Ripple Effect as Gays Jump Into Mainstream

July 31, 2003 -- Gay America has been making a fabulous debut on the small screen — but the reasons for this coming out, and its impact, remain in the closet.

This season, two of the most-talked-about programs are gay-themed: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, where five gay men make over a hopelessly un-hip straight man, and Boy Meets Boy, which can be best described as The Bachelor with gay guys.

Two more gay-themed shows are due this fall: ABC (parent network to this Web site) will launch It's All Relative, a sitcom about life with gay parents, while Showtime will reveal, The L Word, a new series about lesbians.

They join a roster of well-established gay-positive shows, such as Showtime's Queer as Folk, HBO's Sex and the City, and NBC's Will and Grace.

It's been a dramatic change from 1998, when Ellen Degeneres came out on her network television show. Advertisers pulled out and her show was canceled.

Now, recent signs suggest America may be growing more comfortable with its gay citizens.

Last month, for instance, the Supreme Court struck down a Texas law banning gay sex, ruling it an unconstitutional violation of privacy. This week, New York City, recognizing the discrimination often faced by gay, bisexual and transgendered students, opened the nation's first high school for such students.

Television executives' interest in gay America is not just a new gimmick or a new transgression, thinks Robert Thompson, professor of popular culture at Syracuse University.

"Lots of our fellow citizens are gay," he says. "I think it reflects the popular culture at large."

For Love or Money?

But there have been signs to the contrary as well. On Wednesday, President Bush told reporters in a rare press conference he believed marriage "is between a man and a woman."

Added Bush: "I believe we ought to codify that one way or the other, and we have lawyers looking at the best way to do that."

Also, a recent USA Today/CNN Gallup poll also found just 46 pecent think homosexuality is an acceptable alternative lifestyle.

There is certainly a commercial aspect to the current interest in gay-themed television. "We have HBO out there. The networks can't afford to turn their backs on a whole slice of life that's out there watching television," observes Matt Rausch of TV Guide.

Media giant Viacom announced in January 2002 it was researching the viability of a gay network. While those plans have reportedly been put on hold, two other companies are openly trying to become the nation's first gay network.

"The gay community has already been targeted as big spenders," explains Variety's Meredith Amdur. "Advertisers like that group. Selling cars, selling clothing, jewelry. It is actually a good niche if it doesn't alienate anybody else."

Reflecting Reality

Many gays are happy about their new exposure. But some are quick to point out the current spate of television series is hardly representative of their community.

There are few blacks, Asians, Latinos or poor people to be seen in the current line-up, notes Mónica Taher of The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. The media "perpetrates the idea that the LGBT [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered] community is white, male and affluent."

Gay and lesbian groups are concerned about the stereotypes — that an over-the-top, flamboyant character like Jack from Will & Grace will be the only type America finds acceptable.

Ironically, conservatives also fear the new shows may not be representing Gay America accurately.

"Every single program promotes one side of the gay lifestyle … there's no discussion about the downside of the gay lifestyle," argues Genevieve Wood, vice-president of the Family Research Council.

AIDS is on the increase in the gay community, she says, citing a CDC study, but "none of those aspects are ever discussed in these programs."

Adds Wood: "It's quite rare they show anybody disappointed in the homsexual lifestyle. … The gay character is always glorified, he's the popular character, the funny character."

Conservative media critic Brent Bozell wrote in his July 11, 2003, column, there is a "distorted view" of America's sexual revolution: "The message is everywhere: It is not just gays who have a 'right' to their lifestyle, it is society which must accept it."

Ripples Across the Waters

The accurate portrayal of gay America is especially important in an age where U.S. pop culture is exported to all corners of the world.

Mall-hopping suburban American teenagers aren't the only ones sporting basketball jerseys and listening to Eminem nowadays — their counterparts everywhere from Sweden to Suriname are almost invariably doing the same.

So just as U.S. pop culture has turned such signs of marginalized, inner-city culture into status symbols, the increasing presence of gay characters offers the possibility that American pop culture can raise the profile of another marginalized group.

For example, Showtime's fairly explicit series Queer as Folk has been shown in Mexico and other Latin American countries, says Taher — although at one in the morning.

And this month Taher made a groundbreaking appearance on the long-running Latino variety show Sabado Gigante. "It was the first time [they] dared to look into LGBT issues," she notes, adding previously, people from such a community were shown in a negative light.

But Taher warns it was probably too much to attribute this to the growing presence of gays in American media; Latin America's attitude toward homosexuals is also changing.

The Spanish television network Telemundo has had several positive portraits of LGBT characters since 1999, she observes, adding her appearance on Sabado Gigante came after Argentina celebrated its first civil union.

The Spanish-language media is "not yet at the level that the English-language media is," Taher says, adding she believes there is an evolution all the same.

Thompson, the cultural critic, believes the effect of the gay presence in U.S. pop culture will really depend on the country. "In some countries, the acceptance of homosexuals is much greater than in the U.S.," he says. "The U.S. media is so Victorian about sexuality of any kind."

Then there are countries whose citizens wear American fashions and listen to American music, but readily condemn American culture as corrupt and decadent. Like many religious conservatives in the United States, they may interpret the presence of gays in U.S. media as another sign of a nefarious agenda.

Yet it's dangerous to overestimate the power of pop culture, concludes Thompson. "A heterosexual watching gay characters is no more likely to become gay than I am going to become a hip young woman watching Sex in the City."

Good Morning America's Lara Spencer contributed to this report.