Grew up in the 70s and 80s and genuinely faggot was never used in east manchester that I heard, except when me gran made meatballs in gravy.
A fag was a cigarette and the most common slurd for a homosexual male was bent, puff or poofter, never really heard the word fag (not even faggot) until more the 90s when I started work on a lass who closest workmate was gay and he use to call her his fag hag.
Not saying it wasn't used and it is a terrible slur, but think it has crept into our society more recently hence why this outrage is only as recent as the last few christmas periods