For One Anti-Gay Woman, 30 Days Is Not Time Enough

[romantico]

Posted: 6/23/08 at 11:32pm

We’ve seen it a dozen times before on scripted television: an intolerant conservative, often a devout Christian, expresses anti-gay views at the beginning of the episode, but then encounters an actual gay person or couple, only to rethink their homophobic attitudes by the end of the show. Whether it’s recently on Grey’s Anatomy or years ago on Touched By An Angel, the cold, anti-gay heart always melts in the warm, friendly glow of an interaction with an actual, humanizing gay person.

But (mild spoiler alert) that’s not what happens on Tuesday night's episode of the FX reality series 30 Days. And, paradoxically, this “unresolved” ending makes for absolutely riveting television.

http://www.afterelton.com/TV/2008/6/30days

Once again, I wish stupidity and ignorance was physically painful.

[verynewyorkcurious]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 12:14am

30 Days did a homophobe living with a gay man in San Francisco the first season, although he wasn't so much a homophobe, as a guy who didn't know any gay people. It worked out well at the end.

I've been DVRing this new season of 30 Days but I haven't started watching any of them yet. I don't know if I'll watch this Thursday's episode either. I prefer the happy endings. It's a great show though.

[papalovesmambo]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 9:02am

careful what ya wish for, rom.

[folkyboy]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 9:02am

I just read that article. How horrible that she could come out of the experience and advocate AGAINST sex-sex adoption and foster care! what a closed minded b!tch!

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 9:36am

Actually, as I recall, the young man that Spurlock had stay with a gay couple a few years ago, barely tolerated the lives of his hosts. He did appear to have had a bond with the couple, but he certainly didnt change his views. I remember when he returned home, his family was fearful that he'd changed and he said nothing had changed. Perhaps that was for his parent's sake and he actually felt differently, but that was not conveyed.

[Calvin]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 10:58am

But having the scene captured on video made Dennis Patrick uncomfortable. “I’m like, ‘Why did they end it that way?’” he says. “I’m telling Kati that, since she doesn’t agree with us, I can’t be her friend. But it’s more than that. What doesn’t really come out in the show was that she was planning on going back and being an advocate against gay and lesbian foster care and adoption. And when I told her, ‘I spend so much time trying to open doors for kids in foster care who are waiting for a permanent family, and I just couldn’t be friends with someone who was going to be trying to shut down those same doors.’ And so that’s kind of where I was coming from at the end. I said I can be nice to you, but I can’t be your friend. This is just too important to me.”

Why should he even be nice to her? This is a hateful woman who, even after meeting his family, plans to go back and do everything she can to rip their child way from them. And obviously, she's too much of a hateful, cold-hearted beast to ever change her mind. So why treat her with any respect whatsoever?

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 11:02am

I was wondering the same thing, Cal...why was he upset about that edit?

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/24/08 at 11:11am

Are 30 days ever enough time to reverse a lifetime of brainwashing, small mindedness and bigotry?
Updated On: 6/24/08 at 11:11 AM

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:34am

I finally got around to watching this tonight, and it alternately had me feeling bemused, superior, sad, and just all around angry. It's people like this women who should make gay people and those who stand up for them that it's NOT Phelpses of the world that are the enemy - it's THESE people. And sadly, I think that's a fair majority of the population, despite how we try to feel otherwise.

Think about it. Even some so-called gay "supporters" (including the Democratic messiah Himself) believe that marriage is for a man and a woman only, and he's supposed to be as liberal as all get out!

I could never even real feel bad for the woman on this show, because she really was an idiot. She just seemed completely flabbergasted that she'd actually have to defend her position. The entire time I keep thinking, how do those who think the answer is to wait to change the minds of people before we finally start seeing some real results? How long did it take between Massachusetts and California?

Giving women the vote didn't eradicate misogyny (and yet 50 years later the ERA failed miserably and 30 years later no one even seems to care about it anymore); freeing the slaves didn't end racism any more than giving African-Americans the right to vote or rescinding miscegenation laws did. I want to say I don't understand but I DO understand - gay people ick a lot of non-gay people out, but that's okay because they have god on their side.

I also wasn't too happy to see the comment about how gays are more likely to be pedophiles go unchecked, but whatever. The whole episode was just so depressing and disheartening that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Updated On: 6/29/08 at 02:34 AM

[DG]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:41am

"feeling bemused, superior, sad, and just all around angry."

Welcome to my world, PRS.

I try REALLY hard to view history as a whole, and think that we ARE making progress.

MEANWHILE, I'm living my life here, and these freaks are making it damn near impossible!

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:49am

Yeah, I guess I like to think that too, but the answer should really be so simple - either legislate biblically for every single law or leave the gays the hell alone.

What kind of person wakes up in the morning and thinks, "Today I'm going go to the market, worship my lord, take the kids to school, and then try to prevent people who's lives are none of my business from having the same rights that I have because Jesus told me so"?

[DG]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:51am

"What kind of person wakes up in the morning and thinks, "Today I'm going go to the market, worship my lord, take the kids to school, and then try to prevent people who's lives are none of my business from having the same rights that I have because Jesus told me so"?"

My neighbors?

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:52am

Who calls it the "market"? Is that a northern thing?

We call it the "grocery store" down here.

[DG]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:54am

Haha! I call it grocery store, as well!

BUT, my partner calls it the 'market'. But he's half British - which is what I usually blame it on.

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:55am

If I had a partner, and they were British, they could call it whatever they wanted.

I wouldn't complain.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 2:58am

DG, I wasn't denying their existence. I just simply can't comprehend it. Or maybe I can, but I choose not to.

So what if I say market? I can be a little affected. Sue me.

And I'm a Jersey boy by birth, so there.

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:00am

Do you also say "pop" or is that more Illinois/Ohio folks?
Updated On: 6/29/08 at 03:00 AM

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:01am

Nope, though I grew up back east, down south and in the midwest, I still say soda.

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:03am

Good, because when I hear the term "pop" to refer to a soda I go ballistic.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:08am

I also emphasize the SIX in Six Flags, and when I lived in St Louis I always laughed at. And I say "tore" not "twoeer" when speaking of a Broadway road show.

And I'm very very gay.

[Namaste]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:11am

If something has two pronunciations, I'll say them both. That's a pretty annoying habit that drives people crazy.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 3:15am

The Facebook application said I talked Northeastern or something.

Posted: 6/29/08 at 9:43am

You soda-sayers make me sick! You shouldn't be allowed to adopt kids, that's for sure, and indoctrinate them into your sick soda-saying lifestyle!

[wonderwaiter]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 6:12pm

"What kind of person wakes up in the morning and thinks, "Today I'm going go to the market, worship my lord, take the kids to school, and then try to prevent people who's lives are none of my business from having the same rights that I have because Jesus told me so?"


I can has new sig line, plz?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/29/08 at 7:27pm

You may! Feel free to sign my Wall of (De)Fam(e)mation^©
Updated On: 6/29/08 at 07:27 PM