Diversity is spelled G-L-E-E
Same-sex couples, a Jewish girl, football players, a boy in a wheelchair, "Jesus" kid...you name it, they have it represented. Glee, the show about a high school musical performance club, has done more than a brilliant job of not only giving every race, gender, sexual orientation, or trend a run on camera, but of also battling big issues for the American teen: homosexuality, bullying, domestic violence, drug and alcohol abuse, social anxieties, pregnancy, eating disorders, depression, and the ever-common Britney Spears obsession.
I don't know how they manage to cover all bases so flawlessly, but they do it...every week. This show gives me hope for the future of media.
Last class we discussed minority representation in the media and I volunteered an opinion, which was less than well-received. I left class a mess thinking that all of Sid Rich LH4 thought I was the typical insensitive, white, ignorant sorority girl who missed the entire point of the reading. But, while people may think that...it's not true and I think I might have just gone about my point badly. So let's try this again.
...:... Minorities are under-represented in the media. There is no mistaking that and it rings true across all eras of history. But news outlets created to appease to 24-37 year old well-educated, urban Latinos doesn't do much to close the gap of representation First of all, that demographic is most likely to be reading other news outlets. Secondly, that demographic is still excluding an ENORMOUS chunk of the Latino community. Third, I wouldn't be surprised if the affulent, white men that are still running these media outlets (notorious for less-than-equal opportunity inclusion) see these specialized, segregated outlets as a way out of doing their jobs to meet the representation quota. I am ALL about every single person being catered to. I have a brother with Down Syndrome, so I know all about exclusion. But if you are thinking about our global community, outlets like the one we discussed in class do not bring us any closer to minimizing that gap between the over and under-represented.
Glee, however, DOES help minimize that gap and give hope to all sorts of people with all sorts of fabulous qualities and real-life issues. This is a show on a major network, FOX, and has some of the highest TV ratings. It pushes the envelope, but never fails to make everyone important. And that is what our society needs more of; not "specialized" content for specific readers, but content that fosters UNITY among all people. Because at the end of the day, we are HUMANS and it is the health of humanity that should be on the fore-front of the media agenda.
Media is meant for all, not just you and certainly, not just me.
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