Glee

Bristol Palin has a blog post up today on Patheos about how problematic it is that Barack Obama's support of same-sex marriage was inspired by his teenage daughters.

I used to be a regular Glee viewer. For the first two seasons, it was possible (though not necessarily easy) for me to look past the cringe-worthy storylines and enjoy the musical sequences. But as each new episode aired, it became harder and harder to not feel angry about the one-dimensional characters and Ryan Murphy’s obvious lack of ability to write for women, people of color, and people with disabilities. And honestly? With the exception of Kurt, the show’s handling of queer issues has been disastrous, too.

I stopped watching Glee after seeing Season 3’s episode “I Kissed a Girl,” during which Santana performs Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” as if it were a song about lesbian reclamation rather than performative bisexuality for the sake of male spectators. (Don’t worry, we will address Perry’s song and what negative messages it sends about bisexuality later in this series!) But this episode wasn’t the first time the show dropped the ball on queer representation. Season 2’s episode “Blame It on the Alcohol” stands out as a prime example of Glee missing the mark on bisexuality, particularly bisexual men.

Discussions around sex and sexuality can sometimes be dignified by being medicalized or being couched in the terms of education. But sometimes that very frankness makes these discussions culturally unacceptable, even alongside completely normalized images of sexualized bodies, themes of promiscuity, and genres of “romance” that serve as thin excuses to repeat a hackneyed story about sexual conquest.

So I was watching Glee the other night, waiting desperately to see if Brittany and Santana would show some sign that they were still together. As I tried to peer into the minds of Glee’s creators and discover their subversive intent in having the lesbian character Santana dance to a song with romantic lyrics about boy/girl love with the gay-in-real-life Ricky Martin, it hit me: TV is not activism. I mean, critiquing TV can be activism, but TV programming itself exists, by and large, in the service of profit, not activism. In recognition of TV’s persuasive powers over “impressionable youth,” there is a long history of the “after school special” and the “very special episode” of family sitcoms. But the structural inequalities and relations of rule responsible for the most urgent cultural problems of our time run way deeper than the politics of media representation.

Babies on TV serve as props for their parent’s character development. On reality TV, babies are dreams come true and cute fashion accessories (for celebrity moms) or evidence of bad behavior (teen moms). On Dexter, toddler Harrison exists solely as a plot device to anchor daddy Dexter to the non-sociopathic world, and on Up All Night, baby Amy helps her hard-partying parents embrace adulthood. So, who exactly is doing the parenting here? Will the real parents please stand up?

One consequence of this kind of character presentation is that audience members can experience a sense of "she deserved it" when something bad happens. Take, for example, the domestic violence depicted in the Schuester kitchen, where Will grabs Terri, shoves her aggressively against a counter, and yanks at her clothing, all while she pleads with him to stop. This scene was not read as domestic violence by many viewers, because, well, she deserved it. If she hadn't been manipulative, he wouldn't have been "forced" to act in the way that he did.

This plays out continually in pop culture, where mentally ill characters are subjected to brutality and it is read as acceptable, appropriate, or even necessary in some cases, because of how their mental illnesses express. The symptoms and expressions of mental illness are not always easy to control, even for people receiving appropriate treatment, even for people who very much wish that these things didn't happen; it's not that people enjoy violent outbursts or crying jags or hallucinations. When viewers of pop culture receive the message that it is OK to behave abusively to someone because of mental illness, it sets a dangerous precedent.

This week has been chock-full of awesome articles and online conversations! Here's some of what we've been reading:

• The Black Women Film Festival happens this weekend in Atlanta, Georgia!
• Heather at AfterEllen gives her two cents on the events surrounding Glee's Dianna Agron performing in a t-shirt that says "LIKES GIRLS." For more, I recommend Jenny Aisenberg's piece at Velvet Park.
• The Times speculates on "why women don't get caught up in sex scandals." (via Briar Levit)
• Bust responds to recent articles that suggested women "grow up" and be less "girly." What Tami Said comments on the racialized aspects of the personae in question.
• The Daily Beast elaborates on just how horrifically anti-gay Presidential contender Michele Bachmann really is.
• Tiger Beatdown and Original Plumbing introduce their new bloggers, including Bitch contributors s.e. smith and Emily Manuel at TB and Thomas Page McBee at OP.
• Stinkin' Thinkin' opines on "Why Addiction Recovery Should Be A Feminist Issue."
• Clutch talks about a shockingly racist and sexist online ad by a Tea Party group.
• ColorLines and KABOBfest continue the conversation about Tom MacMaster and Bill Graber pretending to be high-profile lesbian bloggers. At TransGriot, Monica recalls her online run-in with Graber.
• Pam's House Blend provides statistics on same-sex couples to encourage the New York Senate to pass marriage equality.
• TransGriot pays homage to late rapper Tupac on what would have been his fortieth birthday.
• Shakesville's Melissa McEwan shakes her head at Mitt Romney's joking about unemployment.
• Liz at Our Turn admires ass-kicking female characters and shares her take on the Double Dare documentary.
• TransQueers XXX and TransErotica on Tumblr provide places for trans* individuals to share naked and/or erotic photos of themselves. (Both pages NSFW.)
• Queerty wants to know what it can do to better serve its female readership! Ideas? Go go go!

Share your thoughts (and/or other awesome articles) below!

Group pic via tvguide.com.

On Tuesday, Glee aired their second vaguely Lady Gaga-inspired episode, "Born This Way." Like the first, Season One's "Theatricality," it was, to quote Alyx Vesey, "a mixed bag stuffed to the purse strings."

OK, we've published plenty of posts here on Glee and how it maybe isn't all it's cracked up to be. Many of us are not exactly what you'd call "fans." We know the show has problems. We get it.

What we don't get, however, is Douchebag de la Semaine Bret Easton Ellis' recent tweets about the show. To quote:

I like the idea of 'Glee' but why is it that every time I watch an episode I feel like I've stepped into a puddle of HIV?

Hm. We don't know Bret. Maybe it's because you are wrongly associating gay characters on television with a virus in a way that is not only douche-y but outrageously homophobic and ableist?

File it under Gross Yet Unsurprising: Terry Richardson, the "creepy uncle" of douchebags has taken yet another misogynistic and off-putting set of photos of the cast of a teen show! Behold his treatment of Glee:


The male gaze? Why yes, we've heard of it. Why do you ask?