11 minute read
Evolving Queer Media & the Realities of Challenged Identities
Evolving Queer Media and the Realities of Challenged Identities A Heartstopper Case Study
Written By: Eda Salad (Nam3Tak3n33) Layout By: SinsationalDoom
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Warning: Spoilers Ahead
In recent years, there has been a marketed increase in consumable mainstream gay media. With the commercial success of films such as Love Simon, Moonlight, and Call Me By Your Name, the big screen has become home to cutting edge queer art in a decidedly progressive way. But it isn’t only the big screen that has embraced fringe identities and sexualities. Television, too, has given gay characters a place to call home. With the recent success of series such as Young Royals, Heartstopper, and Love Victor, gay stories are more mainstream now than they ever were before.
Even outside of film and television we are seeing a definitive shift towards queer acceptance in media. Musicians, openly gay professional athletes, and respected TV journalists show that queer visibility is more accepted now than it ever has been in the past. This isn’t to say that this is an entirely new phenomenon. Movies such as My Cousin Vinnie, Brokeback Mountain, and Beautiful Thing, and television shows such as Will & Grace and Queer as Folk have their own respected places in the gay media cannon. But as films and television media of the past have dealt with queer identities as struggles to overcome or endure, recent additions to gay media have empowered gay characters and celebrated their fringe identities. Too, recent additions in gay media have taken a particular interest in gay youth identity. Young people who are coming to terms with their identities have proven to be marketable additions to film and television in recent years.
Official Promotional Image for HeartStopper
The question that is immediately apparent is whether or not recent gay media is truly moving queer identities away from the margins of society as they once were, or whether or not these new additions to media are simply creating a new space, an “other” space if you will, in which these stories can safely exist without actually shifting societal attitudes and behaviors towards queer people in a positive way. And, on the heels of this, is what this means for the people that don’t live within the confines of carefully scripted stories. That is, how real are these stories? Are they relatable? Is it useful to craft these stories in a way that glosses over, or only deals with in the most superficial ways, the real struggle of queer youth? And, perhaps most importantly, why does it matter?
It’s sweet. But is it too sweet?
I recently had the pleasure of watching Heartstopper on Netflix. This show, adapted from a book by Alice Oseman, follows a group of teenagers at grammar school in Great Britain. The protagonist, Charlie, finds himself in a secret romance with his schoolmate and rugby teammate Nick who is struggling to come to terms with his own sexuality and what it means for his place in the high stake’s world of high school social status. Ultimately, for now at least, Nick and Charlie decide to throw caution to the wind; they profess their mutual attraction and tell their friends (and mother, in the case of Nick). All is well.
It’s sweet. But is it too sweet? Perhaps the best way to describe a story like this is that it’s like bubblegum. It’s sweet, fun, artificial, and tough to swallow. Before I am accused of being a bitter old queen, allow me to say that I thoroughly enjoyed this series – so much so that I watched it a second time. But the feeling that I had both times after finishing was one of longing and perhaps even misplaced sadness. This story was neatly packaged and confidently delivered, but there was something about its artificiality that didn’t sit right with me.
Official Promotional Image for Love, Victor
Being an academic, I tried to analyze these feelings. The first conclusion that I came to was that my feelings of longing and sadness were rooted in some unresolved childhood jealousy. That because these two fictitious, conventionally attractive boys were able to find each other – in an environment where there is arguably little other hardship to experience – it somehow negatively reflected or invalidated my own experiences as an overweight fem gay teen in Texas in the early 2000s. Juvenile as this is, it’s important to expose my own prejudices, for want of a better word, in order to fully explore the evolution of gay media with some degree of transparency.
But I don’t think that’s the whole picture.
It’s certainly a part of it – that the experiences of these characters made me yearn for the connections that I never had – but it’s also fair to point out that my experience was not unique either then or now. The fact is, these new explorations into queer youth identity in television shows such as Heartstopper and movies such as Love Simon paint the world with beautiful rainbow brushstrokes that are in many ways tone deaf to the identities and experiences of gay youth in the real world today.
The characters in Heartstopper exist in a world where teasing is the extent of the social hardships. This isn’t to downplay the seriousness of bullying in schools, but the fact that the bullying doesn’t go beyond light jabs and throw-away comments makes this scripted world a veritable utopia compared to the real world of many gay youths today. Charlie’s parents and sister are accepting, he has a fiercely loyal friend group, a supportive art teacher and a protective coach who both act as shields in a school where there seems to be only one outwardly antagonistic character with homophobic leanings.
But what does this mean for the big picture? How does this impact an audience’s understanding of gay youth identity? And how do young gay viewers perceive these stories?
How does this impact an audience’s understanding of gay youth identity?
A potential problem arises when we consider that because stories such as these don’t adequately address the very real struggles of gay youth identity, they don’t challenge society to make positive change in the present. That is, these characters might exist outside the “real world” but the people whom their identities are based on do not. Series and movies such as Heartstopper and Love Victor have given greater visibility to gay youth identity and there is no question that representation is an important factor in breaking down societal exclusions of queer voices in the entrenched territorial claims of heterosexual media. But there is an important question of how these stories are perceived. Because stories and characters such as this are highlighted –and celebrated among mainstream audiences – does it take away from the lived experiences of real people whose lives aren’t as rosy? In many ways, my concern is an extension of my previous feelings of longing. My initial reaction of “why didn’t this happen to me,” can just as easily be experienced by a young gay person watching these stories saying “why isn’t my life this good.” And, to extend from this, if these struggles aren’t acknowledged as more queer stories are being told, does the expanding library of queer media do a disservice to the youth that they are purporting to portray?
These new stories exist in a world of their own within gay media. They exist in a universe that is only tangentially related to our own. The fact is, experiences like Nick and Charlie’s are rare. They’re beautiful, uplifting, and positive, but they are nevertheless rare. Not every gay youth story has the happy ending of expanded friend circles, supportive adult role models, loving parents, and reciprocated attraction, and it’s important to remember this when looking at gay media in the aggregate. While gay media of the past explored the realities of challenged identities, stories such as Heartstopper do not.
For an outsider, my concerns might be unfounded. That is, if you have not experienced gay youth, you might assume that these stories are just that. Stories. The truth is, however, that these stories carry with them the weight of an identity that is challenged and actively mobilized against within youth societies. To be sure, Heartstopper addresses this concern, albeit briefly, in that it references “last term” when Charlie was bullied for his identity. But what changed between then and where the story picks up? Sure, Charlie seems like an outsider at the beginning of the story, but his support network of friends, family, and teachers seemed pretty extensive. That is, even the mention of an off-camera pre-story bullying seemed to be resolved neatly. For viewers who have not experienced the identity-targeted mobilization, this omission could be conveniently overlooked. However, for those of us who have experienced it, the omission is a painful reminder that Heartstopper fails to address some of the more difficult realities of gay youth identity.
The fact is, these types of happy and positive queer stories haven’t existed in the mainstream before, and it’s important that they do. It’s important to show queer youth that there is happiness to be found, and that life won’t always be a struggle. Stories such as these can show queer youth that they are indeed not alone, and that there are others in the same generation that are experiencing similar confusions. However, representation in media must also validate the struggles that young queer people experience. With Heartstopper for example, the bullying has all but subsided for Charlie, and Elle’s identity is affirmed and valued by not only her friends but also her parents and school before the story even begins.
I argue that shows like Heartstopper fill in a missing piece of queer media. Consider these series to be analogous to the 90s “chick flick.” It’s not super substantive, there aren’t many boundaries that are pushed, and they don’t challenge the status quo. And that’s okay. It’s fine that these types of stories with their perfectly manicured characters and settings exist, so long as we are aware that they are fictitious. Stories like this do not hold the proverbial mirror up to society, and problems only arise if that is what they claim to do, or if it is what people perceive them to do.
Stories such as Heartstopper, in many ways, deserve a new category within gay media; a category that is reserved for pure escapist fantasy. Heartstopper doesn’t fit with the Queer as Folks or the Will & Graces of the past other than it features gay leading characters. These stories are all together new and they deserve their own space in which to be enjoyed. Labeling a story as escapist does not make it any less enjoyable or impactful, but it does set the expectation that “real life” is being put on pause. These stories exist outside of our reality, and if they continue to be made (which I believe they will) it’s important to compartmentalize them in a way that allows them to be enjoyed, but also acknowledges that they don’t challenge queer exclusion in any great or meaningful way. That is, the creation of gay characters does little to ameliorate the current realities and struggles of gay youth identity – but they don’t have to.
Without question, there is value in stories like this. They show us what the world could be; a world where parents, teachers, and (most) other classmates accept identities that are different from their own. But in order to get to that world, we must face the realities of our own.
Happy Pride, Eda
Eda Salad (any pronouns) is a semiprofessional drag queen and Masters of Arts candidate in International Relations. Her concentration is in Sustainable Development and Conflict Transformation, and her primary area of research is in Queer Security. She has recently published on political homophobia in Senegal, and is currently writing on religious colonialism and queer identity in East Africa. She can be found on Instagram, Twitter, and Twitch @EdaSalad
