Thursday 24 May 2012

Gay rep'ns in comics and games in XMen comic

Since blogging the article below, another article caught my eye: is Judge Dredd to be outed?!
Here's another I've just read, which explicitly references (and discusses) the male gaze theory. It included a link to the Wiki on this, which I also re-read: pretty good, and will certainly boost your understanding of the concept. This one centres on a Star Wars game which added a romantic element, but caused controversy by programming 10 hetero Ms + Fs; their response was to create a standalone world, available only for premium subscribers, in which gay couplings functioned, attracting further criticism. Its fair to say that the very fact this has attracted criticism points to the success of the campaign groups who've sought to attack the hegemonic status of hetero-normativity. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/gamesblog/2013/jan/25/star-wars-old-republic-gay-planet.

Sunday 19 February 2012

Row over school curriculum

Bit of wider context here, showing just how contested this whole area is: in this Guardian article we read about literature passed out to faith schools in Lancashire by a visiting Catholic speaker who advises that homosexuality is linked to abuse and that there is no such thing as safe sex. Asked by the TUC to intervene, Education Secretary Michael Gove insisted that the school curriculum was not subject to the 2010 Equality Act ... but a civil service spokesperson for the DfEE (Dept for Education) said it was.
Perhaps the most useful question here is how well fiction TV represents this range of views - is it dominated by 'PC' representations, do old negative stereotypes still dominate, or is the answer a wide range of conflicting, competing representations?