I’m a huge fan of Seinfeld, but like several ‘90s sitcoms being reevaluated by today’s social standards (Friends, how you doin?), bigotry sticks out like Jerry Seinfeld’s dad sneakers.
I’ve just rewatched some Seinfeld episodes dealing with homosexuality, and quite frankly, they make me grimace.
The most infamous, season four’s “The Outing” was supposed to be progressive back in 1993 when it aired, but now it just feels glaringly homophobic.
In the episode, Jerry and George are straight-up horrified to think a New York University reporter believes they’re a gay couple. Run! The sky is falling! This will ruin our hetero-cred! What will our mothers think?
“The Outing” was apparently designed to start a conversation about homophobia, but its famous catchphrase, “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” was never in the original script.
The show’s broadcaster NBC were rightly concerned that Jerry and George’s gay-panic would offend the gay community. So writer Larry Charles came up with the catchphrase that soaked into the pop culture vernacular like mulligatawny on marble rye.
“We had to do something about the fact that we were saying ‘it’s awful to be gay’, which we knew we couldn’t say,” says Jerry Seinfeld in an interview on the show’s DVD. If they kept saying the line throughout the episode (I lost count at around 10 reps) Seinfeld was sure they could “get away with it.”
So you can gay-panic with abandon and then appease with a questionably authentic affirmation Jerry? “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” was really just a PC get-out-of-jail-free card, thinly wallpapering homophobia.
And one of the most offensive parts of the episode was the notion that feigning homosexuality could be used as the perfect prank. When Elaine notices a woman (unbeknownst to the gang it’s the NYU reporter) eavesdropping on their conversation at Monk’s Cafe, she loudly initiates the gay ruse making out that Jerry and George are a gay couple. They should just come out already!
It’s one thing to bring attention to the stigma attached to coming out, quite another to trivialise it for a cheap gag. Because coming out is so hilarious!
And the fact that the notoriously homophobic George goes along with it, harks back to the juvenile mockery of homophobic schoolboys. It’s fun to joke about homos, just don’t call me one.
And George revels in using the fake news of his same-sex relationship with Jerry in an attempt to ditch his girlfriend. He’s “steeped in gayness,” he tells her. Ok, so that’s some clever writing, but a cheap shot that belittles gay males nonetheless.
Several other gay storylines throughout the series are equally as offensive, if not more so.
Take the frankly nasty depiction of Bob and Cedric, painted as bitchy queens (because all gay men are bitchy queens), daylight robbers, and agenda-militants that attempt to terrorise Kramer into wearing an AIDS ribbon.
Or how about the idea that lesbians can be turned or un-turned by the charming (Kramer) or charmless (George) man?
It couldn’t possibly be a thing that their attraction to women is innate, or that they may fall somewhere in the grey on the Kinsey Scale. It’s misogynistic… and well, trash.
But I’ll admit that Seinfeld did get some things right.
It skewered gay stereotypes and broke some ground in dealing with LGBT issues (it was honoured by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation in 1994).
When Elaine wants to attempt to “convert” a gay man she’s thirsty for, Jerry tells her she’s mad to even consider it; no one’s gay on a “whim”. The episode is titled “The Beard” because said gay man wants Elaine to masquerade as his date, fearful that his boss is homophobic.
And “The Outing” admirably addressed the US military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. But by episode’s end, the status quo was restored. WE ARE DEFINITELY NOT GAY. DEFINITELY NOT GAY. NO WAY, NOT GAY….. NOT THAT THERE’S ANYTHING WRONG WITH THAT!
Even allowing for the sometimes-questionable social mores of the time reflected in sitcoms (no seriously Friends, how ARE you doin?), one zeitgeist-behemoth of a “tolerant” catchphrase can’t hide Seinfeld’s blatant homophobia.
It’s simply not enough to say you’re satirising homophobia only to reinforce it at the same time. It reinforces the notion that it’s ok to demonise being gay as long as you follow that up with a boast about how you’re totally ok with someone being gay – just as long as it’s not yourself.
There’s everything wrong with that.