Wednesday, March 11, 2015

Queer Tropes

The movie the Celluloid Closet got me thinking about the typical gay tropes that were and continued to be portrayed in cinema. Here is a fun link where Denny Upkins comments on a bunch of gay TV tropes (and he is pretty funny while talking about it). 

Alongside those typical gay stereotypes, here is an interesting piece on the effects of gay stereotypes. "These forced stereotypes are not only halting our progression to accepting all types of lifestyles but are also shadowing the real issues that homosexuals face in this country such as poverty, discrimination, and narrow molds gays are more and more being expected to conform to."

2 comments:

  1. I think Modern Family would be a great example to use in the context of your post, Elena! I remember when MF first came out and it was supposed to be this huge milestone for TV but over time, the gay relationship depicted has become more and more "censored" in a way. I feel that we rarely see Mitch and Cam embrace, go on dates, or have meaningful conversations like the other two couples on the show. Instead, we see them constantly bickering, rarely touching, or surrounded by gay tropes. In recent episodes, we've seen them be "sneaky": they steal back gifts, they help Haley hide secrets from Claire, they are conniving in attempting to undermine their nemesis' 7 year old, etc. It's an interesting thing to label as a success and for me, seems to be amore subtle form of negative stereotypes. And yes, I watch this show as a guilty pleasure.

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  2. Great conversation! I just wanted to add a few links on bisexual tropes more specifically, since I notice bi issues tend to get lost in discussions of queer representation in film and television.

    Here's a fantastic master list of bi stereotypes, with links to individual articles:
    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BisexualityTropes

    And, for any L-Word (anti)fans out there, here's Autostraddle's take on the show's bi representation, a chronic pet-peeve of mine: http://www.autostraddle.com/the-l-word-and-but-not-too-bi-flipping-the-script-is-not-much-better-217540/

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