Queer representation in movies should be more than just token

By SAIGE THORNLEY

Staff writer

You all know exactly what I’m talking about. 

Every June, every store logo, every sales floor, every window is suddenly covered in rainbows. Pride flags smeared across every commercial, trans actors/models/influencers are being paraded around as a success story and new “look your best at Pride” merch comes out hourly. 

Now that #PrideMonth is over, suddenly all traces of that are gone. Dubbed as “queerbaiting” or “pinkwashing,” every business cares about the LGBTQIA+ community while they can make money from it, but come July 1, that’s gone. They only care until it’s actually important.

Something I’ve come to realize as a journalist is that the news cycle never stops and once you finish one story, there’s seven more coming down the line. It’s the same with what’s “trendy.” When one trend is done, there are more to get on board with to stay relevant.

My point, dear reader, is that everyone cares about the LGBTQIA+ community as well as the Black Lives Matter movement and even the war in Ukraine until people get bored and it’s suddenly not a part of the breaking news headlines anymore. So why should people care anymore?

This is the same idea that fuels the whole Facebook Warrior aesthetic. You can post all you want about Ukraine, standing up against corrupt police and protecting trans kids, but unless you put your money where your mouth is and do something about it, nothing will change. Yes, we have our right to assemble and our right to sign petitions but that doesn’t do anything. What government, for example, listened when its people were telling it not to do something? Roe was still overturned. Brexit was still allowed to happen. It took months of protests and a literal storming of the president’s palace before Sri Lanka finally got a new president. Russia still invaded Ukraine.

I don’t have the answers and I’m not trying to win your favor but I am tired of it all. Aren’t you tired? I could tell you all about the companies who are queerbaiting and perhaps will another time, but right now I’m going to indulge myself in some unadulterated queer joy.

I’m going to tell you all about my favorite media representations of queer love, representation that really matters to the young gay kid wanting to see himself reflected in his favorite characters or to the trans girl wondering what her future will be like. 

The Birdcage. By far one of my favorite films, starring Nathan Lane and Robin Williams, though often relying on stereotypes, two gay men try to convince their son’s fiancé’s conservative parents that they are in fact just a normal, nuclear family. When things go awry, hilarity ensues. Though Nathan Lane was the only actor who was gay in real life, Williams and Lane’s chemistry make this movie a funny but believable representation of men who love men and care about their family as well as those who might seek to harm them.

Cloud Atlas. I realize I’ve written another editorial on this film that you can read in an earlier edition, but Frobisher and Sixsmith’s relationship is sincere and loving and heartbreaking and though they both meet a tragic end, the viewer is somehow still hopeful that they will get the ending they deserve. It’s love through and through that doesn’t objectify the relationship or make it into a perverse farce.

Moonlight. This movie truly deserves its own review. Layered in metaphors and beautiful imagery, Moonlight tells the story of Chiron, a young black boy discovering his queer identity while growing up in Miami, Florida in a culture of toxic masculinity and ghettos. Though it takes him a long time to recognize it, he is attracted to his best friend. Of course, there are ups and downs in his life, but this one is actually a kind of happy ending. While there are good people in Chiron’s life, he has it difficult. Everyone is just trying to get by in a world that doesn’t want them to survive.

Finally, my very favorite, 911: Lone Star. TK Strand is just trying to battle his own demons while his boyfriend, Carlos Reyes is all heart and doesn’t quite know how to help TK. Carlos does his best, but when TK gets hurt more often than not, there are a lot of scenes of a worried Carlos standing over TK’s hospital bed. 

Lots of movies and TV shows feature queer characters simply to garner support and to include their obligatory representation, but when it’s all over and done with, the queer characters are never the important parts of the story, or they are killed off or pushed to the sidelines in one way or another. Meanwhile, the pretty straight and conventional boys and girls always win the fight. 

We’ve made plenty of progress and there are more examples of good queer films than I can list here, but when will our lives actually matter instead of just being a token representation of something when its trendy?