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 Posted: Tue Sep 09, 2008 1:10 pm
Remember when it was a big taboo to have a gay character on a TV show? And when the word 'bisexual' was almost never heard on TV? Yeah, so do I.
Because that's still going on, at least on the shows I listen to. I'm thinking right now of the various Law and Order franchise shows. Even Special Victims Unit, which is supposed to be all about sex.
It struck me first during an episode of SVU that dealt with African-American men "on the down-low." I'm not at all savvy to all the hep lingo the kids are using today, and though the show did a fairly good job of defining the term, I still had to search the internet to be sure I was getting it.
For anyone like me (as if there'd ever be), "on the down-low" basically means being deep, deep in the closet. Someone who puts on a totally heterosexual front, but secretly engages in gay sex. The person in question may be bisexual or gay or any other permutation available.
Nowhere, however, did I hear the word "bisexual" in the episode in question, which centered around a group of male friends, most married or in heterosexual relationships, who meet regularly to play poker and boink each other. It's a big secret, of course, no one outside the group is supposed to know anything about it. At one point, Detective Finn (Ice T) is interviewing one of the men. I believe he's a professional athlete (or former professional athlete), who is counting on big endorsement deals to live on. Which won't happen if his secret sexual activities are revealed. The other men in the group are also professionals and/or family men. One (who turns out to be the killer) is a lawyer with a wife and children.
So Finn's interviewing this guy, who keeps saying he's not gay. At one point, Finn says something like (I'm paraphrasing), "You date women, and have sex with men. That means you're gay."
Seriously, WTF? Is it not possible that he's bisexual? Maybe he likes having sex with both men and women, but only likes dating women? Is that not even a possibility?
I may be remembering this episode incorrectly, but I believe the victim in this case was a former boyfriend of Detective Benson, and all the other characters are consoling her, telling her how it's not her fault he turned gay. Huh? Might it not be possible that he, too, was bisexual? That he actually enjoyed making the monster with two backs with Benson? Nope, it automatic assumption is that this sleaze was gay and only dated/boinked Benson as a cover.
So after seeing that episode, I started paying closer attention to other episodes. And other shows. And it seems to be (at least in the Law and Order shows) that bisexual men just don't exist. There may be a bisexual woman now and again, but a guy who willingly goes down on another guy is automatically gay. Period. Even if he has a wife and children and a healthy, active sex life with his wife, whom he loves very much. If he also happens to have a guy on the side, even just once, a long time ago? GAY!
Again, this isn't true on all TV shows, I'm sure. But I don't watch/listen to all TV shows. But because TNT and USA tend to show big blocks of shows in a row, it's easy for me to just turn on the TV, then go into the other room, sit at the computer, and listen to what's going on in the background. Or, if I'm stuck in bed with back pain (or a cold, like now), I don't have to keep flipping through the channels to find something to watch. Turn on USA and wait for the inevitable Law and Order: SVU or Law and Order: Criminal Intent marathon to begin (or it may be House or Monk or NCIS -- doesn't matter, so long as I don't have to think). So these are the shows I'm most often exposed to. It isn't as if I actively seek them out, per se. I don't sit there thinking, "Oh boy! SVU is on tonight, I can't wait!" They're just there when I need to have the TV on.
So having said all of that, what's your opinion? Is it just Law and Order shows that suffer from this No Bisexual Men Syndrome? Or have you noticed other TV shows where, when it's revealed a male character happens to enjoy some hawt gey seks, he's automatically labeled as gay? If so, which shows? And which shows have actual bisexual men in them, who actively date both men and women (not necessarily at the same time)? Enquiring minds wanna know!
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Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 7:16 am
Men on the downlow are assuredly gay and bisexual, but African American culture is brutal to gay and bisexual men, so the closet rate is high. This is a huge deal as men on the down low are way more likely to contract HIV then out gay and bisexual men. There is some thought that this is helping to fuel the spread in the African American community and there are activists desperately trying to call attention to the devastation and reverse the trend.
I don't know why they didn't say Gay in your show as would be logical.
I do know that Torchwood had at least two bisexual leads: Ianto and Tosh. Captain Jack harkness is omnisexual: IE he not only doesn't care about the gender of his partner, but he's flexible as to species. Ianto and Captain Jack are male. Toshi is female.
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Artemesia_of_Persia Vice Captain
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Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 4:09 pm
Artemesia_of_Persia I don't know why they didn't say Gay in your show as would be logical.
They did say "gay," that's my point. There was no question about it, these men were all gay. None of them could possibly have been bisexual, according to the show. That's what I'm complaining about -- the utter lack of bisexual men. Once in a while, a bisexual woman will show up (because ooooooh, bi chicks are hot!), but I don't think I've ever seen a bisexual man on a Law and Order show. If they do it with guys, even if they're also doing it with women, they're gay. Period.
I do recall an SVU episode with a married couple who did porn movies. The husband was a big "straight bareback" star -- meaning he's straight, but stars in movies with multiple male partners "topping" him without protection, because that's where the money is. He's found beaten to unconsciousness in an alley, the rape kit finds multiple semen samples, and they confront him -- he claims it was consentual and he's bi. At first anyway, to hide the fact that he's starring in these movies. Once his involvement in porn is revealed, however, he "confesses" that he's actually straight and only doing it for the money. So in the end, he's not bisexual, even though he lets men screw him in videos. This is the only exception to the "all men who have sex with men are gay" rule I can think of in a Law & Order show. In every other case (that I can recall), men who do it with men are gay -- there are no bisexual men.
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Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 4:22 am
Sorry. I meant to type "bisexual." It was a brain fart.
Anyway. I do agree that there's a general shortage of bi folk on TV outside of a handful of BBC shows. I know that BBC America was running a documentary on bifolk most of the summer, for example.
For crying out loud, Logo has been running and rerunning a comedy special (hosted by Margaret Cho?!?!) in which an out gay male comic says things like, "If you are a bisexual over thirty? Pick a team." Not cool and typical of LOGOs treatment of bifolk. According to Logo, they don't exist or indecisive. It makes me furious, really, that the supposedly LBGT channel generally mocks bifolk when it mentions them at all.
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Artemesia_of_Persia Vice Captain
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Posted: Fri Sep 19, 2008 6:06 pm
Okay, new TV rant topic: disgusting TV adverts. Let's start with Charmin's current campaign, featuring bears sh*tting in the woods. Seriously, that's what the commercials are. You've got these weird red bears romping around and...well, taking a dump. And, for no logical reason, using toilet paper. Okay, that last part doesn't bother me too much. It's watching the bears squatting down behind the tree to take care of business. I don't need to see that. I don't want to see that. Give me some guy in a grocery store, admonishing people not to squeeze the Charmin.
And while we're on the subject of not wanting to watch anyone doing their thing in the bathroom, is anyone else as disgusted by the Clear Blue Easy pregnancy test advert? You know the one, where the announcer says this is "the most sophisticated piece of technology you'll ever pee on." And then, to prove the point, they show a closeup of the stick with a stream of liquid hitting it! Granted, it seems to be a clear liquid, probably water, but with the very dark background, it's impossible to tell for sure. For all we know, someone is actually taking a piss on it. AND WE HAVE TO WATCH!
I know potty humor is all the rage with adolescent (and college-age) boys, but since when did mainstream television become the place to broadcast scat and watersports?
STOP IT!
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Posted: Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:37 pm
Oh, I agree. Can we also get rid of the Enzite Santa with his line of women waiting to sit on his lap?
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Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 9:55 pm
Gwion Vaughn Oh, I agree. Can we also get rid of the Enzite Santa with his line of women waiting to sit on his lap?
Please, by all means, get rid of that guy and his creepy smile. What exactly is the message in this advert? Because Enzite made his willy .013mm larger, every woman in the office wants to sit on his lap? Where's the logic there? What sort of thrill do they expect to get sitting on his lap? I just don't get it. And I don't wanna get it. I just want it to stop.
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