Homo-Cidal Maniacs: That's Gay

Not the first gay zombie movie.

you're kidding...seriously? that's hilarious...

Nope. But if they're as good-bad as The Room, then I'm down to watch, but if those LDS movies are just bad-bad like 2012 then meh.

When will we finally have a trans-gendered super hero? That would be OH so believable and utterly enjoyable! There is nothing that just screams strength and heroism than a transgendered woman. 007 with breasts, anyone?

What? You had to go pick on every commenter who mentioned gender? You're dropping logical fallacies left and right. You must feel so proud of yourself to rhetorically beat down those straw person arguments you set up. Wicaco's argument was never that feminine men are portrayed as non-manly, but that they are portrayed as evil. Do you not see a difference between non-manly and evil? The fact that you don't see a difference between non-manly and evil only illustrates that point.

As for trans women super heroes, wtf dude? Do you really think the only roles possibly available are dead sex worker, psycho murderer, and super hero? Talk about false choices. But even so, why couldn't a trans woman be a super hero? It's only a ridiculous notion if you are relying on transphobic stereotypes and have no idea about the diversity of experience and behavior among trans women.

And FYI, there has been more than one flick with a trans woman action hero in it before: Killer Drag Queens on Dope and Ticked Off Trannies with Knives. Both had some very critic-able flaws, but they pretty severely prove that you have no clue what you're talking about when you suggest it wouldn't be possible.

the argument is just nonsense. Masculine for men IS "manly", effiminate for men is NOT "manly", PERIOD. You are deluding yourselves. You may wish to be able to read fashion magazines and get an erection every time there is a sale in the most stylish shops and still be thought of as "manly", but that will never be the case. An effeminate man like Jack Benny may be funny, adorable, lovable, but he will NEVER be "manly". NEVER.

First, you completely missed the point. I'm not saying that gender roles don't exist (though they're certainly not innate or universal - What is considered masculine in the present-day United States would be very different from what is considered masculine in, say, ancient China). The point is that biological sex, and sexual orientation along with it, is not the same as gender. Case in point: You might not think that Jack Benny is "masculine", but even in your own words you still agree that he is a "man".

Second, I'm not an effeminate straight guy with an inferiority complex. I'm actually a gay male who couldn't care less about fashion or Lady Gaga, for example (not that there's anything wrong with a gay man liking those things). Most people assume I'm straight upon first meeting me and after I tell them I'm gay, they resort to the same old stereotypes to try and relate to me. I find that annoying.

OK, you know I agree especially with your last paragraph. I really don't care if someone is gay, what you or anyone finds sexually stimulating and satisfying is no one's business but yours (provided no one or no animal is harmed, and as long as they are consenting adults, etc). And one of the things I find repugnant about the "gay culture" is the apparent need by many gays to act in a stereotypical manner. I've known guys who acted like normal guys who finally came out of the closet and then they put on "the act", which i found to be silly. I didn't care if they decided they liked guys, and learned to accept that, but why the "gay act"?

You are totally right about sexual orientation not making a guy "less than a man", although there is more to being a "man" than just genitalia. Any male (regardless to their orientation or preference) who acts like a whiny baby, who is irresponsible and childish, is not yet a "man" in my book because the word, to me, implies maturity, responsibility, and proper behavior (I don't mean that sex between men is improper, I mean a different kind of behavior--acting maturely and responsibly).

So, by that definition, any man--regardless as to their orientation or preference--who does not act like a man is not behaving like an adult man and is worthy of derision.

That may not be "nice" but it's just the way I see it. On the flip side, there are grown females who act like irresponsible, whiny little brats and they aren't being women in my opinion either.

So, brother, it sounds like we're pretty much on the same page. What I don't like about Hollywood's common depiction of gays is always the stereotypical effeminate gay, which is not representative of many of the gays with whom I have been friends. My wife and I have a very close friendship with a gay couple in Venezuela who are awesome people in every sense of the word and I don't have ANY problem with them, and wish that hollywood would be able make the leap to represent that kind of person more often (I do think that the hero of Philadelphia was a good example of how it can be done, kudos to Tom Hanks for his intelligent, respectful depiction of that character!)

but about this current thread, I just don't see the gay villains (or those interpreted by Safi as being gay, which is in question) as being indicative of some evil plot to make gays look bad. It's just bad writing.

A few points:

1. I don't think that maturity and personal responsibility are qualities linked to gender at all, and looking at your argument, I don't think you really do, either. You state that you don't believe a man who acts childish is being masculine, but then you state that a woman who acts childish is not being feminine, either. In the spectrum of gender, "childishness" does not have a place, then. A male with effeminate mannerisms is capable of being mature just as much as a male who trys to be as "macho" as possible is capable of being immature.

2. I don't think it's fair to single out gay men for conforming to images projected by the media and other's expectations. For example, I might find it annoying when a straight guy likes a Lady Gaga song he hears on the radio but won't admit it because he feels that doing so would go against his "masculine" reputation. Why let society's expectations get in the way of being yourself? The truth is, though, social conditioning happens to all of us, in some ways more obvious than others - It's part of being human. As for the gay men suddenly adopting "an act", it's possible in some cases, but in other instances why couldn't it be that they're just now finally being true to themselves in public, after putting up a fake "normal" act for so long (what is "normal" anyway?).

3. Again, I also point out that gender is not concrete - It varies from culture to culture, era to era, and individual to individual. If you were to ask my late grandmother and many others from her generation, cooking would be seen as a feminine gender role. Now, men of all sexual orientations love to cook in our culture.

4. What I got out of this video, which I stated in my original post, is not that there's a deliberate agenda to portray gay men as being evil. First, it's no secret that gay men have long been associated with feminine stereotypes in a lot of films and TV shows. Second, as Bryan Safi is pointing out, male villians are also often portrayed as being feminine. Therefore, if femininity in men is both gay and evil, that implies a connection between the two. That's the point.

Nicely said! Very eloquent and logical. I think there might have been a couple of places where you and I seem to have been saying similar things, but maybe I didn't express myself well, but no rebuttal needed, as I pretty much agree.

...get over it? because there have been historically "evil" gays? because gays DON'T have a bad wrap? it's not purely an LGBT issue if culture subliminally enforces the idea that femininity in males is perverse and wrong, epitomized in villainy. i have quite a few heterosexual guy friends who go to great lengths to assert their masculinity and heterosexuality, which this cultural trope that Bryan is pointing out helps promote the anxiety for. when film media, a significant force in our cultural identity, fails to validate one's gender presentation to the smallest degree and instead demonizes it, it's at very least worth noting and criticizing.

oooooh it's subliminal discrimination now. So Sher Khan, who had NO indication of being gay, was presented that way to make gays look evil, is that it now? The delivery of Khan by George Sanders, the actor who had played Khan, was typical of his acting style. Yet you would have us to believe that he had deviously planned on creating a "subliminally gay" villain to impune gays?

there are only a very very few films where the villain was gay, intentionally, but it's a pretty big accusation to make that they had written that character out of a homophobic desire to make gays all look evil.

to the contrary, the history of cinema is far more replete with gay and bi actors who were given heroic roles and who never felt obliged to make them "gay roles", and as a result were cultural icons in spite of their sexuality and in turn became excellent role models because of their achievements, cause celebres as it were for great people who "just happened to be gay"

this is nothing more than just gay whining and narcisism, 'oooh there should be a dozen films about us per year just because we are great people and we are interesting"...

get over it, that's right.

i think i should reiterate that this isn't a purely sexuality-based issue, but an issue of gender presentation, which tends to be how the ignorant interpret sexuality. but for convenience i'll stick to the word gay i suppose.

it's not a malevolent idea to make gays look evil, it's an unconscious (maybe, though not in the case of 300, as the director has stated that there's nothing that scares teenage boys more than an affront on their masculinity) idea that a feminine guy is off, and an antagonist. i think it's more of where you're coming from though, that it's just a minority that it's offending. so whatevs.

so wait. because there have been gay actors "who never felt obliged to make them 'gay roles'" (read: who play straight), it's a progressive industry? did you hear of the article in which someone argued that straight males can play gay, but gay guys shouldn't bother playing straight because they can't pass? i don't know of many historic actors who got very far out of the closet. everything i've heard about the celluloid closet has kinda pointed in the opposite direction. if police could raid gay bars, arresting and beating men on the assumption of sodomy, i don't think many actors would have got very far saying they're gay. and in terms of today, could you name many a-lister gay actors, as in those who are definitely so? perhaps 5% of the actors you know, going off of that lowest estimate statistic?

no one is calling for a dozen films a year. just a few less uncool portrayals, at very least from Disney (it's not mentioned, but I can't imagine Ursala being portrayed more butch than she is in the early '90s)

"did you hear of the article in which someone argued that straight males can play gay, but gay guys shouldn't bother playing straight because they can't pass?"

Yes, and I thought that was stupid. Cary Grant, George Takei, and others have done it for decades.

I take issue with the statement that they are "playing it straight", in that not all gays are obviously gay by their behavior and have to "play it straight" to "pass" as straight. To the contrary, I personally think the effeminate behavior by many gay men (not all) is the real act, part of "coming out" and learning to accept themselves.

It's a lot less of an act than you might think. Or at very least, it's no more of an act than when heterosexual males play up there masculinity. They should be viewed as equal problems in terms of societal expectations for people.

"Or at very least, it's no more of an act than when heterosexual males play up there masculinity." that's an interesting perspective. pretty close to what I said, but puts a little nicer spin on it.

What about Sean Penn's "MILK"?
And Brokeback Mountain?
Philadelphia?
The Bird Cages?
Alexander?

Wasn't one of the main characters in The Crying Game a transsexual?

Sure, it's not as common as it is in, say, French or Spanish Cinema (like the films of Gerard Depardieu or Pedro Almodovar), but they are there.

Here's a more complete list:
http://oldschoolreviews.com/articles/best_gay_films.htm

Still, what do you want, equal screen time? Gays are only about 5% of the population.

So a handful of films (more or less) accurately depicting gay people discounts their historical slander in cinema? I fail to see a point there.

Even if bisexual and gay Americans are only between 5-10% of the population (the military is barely 1%, so I guess few movies should depict them?), not nearly that percentage of films have gay characters at all, let alone as protagonists. Even when they are characters, as this clip points out, they are often portrayed as villains, or at least unsympathetically. To argue that the depiction of gay and lesbian characters has been accurate or representative in any way strains credulity.

No one is arguing that every gay character must be a model citizen, either. Not only is that impossibly untrue, but no one is inclined to believe that any group is perfect, so it would be dumb even from a purely public relations standpoint. What many people object to is the general slant in the other direction, which is equally dishonest.

Films are made about people who have an interesting story and will sell tickets to a general audience. You apparently want films about gays just because they are gay?

or somehow more stories should be written around a character who is gay, just to be "fair to gays"?! Yet another example of some kind of "pro-gay affirmative action"...why?

Military stories are made because they are inherently interesting.

You clearly don't want more films about the stereotypical gay person, the drag queens etc, so what non-stereotypical gay roles do you have in mind?

if you have some ideas, write a killer script and see if you can get it made.

but I don't see that just because there have been a handful of "negative" images of gays in film suddenly it is a "slander" of gays. Especially since a number of the characters Bryan pointed out were not explicitly gay, he just assumes that Sher Khan was gay because he was "foppish".

Where I can agree with you might be around the roles like "Bird Cages" where gays are almost always portrayed as very effeminate and flamboyant, when we know there are lots of gays who are anything but flamboyant. But since those films are coming from the very liberal, leftist, pro-gay Hollywood, it rings hollow to try to accuse them of some sort of homophobia, instead of comedic laziness--it's easier to get a laugh out of an audience with an extremely "gay sounding" line like "would you like an espresso with a lemon twissst?" than to play it with a "straighter" delivery.

go cry into your latte or else write your own brilliant screenplay.

Just because you percieve Hollywood to be "liberal" doesn't mean it can't perpetuate homophobic stereotypes (since when is "Hollywood" a monolithic thing in the first place?). Have you even been paying attention while watching most of Bryan Safi's videos? Watch the reality show characters in the "Gay Best Friend" video who seem to be accepting of homosexuality (from their evident willingness and even enthusiasm toward being around gay men) but still have some very ignorant, patronizing views about what homosexuality means. If a person has a black friend, does that mean they cannot be racist? Of course they can be.

Fair enough.
btw, I have watched all the of the Safi vids, they are hilarious and thought provoking.

just keep in mind that the original point was about the gay villains in film, not all characters in general