The Year in Gay Television: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Betty

Out news anchor Thomas Roberts (who came out publicly as a gay man last year when working at CNN) found himself on the other side of the camera earlier this year when his own struggles to convict a pedophilic Catholic priest who molested several teens (including Roberts) in the 1980s became the topic of an hour-long installment of a CNN series on religion in America. Considering that the priest preyed on what seemed to be solely gay or questioning young men, we found it odd that the piece made no mention of Roberts’ sexuality, given his openness on the topic. Roberts left the network shortly after and joined the staff of the celebrity gossip show The Insider.

Transgender teens and children were the subject of a special episode of 20/20 hosted by Barbara Walters, for whom the topic became something of a personal cause this year (she tirelessly promoted understanding of transgender people on her show The View). The piece was eye-opening and moving, to say the least.

This fall saw the premiere of the first ever weekly half-hour news program to focus on gay issues, CBS News on Logo. The show, hosted by Jason Bellini, evolved from the ongoing news bites that have been running on the gay network for the past two years. The network also co-sponsored and broadcast the first ever gay presidential forum, Visible Vote ’08, which featured the participation of 9 Democratic hopefuls.

Other news stories to gain national news coverage (some good, some bad) included the Chris Crocker “leave Britney alone” video (which attracted outright homophobic reactions from Fox News anchors), the fallout of the Jim McGreevey divorce and corresponding his-and-hers book tour, and of course homophobic remarks made by Isaiah Washington, Jerry Lewis, athlete Tim Hardaway, and the hatemongering ministry of Fred Phelps.

Earlier this year AfterElton.com took an in-depth look at gay men in the television news industry via two in-depth articles on the topic. The first covered out gay newsmen while the second addressed the various news networks.

One of the most notable shifts of the year involved where Americans are going to get their news in the first place. The continued rise in popularity of comedy programs The Daily Show and spinoff The Colbert Report showed that viewers were hungry for news that was smarter, more pointed, and more unabashedly liberal in tone and humor than what the networks and all-news outlets provided.

Both The Daily Show and the Report have been exceedingly positive in their handling of gay visibility, and both take every opportunity to both defuse conservative rhetoric on gay rights issues and feature gay guests and gay news items. This fall we ran an article documenting the highlights of The Daily Show’s gay-friendly history, on the occasion of their making every episode of the show since host Jon Stewart took the desk available for free online.

Turning to late night talk shows, host Jimmy Kimmel had the most interesting (and volatile) relationship with queer issues. While his hilarious George Takei Public Service Announcement to homophobic basketballer Tim Hardaway hit the mark, a parody video of gay Internet sensation Chris Crocker’s “Leave Britney Alone!” rant reeked of homophobia, and his “tranny” remarks about guest Rebecca Romjin’s character on Ugly Betty were irresponsible, to say the least.

Elsewhere, Jay Leno’s continued use of Ross “the Intern” Mathews as an object of ridicule was as tasteless as ever, with the show going so far as to make Ross a pink riding suit with “Jesse’s Girl” (in reference to infinitely more masculine, and therefore more acceptable, co-host Jesse James) for one segment. Ross is who Ross is and that’s great. But the underlying distaste for effeminacy that drives the segments makes it clear that the audience is meant to be laughing at him, not with him.

And a final mention of the strapping, alabaster-coifed elephant in the room, Anderson Cooper. The “silver fox” has yet to speak to questions about his sexuality but has not shied away from gay press (he was welcoming and charming when speaking to us regarding his AfterElton Hot 100 nomination) and gay topics on his show. Earlier this year Cooper (along with Jodie Foster) was featured on the cover of Out magazine in association with an article on “the glass closet”, or the phenomenon of celebrities being openly gay off-camera but not on.