Obviously, one of my hills to die on is that I do not agree with the very simplistic take of "Ilya is afraid for his safety, Shane is afraid for his career."
Because as I've mentioned before, homophobic violence and institutional oppression is not unique to Russia. All it takes is one look at gay bashing statistics of both Canada and the United States (where both players spend a significant amount of time) to realize that and get very depressed.
Shane isn't going to get arrested for being gay, but there is definitely a non-zero chance of getting beat up for looking at someone too long in the showers.
And yes, of course, this isn't going to actually happen in a light-hearted romance novel. But Ilya getting arrested and sent to the gulag is also not likely to happen in a light-hearted romance novel. But for some reason, while Ilya's fear is acceptable and textually established, the idea that Shane might have a fear of homophobic violence apparently goes against romance novel genre conventions.
That said, the other thing that annoys me about that argument is that it completely ignores the idea that SHANE could be afraid for ILYA's safety. Not so much in episode one, I admit. At that time, he and Ilya are practically strangers and only just getting to know each other. And Russia has not passed the really scary anti-gay laws yet.
But by episode five? The cottage? Of course, Shane's going to be afraid for Ilya. And this is a factor that I wish was brought up in TLG, because even if Shane also isn't happy with the status quo, he's not likely to suggest changing anything until Ilya's citizenship status is safely resolved.
