people who have embraced their queerness. Apparently the rage, aggression, and bravado of a homophobe is simply a performance, a mask for the inclinations they’ve been taught are unacceptable. By classifying “straightness” as the complete, binary opposite of “gayness,” the trope simultaneously pigeonholes and limits all gay men into one specific category. How do we dismantle homophobia if we’re just focusing on one small fraction of it?
Whether intentional or not, this portrayal can also play into a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy in which screenwriters can exact revenge on the most vilified group in society—cis straight white hypermasculine men with superiority complexes—by imbuing them with a secret same-sex attraction and coding it as something to be ashamed of. It’s the kind of lazy, ass-backward way of thinking that seems righteous and subversive on its surface but only serves to reinforce a cultural misunderstanding of queerness.
Netflix’s phenomenal coming-of-age dramedy “Sex Education” applied this trope in its first season to Adam Groff (Connor Swindells), a stereotypical bully who emotionally and physically torments his openly gay classmate Eric (Ncuti Gatwa) before giving him a blowjob during an afternoon of detention. This abrupt development, which occurred in the penultimate episode of season one, rang a bit hollow, especially considering the series’s nuanced, honest, and impeccably well-crafted portrayal of sexuality and gender.
“Sex Education” understands the messiness of sexuality better than real-life sex education, so it’s rather frustrating that the inclusion of the closeted homophobe trope is its major blind spot. The beginning of season two finds Adam at military school, as he bonds with two of his army-mates before discovering the two giving each other handjobs. Initially, he’s cool with it, an unexpected sign of growth for someone who regularly made homophobic remarks the previous season. But quickly, Adam reneges on this progression when he later outs the army-mates to the headmaster, perhaps hoping it’ll buy him back a place at the academy when he’s framed and expelled. His personal stagnation continues when he returns home and sees that Eric is in a relationship with the mysterious but attentive French transfer student Rahim (Sami Outalbali). Jealous of their openness as a couple, Adam ventures to Eric’s house late one night and the two smash glass together in a junkyard before sharing a kiss at dawn.
Adam and Eric’s romantic reunion makes sense in the context of this season’s overarching plot—everyone’s relationships unravel through some form of self-sabotage—but the show’s insistence that they are meant to be together is perplexing at best, contrived at worst. Rahim is unabashed about his affection for Eric and diplomatic when they encounter conflicts, while Adam is embarrassed to be with Eric in public and cavalier about how his embarrassment impacts Eric. Even the main character Otis (Asa Butterfield) believes Eric is making a mistake having these secret meet-ups with Adam—a shrewd move on the writers’ part that both recognizes Adam’s history of abuse and gives Eric some insight into why he shouldn’t be with Adam.
Eventually, Eric does come to his senses during a fantastic scene in episode six, when he confronts Adam and tells him about not only the years of trauma he experienced from Adam’s bullying, but also the pain he felt when Adam didn’t want to hold his hand. It was at this moment that I thought the show was finally holding Adam accountable for his actions.
In the following two episodes, Adam finally admits that he’s bisexual, a refreshing revelation that acknowledges his attraction to Eric doesn’t negate his attraction to women. But rather than allowing for more time to revel in this newfound self-discovery and examine the factors that made him repress this part of his identity, Adam instead decides to follow his heart and declare his love for Eric in front of a crowd of people during the season finale’s climax. Eric accepts, despite not getting an apology from Adam, and the two reconcile, leaving Rahim in the dust. This is where “Sex Education” lost me again.
It’s great to see Adam embrace the vulnerability of being out, but making him be with a boy he barely knows on a personal level—let alone an emotional one—again feels like a disappointing, counterintuitive step in the wrong direction. Not only does it prematurely cut short Eric’s budding relationship with someone who’s actually proud and forthright about his queerness, but it also makes for a rushed, unearned attempt at acquitting Adam of his homophobia.
There’s still a lot to love about season two of “Sex Education.” It continues to be a refreshing, hilarious, diverse, and unflinching portrait of contemporary adolescence that offers a rare, authentic portrayal of what it’s like to be a hormonal teenager in the Gen-Z era, literal warts and all. But my biggest hope for season three is that Adam and Eric’s premature relationship doesn’t last too long, because Adam—and the show’s writers—need some time to figure out what the character really wants, and how he can fully come to terms with the part of himself he buried for so long.
Tackling social issues through the medium of TV and film shapes how we perceive them, and what truths we decide to unveil about those issues can alter our inherent biases for better or for worse. When it comes to pop culture, it is imperative that storytellers and creatives at large understand how homophobia is a tool of oppression and not just a Freudian front. Making tired prison rape jokes or painting a mural of two corrupt male world leaders kissing each other won’t end homophobia. Having a character in a TV show or movie bully a gay person only to carry latent affection for them won’t either.
What might change things is showing the other ways in which homophobia poisons the well of our cultural consciousness—how it festers from patriarchy, religious extremism, rigid ideals of masculinity, and our failure to normalize the fluid complexity of gender and sexual identity. Even with the wonkiness of Adam’s character arc, “Sex Education” certainly has the smarts and power to rectify its mistakes and figure out a solution to debunk this dangerous myth of the closeted homophobe.
Similar reading:
https://i-d.vice.com/en_uk/article/n7jejz/sex-education-eric-adam-gay-bully-stereotype
https://www.themarysue.com/sex-education-relationship-issue/
http://www.newnownext.com/not-everyone-antigay-is-secretly-gay/08/2019/
https://psychcentral.com/blog/the-trope-of-the-closeted-homophobe-is-it-true/
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-weird-science-of-homophobes-who-turn-out-to-be-gay