A strange outing

I have rarely seen gay "celebrity" Todd McKenny on TV - I'm not one for such kitchy shows as Dancing with the Stars, or Boy for Oz, whatever else he has been on.   But I always thought there was something dislikeable about him (not the sexuality per se - he's just one of those people, gay or straight, that has an air of something that makes me not trust them.   I've always put Eddie Maguire in that category, too.)

Anyway, he's in the news this week for a very strange outing.

Back in the 1980's, I remember Simon Gallaher being the subject of one of the old fashioned "gay marriage" rumours with Mike Walsh.  (It was a sister in law who swore someone she knew was at "the wedding".)   I always thought this type of rumour was odd, and they do seem to be very much of that period - I think there a similar rumour around Jim Nabours?  Yes, I know he was gay, but the point is more that it seemed that people wanted to believe the profane unnaturalness of homosexuality by insisting that gay men were having secret mock marriages, in the same way a devil worshipper's black mass was supposed to mock the real thing, I guess.*

Anyway, I had little interest in the topic, other than categorising it as likely urban myth (it was always a friend of a friend who had seen the real thing), but felt a little sorry for Gallaher.  Later, when I read that Gallaher was married and had children, I assumed that my suspicion had been confirmed.

But now McKenny, who seems not to get on with his sister much, decided, with no forewarning, to tell the world that he had been in a gay relationship with Gallaher for 5 years, before he married his sister.

The SMH says that Gallaher and his wife are far from happy:

Simon Gallaher called McKenney a "headline whore"; his wife, Lisa, called her brother a "douche bag".  Simon declined to say more when PS made contact this week, except that it was "time to move on". His wife told friends: "We all have to just duck the fallout now.

It seems unclear, from that article, whether Galaher's sons knew of his relationship with their uncle.

It's an odd story that presumably rarely happens - but it does give some justification for my dislike of Todd.


*  Actually, I should tread carefully on this topic, since I do feel that gay marriages which stylistically imitate straight marriage - such as two women who wear classic wedding dresses - do look weird because of the imitation aspect.  Should come up with something novel for what is, after all, a completely historically novel invention.