Women on TV

Every now and then I watch TV, as opposed to DVD or streaming.   And sometimes a woman catches my eye.  The most recent is Christine Ko, the hot Asian chick on “The Great Indoors”, the new show featuring Joel McHale in the main role.  The dude from “Community”.  Anyhow.  When she’s on the screen I can’t take my eyes off her. 

Here are more.

Kat Dennings.   “Two Broke Girls”.  She has a nice pair of attitudes.   The show also has Garrett Morris, the token black guy from first generation SNL.   He’s still as funny as ever.

Sofia Vergara / Sarah Hyland / Ariel Winter.   “Modern Family” has not one but three hot babes (Julie Bowen doesn’t do it for me), with Sofia Vergara being one of the hottest women on the face of the planet.   Ever.  What makes her even better is that she can laugh at herself.  Hyland is also cute, and Winter has developed nicely.  Of course they all do well with some superlative writing to support them.  In fact, everyone on that show is fun to watch, though some for other reasons.

Zooey Deschanel.  “The New Girl”.  I don’t watch this much, but Zooey is always fun to see wherever she is.  She has a nice attitude, which helps. 

Aubrey Plaza.  “Parks & Recreation”.  Always the goth chick, perpetually rolling her eyes.  Funny that she was goth in personality but never actually dressed that way.

Mila Kunis & Laura Prepon.  The bodacious duo from "That 70s Show".  Kunis was cuter but Donna was easier to deal with and a better package.  Kunis remains delicious, so Kelso is a lucky guy.  Prepon is now a brunette on "Orange is the New Black", a show I've ignored - until I learned that Prepon is now a brunette on "Orange is the New Black."

Emily Wickersham.  Bishop on "NCIS".  Very cute blonde with big eyebrows that seem to work for her.  Another one who dominates my attention if she's on the screen, but it's a show I never actually watch - I simply catch it on the screen at the gym.

I’d say they’re all attractive, and a few are a bit top-heavy.  But they have a delicious attitude, each somewhat different, which makes them even more attractive than their beauty or body alone would indicate.  

The Gay Brain

I remarked earlier about homosexuals, and have come up with a theory on this.  I believe that gays have the cross-gender brain. 

 Anyone with any appreciable experience with the opposite sex knows that men and women think differently.  This is not cultural, but physiological.  In the womb, when our bodies form either penis & testicles or clitoris and ovaries, subtle changes are also taking place in our brains.  We end up with a male brain or a female brain. 

 Men tend to think in linear terms:  A therefore B therefore C, or 1 >> 2 >> 3.  Women think in non-linear terms:  A therefore 2 therefore Tuesday therefore purple.  What a man thinks follows from A is B; what a woman thinks follows from A is 2.  This is why men and women have so much trouble dealing with each other.  “Why doesn’t he know that M goes to cabbage?” cries a woman, whereas her husband says, “M goes to N, it’s logical…why can’t she figure that out?”

 The male brain is physiologically oriented to respond sexually to exposed breasts and vagina – the female anatomy.  The female brain is physiologically oriented to respond sexually to broad shoulders, strong arms, and even the penis.  Switch brains and you wind up with a man attracted to other men, or a woman attracted to other women.  However, there is at least one study that shows that straight women respond not merely to straight sex porn, but also gay porn.  Among men, only gay men respond to gay porn. 

 The gay man has a man’s body and a woman’s brain.  The lesbian has a woman’s body and a man’s brain.  This is why straight women LOVE to have gay male friends.  A man who thinks like a woman!  Brilliant!  And he won’t be offended if she doesn’t make a pass at him!  Even better.  Of course, this makes gay men a poor source of information on how straight men actually think.  What it’s like to pee standing up?  Ok, he can handle that.  What a straight man looks for in a woman?  Eh, not so much.  It’s funny, though – I don’t see straight men seeking advice on women from lesbians.  

 Note, it’s NOT genes.  Identical twins have a slightly higher chance of both being gay, but not much higher, and it’s not 100%.  On the other hand, if it’s due to hardwiring in the brain, it’s still fixed from birth and not something that can be changed with hormones, behavior therapy, or Elaine Benes.  To fix it you’d need an actual brain transplant (ideally trading with a lesbian). 

 As for bisexuals….  I can’t really say how they fit into my theory, which would be all-on or all-off (heterosexual or homosexual).  My own experience with the GLBS community is practically nil – “Modern Family” and not real gay friends.  Therefore, what I say in this regard may come off as uninformed.  These are just my own subjective impressions.

            I noted earlier that bisexuality among women is rarer than porn would have us believe.  “Bisexuals” seem less to be people truly ambivalent and neutral in their preferences, than either homosexuals occasionally engaging in straight sex for various reasons, or heterosexuals doing likewise, again for certain specific reasons.

Reasons such as:  suitable partners of the desired gender are not available (e.g. prison); or economic incentive (porn stars) or duress (heroin junkies).  

            In men, my impression is that bisexuals are really gay pretending to be bisexual because of some latent social, cultural (or possibly even physiological) confusion about their orientation.  These are homosexuals who occasionally dally in opposite-sex fun, but who mostly stick with their own team.  I’d call these “promiscuously bisexual.”

            Contrast this with what I call the “expediently bisexual”, (mostly) men who only engage in homosexual behavior when females are unavailable but are exclusively heterosexual when they do have access to women, the most common example being prison inmates.  Are they gays pretending to be straight in regular society?  Or just straight men with extremely low standards?   My guess is…the latter, with the promiscuously bisexual being homosexuals with low standards.  For all I know, maybe both groups contain individuals best described as “confused.”  But since I’m not bisexual – of either type – I may have to defer to true bisexuals on if and how their behavior fits into my “gay brain” theory.  I know my brain is straight.

Pink Triangle

I’ve been watching more of “Modern Family” – the gay couple, Mitchell and Cameron, are hilarious.  Both of them fit the stereotypes so well.  I suppose it’s time to tackle this particular issue.

 Hardcore haters.  I’ve noticed that the people who bark and bray the loudest against gays almost invariably wind up being bumped out the closet quite dramatically.  Whether it’s denial or self-hatred, I don’t know, but the gay bashers all too often seem to be confused as to which team they’re actually on.  On the other hand, simply not being a “sympathizer” and hanging out with gays, frequenting gay clubs, or embracing them and their lifestyle, is not even prima facie proof of being a “homophobe”.  

 Having said that, I do have a few problems with gays.  None relate to religion, though.

A.         Roger the Alien, from “American Dad”.  Rather, I should say this is my problem with gays as portrayed on TV.  Too many of them have this annoying tendency to be excessively impressed with their own wit and sophistication.  This pretentious depiction exceeds what I’ve noticed of gays in person.  The TV people are so intent on positive portrayals of gays that they go overboard with depictions that are, in fact, annoying.  Fortunately the “Modern Family” writers have dodged that bullet.

B.         I’m not particularly worried that a legion of gay men are going to find me irresistible and hunt me down.  I don’t find all women attractive; do all gay men find me attractive simply because I’m male?  Probably not - especially since not all women find me attractive either.  What I’d be more concerned about is being considered gay simply by association.  The way to avoid that is to avoid gay bars and other places where they socialize as a majority.  But even around Dupont Circle in DC, not every place is mobbed.  

            Way back when, on “L.A. Law”, Douglas Brachtman (Alan Rachins) was invited to lunch by an old friend (law school classmates?  I don’t remember) who wanted to disclose his orientation to him.  And this guy picked a restaurant known – apparently not to Brachtman – as a gay hangout, with serious consequences for Brachtman.  And I’m thinking, Mr. Pink Friend didn’t have to go to this particular place to make his big confession, he could have picked a regular restaurant.  All very well and fine to embrace who you are, but dragging your straight friend into the equation was gratuitous and inconsiderate – a serious lapse in discretion on his part.

C.         Flamers.  Now on “Dancing With the Stars” there is are not one but TWO flamers, Judge Bruno and the contestant Carson Kressley.  Lee, on “Desperate Housewives”, is the flamer; Jack (Sean Hayes) was the flamer on “Will & Grace”.   This is annoying, to be sure, but not offensive per se.  At least not to me.  Then again, a flamer is putting you on notice as to his orientation.  You have been warned!

 Metrosexuals.  “Metrosexual” basically means “acts gay but doesn’t sleep with men” – the whole manicure/pedicure, obsessive grooming and dressing, cooking & wine, etc.  I don’t think any of them are actually gay; to the contrary, it often seems like a desperate attempt by luckless straight guys who can’t seem to attract women any other way.  Be careful: she may think you’re actually gay.   

 Choice vs. Genes.  I really don’t care about this one way or another.  I have no attraction to men, and if put in a position where access to women was practically nil I’d just…take care of myself.  I’m not bisexual or even curious – and no amount of alcohol or drugs will change that.  Nor do I buy into this idea that (A) all women are secretly bisexual or (B) all men are “bi-curious”.  While I’m sure certain women are bisexual, it’s been my experience that this proportion is extremely small.  And my take on the latter is that many truly bisexual – or in fact, gay – men don’t want to admit that the majority of the male population is neither gay nor even bisexual, so they cook up this nonsense about “bi-curious”, partly defensive and partly wishful thinking. 

            But I say “irrelevant” for this reason:  I don’t really care WHY gays do what they do.  Whether something inside them makes them prefer other men, or one day they simply CHOSE to be gay, so long as their sex is 100% consensual and they leave me alone, what they do neither interests nor concerns me. 

            “Not that there’s anything wrong with it”. Jerry Seinfeld joked that straights were worried that with the proper “sales pitch”, they could be persuaded to switch sides.  “Start with holding hands, there’s no obligation.”  Whatever you are, you are, whether you’re in or out of the closet.  Closer examination reveals “switching sides” to be nothing more than “coming out” – a public recognition of true orientation rather than an actual change in preferences.

 Expediently Bisexual.   By this I mean the type of guys who will nail guys when women are not available, but are exclusively hetero when women are around.  The best examples involve (A) prison or (B) Islamic terrorists out in the field.  I’ve noted earlier about Yasser Arafat; the more knowledgeable experts, from Lawrence of Arabia all the way to the Israelis, have observed the dirty secret that the heavily homophobic Islamic world hides a substantial minority of repressed homosexuals.  As we saw during Prohibition (1919-1933), gun control, the Drug War, etc. repressing something never stamps out the behavior in question, it simply raises the cost of doing what we’d do anyway. 

 Molesters.  The big issue with molesters is not that they’re gay, it’s that they prey on children who are too young to understand what’s going on or too weak to resist.  And this is true whether the child is a little girl or a little boy.  It’s also objectionable when a person in a position of trust – e.g. a priest, father, uncle, Michael Jackson, etc. – takes advantage of that to satisfy his own darker desires at the expense of a small child. 

 Will & Grace.  This was the first show which really showcased the lifestyle.  I never watched it unless it came on the TV in front of me at gay church (the gym) while I was on the treadmill.  Even then it wasn’t particularly amusing or funny, just an excuse for these two (McCormack and Hayes) to marvel at their own wit.  I much prefer watching Mitchell and Cameron (and Lily) on “Modern Family” – a clever, sophisticated gay couple who AREN’T pretending to be the most intelligent people on the planet or better than all the straights around them.

 Freddie Mercury & Rob Halford.  We pretty much knew Queen had a bisexual singer; Mercury was fairly open about his lifestyle.  As for Judas Priest, Halford had consistently ACTED gay but denied it.  The music?  Queen did have a drama, show-tune kind of quality to their music, particularly “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “Flash Gordon”, but deep down inside the music still rocked.  Songs like “Best Friend” could be considered ambivalent, as with “Eat Me Alive” and “Love Bites”, two of JP’s more raunchier songs, with “Raw Deal” being the nastiest.  But the clever part about it is that Mercury and Halford knew how far they could go without stepping over the edge – make it, at worst, ambiguous and not explicit. 

            Of course, how could we have missed The Village People?  Apparently the Navy did.

 Gay Marriage.  My take on this is the following:  allow them to have “civil unions”.  If the state had a finite amount of marriages they were willing to perform each year, and straight couples were locked out because gay couples took up the available slots, then it would be a zero-sum game whereby gay marriages were imposing some sort of cost on straight ones; then I could see some sort of problem.  But civil unions do not (A) force straight people to marry gays, (B) prevent any straight couple from getting married if they want to, or (C) somehow “ruin” it for straight couples, who now have to get divorced, live together, or pursue common law marriages in the few states which still recognize them.  The state has no legitimate interest in interfering with the happiness of consenting adults.   

            Having said that, the Constitution has no provision protecting gay marriage (nor, for that matter, should it), so at this point the 50 individual states and D.C. can make their own determination.  If DC, MA, NY, CA, etc. want to legalize gay marriage (or civil unions) and VA, NC, SC, GA, MS, AL, FL, TX, AZ, etc. wish to ban it, that’s their prerogatives.  Part of the beauty of a federal system is that if you’re not thrilled with your state, you can move to a state you prefer; moving out of the country completely due to unfavorable Federal laws is considerably more inconvenient (and unfair) than simply crossing state lines.  This will clearly encourage gays to live in certain more “tolerant” parts of the country, but if they are in the minority in the “less tolerant” areas they really have no business dictating their particular political agenda to the rest of the state.  Tolerance works both ways, and gays have to accept that not everyone loves them, nor do they have the right to unconditional acceptance by the entire country.

 AIDSCAP.  Back in 1994 I had a temporary job working for this USAID agency in Arlington.  Myself and perhaps 3 other guys were the only straight men at this whole project.  However, only about 2-3 of the gay men were actually flamers; the rest were pretty normal.  I got along fine with everyone and was not molested, groped, or mistreated. 

            I did learn something interesting, though:  according to the literature put out by this agency, which was 99% pro-gay agenda, in the US the AIDS problem is 90% a gay problem.  It’s overseas in the Third World, where it seems half the male population regularly visits prostitutes, that straight men and women start having problems with AIDS. 

 Condemnation & Gay Rights.  Having said all that, South Park is still on point: “simply because you tolerate something doesn’t mean you have to like it.”  If gays are free to do as they please with each other, straights likewise have the right say what they want about them, and private organizations like the Boy Scouts have the right to screen out for gays.  Even G. Gordon Liddy pointed it out correctly:  gays have the SAME RIGHTS, no more, no less, as straight people; they have no “gay rights” and no rights specifically because they are gay.

             We know there are two kinds of vegetarian:  the Paul McCartney style who adopt it as a choice but respect the non-vegans’ rights and choices to continue to eat meat, vs. the militant types who try to gross us out from eating meat and ruin it for everyone.  Likewise there are the discreet gays who aren’t out to rub their lifestyle in our faces and just want to be left alone, vs. the militant types who flaunt it outrageously and get off on shock for the sake of shock.  The latter types aren’t doing the movement any favors; most straight people are content to let the gays alone so long as the sex is consensual and discreet.   

            Personally, I don’t think being gay is anything to be proud of, such that a “gay pride parade” is a good thing, but somehow I also don’t think that a Gay Shame Parade, where they block off the street for a few hours to see absolutely no one parade at all, would fly or work very well in practice.  The whole thing works best when everyone just minds their own business and leaves each other alone.

Modern Family

[Updated 4/23/21 – originally posted 6/10/11 after season 2]

 I recently finished the eleventh and final season of this TV show from ABC, I was very impressed and amused by the whole thing – from start to finish.  Amidst mediocre, lackluster and dull programming half-heartedly offered to us as “entertainment”, there are still remarkable gems to be found on the “idiot tube” for those with the patience to look hard enough.

 Premise.  Three separate households, linked by a common family bond.

 Jay (Ed O’Neill), Gloria (Sofia Vergara) and their son Manny (Rico Rodriguez).   Jay is an older guy (think Al Bundy with marginally more charm) with his trophy Colombian wife Gloria and her son Manny.  Her ex-husband Javier (Benjamin Bratt) is kind of a wild stallion who periodically shows up to make Jay uneasy but ultimately shows that Jay, despite his age and conservative nature, represents a stable father figure and provider which Gloria needs for herself and Manny.  For her part, Sofia Vergara has to be, bar none, the hottest female actress on TV – Catherine Zeta-Jones dialed up a few notches in hotness.  She is constant eye candy in every scene, even her accent is delicious.  The show is worth watching for her alone.  While there is some friction, and some cross-cultural issues, this family mostly gets along pretty well, and Jay makes an honest attempt to bond with Manny, not merely tolerate him as the baggage he has to accept to sleep with Gloria. 

 Jay and Gloria managed to have their own child Joe, who is still about 5 years old when the show ends, but already shows an implausible degree of business sense, practically a Ferengi.  Gloria remains as hot in season 11 as she was in season 2.

 Phil (Ty Burrell), Claire (Julie Bowen, formerly Denise Bauer on “Boston Legal”), and their children Haley (Sarah Hyland), Alex (Ariel Winter), and Luke (Nolan Gould).  This is the standard family unit.  Claire is Jay’s daughter; Phil’s father is played by Fred Willard.  Haley is the typical “hot but stupid” teen girl, Alex is the “smart but snotty and fairly plain” (Daria) teen girl, and Luke is hopelessly stupid.  For his part, Phil isn’t particularly bright but has NO CLUE how clueless he really is as a father; he thinks he has all the angles worked out but the results never support this assumption.  He’s the typical real estate guy who’s overly impressed with his own charm and wit, always cracking lame jokes (aka “dad jokes”), a trait he clearly picked up from his father. He has some idiotic fixation on doing magic tricks.  Claire is a decent mother but doesn’t always have all the answers herself, but at least she doesn’t seem to assume she already knows it all, unlike Phil.  Both of them give the appearance of muddling through parenthood with only the vaguest of clues but all the best intentions.

 After being involved with various different men – one played by Nathan Fillion – Haley returns to Dylan (Reid Ewing), the offbeat stoner type (though we never see him smoke).  They have twins.  By the way, Gloria came on the scene, so to speak, far too late to be Claire and Mitchell’s mother: she is Deedee, played by Shelley Long, who we might remember from “Cheers”.  Her character was a bit unhinged and killed off at some point.  By season 11 she’s actually a tree (!). 

 Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), Cameron (Eric Stonestreet) (gay couple) and their adopted Vietnamese baby girl, Lily.  I found baby Lily to be amazingly cute.   By season 11 Lily has grown up to be an attractive teenage girl (Aubrey Anderson-Emmons), though somewhat eye-rolling and snarky – not particularly likable.  Mitchell is Jay’s son and Claire’s sister.  By now gays are sufficiently positively portrayed on network TV that we can enjoy a flamboyantly ridiculous depiction of this couple.  On “Desperate Housewives”, Bob plays the “normal” gay partner who could easily pass for straight, while Lee is the “flamer” who embodies all the stereotypes.   With Mitchell and Cameron, they BOTH illustrate the stereotypes with hilarious regularity.   I suppose they get away with it because everyone else on the show is equally lampooned.  Even beautiful Gloria makes remarks about Colombians re: drug dealers, murders, violence, etc.  The fathers attempt to do their best for her, but like the others, often fail as much through sheer misadventure rather than incompetence (Phil) or indifference.  Mitch and Claire seem to be from California, while Cam is from a farm in Missouri and often makes farm jokes.  By season 11 he’s been an assistant coach for the high school football team and manages to snag the head coach job at a university in Missouri.  I actually watched “Bad Teacher” (with Cameron Diaz) just to see Stonestreet play a straight guy, though he only appears briefly as Diaz’ character’s grumpy and unfriendly roommate. 

 The show is filmed in the familiar “mockumentary” format where the characters frequently talk directly to the audience (e.g. “The Office” and “Trailer Park Boys”).   They all share Michael Scott’s tendency to make inadvertently negative revelations they believe are positive.  The show is definitely a comedy and has as much misadventure as any other – including “Two and a Half Men”, which had previously been my standard for current TV quality.  But as entertaining as Charlie Sheen and Jon Cryer have been, Sofia Vergara is certainly much more enjoyable to watch.

 From season 3 to 11, Ariel Winter managed to….develop considerably, making her competitive with Hyland, though still very much a nerd.  Luke also grew up into a teenage boy.  Almost all of the adult characters remain essentially the same throughout the series.  I found the writing to also remain consistent in nature and quality with no peak or “jumping the shark”, to borrow the Happy Days expression.