This week I read the article “Should gay people seek to cultivate representations of a unified gay identity in the media, or is this counterproductive?” I read the other articles as well and I didn’t find them as compelling as this one. I can actually remember the first “gay” show I watched on TV and it was Ellen Degeneres’ sitcom “Ellen”. What’s interesting about this sitcom was that when the show first began to air, her role wasn’t a lesbian. But then she came out and so the character did as well. Even more interesting is that it was cancelled soon after. I watched a re-run of it awhile ago and I’m beginning to think that had more to do with how not funny it was…. but either way, it was cancelled.
If you look at the tv line up today, there is way more inclusion of gay characters. In the article Horsley explains that when he was growing up he could only see “gay things” on late night television and even then it was rare. Now anytime of day you can tune into Will and Grace. Plus there are shows like Queer as Folk and the L-word which are dramas solely based on gay characters. Frankly I think all three of these shows are great. I’ve watched Queer as Folk a number of times and there are graphic scenes that would shock me whether it was a hetero couple or a gay couple, but the storylines are amazing and the actors are GREAT (and hot!). I’m just glad that there is at least some media representation of homosexual people out there.
Horsely also mentions that Queer theorists seek to problematize the notion of a gay/lesbian identity so as to somewhat normalize the gay community with the straight community. I actually agree with them. Although I think shows like the L-word and Queer as Folk are great, I think people would benefit even more from having gay characters and straight characters together. Rather than making it a “gay show”, we really should be able to just recognize it as a “show”.
dsll said,
March 21, 2007 at 3:31 pm
I feel the same about the need to have shows that incorporate gays/lesbians more into the show rather than focusing in on the topic. Such as Brothers and Sisters there are I think 5 brothers and sisters a couple are married, a couple are single/dating, and one is gay. The focus of the show is not on the one gay brother but on something completely different, although it is not overlooked. I remeber watching Ellen as well and I used to really think it was funny and then I was sad when it was taken off the air and maybe I didn’t really understand then why it was such a big deal I can’t really remember.
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March 21, 2007 at 3:35 pm
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zipzapzoop said,
March 21, 2007 at 4:19 pm
I think you made a good point in your post about combining homo and heterosexuals in one show. I mean we do not live in separate worlds why should tv be divided into different shows. For example Will and Grace was a highly successful and while there was defiently a focus on the gay characters there were other storylines and straight characters that appealed to a wider audience. So I agree with you then that maybe it is a better idea to combine characters and just have a show. I mean this is more a reflection of reality anyways.
biohelixx said,
March 28, 2007 at 3:18 pm
I agree that there’s far more out there in the way of “gay”. But seriously, when you ask the average person on the street what a gay person is, don’t most of them say “effeminate, flamboyant, flashy etc.”? The portrayals were too one-dimensional for too long, and they emphasised one of the rarest “types” out there (if I may call it that). That needs to be reversed in a grand way, we can’t just move on to “normal” and wait for things to change on the street, we have give things a push, because after all, media is what screwed up people’s views in the first place, right?
Okay, maybe not only media, but definitely to a large degree.
Alanna said,
March 28, 2007 at 3:39 pm
agreed. It seems as though gay characters are overlyrepresented as flamboyant and fem in the media. THe push would be to represent homosexuals more often in media and in a more realistic way, rather then just in design and hair shows.