dan and phil's relationship reveal matters - but not for the reasons you think
an ode to being a fan, being queer, and to safety
I’ve heard so many people say this past week: who even are Dan and Phil?, and an equal amount of we already knew that, fork found in kitchen, didn’t they already announce that years ago?
To answer the former question, before I can begin to discuss why this past week has meant so much, Dan Howell and Phil Lester are a pair of British YouTubers who have been creating videos since 2009 and 2006 respectively, including comedy content, chatty videos, and since 2015, gaming on their combined channel. In 2013-16, they hosted a weekly radio show on BBC Radio One, and during this era were often found presenting at awards shows and, basically, anywhere else you can think of.
In 2019, they both came out as gay. Due to trauma and internalised homophobia, along with dealing with an extremely invasive fan base (the Phandom) Dan especially had struggled with this, so their coming outs were a big moment. The gaming channel went on a five year hiatus which they returned from in late 2023.
Last week, they released a 45 minute video that not only confirmed their relationship but went into depth on the trauma and difficulty they have faced throughout the 16 years they have been together and on the internet.
The early days: becoming a fan & signs of the times
I became a fan in around late 2012 to early 2013, at what could be seen by some as the height of their popularity. I was pretty involved in the fan base - not creating art or writing, but running a fan blog and consuming huge amounts of content. I didn’t understand why people were so obsessed with proving them to be a couple, which didn’t matter to me, and I thought their privacy was more important.
The pair made me feel seen in a way that I didn’t really understand at the time. I had been bullied for a long time by this point, and my mental health was starting to truly crack, which would finally crumble a year later. They were that little bit odd in the best way, seemed to have brains that worked a little like mine, and were cosy and comforting.
Dan and Phil’s first tour, The Amazing Tour is Not on Fire, landed in my city in October 2015, just ten days before the mental health crisis that a few weeks later had me placed in a psychiatric unit. I sat on my own, having bought a ticket late on after not getting one as I didn’t have anyone to go with - a friend gave me a lift and met back up with me after. Their videos ended up helping me through my time on the ward.
I’ve been to three in four of the tours Dan and Phil have been on (three together, and Dan’s solo show We’re All Doomed) and they are always spaces of genuine belonging, no matter who you are. The shows are a mix of heartfelt and ridiculous and a little corny and hilarious - essentially several hours of whiplash. When I went to the Terrible Influence Tour this year, it was in the same venue as their first tour, and it was so surreal for me to sit in the same place I had just under ten years prior, when I was so unwell and didn’t understand who I was.
I stopped really watching them all the time for a period in my late teens - before their coming out especially, it felt like they hadn’t grown with their audience. That is not the case now; since the end of the hiatus it’s clear they understand not only where we are at, but where they are at. They are comfortable in exactly who they are, what they like, allowing for more mature content but also more authentic content.
Queerness in all its gorgeousness
I came out as asexual in 2014, a year or so after I became a Dan and Phil fan. It was actually Tumblr, where I was part of all my different fandoms including theirs, that I learnt the term and quickly realised it felt right for me. I don’t think I would have learnt that part of my identity for years if so much of fandom culture wasn’t so intertwined with the LGBTQ+ community.
Dan’s coming out video, Basically I’m Gay, is a masterpiece. Whether you care about the pair or not, it is a piece of media I recommend people watch anyway, because there is so much commentary there about queer equality, internalised queerphobia, and the way society views and treats LGBTQ+ people.
When they came out, something settled within me as to why they always felt like home to me. It wasn’t something I ever needed them to confirm, but to see them as part of my community, see them talk so openly and with so much care and compassion - that was an important moment.
Being part of their community has always been a beautiful thing (at least once I’d worked out who wasn’t being invasive - shout out 12 year old Charli for being aware enough to not get sucked into that). Even before they came out, so many of us were queer and working through that. Lots of us are the ones who were seen as weird and different by everyone else, but found our place there.
Maybe that brings us up to now. I don’t think any of us who have been long-term fans ever expected them to talk about being in a relationship (if they even were - it was always a huge assumption that could have easily been untrue). We didn’t need them to tell us - it’s a boundary they didn’t need to cross for us to love them.
This confirmation of their relationship is not about us as fans. It isn’t about us at all. It’s about two queer men finally feeling safe enough to tell the world after sixteen years of people constantly invading their privacy, scraping their social media for clues, sharing private moments and obsessing in a way that went past inside jokes or simple shipping.
This is not about “being right all along”. This is about them feeling safe and comfortable not only with their audience but with their queerness and their relationship.
When people say “water is wet” or “I’m sure they confirmed this years ago” (they didn’t!)1, they are undermining the level of pressure Dan and Phil have been under, and why this matters so much for them. It is not about the rest of us - it’s about them now being able to live their truth in a way they have been extremely scared to do for as long as they have been together (and in the public eye almost that whole time, too).
This is for them - not for us.
The mainstream press, of course, has reported it in exactly the ways Dan and Phil predicted they would in the video (because why would any of them have actually watched it rather than just reported the confirmation?). It’s, honestly, to me, a sad state of the way the press churns out celebrity information so fast and cannot see the nuances and importance of situations like this.
As Dan said in the video, they aren’t going to suddenly turn into a couple channel or be romantic on camera, because “that is not yours”. This isn’t about their relationship itself, or at least it shouldn’t be. It should be about the freedom they now have, suppressed by invasive fans and trauma and even mass media platforms that stoked the fire.
I am proud of them for this. But not because they had to do this, and not because I ever needed to know. Because I know what it’s like to be queer and feel completely and utterly boxed in by society, and I was there when they were under such huge amounts of pressure from people who said they loved them but wouldn’t let up.
Welcoming them into the community six years ago was a gorgeous moment - and this is too, in a different way. I hope they feel lighter and freer and able to connect to the world in a way they have had to hide from.
I’m sure there are plenty of people who believe I should feel some shame about still being so “obsessed” with a pair of men on the internet at the big age of 25. But, I’m learning that my 20s are kind of just about loving things I did as a teen, but without the guilt and the hiding this time. And, after all, they’ve grown with me, too.
If you liked this post, you might like:
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Trigger warning for discussion of suicidal thinking (no details of thought contents). Learning this was something that completely changed my perspective on my brain and mental health. I hope it might resonate with some of you.
A recent Substack you should read too:
What’s been all consuming lately?📖
We’re officially getting the Red White and Royal Blue sequel!! This was already green lit a while back, but we now have a title and new director, and I couldn’t be more excited.
The Celebrity Traitors, of course. I still maintain that I think the mystery and the game itself is better with strangers, but the hilarity of the celebrity version can’t be argued with. Plus, an autistic-ADHD traitor is iconic.
If you made it this far, thank you so much for reading! If you’d like to support me, you can become a free or paid subscriber, or buy me a coffee (a pink lemonade, actually)💫
For reference, some people are referring to in Dan’s coming out video where he refers to them as, at least previously, being “more than romantic” and “soulmates through life”. There was no confirmation of what their relationship was at that point in time or since.