The Flint Hills Observer
April 1997

From the Top
by Penny Cullers, FHA President

Back in the fall of 1996 as I sat inattentive to my television set as it droned on barely past my consciousness, a newscaster interrupted the commercial break to blurt out: "PRINCESS CAROLINE OF MONACO IS BALD, and ELLEN DEGENERES HAS ANNOUNCED THAT HER CHARACTER WILL COME OUT ON HER SHOW AS A LLLLLEEEEEEESSSBIAN!" Many moons later Princess Caroline has grown back a little stubble of hair and Ellen Degeneres in the month of April will indeed come out of the closet as a lesbian. The hour-long show is scheduled to air on April 30 (ABC). Celebrity guest appearances include lesbian gay idols k.d. lang, Melissa Etheridge, Gina Gershon, and Oprah Winfrey. That same evening Ellen Degeneres will be interviewed by Diane Sawyer of ABC News, and Ms. Degeneres herself is rumored to be coming out during the interview. The evening will make television history in that the character will be the first ever gay main character in a situation comedy.

There has been a great deal of controversy surrounding the airing of this particular episode of Ellen because of the lesbian content. Ellen herself had to fight through a year of Princess Caroline's hair growth with ABC executives to get the show on the air. General motors, Chrysler Corporation (I guess I'll never be buying that Dodge Neon I've always wanted) and Johnson & Johnson have all withdrawn their sponsorship of the Ellen coming-out episode. Reverend Jerry Falwell of 1980's hate-mongering fame has called for all sponsors to remove their ads permanently from the Ellen sitcom. Reverend Falwell made a statement that insinuated that the natural step beyond supporting such "perversity" as the homosexual agenda was that there might next be a sitcom based on bestiality.

All this fuss for a little old sitcom.

But maybe the right-winglets such as Falwell have caught on to something . . . that one thing being that there is some importance to popular culture, especially that which flickers its way into millions of American homes on the television screen. Think for a moment how important television sitcoms were to you as a kid. Think about how even to this day you can still recite favorite lines from favorite episodes of the Beverly Hillbillies or I Dream of Jeannie. And remember as a fledgling lesbian girl wanting to connect with Mrs. Brady, but never really knowing how. There was indeed something deeply erotic about Alice on The Brady Bunch, but it was a mysterious feeling you had towards her that no one ever explained. And think about being a young gay boy frolicking through TV channels and never knowing why you had such a deep affinity to Mr. French on Family Affair.

Think now about young lesbian and gays who will tune in on April 30 and see the old familiar face of Ellen Degeneres, whose sexuality previous to that night had been just as ambiguous as Ellie Mae Clampett from The Beverly Hillbillies. On this night Ellen reviews her sexuality, not as a recruiting tool for young children as the Reverend Falwell and his followers seem to believe, but because she is coming to terms with those mysterious, unexplained, never-talked-about feelings like we all had as young growing-up people who happened to be lesbian or gay. The Ellen sitcom will not transform little girls and boys into lesbians and gay men. It will instead inspire lesbians and young gay men to have respect for ourselves as we respect and admire the character that Ellen portrays.

There are some other gay and lesbian characters on television this year, though none seem to have inspired such excitement as Ellen. On the ABC sitcom Spin City there is a regular character who is a positive image of a gay male. Mad About You (NBC) has an occasional visit from a lesbian character who is sister to Paul Reiser's role. Rosanne's mother has come out of the closet this season (ABC). Also from ABC is a lesbian who is slipped in occasionally on Relativity. Then of course there is the Xena: Warrior Princess episode containing a Xena-to-Gabrielle kiss scene. The season's surprise is that on the show The Profiler (NBC) the main character seems to be a lesbian, though hardly anyone has noticed. Television does matter. Gays and lesbians matter. Tune in your TV on April 30 to support the Ellen show. And to Jerry Falwell and his followers, I say get off your sheep and relax to a little ABC television entertainment. It might be educational.