The Devil is in the Details

Once again this week I find my self with plenty of food for thought. (I’m guessing I will have much more to digest before this class is over). This week, the perspective under review, for me, is the role and characteristics of lesbian and gay couples as they are portrayed in “Queer” shows.

My interest in looking past the surface of this issue was sparked by Carolyn Byerly’s article “Situating ‘the Other’: Women, Racial, and Sexual Minorities in the Media.” In the section The Sexualized (Queer) Other, Byerly gathered a number of scholarly contributors to support the idea, that although “Queer” shows have become more visible, Gay and Lesbian character portrayals are still burdened with a number of oppressive and diminishing components.

She writes: “Film scholar Vito Russo (1987) found that historically, mainstream films show gay characters (and their lives) as sterile in the areas of love and sexuality, and as silly or corrupt.”

She goes on to cite instances in the show Will and Grace that exemplify that although the series showcased openly gay leading characters, those characters were not allowed to be romantic, political, or overtly attracted to the same sex.

This was an interesting point to me, as I remember watching (and loving) that show, thinking to myself how nice and groundbreaking it was. But, that was superficial, or to be more kind, it was an opinion that was far from holistic. I never noticed how Will never “checked out” guys. Or, how he never was seen cuddling or dating, maybe that’s because I was too distracted by the silliness of Jack’s character – which was an obvious stereotype of a feminine gay man or “queen.”

In the later half of the section, Byerly turned her focus to lesbian characters, or lack there of, within the media. She cites Hantzis and Lehr, “Program makers seem especially unwilling to represent lesbians, rendering invisible women’s desire for other women and thereby avoiding any threat to heterosexuality or to the heterosexist male role of definer and center of female relationships.”

This statement got me thinking about my favorite show, the Showtime series Queer as Folk. Even though, I do feel that show was a great representation of gay life, in that it allowed for multiple types of gay male characters, it did seem to shun lesbians. The show included only one lesbian couple, and they were rarely featured as the central plot in episodes. Additionally, in retrospect, I find it interesting how their child was fathered by the character, who although gay portrayed the most stereotypical traits of a heterosexual man, including competiveness, aggression, and machismo.