The Root has just come out an exceptional article talking about the absence of lgbt of color character on television.
Don't get me wrong - I love the visibility of lgbt television characters, but I wouldn't mind seeing some folks like myself. And not just for my own desires. There are million of young lgbts of color who also need that self-esteem which only comes from seeing positive portrayals:
More here . . .
Don't get me wrong - I love the visibility of lgbt television characters, but I wouldn't mind seeing some folks like myself. And not just for my own desires. There are million of young lgbts of color who also need that self-esteem which only comes from seeing positive portrayals:
To let Entertainment Weekly tell it, we are in the midst of a "gay revolution."
According to the magazine's latest cover story, Fox's ever popular series Glee -- and in particular its young yet openly gay characters, like Kurt Hummel, the high-note-hitting, fashion-loving teen played by Chris Colfer -- is "changing hearts, minds and Hollywood."
Joining in the praise is Newsweek, which celebrated the musical comedy-drama series by branding it "the gayest show in the history of network TV." In the Newsweek interview, columnist and anti-gay-bullying advocate Dan Savage echoed these sentiments and praised Glee and The Ellen DeGeneres Show. "Really, when it comes to gay rights, there's two wars going on," Savage opined. "The first war is political. But the culture war is over. Between Glee and Ellen and how integrated and accepted LGBT adults are, that's done."
I would have joined in on the celebration going on at Newsweek and Entertainment Weekly, but I stopped believing in fairy tales after finding my mama's signature on "Santa's receipt" some 20 years ago. While I applaud Glee's efforts and adore DeGeneres for simply being alive, Hummel's high notes and DeGeneres' nonthreatening dance moves have aided only a portion of the gay population.
Many gays of color certainly don't see themselves in this revolution. Though we are seeing a lot more gay faces on TV, many of them are of the same ilk. And are we really challenging the tolerance levels of Americans that much by asking them to accept versions of gay people that they've long grown accustomed to seeing?
More here . . .
7 comments:
I'm guessing you're not counting Anthony on "Designing Women?"
His character was not gay. Remember that Anthony dated Olivia Brown, was engaged to Jackee Harry, and then married Sheryl Lee Ralph.
Rod McCullom did a series of articles about this subject for After Elton back in 2007. There are direct links on the Rod 2.0 blog. Are actors of color turning down LGBT roles or are there just not any written for them? Is it the casting directors?
I don't think I have ever seen a black lesbian on TV. Actually seems that TV is only interested in the male gay, anyway. But as a black lesbian I am annoyed that "Love That Girl" has two gay white guys instead of or in addition to a black lesbian. And I don't like how a lot of the women who should be lesbians like Olivia on SVU and Rizzoli and Isles on Rozzoli and Isles should be lesbians. Since we live in a pretty segregated society I don't really expect to see black people around other races in general.
I take it by characters, we're limiting ourselves to completely fictional portrayals?
The reason I ask is because I've always appreciated RuPauls Drag Race's diverse cast of contestants.
There was the liason on Spin City. The character was black and gay, and the actor has done one-offs on several other shows as an openly gay character. Dunno if the actor himself is gay but given he nigh exclusively plays gay men it's pretty likely. Too lazy to IMDB him today though.
There have been some great black gay characters on television over the years. For example - Lafayette on True Blood, Omar on The Wire, Bette (Jennifer Beals' character) on The L Word, Carter on Spin City, Keith on Six Feet Under, Wilson Cruz's character on My So-Called Life, the characters on Noah's Ark, etc.
That's not to say that there shouldn't be more. I just question the notion that gay TV characters are more likely to be white than straight ones. It seems to me that gay TV characters are more likely than straight ones to be racial minorities.
I remember hearing GLAAD complain that only 6 out of the 23 openly gay characters on TV at that point in time were racial minorities. While it's sad that there were only 23 LGBT characters on TV, those figures meant that more than 25% of the LGBT characters on TV were racial minorities.
That's got to be a lot higher than the percentage of straight television characters that are racial minorities.
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