"I don't want people offended by "f****t" as a "slur" following me" --homophobic asshole or 3edgy5u tumblr kweer?

what do you think about "political correctness" in tv shows? i think it kinda stifles representation ironically bc im a minority but whenever i watch a show displaying my culture i feel like theyre whitewashing the reality out of fear of offending ppl :/

I feel like I should start here by saying that I’m not a huge fan of “political correctness” as a movement in general.  I am (of course) all for people improving themselves, learning how to interact with people who are different than them in a respectful and empathetic way, and supporting minority communities, but oftentimes I feel like “political correctness” leads to a culture where saying the right thing is more important than doing the right thing, and where people are shamed for imperfectly trying to learn.  I would much rather see someone screw up while trying to understand than someone parroting other people’s views without understanding what those viewpoints mean and why they’re important. You guys know that I am all for authentic self-improvement, figuring out what you truly believe, and then fighting for it. I think that’s what we should be striving for instead of saying things we think our culture wants to hear.

Moving to your actual question, the thing about representation in TV is that TV isn’t real life.  What I mean by that is that every choice you make when you’re writing a TV show is within your control, and every choice you make when you’re writing a TV show contributes in some small way to the way our culture views of different groups of people.  The more you see a point of view represented in media, whether that’s about race, gender, sexuality, or even silly things like what a college party looks like, the more you internalize, consciously or not, those points of view and expect them to be true.  You show up at your first college party and expect there to be red solo cups, because they’re in every college party scene ever.  And the red solo cups are there, because the people throwing the party knew you were going to expect them.  And so I do think that writers do have an obligation to be aware of the consequences of how they’re depicting the world, because there are consequences.

For example, I’m part of the LGBT+ community.  For a long time, our representation in media was limited to villains (because of the Hayes Code- if you’re curious, check out Jessica Kellgren-Fozard’s video on the subject here).  Later, as the world got more “progressive”, our representation in media became “promiscuous, unfaithful people that die at the end of the movie”.  While it’s true that some LGBT+ people are villains, or slutty, or die a tragic death (and are even more likely to die a tragic death than straight people, given the AIDS epidemic and increased rates of death by suicide among LGBT+ people), when you write a character for whom that’s true, you’re perpetuating those stereotypes. You’re contributing, in a small way, to the perception that LGBT+ people are deviant and untrustworthy, or are people that don’t deserve happy endings.  

Skins series 7 is a great example of this.  Skins in a lot of ways handled its LGBT+ characters well.  It allowed them to be full people outside of their sexuality, while not shying away from exploring their sexualities or the unique difficulties that come with being a sexual minority.  Naomi and Emily even got a happy ending in series 4, which was huge for WLW viewers at the time, because they so rarely saw themselves reflected in characters who get to be happy.  But then the writers killed off Naomi in series 7, and that really hurt, because it felt like a reiteration that LGBT+ characters will always be miserable and die at the end.

It’s really important for people to see themselves reflected on TV, because it’s really important for people to see that there are options for themselves. If you never see LGBT people who are allowed to be in happy, loving relationships, or women who are scientists/astronauts/engineers, or whatever it might be, it’s hard to imagine that those things are a possibility for yourself.  

It’s also important for people who aren’t minorities to see minorities represented in all different ways in media.  When LGBT+ people started being represented on TV (not to harp on the LGBT+ thing, but since it’s my community and part of my cultural history, I feel like it’s something I can speak about...) there was a huge upswing in acceptance because people realized that LGBT+ people aren’t really all that different to them.  They realized that LGBT+ people are just people who frequently do boring, people things.  That was a huge step towards straight people tolerating the LGBT+ community.  Now that being LGBT+ has become more acceptable, we’re starting to see media that celebrates our cultural differences instead of trying to highlight how “normal” we are.  

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy vs. Netflix’s Queer Eye is a great example of that.  In the original Queer Eye, it was very much about, “we’re just like you”.  In Netflix’s Queer Eye, JVN can be shown on TV as his fabulous, high-heeled, skirt wearing, gender non-conforming self, I think because we’re at a place culturally where we now understand that many LGBT+ people are “just people”.  We live in a world now where LGBT+ representation includes everything from Brooklyn 99′s Raymond (the boss of the precinct) and his husband Kevin, a very straight-edge, “normal” interracial gay couple, to Brooklyn 99′s bisexual Rosa Diaz, who’s fearless and tough, to the cast of Queer Eye to Naomily to Choni from Riverdale to Mitch and Cam from Modern Family to Titus Andromedon from Unbreakable Kimmy Schmitt to Jules from Euphoria.  But if your only LGBT character in the whole show is a promiscuous villain who dies (or if the only character in your show that dies is LGBT+, or the only promiscuous character is LGBT+, or everyone gets a happy ending except for your LGBT+ character), to me it feels like in a small way, you’re driving progress backwards by introducing that depiction of LGBT+ people back into the world when we’re not quite clear of that reputation yet.  Regardless of how well the story is done, the number of LGBT+ stories that end in tragedy is substantially higher than the number of LGBT+ stories that get a happy ending, so writing a tragedy is picking at a cultural wound that hasn’t quite scarred over yet.

Finally, I think when it comes to how you represent minority characters, the question of “what is the point your media is trying to make” becomes important.  If your goal is to include minority characters because you want to improve representation, that’s different than if you’re including minority characters to make that minority more understood/accepted by culture at large, which is different than if you’re a minority yourself and you want to speak to the issues your community faces, and all of those are different to when minorities are included for the sake of appearing “inclusive” or “woke”, without a lot of thought going into how best to contribute to the conversation.  All of those require different approaches and different ways of writing the characters.

The bottom line is, I absolutely think you’re right. There’s a lot of minority representation on TV that erases cultural factors of the minority experience in favor of being palatable/above reproach.  Unless that’s being done with the intentional goal of making a minority group seem “just like the majority” to improve acceptance, it’s a misguided approach at best and harmful at worst.  

I think the solution is just to include more minorities in the writer’s room.  One of the reasons the characters in Skins and Euphoria feel like they have such real, accurate portrayals of what it’s like to be a person who’s part of a minority (whether that’s in terms of physical or mental health, sexuality, gender, race, etc.) is because they included people who are part of those minorities in the writing of those characters.  Jules’ story is shaped by Hunter Schafer’s own experiences.  Rue’s struggle with drug addiction is informed by showrunner Sam Levinson’s struggle with drug addiction.  By having people in the writer’s room who live that experience and can say “this is what it’s really like”, it’s harder to fall back on stereotypes or erase indicators of culture.

dont argue with me and then block me shithead.

1. “Maybe as a bromance but I cannot see the two like doing anything sexual” yeah because gay relationships are always about sex because were perverted deviants who dont have feelings

2. harry and louis are real people and thinking theyre closeted is way fucking different than having theories about a book. the fact that you call yourself a larry stylinson shipper and not a larrie is a really good indicator that you ship them in the sense that you read fanfics about them and fantasize about their sex life instead of, yknow, being concerned for their well being. people were using homophobia and the fact that being gay in the 60s would very often result in violence as a reason why we shouldnt ship jally. gay love and intimacy is beautiful and wholesome and its straight peoples fault that it isnt seen that way.

3. leave it to the internet to see a grown ass adult arguing with teenagers over twitter and praise her for being savage

3. “And So what if they’re all straight? That means more for us!“ im a guy.