Saturday, March 13, 2010
Antigay Bigotry from SNL. Saturday Nite Live had a bizarre and offensive opening tonite, in a preposterous "exit interview" for Congressman Eric Massa, in which a woman invaded his sexual privacy and said of his homosexual interests "Ew." How dare they?
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No Congressman has to go thru a personnel office "exit interview", so the whole premise of the skit was absurd. That SNL chose a woman interviewer to inquire about a man's homosexual inclinations was an offensive intrusion of compulsory heterosexuality, where men have to get the approval of women in all things; and to have that female interviewer express disgust with male-male sex is inexcusable. SNL has not heretofore been known for antihomosexual bigotry, so this lapse in judgment is particularly objectionable.
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We might expect antihomosexual propaganda from Rightwing televangelists in Texas, but from Saturday Nite Live in New York City? Disgusting. It's good to be reminded, however, that straight people are NOT reliable friends and allies, and we can rely only on ourselves.
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When the host of that episode turned out to be a Brit, I'd had enuf, and turned the TV off in distaste. Not only are gay men to be judged by heterosexual women, but Americans are to be forced to listen to a hideous British accent. Revolting.
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I may yet turn the TV back on for "Weekend Update", which is generally, with the opening skit, the best part of that generally mediocre television show. If it is also offensive, I will find something else to do with my time.
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P.S. I tried to watch "Weekend Update". During the "Really" segment therein, Seth Meyers and guest Jerry Seinfeld addressed the Massa story again, but I missed parts of it because we have had a gigantic storm in this area all day long, a maelstrom of high winds and heavy rain. Digital broadcasting is such a crappy technology that wind and rain knock out TV! So for over a minute in the middle of that segment, my digibox reported "No Signal", and I got no picture and no sound. In the days of analog TV, we might get a poor picture and scratchy sound, but we'd get something. With digital broadcasting, we get either a brilliant picture and great sound, or NOTHING. When it announced that it would be abolishing analog broadcasting (to make money by selling off larger segments of "the people's airwaves" to obscenely rich corporations), the Federal Government assured us that we'd get better TV from the changeover. Instead, tens of millions of Americans have lost free TV all or part-time. When I was young, we used to think the future would be better than either the past or the then-present. We never foresaw the Federal Government destroying free television, on purpose.
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No Congressman has to go thru a personnel office "exit interview", so the whole premise of the skit was absurd. That SNL chose a woman interviewer to inquire about a man's homosexual inclinations was an offensive intrusion of compulsory heterosexuality, where men have to get the approval of women in all things; and to have that female interviewer express disgust with male-male sex is inexcusable. SNL has not heretofore been known for antihomosexual bigotry, so this lapse in judgment is particularly objectionable.
+
We might expect antihomosexual propaganda from Rightwing televangelists in Texas, but from Saturday Nite Live in New York City? Disgusting. It's good to be reminded, however, that straight people are NOT reliable friends and allies, and we can rely only on ourselves.
+
When the host of that episode turned out to be a Brit, I'd had enuf, and turned the TV off in distaste. Not only are gay men to be judged by heterosexual women, but Americans are to be forced to listen to a hideous British accent. Revolting.
+
I may yet turn the TV back on for "Weekend Update", which is generally, with the opening skit, the best part of that generally mediocre television show. If it is also offensive, I will find something else to do with my time.
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P.S. I tried to watch "Weekend Update". During the "Really" segment therein, Seth Meyers and guest Jerry Seinfeld addressed the Massa story again, but I missed parts of it because we have had a gigantic storm in this area all day long, a maelstrom of high winds and heavy rain. Digital broadcasting is such a crappy technology that wind and rain knock out TV! So for over a minute in the middle of that segment, my digibox reported "No Signal", and I got no picture and no sound. In the days of analog TV, we might get a poor picture and scratchy sound, but we'd get something. With digital broadcasting, we get either a brilliant picture and great sound, or NOTHING. When it announced that it would be abolishing analog broadcasting (to make money by selling off larger segments of "the people's airwaves" to obscenely rich corporations), the Federal Government assured us that we'd get better TV from the changeover. Instead, tens of millions of Americans have lost free TV all or part-time. When I was young, we used to think the future would be better than either the past or the then-present. We never foresaw the Federal Government destroying free television, on purpose.
