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On As the World Turns, the devious Jade told Luke to be proud of who he was and who he loved. Meanwhile, when Luke's dad, Holden, confessed to his cousin Jack his fears that Luke might be in gay, Jack said it was nothing to be ashamed of. Holden readily agreed, even if he didn't seem entirely convinced.

Nonetheless, thus far both storylines have covered familiar gay territory. Luke and Lucas are both embroiled in coming out processes, and both have been victims of homophobia (Luke is blackmailed, Lucas is gay bashed). The good news is that both have potential love interests on the horizon (Kevin and Guy, respectively). Love has long been the litmus-test for queer characters on daytime (and primetime television), and if these two gay characters can add relationships to their storylines then the violence and exploitation they have experienced will not be much different from that weathered by straight characters.

After all, straight characters are blackmailed, deceived, raped, and murdered regularly in the world of soap operas. But they also enjoy fully fleshed out lives and are rarely limited to being exclusively “good” or “bad” people. Their complexities, tragedies and joys make them whole, and make them recognizable and sympathetic to the viewing audience.

The two-timing, back-stabbing, evil-twin-with-amnesia storylines afforded heterosexual characters are rarely assigned to queer characters. This not only makes queer characters inherently less interesting by comparison, but it also quietly undoes the efforts of soap opera producers to depict gay and heterosexual characters as equals.

As the stories of two young gay male characters on As the World Turns and General Hospital unfold, it's worth examining the gay past of daytime television to see how representations have evolved over the last 25 years.

In 1982, All My Children introduced the first ever significant gay character on a daytime soap opera, Dr. Lynn Carson played by Donna Pescow (Saturday Night Fever). Unfortunately (and typical of the stereotype of lesbians as asexual), the Carson character never had a love interest and lasted only a year.

It would be another five years before the first gay male character on a daytime soap was introduced. On As the World Turns , gay character Hank Eliot (played by Brian Starcher 1988-1989) was originally supposed to receive an AIDS diagnosis. But the AIDS plot was altered to instead be about his lover, Charles, a character rarely seen onscreen. After only a year the character of Hank was written out, but ATWT received a great deal of praise for the story and was honored with a GLAAD award in 1990.

One Life to Live also introduced a gay character in the early 1990's, teenager Billy Douglas (played by future movie star Ryan Phillipe, 1992-93) who struggled to come out to family and friends. A young female villain on the show falsely accused main character Reverend Andrew Carpenter of an affair with young Billy, and it was later revealed that Carpenter's brother had died from AIDS. The storyline included a ceremony for the AIDS quilt as it passed through the town. Once again, the association of a gay character and a plot with pedophilia, homophobia and (even if only tangentially) AIDS is typical of the limited scope of gay story lines in that period.

Soon after, All My Children made another attempt to introduce a gay character, this time in the form of noble gay teacher Michael Delaney (1995-1997, played by Chris Bruno). The Delaney storyline was of particular note because it was partially based on a true story about Rodney Wilson, a gay teacher in Missouri who had come out to his students.

Soap Opera Weekly (July 9, 1996) reported that AMC writers researched the Wilson story, relying on newspaper articles and materials about him from Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) and the Gay Lesbian Straight Teachers Network (GLSTN) to flesh out the character of Michael Delaney. The show received an award from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) for their efforts, and AMC's win that year of a daytime Emmy for writing that year was largely attributed to the Delaney storyline.

Around the same time period (mid-to-late 1990s) One Life to Live and General Hospital also featured gay teachers who were falsely accused of wrongdoing. What all three programs had in common was their portrayal of gays as sympathetic victims of prejudice rather than menacing perpetrators (sexual or otherwise).

In fact, “victim” may be the operative word when it comes to portraying gay, lesbian and bisexual characters in daytime television. To their credit, soap operas rarely if ever depict queer characters in the sort of malevolent light that anti-gay bigots would prefer. But it's just as rare to see queer soap opera characters as empowered, multi-faceted individuals with problems beyond the scope of homophobia or the coming out process.

Following One Life to Live's brief depiction of gay teen Billy Douglas, a second gay character grew out of All My Children's Michael Delaney storyline. Kevin Sheffield (played by Ben Jorgensen, 1996-1998) was a gay teenager who sought counsel from high school teacher Delaney. He came out to his parents, only to be disowned and turned out of their house. Kevin's older brother Jason blamed Delaney for Kevin's gayness and tried to kill him.

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