Reddit mentions of Robbie Ross: Oscar Wilde's Devoted Friend

To understand this problem is to understand that the roots stem almost entirely from the Oscar Wilde case, and the public reaction to that. Prior to the case, it was much more acceptable for men to have a platonic physical relationship (we can see it in letters, books, and novels at the time). After the trial (which was on libel, not homosexuality), the culture shifted hard to limit expressions and physical contact for men in England. There's a bit of a perverse joke that the night after the trial, there was a huge migration of men to Paris to avoid similar fates. But it wasn't that homosexuality was completely and utterly taboo (not in the way we think of it). Men could be "out" in a way (but mostly not). Oscar Wilde's own executor (and really good friend) Robbie Ross was about as out as could be for the time, and stayed in London long after the trial. He was also a mentor for many future gay male writers and poets. That's not to say he didn't have problems (he did), but he somehow navigated one of the most conservative cultures in his own way without just being completely closeted and also being completely overshadowed by Wilde- he barely gets top billing in his own biography.


As physical contact quickly eroded in the British culture, it set the tone elsewhere (not everywhere- France was and still is far more open) as the culture spread through its colonies and soft power cultural tones right when the visual arts of and for the masses were starting to come into their own- movies, illustrations, newspaper pictures, and photographs. Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Watson had a far, far more intimate physical relationship in the canon than they ever did in the illustrations, movies, and tv shows. The closest I know of is when Jeremy Brett and Edward Hardwick would be filmed arms linked together as they walked down the street. Even now, that would be incredibly "physical" if BBC's Sherlock and John did that. The internet rage reaction on that denouncing "fangirls" and "fanservice" only shows this entire point, and reinforces the "no touchie" aspect we have to our culture now.