How Gay-Friendly Is FX? Not Very

It's Always Sunny, if Not Very Gay, in Philadelphia

The very first episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, a half-hour comedy that debuted in 2005, deals with the show's setting, an Irish bar, being transformed into a gay bar to improve revenue. In order to get the bar changed back, two characters get another male character drunk and convince him he had gay sex while blacked out. Naturally, he's so horrified that he immediately de-gays the bar again.

Further episodes deal with a character falling for a transsexual as well as a false accusation of child molestation. This show is a twisted version of Cheers complete with swearing, and is meant to be politically incorrect.

Dirt's Gay Dirt

A recent addition to FX's lineup, Dirt is a "salacious prime-time soap" set in the underbelly of Hollywood. The show received mostly negative reviews due to its sensational plots, including one involving Leo Spiller (Will McCormack), the bisexual brother of the show's main character, tabloid editor Lucy Spiller (producer Courteney Cox).

The sexually confused Leo falls for Jack Dawson (Grant Show), a closeted, married action movie star, but later allows himself to be manipulated by Lucy into outing his lover. Angry with his sister, Leo leaves only to be revealed later as the person stalking and terrorizing Lucy.

Despite the negative portrayal of both of Dirt's gay male characters, Seomin argues their presence is a good thing. "Frankly, on a show like Dirt and what it deals with, if we didn't do [this] story, we would have done a disservice," he said. "This happens. Hollywood on screen, it's still one of the last bastions — it's where out gays are still lacking … movie screens and in the locker room."

The Riches Is Rich With Tolerance

This hour-long comedy-drama hybrid, having just finished its first season, is about a family of "Travellers" (modern Irish-descended nomads) who hijack a dead family's opulent suburban lifestyle. Star Eddie Izzard identifies in life as a straight transvestite, and coincidentally the youngest son of the family in the show is a transvestite as well.

In one subplot, the husband of a long-married neighbor couple is revealed to be a closeted gay man, and their situation is treated with a minimum of finger-pointing. Another episode dealt with the rights of a lesbian couple and their child to buy property in a conservative community. The point was clearly made that homophobia — although entirely legal — is wrong.

30 Days Gets It Right

This reality show created by Supersize Me's Morgan Spurlock provides one of the few unabashedly pro-gay moments on FX. 30 Days' concept is to use a series of self-contained documentaries that put " an individual … inserted into a lifestyle that is completely different from his or her upbringing, beliefs, religion, or profession, for 30 days," and watch what happens.

30 Days' fourth episode, "Straight Man in a Gay World," placed Ryan, a 24 year-old Christian from Michigan, in San Francisco, where he lived for a month with Ed, a gay man. By the end of the month, Ryan's views on homosexuality had grown considerably more positive.

The Verdict

FX has a reputation for edgy, violent shows aimed at a younger, male audience which Seomin says is a factor. "Rescue Me, Over There, Thief, The Shield … these are overwhelmingly male shows," he said. "By putting gay and lesbian characters and story lines on them … there's still, and it's a sad fact, such homophobia in this country, we could easily be turning off viewers. The fact that we're putting these on, we're taking a huge risk."

Seomin also feels that these characters' actions need to be looked at within a context, not as standalone acts. "Positive and negative, I don't think that's fair," he argued. "Everything needs to be taken in context."

Indeed, FX characters are usually complicated and often deeply flawed, which does make for good television. As any good writer will say, conflict is drama, and saintly characters are usually boring. Much like the murderous yet sympathetic Soprano patriarch Tony Soprano, The Shield's Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis) is a cop-murdering liar, but audiences are nonetheless asked to pity and even root for him — and they often do (likewise Rescue Me's troubled lead Tommy Gavin, played by Denis Leary).

But looking back over FX's track record, it's hard to find much for gay viewers to root for, and for gay men, the pickings are especially slim.

The Shield gave us a closet case who appears to have undergone successful reparative therapy to cure his "gayness," which moves beyond "complicated" to "insulting." Rescue Me's Probie can't seem to figure out who he is, and his "gay" relationship was rarely little more than violent and abusive. (Additionally, two female characters on Rescue Me were involved with women, only to eventually return to heterosexuality.)

Nip/Tuck's highest profile gay or bisexual male turned out to be a serial killer, and while the show is to be commended for an interesting exploration of love between straight men, it was, in the end, about straight men. And while Dirt's bisexual character wasn't a killer, he did terrorize his own sister.

Secondary characters fare somewhat better on the network. The chief's gay son on Rescue Me and the gay neighbor on The Riches were both portrayed sympathetically, but they are only secondary characters (if that) and only appeared briefly. It's doubtful they made much of an impression on viewers.

None of these characters are in and of themselves necessarily a problem. Gay people are every bit as complicated as their straight counterparts, often behaving in selfish, stupid and even murderous ways. Indeed, gay people want to see the whole range of gay life when we turn on our television.

But that is where FX falls short. To balance out the self-hatred of Julien Lowe, there needs to be a Kevin Walker (played by Matthew Rhys on ABC's Brothers & Sisters), himself a complicated character. And if FX is content to show the sexual confusion of someone like Probie, then why can't there also be a well-adjusted character like The Class' Kyle Lendo (Sean Maguire)?

Obviously, no one expects FX (or any network) to institute a quota for positive gay characters, but diversity means more than just having gay characters. It means having all sorts of gay characters — good and bad, heroes and villains — who are organic to the shows and not used for shock value or as jokes, something FX resorts to far too often. If FX does not want to be labeled as unfriendly toward gays, they need someone to rescue them before it's too late.