Coomer 1 Katharine Coomer Instructor: Malcolm Campbell Honors English 1103 (Mon/Wed) 6 October 2013 Mother May I?

Our generation is completely surrounded by media and technology- they have slowly infiltrated our lives and now we have integrated them into our daily routines. Media is a way of communicating or influencing a large group of people and media presents itself in many forms such as radio, television, the internet, newspapers and magazines. I watch the news on television and recent local news coverage has included stories about gay couples that are not being granted marriage licenses. However, it was just last month that the legalization of same-sex marriage in the Sstate of New Jersey was being covered in the news. When it comes to the rights of those in the LGBT community, it seems as though each time some progress is made they are then forced back two steps. After noticing the pattern of one step forward, two steps back, I began to wonder whether or not media is being utilized to advance rights for the LGBT community or if it is being utilized to prevent the LGBT community from advancing. The primary obstacle in the fight for rights for the LGBT community is acceptance. Alfred Kinsey was a pioneer sex researcher and his research has proven key in advancing the topics of homosexuality and other sex related topics. . Although the way in which Kinsey conducted much of his research has now been found to have been unethical, many of his beliefs and findings are still held to be true. Kinsey believed that penalties have been imposed on and against persons who have done nothing to the property or physical bodies of others, but who

Coomer 2 failed to adhere to the mandated customs (16). And Kinsey makes a valid point- many of the arguments against homosexuality claim that it is in some way harmful and these assertions are completely invalid. Religious and evolutionary conservatives have deemed homosexuality as unnatural because it arrogantly ignores Gods intentional design. But society has become so consumed with determining whether certain sexual behaviors are natural or unnatural that the consideration of those behaviors as harmful or not has been overlookeddetermination of sexual behaviors as harmful or not has been misconstrued. Jesse Bering is the author of a new book titledIn his book, Perv: The Sexual Deviant in All of Us,s Jesse Bering. The book explores a variety of sexual behaviors that are deemed deviant, but. Bering himself is a homosexual so he spends a great deal of time discussing the perceived sexual deviance of homosexuals. Bering discusses the issue of same-sex marriage and satirizes the arguments that legalizing same-sex marriage is harmful to America or that it is defiling the sanctity of marriage or that it is destructive to society (32). Bering asserts that claiming same-sex marriage asis harmful to these symbolic entities only makes sense to those with an agenda. He goes on to compare the consideration of gay marriage as harmful to these symbolic bodies to giving corporations the legal status of personhood (33). In order for the arguments of social conservatives to be valid, political parties, world views and nations would have to be viewed as organisms in possession of pain receptors and a nervous system able to register emotional trauma, pain and distress rather than an abstract entity without a brain (33). Through his humorous assertion Bering makes a good point- you cant hurt something that cant experience pain. Many of the arguments used to disparage homosexuality have no actual merit but they dont necessarily need any merit because for the last one hundred forty years or so, society has

Coomer 3 found ways to stigmatize homosexuals. At first, In the 1800s being a homosexual was a crime that was punishable by imprisonment and by death. In the latter half of the 1900s Then it was deemed a mental disorder. Homosexuality that was no longer punishable, but it wasnt acceptablea crime, but it still wasnt acceptable. Homosexuals were institutionalized, medicated and subjected to treatments that would rid them of their affliction by manipulating their sexuality. Although homosexuality is no longer a crime or a disease, the stigma still remains and that is what makes progress of the LGBT community so difficult- the stigma has affected the way that the community is perceived. Recently, media has had a large effect on the way that the LGBT community is perceived as well. Media has been used to perpetuate the merit and truth behind the arguments of the evolutionary, religious and social conservatives. But media has also been used to promote the acceptance of the LGBT community. Since the 60s, television has manipulated the way that the LGBT community is perceived. At that time, the news primarily portrayed homosexuals as perverts and sexual deviants that committed crimes and the purpose of this was to instill negative feelings toward the LGBT community in people. However, beginning in the late seventies, broadcasting entertainment began to portray positive images of the LGBT community. and Tthis was done in an attempt to counter the damage done in the sixties and to promote support for the LGBT community in their pursuit for equal rights. Incidentally, major news organizations are responsible for the portrayal of the LGBT community as a minority. The news organizations began framing the LGBT community as a minority seeking equality yet those organizations have yet to give concerns of the LGBT community the same status as the concerns of other minority groups (Stein 242). As I mentioned earlier, in recent news the struggle in the

Coomer 4 legalization of same-sex marriage is being discussed but what is not being discussed or emphasized is the importance of the injustices or the importance of equal human rights for the LGBT community. LGBT media has proven important in the formation of the LGBT identity and community (Stein 242). Unfortunately, LGBT media includes television shows such as Will and Grace and Ellen. While these television shows were created with the intention of portraying a broader image of the LGBT community, but they actually portray a very narrow image of the LGBT community. Those shows failed to reflect the characteristics of the LGBT community as a whole and they also failed to challenge the assumptions and stereotypes that heterosexuals have of the community. This is primarily because Max Mutchnick and David Kohan (creators of Will and Grace) and Neal Marlens and Carol Black (creators of Ellen) have limited insight into the LGBT community as a whole. Max Mutchnick and David Kohan are both gay men that created Will and Grace with the intention of educating the public about homosexuality but they ended up marginalizing the other factions of the LGBT community. Neal Marlens and Carol Black are a married couple who cant relate to the struggles of the LGBT community. However, Larry Gross, a specialist in the media portrayal of minorities and a founder of the field for gay and lesbian studies, asserts that although the current portrayal of the LGBT community is less than ideal and lacks accuracy at times, at least the community is being recognized (21). At least
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Tthe media is making an effort to integrate the LGBT community into entertainment and manages to conveys some information about the community as well. The Internet is a portal in which forms of virtual media can be accessed instantaneously by a large number of people. The Internet has helped in the formation of the LGBT identity just as media has. I interviewed a man named Tom who is in his late sixties and he told me that

Coomer 5 when he was younger he failed to identity as gay because there was not enough information available to him. All that was known about homosexuals was the stereotypes. Homosexuals were thought to have lisps and high pitched voices and wear dresses and homosexuality was also synonymous with pedophilia. Tom told me that he didnt think he could be gay because he didnt wear dresses or touch little boys or have a lisp . I also interviewed a woman named Jeanne who is in her early seventies and she told me that when she was a teenager she didnt really know what it meant to be a lesbian. All Jeanne knew was that she didnt want to get married. However, now the Internet offers a way in which those struggling with identifying their sexuality can access limitless amounts of information instantaneously. Many teenagers in the LGBT community that I spoke with admitted to me that they used to Internet to find the right label for their sexuality. One girl that I spoke with, Kayla, told me that she knew she wasnt heterosexual, bisexual or a lesbian so she turned to the Internet for more information. She said that she was able to determine that she was a pansexual. Pansexuals are people that are attracted to all genders across the gender spectrum and this includes hermaphrodites and transgendered people. Kayla showed me that tThe Internet has been used by those within the LGBT community to help develop a sense of self. A sub-culture of media is social media and its various forms include Facebook, YouTube, Myspace and Twitter. LGBT youth were among the first users of first generation social networking sites and this is because they are so eager to develop a sense of belonging to some form of community (Palmer 13). The most popular social networking sites for community outreach are Facebook and YouTube because it is easier for LGBT youth to find someone that will accept them, someone that they can relate to or have a common history with. But social media (and the Internet in general) have also been used to expose LGBT youth to negative

Coomer 6 influences on self-acceptance such as cyberbullying. Social networking sites have acted as a place to harass, bully and torment LGBT youth simply because of their sexuality. Since oOnline lives have a tendency to integrate with reality, and so the cyberbullying evolves into physical bullying and harassment. Thisat is one reason thatwhy LGBT youth suicide rates are so highbecause they are subjected to and cant escape from bullying. In 2011, in response to the alarming number of teen suicides due to bullying, Dan Savage and his husband, Terry Miller, posted a video on YouTube. The message was simple: It gets better. The purpose of their video was to let teens know that no matter how difficult life may seem due to the bullying or other problems that they were are facing, as they get older things will get better for them. Dan and Terrys one video evolved into the It Gets Better Project which now consists of over fifty thousand videos that have been created in response to the one created by Dan and Terrytheir video. The project has gained the support of many influential people such as Anne Hathaway, Lady Gaga, Hillary Clinton, The Obamas and Ellen DeGeneres (Savage). While Tthe It Gets Better project offers a place for people to offer support and encouragement for the LGBT community and the supporters encourage the support of the LGBT community and try to spread the sense of community. It also offers a place for those seeking a sense of community to find it, but , there are those who fight against the expectation to be part of a community. Those individuals fight the expectation to be part of any such us because there is the expectation of the others within that group or community that since you are like us, you should behave in certain ways. Also, the societal definitions and expectations of a community are used by opportunistic politicians either to advance minorities or to organize against them, these definitions and expectations help to crystallize identification with a group, so that people defined categorically come to see themselves as having a common history and destiny that is

Coomer 7 distinct from others (Dynes 260). Factions of sSociety haves manipulated the way that the LGBT community is perceived in order to both unite and tear down the community- it is just a matter of which tactic is necessary at the time. Also those that are developing their sexual identities may find it difficult to identify as part of any of the groups that make up the LGBT community. This is because they dont feel that they behave in ways that are aligned with the definition of the behavior of that particular group. Media is used as a place to promote the involvement in a community as well as a place to deter the involvement in a community. The relationship between the progress of the LGBT community and the media has been frustrating to follow. The trend reminds me of a childhood game called Mother May I? The game requires one person to act as the mother and for multiple people to act as her children. Each child takes turns stepping forward and asking the mother if they can have permission to move forward or not. Sometimes Mother grants them their request and sometimes she orders them to take a few steps back. In this case, the LGBT community would be the children and society as a whole would be represented by the mother. The LGBT community is constantly seeking approval and acceptance so that they may progress. Sometimes society allows for the LGBT community to make progress and other times it is less inclined to do so. In a society where we are dominated by mass media, the only way that the LGBT community will ever be able to make any true progress is through the proper utilization of media. I just hope that Mother permits it.

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Works Cited

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Coomer 9 Bering, Jesse. Perv: The Sexual Deviant in All of Us. New York: Scientific American/ Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013. Print. Dynes, Wayne R, Warren Johansson, William A. Percy, and Stephen Donaldson.Encyclopedia of Homosexuality. New York: Garland Pub, 1990. Print. Gross, Larry. Up from Invisibility: Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Media in America. Chichester, West Sussex: Columbia University Press, 2001. Print. Kinsey, Alfred, Wardell Pomeroy, Clyde Martin, and Gebhard Paul. Concepts of Normality and Abnormality in Sexual Behavior. New York: Grune and Stratton, 1949. Print.
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Palmer, Neal. LGBT Youth Online and in Person: Identity Development, Social Support, and Extracurricular and Civic Participation in a Positive Youth Development Framework. (2013): n.page. Web. 1 Oct. 2013. <http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu >. Savage, Dan. "What is the It Gets Better Project?." It Gets Better Project. Savage Love, n.d. Web. 3Oct 2013. <itgetsbetter.org>.

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Stein, Marc. Encyclopedia of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender History in America. New York, NY: Charles Scribners Sons/Thomson/Gale, 2004. Print.