Before the Algorithm: How We Found Ourselves in Media We Weren’t Meant to See

It’s the late 1990s/early 2000s. It’s 1:12 a.m. You’ve got one ear trained on the hallway, the other drowning in the opening credits of Queer as Folk or The L World reruns on SBS. You’re perched close to the screen like proximity will somehow make it less dangerous, remote in hand, thumb hovering over “last channel”—ready to switch to cricket if someone stirs.

And the whole time your heart is thumping not because of the sex on screen, but because you’re terrified that your stepdad might get up for water. Or worse, your mum might need Panadol. You don’t even know if you like what you’re watching yet. You just know it feels… important. Forbidden. Yours.

That was queerness in the ‘90s and early 2000s: high-stakes, pixelated, and hiding in plain sight. You didn’t discover yourself through curated content—you mined for scraps.

The panic of searching “queer as folk Brian Justin sex scene” on LimeWire and downloading a virus named winlogon.bat, or scrolling Angel/Spike slash fanfic and praying no-one picks up the home phone. Or watching French arthouse films of hairless twinks taking baths on SBS, always watched with TV on volume level 3. The thrill wasn’t just the content: it was the risk. And weirdly, it bonded you to it. You earned your queerness, click by anxious click.

Flash forward: you’re on TikTok at 10 a.m., haven’t searched a single queer thing, but the algorithm has clocked you. Maybe it was how long you hovered on scenes of Jonathan Bailey and Matt Bomer in Fellow Travellers. Maybe it was the sad bisexual playlist you made at 2 a.m. Either way, you're suddenly drowning in binder hauls, “this is your sign to come out” voiceovers, and lesbians re-enacting Carol scenes with their cats.

It’s precise. It’s unrelenting. And it’s public. Queerness went from a secret folder within another folder within another folder and within yet another folder named homework.doc to a fully branded aesthetic with its own light settings and skincare routines.

And look, there’s real beauty in that. Gen Zs get baby gay starter packs and casual representation like it’s nothing. But that shift? It was seismic. We went from stolen moments of blurry representation to HD, 60fps queerness on loop, and I’m only 35.

Before? It was a knowing glance, a coded line or a shirtless vampire gazing a little too long. It was secrecy. It was shame. It was a finely tuned ear for footsteps in the hallway. Now? We’re not just saying them out loud—we’re being auto-captioned. In 4K. With hashtags, duets, and algorithm-approved confessionals. Somewhere between Tumblr’s horny chaos and TikTok’s identity carousel, things took a weird turn. Because now it’s visibility, but also commodification. Data surveillance with a side of affirmation.

But here’s the twist: Gen Z, a generation raised on openness, feels like it’s becoming a little prudish. The same platform that delivers binder hauls and queer theory explainers will also throw up 47-part stitches on why kissing is too intimate. It’s like the faucet broke—overshare or overcorrect, no in-between. Maybe it’s burnout. Maybe it’s the algorithm chasing shock value. Or maybe we just miss the mystery. That pixelated, late-night thrill of stumbling on something you weren’t supposed to see.

We used to watch ourselves watching. Thumb on the remote. Guilt and desire wrapped together. Representation came with risk—like forgetting to clear the browser history on the family computer. Now we swipe through curated, cropped, choreographed queerness and worry we’re not doing it right enough.

But both versions—the pixelated panic and the algorithmic affirmation—are valid. Both were, and are, ways of finding ourselves in media we weren’t supposed to be in.

And if you’re still watching Queer as Folk reruns with the volume down low even now? That’s okay too. The past doesn’t vanish—it lingers. Queer memory is muscle memory. And it still flinches when the hallway floorboards creak.

Next? (No LimeWire Needed)

Watch: Heartstopper (Netflix) is what closeted 2003-you deserved: soft, open, cute teen boys falling in love without a tragic twist. Let your inner baby gay exhale. You’ve earned it.

Read: We have Always Been Here by Samra Habib is a beautiful memoir that captures the journey from hiding to living out loud—across continents, cultures, and closets.

Listen: Like A Virgin podcast for millennial pop culture therapy with two queer hosts unpacking everything from Britney to Catholic shame. You’ll feel less alone and also learn things about The L Word you’d repressed.