The Importance of Accurate Queer Representation in Modern Media
For too long, members of the LGBTQIA+ community have been left unseen and unheard in all forms of media, leaving the entire community to feel dejected. Big media conglomerates find it too risky to portray LGBTQ+ representation on the big screen as it can affect their international sales. It’s completely homophobic and an issue that must be resolved, and makes it even harder to know where to look for accurate representation. Smaller media companies or even relatively well known ones tend to completely miss the mark on LGBTQ+ rep, resulting in members feeling unhappy and hungry for accurate LGBTQ+ content.
While it is 2021 and there are certainly more LGBTQ+ characters, shows, and even movies centering around queer characters, many of these shows tend to miss the mark entirely. As a gay man myself, I find it tiring to sit through hour long movies *cough cough Love, Simon cough cough* just to realize this story was almost certainly written by a white millennial woman with very little concept of what it means to be gay. It also doesn’t help that almost every single gay character is portrayed by a straight actor and even if their acting is Meryl Streep level, us gay people can just tell that they aren’t Queer. Not to mention a massive chunk of LGBTQ+ storytelling is mainly reduced to their ability to come out or their coming out story in general; in even worse scenarios, the gay characters are simply a means of plot development for the straight protagonist. The list of problematic character typing, writing, and storytelling goes on and on when it comes to Queer representation. Unfortunately, when these Queer stories are nailed on the head correctly, the shows are inevitably cancelled after one season due to a “low viewer turnout.” Shows like Genera+ion, High Fidelity, Everything Sucks, Sense8, and I Am Not Okay With This are excellent examples of Queer representation that have been cancelled when they really shouldn’t have been. Queer stories that accurately represent who we are are integral to those who have yet to come into their Queerness and feel seen in ways that only books, television shows, movies or honestly any form of media can provide.
Queer media is also essential to the normalization of LGBTQ+ individuals as it allows cisgender heterosexual people to potentially grasp the concept of who we as a community truly are. We can’t simply be reduced to tropes or stereotypes that our community has long since been victimized by and Queer media can help people recognize this. For example, Genera+ion is a show about Queer teenagers coming to terms with their identity in ways that isn’t just about coming out. Coming out is an outdated and no longer needed idea that stems from the concept that Queer people need to inform non-Queer people of their Queerness so that if Queer people do something that may make cisgendered heterosexual people uncomfortable, they can simply chalk it up to us being Queer. By sharing stories of young gay men or women falling in love in the same manner as any straight person, we can normalize being gay. By showing what it means to come to terms with one's own gender-identity or one’s Queerness, we can allow straight people to empathize with the process of coming into our Queerness that isn’t simply through us coming out.
Queer media is essential not only to the modern day LGBTQIA+ community but to cisgender heterosexual people as well. Collectively, by sharing Queer stories, we are able to normalize and showcase who Queer people are, who they grow up to be, and how they really are just doing their best to get along and live their own life.
Cover Photo by NBCNews. Edited by Katrina Kwok.