It comes as no surprise that the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) gave awards to Showtime's "Queer as Folk" and NBC's "Will & Grace" for their "positive portrayals of gay and lesbian issues" (Morning Report, May 1). But for this gay malcontent, it's a tad disturbing, something akin to if the NAACP had handed out an Image Award back in the 1950s to "Amos 'n' Andy" for its contributions to African Americans.
Frankly, I mostly agree with him about QAF. And, for the moment, I have no opinion on "Will and Grace", since it's rarely appealed to me enough to watch an entire episode. (In fact, I'm fairly certain that I haven't, as yet.) But vast chunks of QAF are intensely dislikable, as the stereotypes come thundering down the plains. (That said, the show is mostly betrayed by writers who [a] aren't actually writing very well and [b] who seem to have a shocking lack of any broader vision and [c] the fact that the original source material was never ever EVER meant to stretch to 22 hours in length.)
(OK, a mild shock: Encyclopedia Britannica doesn't even mention "Amos and Andy" ... except as a sidenote in an essay about "Nurse Betty", of all things. Love it or loathe it, the show was certainly historically important. Not to warrant even a mention really is shocking.)
Copyright © 2001, Iain Jackson, after-words.org
[Archives: 2001 and after]
Archives before February 5, 2001
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12/19/2001: vive la france
12/19/2001: princess, redux
12/19/2001: yemen and rumsfeld
12/18/2001: you're NOT in the army now
12/18/2001: interesting donation
12/18/2001: shame on winn dixie, indeed
12/18/2001: saudi princess
12/17/2001: new resolve
12/17/2001: a victim of the attack ... yeah, right
12/17/2001: polluters ho!