...Continued
Saito S said:
And no, having aliens that are homosexual is not the same as having some of the human character being homosexual. It's certainly not at all BAD, and can be interesting from the standpoint of exploring said alien culture, but the issue is how homosexuality for humans is depicted in this show about humanity's future, about showing that in said future, our race has finally gotten over this incredibly outdated, worthless idea that being homosexual should be viewed as anything other than perfectly normal, perfectly healthy, and perfectly acceptable. Thus, the inclusion of gay characters who are human is important.
I agree completely. If you have asexual hermaphrodite aliens and the like, it might make for an interesting biological discrepancy to define the alien and add to the "alien" experience, but it does nothing to support the LGBT.
And what you and others are wanting is to push LGBT, "Trek and entertainment be damned, I want to push my politics" is what I said (paraphrased) in an earlier post in this thread. And someone asked "who's saying that?" well the answer is you are Saito.
I don't want to oppress gays or promote them, I don't care about gays. I care about gays like I care about trains and tie dye t-shirts. I'm not against it, and I'm not for it, I just don't care.
You say "in said future, our race has finally gotten over this incredibly outdated, worthless idea that being homosexual should be viewed as anything other than perfectly normal, perfectly healthy, and perfectly acceptable."
The problem I have with this statement is you act as if this is a universal truth like water is wet, fire burns, gravity gives an object weight. You act as if it is a testable and undeniable truth rather than just a current theory held by the slight majority. You say it's perfectly normal. Normal is an ambiguous term, at it's base it means majority, occurs often, expected, within parameters. Being left handed is abnormal, because it occurs in only 7% - 10% of the population. It isn't evil or bad, it just isn't normal. Neither is being gay which occurs even less than being left handed.
If you mean "mentally healthy" well it was only in 1973 that it got dropped from psychologies holy book the DSM. And that was due to political pressures, and not based on new evidence, or a new psychology paradigm.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders Scroll down to "Seventh printing of the DSM-II, 1974"
As far as "perfectly acceptable" If it were perfectly acceptable, than it would be accepted by everyone, and you wouldn't need to push it. What you are saying is you "want" it to be perfectly acceptable, rather than "you're an idiot for not accepting that it already is perfectly acceptable".
We also make assumptions like "they were born that way". I hear so many times a christian bible thumper bitching about homosexuality, and some liberal retorts "everyone knows gay's don't have a choice, they were born that way."
Well I doubt any sexual preference or fetish is a conscious choice, but I am highly skeptical on people born with a fetish or a sexual preference. I think it can be easily argued that for some people it is the result of abuse or trauma (I said some people). People who go to prison and are raped frequently, in a culture that says "a man puts it in you, a fagot has a man put it in him" enough years of that psychological trauma can mess people up, and they have went to prison straight, came out gay or bi.
To what extent is any mental illness or state of mind nature or nurture, is an on going debate, and therefore to say "they were born that way" as if this were an undeniable scientifically proven fact, is ignorance.
Furthermore, there are evolutionary reasons why I don't think homosexuality would be a natural genetic outcome. A characteristic, either physical, or neurological, is the result of what works. "Works" meaning what will produce the highest abundance of healthy offspring. Two men or two women can produce no offspring. So if evolution is true, this characteristic should have been weeded out of the gene pool, or more accurately never been in our gene pool to begin with. I am willing to believe that "some" people are born gay, but the percentage would have to be on par with Siamese twins, being born blind, being born deaf, being born with two sexual organs, or being born with any abnormality that would render the chance of finding a mate and reproducing, virtually non-existent.
I don't personally care if homosexuality is a choice or not. If it were a choice, and you chose to be gay, what's wrong with that? Is it really any different whether you were "born" gay or whether you "chose" to be gay? I don't personally think so, so it shouldn't matter or have impact on social acceptance.
I feel the need to re-iterate the point that I am not claiming I believe homosexuality is a mental illness, or the result of abuse. Though I do stand by my belief that it is way too common to be explained by genetic chance). I am merely stating that these things are open to debate, thus wanting a mainstream entertainment industry to push only your side of the debate as fact, is deceptive propaganda, and anyone who screams "homophobe" during these details, is coping out due to lack of debating skills. healthy, normal, acceptable, is not a fact, it's your own political theory and agenda.
And you have basically confessed an earlier point I made, that for some people, the idea of a gay character has nothing to do with the marketability, or the entertainment value, of a franchise, but with pushing a political agenda.
I am not here to push a political agenda, my objection to a gay character is not routed in a political or spiritual belief system, it is based on what I perceive to be marketable and entertaining. If there is a new trek, and it does have a gay character, and that gay character is entertaining, than that's great. But before I see it, and I am asked "should we put a gay in there?" my default answer is "no, I don't think a gay would add anything to writing, or the ratings, or the character cast dynamic."
Now someone talked about Travis on Enterprise could have been made a gay character. I agree. After they had nothing for him, gave him no development, and pushed him so far in to the background, yes, Travis could have come out of the closet and be gay, and I honestly feel that would revitalize the character, give him a fresh start.
I recall an episode where it was Malcolm Reed's birthday, and Hoshi wanted to get him the perfect birthday present. But the problem was he was such a secretive guy, no one knew anything about him. I tell you, I had this strange feeling that when they were digging through his files and his life, at the end they were going to find out he was gay somehow. I just had that feeling. Although that never came to fruition. So I think Travis and Malcolm should have paired up and been gay. Considering how little these characters got used, it would have made them more entertaining.
Or what about Malcolm and that paramilitary leader, I forget what that squad was called, but they were the military guys on enterprise during the Xindi plot, and Malcolm and the leader of the team hated each other, and then started fist fighting. You know, if that were a male and female, all that hatred would have been called "pent up sexual frustration" and they would have fought and then started kissing. You know if that had been a guy and girl, you know that's how it would have ended. Well, it still should have ended that way. That would have blown my mind LOL.
So yes, a gay character "could" work, it could be interesting. And if Star Trek ever was a pioneer of civil rights (which aside from Roddenberry's wife as Number One, on the TOS pilot, and having a black woman on the bridge) is debatable. Beyond Number One, and Uhura, I don't see a ton of civil rights advocacy from Trek. Sure it's there, but I think the fans amplify through perception just how much it's there. If indeed Star Trek is a champion of civil rights, they totally dropped the ball on Enterprise. It would have been understandable to "try" to make an appealing gay character in 2001. I think by 2012, "trying" to make an appealing gay character is just jumping on the band wagon, lacks shock value, and is almost certainly going to be the focus of the LGBT hatred. After all, one stereotype and LGBT screams about the stereotype. Lack certain stereotypes and LGBT will scream about the portrayal of gays. There is no satisfying the LGBT, and therefore my advice is to not try to satisfy them, just ignore them, and make an entertaining show.
Maurice said:
Mars said:
You want to check the box for homosexual, fine, what's next do you suppose? Its not really science fiction and it doesn't add to the plot, most viewers would tolerate it out of politeness, because the writer wanted to include a homosexual in the 24th century, no one wants to be called a homophobe after all.
Change "homosexual" to "black" and maybe you'll see the point, but I doubt it. The double-standard is staring back at you from the mirror. Enjoy the view, ugly as it is.
Nope, already covered that. In fact, the black token, is what launched my fear of the gay token.
There is nothing wrong with a character being played by a black actor, but when you deliberately stick a black person in there to fill a quota, or push diversity, you create a token.
Also, there is a huge difference between a gay character and a black, Hispanic, or female character. Race and sex is what you are, gay is what you do.
If you write a character, and a black person auditions, and you hire him, your character, who was never written with race in mind, is now a black character because he is played by a black actor.
If you hire a gay person to play the character, the character doesn't become gay. Takei was gay, but the character Sulu was not.
So you don't have to "write" a black character, all you really have to do is write a character and hire a black person. It's when you do write the character as black, you've either created an obnoxious and offensive stereotype, or pointless token.
My advice to Hollywood "stop writing black characters, and start hiring more black actors"
But when you write a gay character, the character has to be written gay. i.e he must be flamboyant and prance around like a sissy, listen to lady gaga, gossip about fashion, and shout faaaabulous. That's "acting" gay. That's a gay character. Or he must make out with a man, or just offhandedly mention his boyfriend, husband, he's gay, in order for the audience to know that he is gay.
If a character never makes out with a member of the same sex, never mentions they're gay, and doesn't lisp and prance around, how would you ever know he was a gay character? You wouldn't.
Again, race and sex are what you are, gay is what you do.
So for all you LGBT's out there, just look at all the Star Trek extras that aren't with a member of the opposite sex, hey, they might be gay.
Again, the token aspect, if you write a gay character, you have to write him as gay, why write a gay character if you're not trying to please the LGBT? Don't please the LGBT's or any other loud obnoxious vocal political minority, just write an entertaining show. It's too late to be shocking, risky, or champion a social cause for the gays, it's 2012, the time to have done it for those reasons would have been the Enterprise series.
Although, as with my example of Travis and Malcolm, I think making characters, with no development, suddenly gay, or suddenly realize their homosexuality, could actually revitalize an otherwise stale, and boring character with no development. This would actually be the ideal scenario to create a gay character. After all, if the character is slowly becoming an extra, and has no purpose, it sure as hell can't hurt the character, and could be a way to develop him.
Now if they had made T'Pol and Hoshi gay lovers, that would have pissed me off. Because it would have been capitalizing on the girl on girl phenomenon that permeated Hollywood alongside rough tough women who smack men around when they get out of line. It would have been one more Hollywood cliché rubbed in our face. And the other reason it would bother me is it would be an attempt to appeal to the lowest common denominator and attract viewers with hot steamy lesbian scenes.
Look, a year after Sara Michelle Gellar did the girl on girl kiss in Cruel Intentions, girl on girl action was a cliché to the point of that kiss scene being parodied a dozen times.
I cringe every time I see the steamy scene with Trip and T'Pol rubbing disinfectant oil all over their bodies, with closeups that made it look like a scene out of a Cinimax movie. The first time I seen that I thought "oh god, they're so desperate for viewers they are trying to get the Baywatch audience to tune in."
So in some characters, making them gay could have worked, in other characters it would have made it so much worse.
T'Girl said:
Here's a question for you Mars. A lesbian couple is at their doctor's office because one of them is pregnant, much to their combined horror the child's brain structure indicate that he/she is heterosexual. Do you think the couple should seek to "adjust" the child sexuality to emulate their own homosexuality?
Fair is fair, right?
How would they have gotten pregnant to begin with?
beamme said:
Homosexuality is all about confused sexual identity?
You really aren't all that bright, are you?
Actually, Gender Identity Disorder (GID) is strongly linked with Homosexuality and visa versa. In spite of the fact that Homosexuality got politically muscled out of the DSM in 1973, it often pops up as contributing factor, or association, with many other identity, gender, dissociative, compulsory, disorders.
Here's a link on GID
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_identity_disorder
So it is reasonable to assume that a lot of people who are homosexual are only that way as a result of a knee jerk reaction to not liking the responsibility or restrictions of their gender role, and homosexuality being a manifestation of this. This would apply to some, but not all cases of homosexuality and transgenderism.
Mars said:
Well what would you do if you had the opportunity to change your body from male to female, that way you could be attracted to males and have the right "equipment" to match your "software". I notice your picture is that of a woman, what if you could be her? I guess what I'm saying is what if in the 24th century is was possible to match sexual orientation to one's gender? if such was the case, there would be a very good reason why there were no homosexual characters, as they all altered their bodies to match their minds.
Did you miss her post about the fact that most Lesbians don't actually want to be male, and most gays don't actually want to be female?
I think a future where an adult can choose to have a new body assigned to them, by choice, would be pretty cool. After all, some people want to be a different sex. Though it is unfair to force this on them. Of course the greater advantage would be immortality, just keep switching bodies before you die LOL
Guy Gardener said:
There's a difference between aspergers and being offensively homophobic.
Oh come on, that's not fair, he is not being offensively homophobic, he is discussing the rationality of a gay Star Trek character, and on certain aspects of homosexuality, he has a difficult time understanding because he has a difficult time relating to things far removed from him.
He hasn't said anything like you're all going to burn in hell, you are disgusting freaks, you should be beaten, hurt, imprisoned, etc.
He hasn't said anything deliberately hurtful to anyone here.
Maurice said:
Right there is the issue. You see it as a "problem" that needs fixing, rather than just accepting that it's just one of the many ways sexual desire manifests itself in the species (and not just ours).
That, sir, is a beautiful statement.
I remember being a youngster and hearing people talk about homosexuality as if it were a defect, and gays were suffering this "disease". And I remember thinking "but what if the gays don't mind being the way they are?"
There seemed to always be that assumption that gay people were somehow "broken". You'd be surprised how many people can't wrap their heads around the concept that most homosexuals don't view themselves as "broken" or "defective" and are perfectly content with the way they are, and simply wish the people around them would get over it and be happy with them being the way they are.
And wholly crap, Maurice, you're a bastard! I am actually beginning to see how important it might be to a gay person to have their choice/lifestyle/sexuality, be promoted as something "acceptable" and I now understand a little better the demand for a gay character.
Maurice, you bastard, you've made this Grinche's heart grow 5 sizes today.
Fine. I am in favor of a gay character in the new Star Trek series. But he better be a real character, a great actor, and not just some token to please the LGBT.
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And I can accept that most women are attracted to men, even if I don't get the appeal myself, so it's not that difficult to accept that some men do too.
