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One of my friends sent a mass e-mail to let everyone know about the premier of a show that she was involved with called “Playing it Straight,” which I believe will be on Fox. I know friends are supposed to be kind, but I couldn’t hold back the vomit that was rising in my throat when I found out that someone I know is endorsing this unpalatable garbage. So I wrote her back an angry e-mail to send to her bosses. (I won’t share that with you because it was too polite, instead I will rant.)

Now, I have heard of this show, seen the commercials, and am fairly offended by the premise. It gets me so angry that gay is this new acceptable group to portray on TV, as long as it is through stereotype and gimmick. Why cant there be a show that is just like The Bachelor, but gay? Without a stupid twist! Without offensive stereotypes!

This is the type of TV, that teaches people that gay people are to be figured out like some puzzle, and that their sexuality is something that that they can trick you with. It does not educate society at large, that people can be gay, and live a “gay” life as a non-issue. It puts gay people in a category of an “other,” it is a separate but equal mentality (”we accept you, but only if you are over there and I can tell what you are”) that was supposed to be abolished by law with the end of Jim Crow laws (my sister and my favorite case, Plessy –v- Ferguson.)

I know that it is just dumb TV but can’t there be more constructive examples of gay-related reality TV? How about “Same Sex Shotgun Weddings” (a long time gay couple from Iowa takes a long weekend to go to San Fran, or that small town in N.Y., and finally get married, even though they have two kids already, and a house and are also partners in a construction/architecture business, or something like that.). Or make “Guerilla Queer Bar” a hidden camera miniseries, exploring militant gay actions on your local dive bar/posh bar/not gay enough bar. Or what about Gay Fear Factor (find some nice young gay couples who protest the ban on gay marriage, and give them an all expense trip to get married somewhere where it is allowed, and then see if they have the guts to actually do it, or if they were all talk. oh and they would have to eat sheep’s eyeballs to get the rings….) ok joking aside (and being hypocritical and making up shows that still “other” us Homo’s) I think I will not watch this “Playing It Straight” crap, and instead read a book, or make a flower arrangement from wild flowers I grew in an antique urn I bought at the swap-meet a while back for a great price while looking for vintage lace to sew into the draperies at the chalet.

P.S. - Anyone else think it is funny that so many actors on TV who play “straight” characters are secretly gay (met quite a few myself, back me up here Joz.) and yet most of the “gay” characters on TV are played by straight guys? What is that? Or if they play a gay character and they are gay, they claim not to be, but avoid the question. Isn’t Sean P. Hayes still straight? Whatever… what do I know?