Oh, Glee, No....

[ladysprite]

I have been a fan of Glee since the first episode. I have promoted it to my friends. I have bought songs from the show. I have stood by it through the loss of focus that hit somewhere around the second season, and was willing to see what they did with the third season, after half their main characters graduated.

But I think I may have just found the line I can't cross.

Specifically, their portrayal of the school's D&D Club as a bunch of hyperkinetic nerds who dress up in wizard robes and pointy hats and jump around hitting each other with cardboard swords while an even more angsty pencil-necked dweeb gesticulates wildly, trying to control them and failing.

I am livid that a show whose primary message is about underdogs, losers, and unpopular kids triumphing in the face of bullying; whose characters include a transgendered student, openly gay couples, and a student in a wheelchair; that makes such an ostentatious point of acceptance, openness, and inclusivity, still thinks it's okay to make fun of gamers and geeks. Because, you know, they're just funny. It's okay to mock them.

I'm probably overreacting. But I'm sick and tired of the media stereotype of gamers as asthmatic, cheeto-chowing, socially retarded nerds who can't tell the difference between reality and fantasy. It's not accurate, and it's hurtful - both to those of us who actually enjoy RPG's and to those who are driven away from a hobby and a social circle they might enjoy because of the negative associations.

Maybe someday I'll watch this show again. But right now? I highly doubt it....

Comments

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

Sheesh, and they even went to the trouble of writing sympathetic jock characters... Suddenly deciding to rip on gamers is seriously disappointing.

[darkoni]

That does not encourage me to watch more of the season. I'd only seen the first episode this season and I thought it looked like it had promise in some areas. There were some areas I didn't like as much, like Puck's brother, but I really like Blaine as a character and wanted to see him featured more. He has such a good nature that he helps make that show for me.

I may watch more just to see what they did, but that does not encourage me at all.

[siderea]

I'm probably overreacting.

This week I had a patient, who I have been treating for nine months, finally come out to me that the weekly "card game" she'd been attending was an on-going D&D campaign.[*]

She found it easier to tell me about relapsing to her drug addiction and cutting than to tell me she was a geek. She assumed her therapist would be less judgmental about her doing heroin and mutilating herself than about her playing an RPG.

I wonder where she got that idea.

No. You're not overreacting.

[* Some details have been changed for patient privacy. But it is, in fact, a D&D game.]

[dagibbs.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

[edthetallguy.livejournal.com]

All of the groups you mention before gamers are in legally and socially protected categories, or part of the power structure. From my memories of high school, that leaves only two groups of recognizably different folks to poke fun at: theater folks and gamers. It'd be a major miracle if anybody on the Glee staff noticed that they were part of one of the targetable groups.

[etherial.livejournal.com]

This is completely in keeping with my impression of where Glee was going from the pilot. It's the same reason I have been warily looking askance at the Big Bang Theory and wondering if my friends were watching a completely different show than I was.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

*hearty angry agreement*

[lisagw.livejournal.com]

I almost gave up with their initial portrayal of a young woman with Asperger's last year, but luckily they took the edges off her portrayal fairly quickly, though it is now almost unnoticeable, so it is no longer an opportunity to cheer for that particular (sometimes) underdog. I am pleased with their consistently solid portrayal of a student with a physical disability and one with Down Syndrome.

Also, I was disappointed with the blithe turn to drinking during last season. It did not really fit with my perception of the show in how they addressed it, though I know it is a sadly accurate of many high school students.

I am interested to see how the new characters develop this season, but I do hope it will be more even.... I am still here mainly out if loyalty to the concept.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

s/gamers/Black kids and you have why I don't watch Glee. It makes a big superficial show of inclusiveness, but then trots out the same old wearily untrue stereotypes.

I'm sorry it hurt you, and mad right along with you.

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

Oh Glee. You hurt everyone that loves you.

*sad*

[serakit.livejournal.com]

One of my psych professors wrote a whole book about geeks and one of the things he comes up with is that America as a whole has an anti-intellectual bias and our culture has "dislike smart people" baked into it. To play D&D well, you have to think. Therefore pop culture hates geeks.

Besides, gayness and transgenderedness and physical disabilities are trendy issues. Being inclusive of them lets the showrunners go "Here, see, we're inclusive! Give us a cookie!" Being inclusive of geeks is not going to get them that benefit, so they don't want it-- I think this proves that they're not so much founded on inclusiveness and underdogs as they've figured out that's a working formula that will get them lots of props from special interests.

[mr-teem.livejournal.com]

I...I was a little appalled at that snippet, despite being in the middle of a cover of an awesome song. I admit it has knocked Season 4 from the "can do no wrong" category down to "fast forward until they start singing".

[citabria]

Is that what that was about? Seriously? I was wondering why everyone was in Halloween costumes a month early.

I almost said that obviously I'm not paying enough attention ... but I think that might have been a good thing in this case.

[aries-walker.livejournal.com]

You're not overreacting. For anything further, I need to do some research. Back later.

[aries-walker.livejournal.com]

All right, I watched it. That opening number, anyway, which - as far as I was able to watch - was the only appearance of the D&D club.

And, sure enough, you were not overreacting. That was really some base and egregious demeanifying there (and yes, I did just make up that word). I can sort of see what they were going for, if I squint - people hunched over a table, consulting books, does not make for a Pop! Wow! Exciting! Musical! Number! so they gussied it up with thrown sparkles and faux swordfights, but it's obvious that the people who wrote it had no idea what they were writing about, and didn't bother to ask anyone what it was like.

Hollywood is actually getting better at showing geek culture - consider the movie Role Models, for example - but this is a giant step back. This is pretty good confirmation that my not watching the show was the right choice.

Especially since I see Sarah Jessica Parker just wedged herself into it as well. Yug.

[leiacat.livejournal.com]

I don't remember what precisely turned me off them, but I gave up on them at the beginning of season 3. I've been meaning to give it another shot (at least for the Kurt & Blaine part of the story and the singing, if nothing else), but every time I think about it, I hear something like what you just said. Sigh.