2 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
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Very interesting! Will definitely watch later. I wish more people would see things like this to understand why representation is actually an important thing in our media. Audiences see that another human being dealing with an illness is just that, and not Satanic sinner.
Comment by chemguy216 at 14/02/2025 at 16:16 UTC*
3 upvotes, 1 direct replies
One of many parts of the success of various LGBTQ movements was representation, particularly in close-to-home ways.
We’re more removed from this reality but coming out used to be much more societally consequential. There was barely any gay representation in media, and often when present it had coded characters or characters who had to come to “punishing” ends to their stories—a common option being death (this is part of why the “bury your gays” trope exists). When gay people started coming out, inspired in part by the political career of Harvey Milk, that started making people realize that they knew gay people in their personal lives. That made it harder and harder to dislike them (though this was a gradual societal change, and many gay people suffered various negative outcomes after coming out—conversion therapy, getting kicked out of the house, social ostracization, fired from jobs).
Funny enough, Matt Baume has another video about how a group of gay activists organized and executed some strategic protesting to make a major network show programming with more positive portrayals of gay people. I also loved that video because it showed some often necessary elements of effective targeted protesting.
My apologies. When I start talking about LGBTQ history, it animates me. I gain so much personal strength from my knowledge of my predecessors’ struggles, their suffering, their pain, their resilience, their ability to find joy even in the darkest of times, and the memory of the ones who for many reasons left this world too soon (e.g., murdered in hate crimes, lost to AIDS, gone from suicide).