People sometimes remark about me, sometimes to my face but often behind my back, that I am not camp. This is meant to be a compliment. I want to break this down a little.

When people say this they mean it in a nice way. They are saying that they feel it is easier to identify with me because I am more like them. I understand that completely. There is no intent to offend in what they are saying.

You know what I’m about to say, though. It does offend.

What is actually being said is this: My view of homosexuality is of a closed stereotype, where a gay man is camp and enjoys pink things, and a lesbian wears vests and has short hair. Any deviation from this view is to be commended.

Whilst I am not offended at a personal level by the intent of what is said, the subtext to this kind of comment gives away just how much work still needs to be done in addressing the perception of LGBT / queer communities in the eyes of others.

Public Perception

Things like this probably do not help. I am not the first to call it out, either.

I watched this this for the first time on Friday night with my family. What I hadn’t realised until watching it was that this is not the only character playing on the camp stereotype for comedy.

This is not comedy for subversion, to highlight our social ills and get people thinking about how they view homosexuality. Far from it. This is hopping on a growing trend that legitimises this world view.

A Little Sense

I am not a killjoy and I recognise the role of satire / irony in comedy. What I am pointing out here is that we are not in a place yet as a society to start collectively looking gay stereotypes as comedic in this sense. Why? Because the public perception is still that this is the norm in gay culture. It isn’t viewed as a bad stereotype to have.

Until we start to see a more representative, slightly more serious view of the LGBT / queer community we will not see society’s values changing. In the meantime this so-called comedy on our screens will only serve to reinforce the negatively held beliefs that people hold, whether they hold those views consciously or not.

END RANT.