Note: Contains spoilers for Channel 4's It's a Sin.
First of all, I want to say that I have not cried that much watching TV since that episode of Game of Thrones (if you know, you know). What this stemmed from is the fact that my housemates and I (perhaps ignorantly so), sat down to watch It’s a Sin without knowing that it was actually about the AIDs crisis. So, in our blissful ignorance, we sat down ready to indulge in some feel-good 80s coming of age LGBTQ stories. Then we realised.
I am anxious of how easily this could turn into an opinion piece, because what this show does so cleverly - it makes you angry. Watching it, of course, you feel sad and hopeless, but for me the emotion I felt the most was anger. I felt frustrated about how easily this could have been avoided, and angry about how these individuals were treated. Seeing Collin being locked in a room, left to die, enraged me and it’s difficult to get that image out of my head. This was all made worse by Russell T Davies’ brilliance when it comes to the screenplay. At times, I wished that the show in front of me was fiction, and thought how easily it could be seen as fiction, because of how awful the events are. However, what Davies does so well, with anything he writes, is that he makes us feel the reality of it.
Something else which Davies does in the show which impacted and educated me was that he reminded us that the AIDs crisis is not solely a number - it is the collective suffering and destruction of individuals. Of course, no one can create any piece of art which effectively represents each individual’s experience, but It’s a Sin’s collective of characters reminds us of the personal devastation the crisis caused. Each one has their own story, and by forcing us to watch these stories slowly end makes us understand this personal loss. Ultimately, this is the show’s greatest lesson.
Now, it is not a new thing to write about how uneducated we are about this crisis, and how little our school education explores something which is so monumental. However, what is not discussed enough is how uneducated the LGBTQ community can be about it too. I proudly identify as LGBTQ (the B specifically, if you must know), yet I never fully realised the magnitude and real devastation of the AIDs crisis. Of course, I knew it happened and I knew it killed many, but I think not being fully exposed to it in any way left me ignorant to the full magnitude and the personal side of it. I don’t want to speak for the entire community - as this may just have been my own personal ignorance - but I do think that we especially need to make an effort to educate ourselves on this.
What we cannot forget is that the rights and privileges we have today (in the West at least) were not given to us automatically - they were fought for by these individuals. This is what It’s a Sin teaches us. When watching, I recognised the comfort of my own position in comparison to theirs, and it terrified me that had I been born just 40 years earlier, that could have been me in one of those beds. There is so much more that we need to continue fighting for, and shows such as these are inspiring for this reason.
Additionally, It’s a Sin teaches us that it was not simply the community who fought for these rights and the recognition of the disease. The character of Jill reminds us of this important fact. Throughout the show this character not only acts as a brilliant friend and ‘mother’ to the group, but she also demonstrates the power LGBTQ Allies can have. In my own life, the presence of individuals like Jill have been invaluable, and the actress who plays Jill perfectly depicts how crucial these individuals are to LGBTQ individuals.
Jill not only depicts the crucial role of allies, but she also reminds us that there were moments of happiness in what is thought to be a period of overwhelming darkness. Dramas focusing on disasters often forget this fact. This is all culminated by Ritchie’s line in the back of the police van: ‘I’m gonna live’.
This small, yet impactful line, reminds us that these people did live - and they did so beautifully. Despite how devastating the disease is, Ritchie’s character in particular reminds us of the determined nature of these individuals - their willingness to live despite being diagnosed with, essentially, death. Another moment this was clear was when Ruth tells Ritchie’s mum that he was ‘beautifully gay’. This is a phrase I have never heard, but one which truly made me feel warm when I heard it. It also perfectly encapsulates how these people were not simply victims, were not simply numbers - they were people who lived, and as Jill says, they lived ‘beautifully’. With this in mind, It’s a Sin reminds us that there is light to be found within darkness, and to that end, the determination of the LGBTQ community to live within such dark times.
This essential fact is apparent within our own situation now. Undoubtedly, living through a pandemic is not all sunshine and rainbows, however, I think we can all, hopefully, look back and see times when we were happy and when we had the opportunity to live.
The comparisons between It’s a Sin and the Covid-19 pandemic do not end there. This was one of the first things my housemates and I discussed - watching Jill clean the pink mug over and over, feeling anxious when Ritchie kissed Ash; our knowledge of Covid made the experience of watching this all too real. However, this prior experience was essential to helping us understand how these people felt, because we know what it’s like. We understand the fear, and we relate to the misinformation that spreads just as easily as the virus, like when Ritchie discusses how battery acid is thought to help cure AIDs, just as (now-ex) President Trump told the masses that bleach could help treat Covid.
I don’t know if Davies had this in mind when he wrote the show, but the timing of its release is perfect. Now that we can understand the fear of such a health crisis, we can understand just how important it is to not forget what happened with AIDs. Forgetting the crisis does nothing but benefit those who still continue to discriminate against the Community.
Again, the show demonstrates just how important it is to not forget what happened. In the last episode, when Jill speaks with Ritchie’s mother she says ‘it’s astonishing, the perfect virus came along to prove you right’. This was such a pertinent moment, and I think it is the one that stuck with me the most. What Jill says is true - AIDs gave justification for discrimination, and importantly, it helped in destroying a community that humanity had been trying to get rid of for centuries. It was in this moment that I realised why this show had been made, and why more needs to be done. In remembering these people as they were - as people who just wanted to live - we can begin to destroy that false narrative, and use it to prove them wrong instead. To prove that members of our community lived, and lived beautifully. They formed relationships, supported each other, and were not afraid to be themselves. This is what we must take from this show and from the crisis overall.
There is no easy way to end this, because there is so much to be said and I don’t think there is any way to effectively ‘conclude’ on it - doing so would be reductive. Instead, I will end this by discussing the most impactful scene the show offered for me.
Episode 5, 45 minutes in. Jill visits a man with AIDs, sits with him, holds his hand and we see him smile. “Is that ok?” - “yeah” - “good”. We see how connected we are, and how each of us has the responsibility to reach out to those who are isolated and discriminated against. We see how in times of darkness all these people needed was to be held and for someone to let them smile. All they needed was for someone to make them feel human again.