Doctor Who handling homosexualilty

[jackfaire]

I appreciate that there are forms of media out there that aren't directed at a homosexual audience that are starting to display homosexuality in a normal light but sometimes they mess up at it.

There was a Dr. Who episode where a gay married couple introduced themselves as a gay married couple and made a big deal about how if people were talking about a gay married couple it was always them people were talking about.

This was supposed to be the far future.

Honestly they didn't need more than "I am Bob and this is my husband" end of sentence they didn't need a whole little thing about it as if in the far future homosexuality is frowned on too. In case other people want to jump on the fact that one of them was then promptly killed off that has nothing to do with being gay and everything to do with the whole, "introducing new characters so you care when we kill them in 2 minutes"

[Ginger Tea]

iir that episode, one wasn't killed off, he saw his husband later as a headless monk, well he found out his husband lost his head when he was taken away to be 'converted' to their religion.

The penultimate episode is what I thought you were going to be on about from the title, where he gets back with the guy from the lodger (his now wife is out of the episode for most of it) and working in the shop all his co workers think they are a couple even more when hes carrying blokes son around.

Seeing as Amy Rose etc were called companions, he was trying to think of the right word to refere to him and that also inforced their belief in the situation being what it wasn't.

[IDrinkaRum]

OoO! At first I thought Jack was referring to "Gridlock". That's the second episode of Series 3. Where one of the couples driving in their were an old gay (lesbian) couple. XD

Haven't seen the Matt Smith episodes, so will have to wait to reserve judgement.

Actually, Torchwood (a spin-off show from Doctor Who) does the homosexuality thing really well. John Barrowman, who plays Captain Jack Harkness, is himself gay in real life. On the show, he's more "omnisexual", but he does fall in love with a male.



I don't care either way. I John Barrowman. So he makes the show entertaining. And a love interest is a love interest.

[SongsOfDragons]

I always thought their handling of Jack was rather epic. You don't focus on it nor does he carry a sign saying 'look at me!! I'm gay, don'tcha know?!'. It's more a basic tenant of the character that was established from the beginning, as if it's classed as his hair colour, eye colour, height, sex - we can see all those, they don't focus much on it - if anything they do more about his immortality and how often thay can kill him in awfully funny ways only to see him come back to life. ^^ It's like Daniel from SG-1 - 'I'm bored, how can we kill Daniel this time?'

I liked how he kissed Rose goodbye, then kissed the Doctor goodbye. Just like that. Lovely. Just little bits of fun every so often...who was it, Captain John from Season 2 or something? Meet, glare, march towards, snog, then pull guns and fight.

[jackfaire]

To be fair most of the time I love their handling of homosexuality it was just that episode.

Supposed to be far future and yet Homosexuality is still a weird enough thing to be that people are identified as "that gay couple" instead of who they are as individuals.

[KnitShoni]

Are you talking about the thin, fat, gay, married, Anglican Marines? That was the only time it was mentioned, and that was to explain why they didn't have names.

[jackfaire]

Are you talking about the thin, fat, gay, married, Anglican Marines? That was the only time it was mentioned, and that was to explain why they didn't have names.

Yes them and I know that.

That very explanation is what offended me. Essentially what they did was say, "Oh Yeah I don't have a name I am just token black guy everyone just calls me token black guy"

You would think in the far future when gay marriage is apparently legal there wouldn't be a token gay couple. That having a gay couple aboard wouldn't be unusual. That was precisely my problem.

All they had to say is "I am so and so and this is my husband" (which was said) end of line. That's all that was needed we didn't need an explanation about how they are the token gay couple.

[Hyena Dandy]

I dunno, I really didn't mind.

It was just like how I know a guy who served with a pair of brothers in Vietnam. Everyone called them 'the brothers' because they were brothers. It wasn't like it was that odd that they were brothers, just that that made them particularly notable.

I see it the same way. It would be odd to have a married couple on an operation. And they are gay, and one's fat, one's thin. It didn't seem that token-y to me, really. It would have been more token to me if everyone else made a big deal about them. That just seemed like a cute way to introduce themselves. I found it adorable.

[jackfaire]

It would be odd to have a married couple on an operation. .

Then like with the brothers the point of notability would have been that they were married.

That's my point if something is used as a note of oddness it is those aspects that are odd.

Hmm you and your brother are in the same unit that's odd.

Your married and your both in the same unit that's odd.

Your both gay that's odd.

That's what makes it a token thing. Noting that they are a married couple and in the same unit it is quite likely that is odd. Unless you establish, which they didn't, that lots of the other people on board are married thus the being married isn't the oddity.

[Hyena Dandy]

Then... Is it also offensive to fat and thin people for remarking on that?

[jackfaire]

Then... Is it also offensive to fat and thin people for remarking on that?

Yes. But right now neither of those things is a hotly contested political issue about denying or granting fat and thin people equal citizenship rights.

[Seshat]

If I recall correctly, that particular culture was strict on 'deviance'. We discover this through a couple of other things - the way the girl from the forest town was sneaking rather than being open about talking to the Doctor and to Amy, for example.

So the very fact that the pair being gay was unusual was a way for the writers to highlight how unusual the society was.

[jackfaire]

We discover this through a couple of other things - the way the girl from the forest town was sneaking rather than being open about talking to the Doctor and to Amy, for example.

Except they never expressed any issue with Deviance the reason the girl was sneaking was because the group's existence was to kill the Doctor and Amy was a prisoner who was a friend of the doctor.

A lowly soldier would be seen as fraternizing with the enemy.