#mediaexamples

[queermediastudies]

“Cultural Diversity as Brand Management in Cable Television”

“The Fosters” is a hit show for Freeform, ABC Family, showing Cultural Diversity.

“The Fosters” aired on ABC Family, now Freeform, was originally from “Christian Broadcasting Network” (CBN), founded in 1977, and sold to News Corp called Fox Family in 1998. In 2001 Disney got called the ABC family. Having previous conservative owners, it had along the way, Disney catered to younger audiences.  Ad agency hired by Disney to see what they valued the most. “We learned millennials value their families. As a network called ABC family, that was music to our ears.” John Rood said to market their shows to the younger generation, millennials. Now, we can see with the shows Freeform produces mainly centralized millennials, family close-knit shows, or working in the corporate world.

 They started to write shows within the family branch, but everyone doesn’t come from a nuclear family. The test shows “Kyle Xy” (2006-2009) and “The Secret Life of the American Teenager” (2008-2013) were hit showing of different families. They would also mainly “target a particular generation and use diversity as one core feature of its brand to attract that particular group” that when in from 2013-2018 was “The Fosters,” a Lesbian couple Stef, a police officer, Lena, Vice principal, for a charter school. Stef and Lena raise their Children biological, adoptive, and foster children.

The Fosters show the main relationship of Stef and Lena, a lesbian couple in the show. They show intimacy so everyone can have insight. Again, to the target of people who now have a different family than nuclear families. The majority of the characters have diversity. The children Stef and Lena raised adoptive twins Mariana and Jesus, who identify as Latinx. Lena is a black, biracial, and lesbian woman. While the other main characters identify as white, or the writers don’t go into further detail. To conclude, ABC family, now freeform, is a Disney channel-owned network. Catering shows the younger generation different ways of the family instead of a nuclear family.

Cultural diversity as brand management in Cable Television. (n.d.). Retrieved November 7, 2022, from https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/mij/15031809.0002.205?view=text;rgn=main 

[comm4000]

         America’s number one pastime is notorious for its concussion record and even worse, its tendencies to fabricate information that minimize the severities within the multi-billion dollar franchise. However, in Nicholas Schmidle’s (2017) “Can Technology Make Football Safer”, we are educated about the gruesome outcomes of concussion victims, but also the technological innovations that are gradually improving player’s safety. When discussing concussions and potential solutions, it’s significant to keep in mind that according to Schmidle (2017), Mccarthy found that “studies show that sports practice sessions are a major source of concussions” (p. 9) and “if we don’t change the way we coach the game, we won’t have a game to coach” (p. 10). For many, this translates into Americans could experience economic declines from an industry which they expect so much capital from.

           In the two YouTube videos that focus on utilizing robot tackling dummies, we can watch Dartmouth College’s product in action in the NFL’s Youtube clip “Steelers Experimenting with Robot Tackling Dummies” and gain insight of both NFL players and analyst’s thoughts. In the second Youtube clip, “Technology aims to prevent 100 million concussions” Nick Lowery emphasizes that the implementation of dummies is not as silly as it sounds. And I agree with Lowery on his stance that once young, aspiring football players view their idols training with the dummy that they won’t be so reluctant to do the same. This concept ties in fittingly with course material because we’ve learned how athletes have a unique ability to influence and transform American culture. Hence, the reason why prominent athletes are offered endorsement deals in exchange for very generous compensation. Eventually, the goal is that all football teams (recreational and professional) will adopt this method. And hopefully, through various inventions such as the tackling dummies, Michael Hoffer’s goggles (pg. 9), and other innovational technology, we can revolutionize America’s favorite game to become a much safer one.

[maevemckaig-blog]

This is from November but it’s still an interesting interview. Not really news, but some great insights (in my opinion) on the importance of school integration and how to move forward in this age of extremism.

“The humanities at their best, especially fiction and poetry, refine the souls of human beings. They open our hearts to compassion, give a profound sense of human vulnerability, and open our hearts to identifying with those who suffer most. The virtual decapitation of humanities and social studies in our public schools over the past 15 years has, I think, helped to narrow our sense of civic decency, collective responsibility, and moral generosity.” 

“One of the greatest gains made during integration was not something that can be reduced to numbers: mutual understanding and respect for each other.”       -Jonathan Kozol

[queermediastudies]

Gillian’s Queer Media Example: Comic Books

Comic books have often been dismissed or overlooked when it comes to queerness. But the comic from its very beginning has “been linked to queerness or broader questions of sexuality and gender identity in US society” (Scott and Fawaz, 2018). The American comics industry as they are known today was created by Jewish Americans who were originally denied jobs at regular publishing industries, so they started their industry. Some of these creators were Stan Lee (Writer and co-creator of Spider-Man, The Avenger, The X-Men, and The Fantastic Four), Jack Kirby (Artist, writer, and co-creator of Captain America, The Fantastic Four, and Spider-Man), Jerry Siegel (co-creator of Superman), And Bob Kane (co-creator of Batman). Therefore, both Superman and Captain America were heavily inspired by Jewish mythology with Superman being inspired by the story of Moses and Captain America being inspired by the story of the Golem. This influence is also why most superheroes' backstories are formed from family loss and death because it was the trauma a lot of these men were most familiar with.

So, it's no surprise that comic books would continue to tell the stories of marginalized people. “This has made the medium especially effective as a space for the depiction of an array of fantastical characters, worlds, and social interactions (among humans, mutants, aliens, cyborgs, and other “inhuman” figurations). The fantasy aspects of the medium have historically lent themselves to the depiction of a vast array of nonnormative expressions of gender and sexuality—from the most metaphoric (in hyperbolic camp visuality or the metamorphosing of human bodies into forms that call into question traditional gender norms, etc.) to the most literal (the actual depiction of queer bodies and erotic attachments)” (Scott and Fawaz, 2018). Marvel had the first openly gay superhero, NorthStar (Jean-Paul Beaubier) of Alpha Flight and the X-Men. And in 2011 when New York passed the Marriage Equality Act of 2011, Marvel celebrated this with NorthStar marrying his partner, Kyle.

The first transgender superhero was in DC’s Doom Patrol with Coagula.

Doom Patrol also has the characters of Negative Man (Larry Trainor) and Danny the Street. Negative Man is a gay superhero in Doom Patrol. Danny the Street is an Allie of the Doom Patrol a sentient living teleporting genderqueer street who uses they/them pronouns. Danny provides a sanctuary for anyone that society ostracized and seeks to hurt.

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One of the most revolutionary comic book series was DC and Vertigo comics The Sandman written by Neil Gaiman (who would go on to write American Gods, Coraline, and co-write Good Omens). Since its debut in 1989, The Sandman resonated with the LGBTQ+ community and has become a cult classic. It was one of the only comics at the time with reparation in a mainstream medium when prejudice against the community was at an all-time high. When asked about this Gaiman stated, “I had gay friends and I had trans friends. I wanted to see them represented in the comics that I was writing, and it felt to me like if I wrote comics and left them out, then I wouldn’t be representing my world or the world that I was in, or the world I was perceiving accurately, bravely, or truly. And that’s the point of art. So, for me, it was just a given.” The Sandman’s main character Dream of the Endless and his sibling's Destiny, Death, Destruction, Desire, Despair, and Delirium are notable in this context of queerness because while they all have preferred forms, they can present themselves however they choose and people they meet often preserve them in many different forms that vary in gender and race. Desire is most notable amongst the seven siblings in that they are genderqueer. They can present as either masculine, feminine, or something more in between. There is also the character of Wanda. Wanda is a transgender woman who is friends with Barbie. Wanda tragically died in a natural disaster and Barbie has a dream about Wanda looking perfect and beautiful. Wanda notices Barbie and waves goodbye to her as she leaves with Death. Later Barbie visits Wanda’s grave and sees that Wanda’s family put her dead name on the grave. Barbie rectifies this by crossing out the deadname and writing Wanda’s real name with her favorite shade of lipstick because it is the least, she can do as a friend.

Sandman later faced controversy when it released ‘Death Talks About Life’ in 1994. This was a PSA story to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and teach safe sex practices the PSA was released in Hellblazer #62, The Sandman #46, and Shade the Changing Man #32, and later as free pamphlets. This PSA almost got a few comic shops shut down and was banned in a few other shops. The story was of Death of the Endless as she advises on how to live longer, what are STDs, what are HIV/AIDs, how to use a condom with help from John Constantine, as well as dispelling myths about AIDS.

Sandman was not the only comic book to tackle the subject of HIV/AIDS. X-Men handled it in the form of the Legacy Virus. The Legacy Virus was created to target, infect, and kill mutants. But it did not just kill mutants since it targeted the x-gene which can be in non-mutants it started killing non-mutants as well. The X-Men in general has served as a long-time allegory for queerness for many years. They are a group of humans who present extraordinary abilities around puberty but can be present since birth (like gender and sexuality) and are often outcast by society that sees them as inhuman, something to exterminate, or something to cure. Mutants find safe havens at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters where they can be themselves. The X-Men were also known for their diverse characters such as “Storm, a Kenyan-born immigrant to the United States, the first black woman superhero in a mainstream comic book, and the X-Men’s team leader by the 1990s” (Scott and Fawaz, 2018). It’s also noteworthy that a lot of early queer representation came from mutant characters. As mentioned before NorthStar the first openly gay superhero is a mutant. Mystique (Raven Darkholme) and Destiny (Iren Adler) have been long partners and they even raised one of the most famous X-Men together, Rogue.

Iceman (Bobby Drake) was also revealed as gay and was likely overcompensating because of his bigoted parents. Wanda Maximoff’s (Scarlet Witch) twin boys, Bobby (Wiccan) and Tommy are both queer. Tommy is bi with a boyfriend and Bobby is gay and got married to Teddy (Hulkling)

Also, the infamous love triangle of Cyclops (Scout Summer), Jean Grey, and Wolverine (Logan) have become a much healthier polyamorous relationship.

I could go on about many more queer characters and stories in comic books, but it is probably best if I stop it here. There are so many more characters and stories that I could talk about so just remember comic books are queerer than you think.

[queermediastudies]

QUEER TV

Before I watched POSE, I thought it might be a fashion show about how models express themselves. POSE is a queer television related to fashion but not as similar as what we saw in a commonplace. It is not about a great fashion design with a famous luxury designer, the roles in POSE are all designers to themselves because they designed and made the costumes. 

The first queer media I watched was called Brokeback Mountain, which did not leave me with a deep impression but misconception of gay people that I do not understand why the two leading male characters fell in love but marry with other women. I have never considered what kind of humiliation or discrimination they would meet if they came out. I was ignorant before I reached out to POSE, a television that focuses on minority people within the marginalized group. It is a television that no longer focuses on white gay people but on black trans people. This brought out the breakout text in both queer media and the natural world since the world is still arguing about the problems of trans people, such as whether trans people should use the women's restroom. 

According to what we have learned before, the LGBT group is a marginalized group because the whole world system is still or mainly focuses on heteronormativity. To love or have a relationship with the same sex people is violated the binary rule, human morals, and reproductive futurism. And it is perceived as demonic behavior by Catholicism. 

POSE is the first queer TV that changed my perspectives on gay people. Although this TV has been controversial, it uses three seasons to sketch the queer history in New York City, starting from 1980 entirely. For me, POSE is not just a queer TV but a 'documentary' TV because the play is in chronological order, which shows the historical moments from queer history. Moreover, according to Joyrich(2014), TV is still at the top of mainstream US media institutions, and it has a function of influencing people's perceptions by bringing out intensely political history. TV is a thing that is ordinary, mundane, and unremarkable or a concept that illustrates a fixed type of framing in media. Queer is unusual in adjective and ruins things in verb meaning. Queer TV can be seen as a "breakout text" (Cavalcante, 2017, p.1) that appeared in ordinary television. This breakout is like a sudden rise of layer after layer of huge waves across the calm sea. Therefore, POSE is also a cultural breakout text to me.

"Queer is defined precisely as the subversion of the ordinary" (Joyrich,2014,p.134). Queer TV studies focus on how queer TV reflects, refracts, and generates the dominant ideology, firmly challenging and troubling the normative ideology, thus providing a powerful venue for cultural and political resistance. According to Tongson(2017), queer media has its function of examining queer history by portraying LGBTQ civil rights events. Each era's cultural, political, and LGBT activities affect queer media creations. Queer media from various eras mirrored queer society. Queer media helps people understand the challenges and limits queer people faced before. The content of how trans people defend against HIV disease and why they get infected in this TV series brought me a type of cultural shock corresponding to the breakout text function. In season2, episode2, they went to the church and started their protest to ask, "stop killing us." The director uses a close-up shot to show the cardinal's crime through the leaflet. As we can see from the picture, it pointed out what the cardinal did at that time. 

The scenes played in the show used a narrative way to show how ACT UP and our main characters participated in the protest, which is similar to what happened in the actual ACT UP protest during that time. I appreciate the documentary film United in Anger which precisely explained this scene because I did not understand why they started the protest in the church when I watched the scene. But after we read and learned from our class, I re-watch the TV and finally connected some confusing points to actual history.

Another scene in the POSE that left me with a profound impression is that they spread the ashes. This scene is based on the actual hisotry, which is also recorded in the United in Anger. After Pray dead, his friends united together and joined the activity made by ACT UP— spread the ashes onto the White House lawn. Ashes are meaningful and more direct in showing how many people died from AIDS. It was more efficient in getting people to become angry and remember how this disease took their friends, families, and people they knew. This scene revealed how people with AIDS or without AIDS were angry and disappointed when the government was not fully responding to act to these dead people.

Do you remember a scene where the presenter asked trans people horrible questions about their biological body system in the last documentary film called Disclosure? Have you ever thought about why those people ask these awful questions to trans people? This is also driven by Cavalcante, "particularly on television talk shows, transgender people are routinely asked to reveal intimate details about their bodies, questions other guest never receive" (Cavalcante, 2017, p.9).

POSE has reflected the similar problem of trans people in the show. It can be recognized as a combination of Cavalcante's idea of breakout texts and Joyrich's idea that queer created "a tension between the articulation of the mainstream and the unsettling of the mainstream, both framing and displacing a televisual logic as it attempts to take queer viewers, texts, and issues into account even as it aims to undermine TV's usual accounting" (Joyrich, 2014, p.133). The worry from trans people seldom or never appeared in a show but POSE pointed out. Like Cavalcante(2017) said, trans people are worried about how the screen showed trans people, and "the movie may have made people think you have to have the surgery" (Cavalcante, 2017, p.9). In the first season, episode 4, Elektra clarified the idea of why she wants to do the transsexualism operation, it is not to be a complete woman, but it is because of inconvenience. Many media coverages mislead us to believe that trans people will only be complete after they do the surge, but did the media reveal the truth about the inconvenience? I am glad to see queer TV like POSE pointed out the fact and eliminated the misconception of transsexualism operation. 

I believe POSE also indirectly explained why some people ask horrible questions to trans people. In season1, episode 7, Elektra's lover found she had done the surgery and became very angry. The words he uses: selfishness and stupidity, illustrate that he defined or identified Elektra as a toy to satisfy his perverted curiosity. This can be seen as how he identifies other trans people. In another scene in season2, episode1, Angel suffered dehumanization behavior by being photographed naked photos from the photographer. In their dialogue, he used the personal collection to highlight his wrong intention that he considers Angel a rare collection, not a human. He made her take off her clothes and underwear in an icy and commanding tone, and here's a detail of when he saw Angel take off her underwear that he swallowed. I think the director wanted to use this performance technique to express the ecstasy that he couldn't help but to imply his indifference and curiosity. The photographer, Elektra's lover in the play, identified some people's minds--to the hate, curiosity, shame, and indifference of crowds. 

All these scenes I showed above correspond to Joyrich's idea that queer TV created tension between ordinary television and queer TV(Joyrich, 2014). It focuses on the intersectional people at the edge of the marginalized LGBT people. It shows the function that broke up into the mainstream and made the marginalized group visible by revealing the issue of trans people of color.

Joyrich(2014) also mentioned that reproductive futurism rests on children all hope for the future. It believes that the primary motive for political science exists is to create a better future for the next generation. The fact that we don't know what will happen in the future also limits the idea of futurism. It is based on what people think or imagine about the present. But the idea that people must have children to ensure a future is common and expected(Harada, 2017). 

The ordinary TV follows the reproductive futurism pattern by creating thousands and thousands of similar televisions to meet the mass media's trend. Those televisions are TV's offspring which provide possibilities for future expectations.

I think this is why POSE only has three seasons because if it continues to self-reproduction, it may lose its initial goal to break up the normal TV interpretations of trans people. A meaningful queer TV might become an ordinary boring family drama, such as The Vampire Dairies, a fiction TV about vampires, werewolves, witches, and humans but focuses on heterosexuality across species. They are all busy dealing with their love and hate disputes. I think POSE also covers some repeated content implying the constant reproduction, but POSE retains its queerness since it only has three seasons. 

Cavalcante, A. (2017). Breaking into transgender life: Transgender audiences' experiences with “first of its kind” visibility in popular media. Communication, Culture & Critique, 10(3), 538–555. https://doi.org/10.1111/cccr.12165

Joyrich, L. (2014). Queer Television Studies: Currents, flows, and (main)streams. Cinema Journal, 53(2), 133–139. https://doi.org/10.1353/cj.2014.0015

Tongson, K. (2017). Queer. In L. Ouellette & J. Gray (Eds.), Keywords for media studies (pp. 157–160). essay, New York University   Press.

Harada, K. (2017). A challenge to reproductive futurism: Queer families and nonhuman companionships in ueda sayuri's the ocean chronicles. U.S.-Japan Women's Journal (2003), 52(1), 46-66. https://doi.org/10.1353/jwj.2017.0011

[queermediastudies]

Do you listen to Girl in Red?

Do you listen to girl in red? This question isn’t necessarily asking what you think it may be. It actually means something more along the lines of “are you a lesbian?” or a “woman who likes women?” But why is that? Like most people, queer folks have often turned to musicians and their work for things like self recognition or to find community. This is a fact brought up by Moore (2012) when discussing how gay men “idolize divas”. This want for self recognition and community building can sometimes lead queer folks to listen to queer artists, such as Lil Nas X. Kwateng (2021) notes that Lil Nas X is normalizing queerness through his work. In addition, she states that “he’s not apologizing for who he is and, in fact, touts it defiantly as a signal to his listeners to do the same” (Kwateng, 2021). This normalization and call to listeners to “do the same” is mirrored in girl in red’s music. Girl in red herself is a lesbian, and in her music she openly sings about past romances in a way that is so real it genuinely resonated with the lesbian or women loving women (wlw) community. It resonated so much that asking the question “do you listen to girl in red?” stopped just being about if you listen to her music but instead became a way to ask someone about their sexuality without having to explicitly say it. The question became a queer identifier and girl in red became a queer icon.

The popularity of this queer identifying question sparked other similar questions such as “do you listen to Mother Mother?” which asks if one is nonbinary. And “do you listen to Sweater Weather?” which signals bisexuality. Why is this a thing though? Can’t queer people just ask others if they’re queer explicitly? Well, the use of musicians/music as queer identifiers may be more safe. Since the original question is from lesbian tiktok and the others stemmed from other queer tiktok communities it may not necessarily be something that individuals from outside those queer communities may know of, therefore protecting the individual asking the question from potential homophobic or transphobic black-lash that may happen if they were to ask the question explicitly. So, my question to you all is, who do you listen to?

References

Kwateng (2021). “DaBaby, Lil Nas X, and Homophobia in Hip Hop.” TeenVogue.

Moore (2012) Tina Theory: Notes on Fierceness

[queermediastudies]

Queer Media History - Jordan Carpenter

The Stonewall riots are some of the most important things to happen in queer history. It was one of the first times in history queer people had tried to stand up for themselves and make a difference and this was a very important event. The media looked at it very differently though. With humorous headlines such as “Homo Nest Raided, Queen Bees are Stinging Mad,” the media made a mockery of what was currently happening. The media had always mocked and criticized queer people, and they were now taking the police’s side as well. “The Village Voice was soon to learn that the “forces of faggotry” were willing to fight the media as well as the police. In the wake of the Stonewall riots, a group of gay activists quickly organized a rally that lead to the formation of the Gay Liberation Front” (Stonewall and Beyond, Gross, p. 42).

The Gay Liberation Front (GLF) was an activist group comparable to the Black Panther Party. From the video above, Mark Segal talks about his experience in the Stonewall riots and in the GLF and he says it is the most important activist group in the history of the LGBT community.

The newspapers were making jokes and slandering the GLF and the people in the Stonewall riots. Joseph Epstein wrote an article called “Homo/Hetero: The Struggle for Sexual Identity” which was an article that mocked queer people in disguise as an analysis of sexuality. In this article he writes: “if I could I would wish homosexuality off the face of the earth” and “… nothing would make me sadder than if my 4 sons were to be homosexual” (Stonewall and Beyond, Gross, p. 43). Homosexuals have always been mocked in the media, even when an event as important at the Stonewall riots was occurring. There was starting to be more queer run media publications but the police still tried to shut them down. It is amazing to look at how far we’ve come as a society with queer media representation and publications, and hopefully it can only get better from here.

[queermediastudies]

Contextualizing Marriage Equality

This media example relates to the “Marriage Will Never Set Us Free” piece, including one of the authors (Willse) expanding upon the ideas presented in the article along with other activists and educators. The article attacks the “marriage equality” movement by analyzing marriage in a feminist framework as a violent power structure that harms and controls women, children, the poor, ethnic minorities and immigrants, as well as queer people. This structure works to maintain wealth for the wealthy and keep life essential benefits and “life opportunities” from those that do not or cannot participate in marriage. In light of this analysis the authors argue that LGBTQ demand for inclusion in such an institution is absurd and validates notions of assimilation, exclusion, making the political personal, acceptability politics, racism, classism, xenophobia, and sexism. I think the closing of the article express it’s argument succinctly, “It is stunning to watch, in such a short period, the rebranding of institutions of state violence as sites of freedom and equality. As the same-sex marriage fight draws to a close in the coming years and conditions remain brutal for queer and trans people without wealth, immigration status or health care, it is vitally important that we support and expand the racial and economic justice centered queer and trans activism that has never seen marriage as an answer” (Spade and Willse, 2013).

The video above furthers the points and concepts in the reading. By “following the money” (funding) the interviewees paint a historical picture of how marriage equality became the dominating/defining LGBTQ issue and how the marriage equality fight actually harms other forms of activism working to solve the more material issues facing marginalized groups. The video also expands on how marriage equality ideology limits LGBTQ communication and expression to mainstream society (ie. those who are not involved in or educated on the movement or true community needs). It also expands upon how marriage equality delivers affluent white gay men to a sort of “full white male citizenship” status along with things like access to serving in the military, same sex marriage, hate crimes inclusion, employment non-discrimination while leaving others behind. The digestible and concise framing prioritizes logic in an argument that is no doubt unpopular because of the long ingrained and accepted “what” and “who” it questions. Overall, I like this video most for how it contextualizes the points made in the article both historically and within the LGBTQ activism realm, further informing and supporting the argument against marriage.

Sources:

Spade, D., & Willse, C. (2013, September 6). Marriage Will Never Set Us Free. Organizing Upgrade . Retrieved from http://archive.organizingupgrade.com/index.php/modules-menu/beyond-capitalism/item/1002-marriage-will-never-set-us-free

[queermediastudies]

AYTO? Season 8 Breaks Norms

When one thinks of reality dating television shows, The Bachelorette and The Bachelor are usually shows that can pop into one’s head immediately. In 2019, MTV's Are You the One?, broke down the walls of heteronormative ideas when it came to reality dating shows/games. Before season 8 of AYTO? the previous 7 seasons looked at typical straight relationships and were typical to hetero norms that are seen in most reality dating shows. Season 8 changed the game by bringing on a full sexually fluid cast, that were open to whatever may get thrown their way. The show breaks down different sexual identities and gender identities.  This season of the show also sought to bring awareness to issues that people of color face in the LGBTQ Community. In my example, one of the contestants Jordan, mentions that on dating apps there can be bigotry and people only wanting to date a certain type(implied race) and being closed off to certain individuals, I feel like this connects to the Leiva article, because it allows for awareness to be raised for issues that are not always mentioned. In the article, Leiva states,“our experiences deserve to be more than one-dimensional afterthoughts; we are owed so much more than that,” (Levia, 2017). This season took steps at trying to start the conversation of bringing more awareness of people of color’s stories and allowing them a way to be heard. In an interview with the Wrap MTV’s Sitarah Pendelton discusses the importance of diversity on the show and explained that the goal of this season was to a give a “younger queer audience a reflection of themselves” (Pendelton, 2019). The show can also be connected to the Bonnie Dow article, “Ellen, Television, and the Politics of Gay and Lesbian Visibility,” from Monday as well, because her discussion of various stages of “coming out”. For one of the contestants on the show, Paige Cole, it provides the opportunity for her to “come out” because her family did not know that she was bisexual. In the reading, Dow states, “As a case study, the Ellen coming-out sheds light on the various mechanisms through which the ostensible liberation of the truth of sexuality- from silence, repression, denial- was not a simple case of setting free the truth, but was, rather the beginning of a discursive construction of that sexuality- of its authenticity, of its form, and of its politics” (Dow, 2001, p.124). In an interview after the show Paige, was asked what it was like “coming out” on television to everyone. During the interview, Paige answers “It was really liberating. It was something obviously I was anticipating with the whole casting project to be able to do. To finally be able to come out to everybody and actually say out loud, “I’m bisexual” — it was one of the most liberating, happiest feelings ever” (Cole, 2019). It is still important to remember that not all queer stories are exactly alike, but bringing to light individual’s stories like those on Are you the One? may help to continue breaking down barriers for LGBTQ individuals.

Works Cited:

Dow, Bonnie (2001). “Ellen, Television, and the Politics of Gay and Lesbian Visibility.”  Critical Studies in Media Communication 18(2), 123-140.

Leiva, Ludmila (2017). “TV Is Getting More Progressive, But It's Still Failing Queer People of Color.”Bustle.

Nakamura, Reid. “How MTV's 'Are You the One?' Became the Show YOUR LGBTQ Friends Can't Stop Talking About.” TheWrap, 9 Sept. 2019, https://www.thewrap.com/are-you-the-one-season-8-mtv-lgbtq-friends-cant-stop-talking-about/.

Schwartz, Stef. “Are You THE One?'s Paige Cole on Coming out, Finding Love and Breaking BISEXUAL Reality TV Barriers.” Autostraddle, Sept. 2019, https://www.autostraddle.com/are-you-the-ones-paige-cole-on-coming-out-finding-love-and-breaking-bisexual-reality-tv-barriers/.

[queermediastudies]

Queer Terror

The concept this week is Queer Terror, which is defined by the article, Feeling Fear, Feeling Queer: The Peril and Potential of Queer Terror by Harris and Jones as, “both terror against queer subjects and a queering of terror culture itself,” (2017).   An example of Queer Terror in mainstream media is the way that the Stonewall uprising was reported on in 1969.  Linked HERE is an article written by Gillian Brockell and published by the Washington Post titled How the Homophobic Media Covered the 1969 Stonewall Uprising. The Washington Post is a mainstream media source, which by the article makes reference to multiple popular publications of the 1960’s and 70’s in regards to their reporting methods surrounding Stonewall.  Fear of LGBTQ+ community members was commonplace in the late 60’s, and reporting often included fear mongering (encouraging terror) and homophobic or otherwise offensive language.  Articles surrounding Stonewall aimed to break apart community members, discourage gathering, and instill fear of LGBTQ+ persons in their heterosexual and cisgender societal counterparts.  Media coverage is manipulated to depict queer folx as dangerous, scary, and also serves to dehumanize them. The article by Anne Harris and Stacy Holman Jones also articulates how reporting methods and socialized queer terror aim to harm LGBTQ+ Communities.  The article which references the homophobic massacre at Pulse nightclub reads, ‘Orlando as an affective outcome of an instance of queer terror reinforces the pervasive prohibition against gathering.  Gathering is an increasingly suspect activity which often has radical and life-taking consequences: it is no longer safe to gather.   But people of color and other minoritarians (including queers) have been dogged by this prohibition for centuries” (Harris & Jones, 2017).  Both the Harris & Jones article and the Washington Post article emphasize the social terror associated with queer folx; illustrating that simply existing as a queer person and gathering with your community has been, and remains, dangerous.   Below are some images from publications reporting on Stonewall, TW: racial and homophobic slurs, violence. 

References:

Brockell, G. (2019, June 08). How the homophobic media covered the 1969 Stonewall uprising. Washington Post. Retrieved November 03, 2020, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/06/08/how-homophobic-media-covered-stonewall-uprising/?noredirect=on

Harris, A., & Jones, S. H. (2017). Feeling Fear, Feeling Queer: The Peril and Potential of Queer Terror. Qualitative Inquiry, 23(7), 561-568. doi:10.1177/1077800417718304

Images Retrieved From:

HISKIND. (2017, February 06). LGBT+ History Month: How the Press Reported the Stonewall Riots in 1969. Retrieved November 03, 2020, from https://hiskind.com/lgbt-history-month-how-the-press-reported-the-stonewall-riots-in-1969/

[queermediastudies]

Histories of Queer Media

“To gain the attention of the public, it seemed, one needed to do it in the streets, while the whole world was watching.” (Stonewall and Beyond, 40) “The village soon learned that the ‘forces of faggotry’ were willing to fight the media as well as the police. In the wake of the stonewall riots, a group of gay activists quickly organized a rally that led to the formation of the Gay Liberation Front and the birth of a new radical, gay liberation movement modeled on such sixties groups as Students For a Democratic Society and the Black Panthers.” (Stonewall and Beyond 42) After WWII, The U.S was in a position of change and uprising including queer power. Queer people were ostracized and very often brutalized by society and police. As Different events such as Stonewall occurred, media outlets spread news like wildfire but in a way of making LGBTQ people the enemy and only defending the police point of view. Although this painted an incorrect picture of the specific events, an explosion of queer people willing to fight for their rights were here and weren’t going away.

Joe Negrelli explains how preceding stonewall was a blank space and hope for gay people was little to none. West village was filled with other movements such as Equal rights, Anti-War and Women’s Liberation creating the perfect storm for queer people to stand up and demand representation. A spark of violence gave people hope and drive to defend themselves and while beginning a landslide action. Coverage from different events from queer people during the 1960’s and 1970’s use homophobic and vile terms but they can now be viewed as proof of how far we have come as a society near and far. Without the influence and power of the media, would revolutions still occur at levels such as this?

[maevemckaig-blog]

“These felony charges are bizarre and essentially unheard of when it comes to journalists here in America who were simply doing their job,” said Suzanne Nossel, the executive director of Pen America. “They weren’t even in the wrong place at the wrong time. They were in the right place.”

[queermediastudies]

Media Example

Hi everyone,

I picked the trailer of Queer Eye as my media example. The television series Queer Eye was first released by Netflix in 2018. It is a reboot of the series Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. For the new series, its goal is to fight for acceptance. For Queer Eye, the Fab 5 provides advice for people in need of food, dressing, culture, grooming, and interior designer aspects. In the first season, the series focused on providing help to straight people. The topic became broader in the second season. The fifth episode in season two, the main character Skyler is a transgender person who just recovered from surgery. In this episode, the show discussed a lot of issues that transgender people face in their life. Although people usually put LGBTQ together, there still is a lack of understanding and awareness of the transgender people even inside the LGBTQ group. As the reading mentioned that more and more LGBTQ regular character on stream. Although there is a lack of diversity in that LGBTQ character, it is undeniable that TV has already made a lot of progress. Sarah Kate Ellis, President and CEO of GLAAD said that “At a time when the Trump administration is trying to render LGBTQ people invisible, representing LGBTQ people in all of our diversity in scripted TV programs is an essential counterbalance that gives LGBTQ people stories to relate to and moves the broader public to support LGBTQ people and families (Townsend, 2017).” More and more series like Queer Eye appears in the stream can help people have a deeper understanding of Queer people.

References: GLAAD's 'Where We Are on TV' report highlights why #RepresentationMatters. (2017, November 17). Retrieved from https://www.glaad.org/blog/glaads-where-we-are-tv-report-highlights-why-representationmatters

Netflix. (2018, June 7). Queer Eye: Season 2 | Trailer [HD] | Netflix. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97Gh0LRdKu4

Rodriguez, L. (2018). Netflix's 'Queer Eye' Ready To Makeover Kansas City Starting Next Week. Retrieved from https://www.kcur.org/post/netflixs-queer-eye-ready-makeover-kansas-city-starting-next-week#stream/0

By Xiaoyu Cheng (Annie)

[queermediastudies]

“Afterbuzz” as a Source of Mediatized Linked Fate

Alexis Hartung September 16, 2018

While reading the Cavalcante article I immediately thought of 𝘐 𝘈𝘮 𝘊𝘢𝘪𝘵 even before it was mentioned. In particular, I thought of the episode where Caitlin Jenner’s new transgender friend group revealed to Jenner how privileged she was in her transition in process. Not only was this conversation bringing light to Jenner about transgender life, it also brought the discussion of more common transgender experiences to the audience. This conversation was necessary due to all the talk surrounding how Jenner does not show an accurate representation of the more common transgender life. I believe this episode in particular provided a context of mediatized linked fate because of how it explained that the show may not show the harder experiences of transgender life, a complaint many transgender viewers were having with it. What viewers were seeing was not accurately representing the transgender community which frustrated them because people were associating their social group with Jenner, which is where mediatized linked fate comes in.

Mediatized linked fate is “the sense that one’s own everyday life experiences, chances, and potentialities—and those of their social group—are tethered to a media text or character” (Cavalcante, 2017, p. 7). 𝘐 𝘈𝘮 𝘊𝘢𝘪𝘵 does not provide a good context for representing the experiences of transgender people. They are concerned that the show made transgender experiences appear easy in terms of the actual transitioning since Jenner was able to transition relatively fast due to her wealth. She was also able to get a lot of media coverage where she became a spectacle and as the ariticle says many transgender people felt this was unfair and ascribed the interest to her being a famous, wealthy, white male prior to her transition.

I wanted to find the clip from the show where the group talks to Jenner about the more common transgender experiences, but was unable to find it. However, while searching I stumbled upon this show called 𝘈𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘣𝘶𝘻𝘻 that is basically just people discussing shows after watching them. This particular episode of 𝘈𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘣𝘶𝘻𝘻 focused on the episode I was looking for and I found the dialogue to be interesting. I believe the show is a good example of mediatized linked fate because the people in the discussion were drawing all of their thoughts from representations in the show as well as ideas they likely got from media as well.

The group consists of a cisgender man and two cisgender women with no transgender representation. The discussion began fairly good with them acknowledging that there are a lot of struggles for transgender people that goes beyond just how they look. It felt that they were making these statements based on the content they just watched on 𝘐 𝘈𝘮 𝘊𝘢𝘪𝘵 because they appeared to be empathetic with the trans community after hearing how difficult life can be for a majority of them. This meant that the linked fate being created was more positive for the transgender community. However, not long after this recognition one of the participants, Danica, makes a statement saying she doesn’t get why Jenner was so focused on her voice when she should be focused on getting the gentital reassignment surgery because that is what will make Jenner a woman. I found this to be problematic because the group is making assumptions that genitalia is what makes a person part of a certain gender. It reminded me of the moment in the text where Cavalcante talks about how cisgender people believe that transgender people need the surgery or want the surgery in order to be complete. I think in this way, there is a negative mediatized linked fate in which media gives the impression to those outside of the trans community that the gentian surgery is the most important aspect of being transgender.

Link to video:

https://youtu.be/QJ4cfYIsfnE

4:20-6:15

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[queermediastudies]

On Fierceness and Fandom

In Madison Moore’s 2012 piece titled, Tina Theory: Notes on Fierceness, he provides an in-depth reading of Tina Turner’s groundbreaking career and stage persona in the 1960s, as one that elucidates his concept of fierceness. Moore describes the seemingly infinite possibilities that Tina Turner offered to her audience through her life, not only as one of the innovating black women in early rock music, but as a strong contrast to the more prim and polished black female artists of her day, like Diana Ross and the Supremes. Moore looks into and ultimately beyond the diva archetype usually applied to bold women on stage and sees Turner as a role model who helped him understand his own queerness at a young age.

Moore describes fierceness as an intervention that subverts dominant socio-cultural expectations and norms, giving ownership and self-preservation to both those who witness and embody it, while also creating “a disruptive strategy of performance” (p. 72). For him, fierceness is necessary in life for marginalized people as a method of self-assertion, and “a spectacular way of being in the world and “a transgressive over-performance of the self through aesthetics” (p.72). Fierceness is also full of contradictions, demonstrating what Moore describes as “both ownership and the loss of control, simultaneously deliberateness and spontaneity” (p.73). Witnessing the command that divas like Turner conduct from the stage is particularly instructive to anyone who is not a part of the dominant culture, in order to “live a conspicuous life within white patriarchy and try to live that life on your own terms….the diva will make certain that it is tradition and convention that yields to her (p.72).”

I choose the new, crowd-sourced video, by queer artist Perfume Genius, as my media example because it both illustrates and complicates Moore’s concept of fierceness. Through his evocative songwriting and chamber pop style, Perfume Genius addresses a variety of issues specific to queer life, and explores themes of acceptance, love, illness and more. As an independent artist on a small label, his audience and reach was quite small, until he made his TV debut on on David Letterman in 2014, giving one of the fiercest performances that late night television has ever seen. Dressed complete with a bondage collar and white suit, complete with red nails and lipstick, no less.

As his fame and following have grown in recent years, his music has affirmed the lives of people who are underrepresented in media, by connoting confidence, and humor through his artistry, in an industry that is still very heteronormative. Recently he held a contest for his fans to film themselves dancing and lip syncing to one of his new songs, called Wreath, resulting in the joyous video above. Overwhelmed by submissions from around the world, the media experiment and text illustrates how the fierceness of Perfume Genius gives life to his fan’s conception of themselves, similarly to the ways in which Moore’s asserts that fierceness is way to  “crystallize a solid identity for people who might otherwise be overlooked (Moore, p.84).”  Perfume Genius himself does not appear in the video, instead he leaves it to his fans to embody the spirit of the song. Although they are not “professionals”, their spontaneity and raw passion gives us a feeling of freedom, wildness and self-love.

[queermediastudies]

In Lynne Joyrich’s “Queer Television Studies: Currents, Flows, and (Main)streams,” Joyrich explores the space where queer representation in media defines or defies the mainstream. Additionally, Joyrich discusses the shift in television that is moving mainstream media to include more LGBT characters. However, Joyrich discusses how the assimilation of LGBT characters in mainstream media is typically represented by homonormative LGBT characters, thus ultimately creating a negative representation of queerness in television and not entirely or accurately representing the depth of the LGBT community.

Television shows that feature LGBT characters often portray them in a binary. Gay or lesbian characters are portrayed in simplistic “masculine-feminine” categories.  Joyrich presents the example of television show The New Normal, which maintains the main characters, Bryan and David, as “a standard “girly” versus “boyish” gendered polarity” (Joyrich, 2014, p. 137). The show is about a woman who becomes a surrogate for Bryan and David, as they fantasize having a family of their own. 

There are many layers that can be uncovered from this clip. David and Bryan, the gay couple, recall when they first met in a gay bar. Bryan asks David to dance, asking him if he’s ever been with a “guy who leads” on the dance floor, which perpetuates this idea that gay couples constantly portray a dynamic of masculinity and femininity. Additionally, this clip portrays Bryan and David in a nuclear family situation, which is on display throughout the entire show. This is even clearer in Bryan and David’s pursuit to start their own family.

While television is making strides, Joyrich argues that LGBT characters on TV are mostly portrayed in a certain way in order to appear more palatable to a mainstream audience. When they fall out of these societal binaries and expectations, they are queer, which is positive representation, but may not be perceived that way through mainstream media. This validates Joyrich’s argument that “it’s the ambivalence, though, of how queerness can be both the electrical spark and the grounding against any possible shock that remains the paradox of the problem—indeed, I’d argue the problematic—for queer television studies today” (Joyrich, 2014, p. 139).  

Joyrich , L. (winter 2014 ). Queer Television Studies: Currents, Flows, and (Main)streams . Cinema Journal, 53(2), 133-139. doi:10.1353/cj.2014.0015