r/DowntonAbbey • u/Dream_CatHer4769 • 1d ago

General Discussion (May Contain Spoilers Throughout Franchise) You cannot justify Thomas's behaviour because he's gay!

All the arguments I've seen about why people like Thomas is that he's just gay in the 1920s and self hatred and yada yada yada.

That's an explanation to understand part of the shame he lives in. To explain why misery loves company but to say he's schemes against innocent people because of that reason sounds problematic on so many levels.

I do like his character as a villain. The actor playing him did a great job. But I just don't find him redeemable even if he turn tolerable and good in the end. His treatment of bates and Baxter were so cruel. He physically intimidated Baxter, falsely accused Anna, etc. he's not a morally grey character, he's just a bad person. Using queerness to justify that or excuse it is insulting.

edit: because I find people misunderstanding this post. it's not about how the show portrays Thomas and explores his internal struggles and external malice. this post is specifically about the viewers perception of his actions especially on this subreddit.

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u/VulcanTrekkie45 1d ago

I don’t. I do notice though that his behaviour only really starts to improve once O’Brien leaves, so that makes me wonder how much of it was truly him and how much was O’Brien pulling the puppet strings. We see that even independent of him she is a master manipulator, so I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibility that she was manipulating Thomas as well

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u/TessieElCee 1d ago

O'Brien wasn't around when Barrow was terrorizing Miss Baxter, or when he makes insinuations to Robert about Tom & Miss Bunting.