Televisn has been val alterg perceptns on gay rights, perhaps more than wh any other social issue.
Contents:
- TV’S ACCEPTANCE OF GAY STORYL HAS BEEN A LONG TIME COMG
- "PEN15" HAS THE MOST PAFULLY AUTHENTIC GAY TEEN STORYLE I’VE EVER SEEN ON TV
- ‘ONCE UPON A TIME’ REVEALS GAY STORYLE; CREATORS SAY “LOVE IS LOVE”
TV’S ACCEPTANCE OF GAY STORYL HAS BEEN A LONG TIME COMG
Glee took Kurt through the wrger — everythg om an unacceptg parent to makg love wh another man to an unexpected hate crime — and betifully crafted Kurt's evolutn as an openly gay man.
"PEN15" HAS THE MOST PAFULLY AUTHENTIC GAY TEEN STORYLE I’VE EVER SEEN ON TV
Though the show and the work were h wh some backlash for the 2017 storyle of Cys g out as gay to his iends and later datg a boy, broke ground for Disney Channel to feature a story of a stgglg teen who eventually out and be an openly gay character. It may appear quat now, when we have TV seri like Hulu’s Love, Victor (about a Latx teen explorg sexual fluidy) or Netflix’s Bondg (about sex work and alternative sexualy), but the great gay panic set off by Ellen DeGener g out on her s 1997 was a bombshell that didn’t necsarily nvce the works that they’d open the gat to LGBTQ experienc.
Luckily Will & Grace buted 1998 and the groundbreakg NBC seri nvced many that gay people might not be so toxic (and wouldn’t sre off advertisers) — so much so that Vice Print Joe Bin later creded wh changg his md about same-sex marriage.
‘ONCE UPON A TIME’ REVEALS GAY STORYLE; CREATORS SAY “LOVE IS LOVE”
Dpe the fact that lns of Amerins wnsed two men raise a happy and healthy dghter om the fort of their livg room sofas, took a fan mpaign to lobby Disney-owned ABC to fally allow Mchell (gay actor Jse Tyler Fergon) and Cameron (straight actor Eric Stontreet) to kiss ( fally happened 2010). For years, ranged, perverse, and spible homosexuals were on full display — pecially om Ryan Murphy, who remas our most proment culture czar when to queer characters on TV.
From the Roy Cohn-flected Army-McCarthy heargs — which was the first time many people heard the word “homosexual” uttered on TV — through the “don’t ask, don’t tell” Neti, that clud The Goln Girls and Digng Women, to our current glter-and-glam era of RuPl’s Drag Race and almost-anythg-go pansexualy. In that way, ’s breakg siar ground to the Sundance Now seri This Close, om af actors Shoshannah Stern and Josh Feldman, about a straight woman and gay man who are bti lookg for love and unrstandg. And while the seri received as much hate mail as adoratn — an evable byproduct of beg the first show to have openly gay male lead characters — lasted eight seasons before endg 2006.