8:17 am - 10/05/2012
There’s good news, albeit qualified, for our representation on television: Prime-time broadcast TV for the 2012-2013 season offers a record high percentage of LGBT characters, according to GLAAD, although it still doesn’t reflect the diversity of the U.S. population.
GLAAD’s “Where We Are on TV” report, released today, notes that 4.4% of characters to be featured regularly on the five broadcast networks this season are LGBT, up from 2.9% in the 2011-2012 season. There’s also greater LGBT representation on scripted cable shows. GLAAD found Fox’s Glee to be the most inclusive show on broadcast TV, HBO’s True Blood the most inclusive on cable. ABC led broadcast networks in LGBT characters, while Showtime had the highest number on cable.
“This year’s increase of LGBT characters on television reflects a cultural change in the way gay and lesbian people are seen in our society,” said GLAAD president Herndon Graddick in the report. “More and more Americans have come to accept their LGBT family members, friends, coworkers, and peers, and as audiences tune into their favorite programs, they expect to see the same diversity of people they encounter in their daily lives.”
GLAAD also found that the ethnic diversity of characters on prime-time broadcast TV improved, but it still doesn’t accurately reflect U.S. demographics. Cable programs are actually less diverse than broadcast in terms of race and ethnicity, GLAAD reported. Women and people with disabilities remain underrepresented on television.
This is the 17th year GLAAD has tracked the number of LGBT characters on television, the eighth year it has looked at gender and race/ethnicity demographics (of all characters, not just LGBT), and the third year it has tracked characters with disabilities. This year, for the first time, the report includes perspectives of other media advocacy groups: the National Hispanic Media Coalition, the Asian-Pacific Media Coalition, SAG-AFTRA, and Missrepresentation.org.
The report is based on characters on scripted series that started after May 31 and anticipated casts for the upcoming 2012-2013 season. At the season’s end GLAAD will compile an in-depth analysis of the images presented on television in its seventh annual Network Responsibility Index, which rates broadcast and cable networks on the quantity and quality of their LGBT content.
Television can have a major impact on people’s lives, Graddick said. “It is vital for networks to weave complex and diverse storylines of LGBT people in the different programs they air,” he said. “When young LGBT people see loving couples like Callie and Arizona on Grey’s Anatomy or Degrassi‘s confident transgender high school student Adam Torres, they find characters they can look up to and slowly start building the courage to live authentically.”
I miss QAF..both versions
LGBTQIAO peeps, do you feel like you're represented on TV?
Source, 2
LGBTQIAOs Have Record Representation on TV
There’s good news, albeit qualified, for our representation on television: Prime-time broadcast TV for the 2012-2013 season offers a record high percentage of LGBT characters, according to GLAAD, although it still doesn’t reflect the diversity of the U.S. population.
GLAAD’s “Where We Are on TV” report, released today, notes that 4.4% of characters to be featured regularly on the five broadcast networks this season are LGBT, up from 2.9% in the 2011-2012 season. There’s also greater LGBT representation on scripted cable shows. GLAAD found Fox’s Glee to be the most inclusive show on broadcast TV, HBO’s True Blood the most inclusive on cable. ABC led broadcast networks in LGBT characters, while Showtime had the highest number on cable.
“This year’s increase of LGBT characters on television reflects a cultural change in the way gay and lesbian people are seen in our society,” said GLAAD president Herndon Graddick in the report. “More and more Americans have come to accept their LGBT family members, friends, coworkers, and peers, and as audiences tune into their favorite programs, they expect to see the same diversity of people they encounter in their daily lives.”
GLAAD also found that the ethnic diversity of characters on prime-time broadcast TV improved, but it still doesn’t accurately reflect U.S. demographics. Cable programs are actually less diverse than broadcast in terms of race and ethnicity, GLAAD reported. Women and people with disabilities remain underrepresented on television.
This is the 17th year GLAAD has tracked the number of LGBT characters on television, the eighth year it has looked at gender and race/ethnicity demographics (of all characters, not just LGBT), and the third year it has tracked characters with disabilities. This year, for the first time, the report includes perspectives of other media advocacy groups: the National Hispanic Media Coalition, the Asian-Pacific Media Coalition, SAG-AFTRA, and Missrepresentation.org.
The report is based on characters on scripted series that started after May 31 and anticipated casts for the upcoming 2012-2013 season. At the season’s end GLAAD will compile an in-depth analysis of the images presented on television in its seventh annual Network Responsibility Index, which rates broadcast and cable networks on the quantity and quality of their LGBT content.
Television can have a major impact on people’s lives, Graddick said. “It is vital for networks to weave complex and diverse storylines of LGBT people in the different programs they air,” he said. “When young LGBT people see loving couples like Callie and Arizona on Grey’s Anatomy or Degrassi‘s confident transgender high school student Adam Torres, they find characters they can look up to and slowly start building the courage to live authentically.”
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I miss QAF..both versions
LGBTQIAO peeps, do you feel like you're represented on TV?
Source, 2
Always here for the UK version though.
perfection.
i was just looking for something to watch while i ate dinner after work and ended up watching 5 episodes
Barristan Selmy is also in it btw.
season 3 was the best!
ehh yes they include them but its painfully obvious how they treat their straight couples and gay couples differently.
i see no lies.
but at least they noted that in the report.
...it still doesn’t reflect the diversity of the U.S. population.
Although she always gets fucked over idk
And lafayette and jesus was so cute.
And sadly I can only think...of two? :/ that is a huge ass problem.
The unicorn is to me the bi pocs in movies.
i consider myself a lesbian, but i'm not ever going to rule out that i would NEVER find/be with a man that i was really attracted to. i truly believe that sexuality is fluid and you can fall in love with anyone.
:-(
Especially all the Ryan Murphy produced stuff. Seriously, does he just pull every fucking stereotype out the bag and just regurgitate it?
Maybe I'm just being an asshole, but most of these shows and their "representation" suck. Characters are still over the top cliches, the same-sex couples are rarely given the same treatment as the hetero ones, and it's still rarely the 'star' (heartthrob, leading man/lady) character(s) of the show.
Maybe I'm just waiting for the day when mainstream American tv can produce something LGBTQIAO+ that really surprises me.
As a gay man myself I would love to see a normal gay character portrayed in a lead role on a show that doesn't center around them being gay... but I don't think it would happen anytime soon, sadly.
LGBTQIAO: lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, intersex, asexual, other
I feel the same about gay clubs and straight people working at them. Many of my friends hated that I hired both gay and straight men/women to bartend at the nightclub I used to manage, but my perspective was, if these people support gays, then it's a job and no one should not be hired based on their sexuality. I shouldn't even be able to ask that during an interview. And hopefully the same applies to she a gay person applies at a predominantly straight nightclub.
Do you think it's ok that Sheldon on Big Bang Theory is a straight character played by a gay man? Or Barney on How I Met Your Mother?
Yeah, I can't recall a bisexual character who gets treated seriously by the narrative, either. I came in here to see if there were any on shows I'm not familiar with.
& were there any trans characters in that list?!
maybe sherlock, and i feel like dexter started out that way but then rita came along
besides fixing the lack of trans* people, my wishlist for tv would include characters actually using the word queer.
Edited at 2012-10-05 01:32 pm (UTC)