Gayle R. Baldwin
Assistant Professor, University of North Dakota
Department of
Philosophy and Religion
Abstract
The "Magic Negro" is a term coined in the
1950s describing Hollywood's portrayal of black men as characters
who, although disabled, have supernatural powers that allow
them to save lost or broken white men. Here, I compare
this "gospel" with that of the Fab 5 (Queer Eye for the
Straight Guy), who transform disheveled, uncultured straight
men into "chick magnets." This comparison concludes
that racial and sexual minorities are acceptable in American
popular television and film as long as the salvation and redemption
motif of the American myth prevails and white heteronormativity
remains unchallenged and privileged.
[1] Queer Eye for the Straight
Guy, a so-called "reality TV show," debuted on the cable
network Bravo in July, 2003. Their website describes
the mission of the five:
They are the Fab 5: an elite team of gay
men who have dedicated their lives to extolling the simple
virtues of style, taste and class. Each week their mission
is to transform a style-deficient and culture-deprived straight
man from drab to fab in each of their respective categories:
fashion, food and wine, interior design, grooming and culture.
It's a full lifestyle make-over - a make better show
where straight guys turn in their pleats for flat fronts,
learn about wines that don't come in a jug and come to understand
why hand soap is not a good shampoo (and vice versa). When
the journey is done, a freshly scrubbed, newly enlightened,
ultra hip man emerges. 2
[2] But this only describes a secular
mission. Carlson Kressley, the leading spokesperson
for the Fab 5 speaks of this mission with all the religious
fervor of a vocation: "We're doing the Lord's work.
I'm here to be His servant."3
With this religious twist, the "queer guys" can suddenly be
seen as the "Finity," a new incarnation of God, five persons
(each with a particular charism to impart) in one substance
(gayness, of course). They are not only intent on cleaning
up straight guys who are sloppy, uncultured and unable to
attract or keep a woman, their mission is salvific.
They intend to change lives. With all the urgency of
TV evangelists, the five men, who have been called in
by friends and family to do an intervention, invade the homes
of the "sinners," and begin the business of exposing sins
in order to invoke full repentance. Critics claim the
Fab 5 only accomplish one thing: they turn straight guys into
bonafide "metrosexuals," narcissistic style-conscious heterosexuals
now equipped to spend money on clothes, fine food, and overpriced
skin and hair products. Another plus is that they are
now self-sufficient and no longer need women to do these things
for them.4 This autonomy the Finity assures their disciples,
makes them "sexy" because they are self-confident, and self
confidence is sexy. In other words, the "gospel" according
to the new Finity is aptly summed up in the theme song, "Things
just keep getting better." As the lyrics go, "You came
into my life and my world never looked so bright. It's true,
you bring out the best in me when you are around. Things
just keep getting better." Confidence is the sign of being
"born again," and the reward is knowing what to buy to make
yourself look good and thus, sexy. The "booty" is women.
[3] The gay community has raised some
serious questions about this "gospel" and the ostensibly salvific
role of these queer heroes. The major criticism has
been whether or not Queer Eye simply concretizes stereotypes
of gay men. If this is so, why is the show so popular
in America where the "Christian Right" and its "anti-gay"
campaign seems to have the upper hand when it comes to winning
political equality for non-heterosexuals? Why would
stereotypical gay men be acceptable? Could the answer
be found in the very salvation myth they impart?
[4] Questions concerning the role
of minorities in bolstering America's religious ideology of
'Manifest Destiny' are not new. Several analyses of
the American myth and the role of the "Other" beginning with
the first American "savages," the indigenous peoples have
laid the groundwork for examining the pattern of the American
psyche when faced with "aliens."5
A second source of analysis comes from African American critics
and scholars of Hollywood's use of Black men and women as
stereotypical "Others" who are redeemed by being saviours
of straight white men. Relying on these two sources,
I extracted several themes which could serve as a useful methodological
framework by which to critique the success and popularity
of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. First, the
use of successful gay stereotypes who are portrayed as childlike,
shallow and in some degree asexual makes them acceptable to
an American psyche that has been trained to fear gay men as
predatory. This has also been the case with black men
who have also been perceived as sexually dangerous and in
need of control. The use of gay men and black men as
stereotypes and comedians allows the "Other" to be controlled,
thus rendering them harmless. Secondly, the use
of gay stereotypes prevents any referencing to gay violence,
inability of many gay and lesbian couples to achieve full
human rights, and the everyday unreported discrimination of
gay, lesbian and transgender people. This has also been
the case for African Americans. As long as black men
are in "black face" and continue to "step and fetch it," or,
as in the case of professional athletes, have successfully
cloned themselves in to upper class whites, the reality of
the ghetto can be hidden. At the same time inclusion
of minorities on these terms perpetuates the American myth
of "liberty and justice for all". But most importantly is
the religious theme of "vicarious sacrifice" by the "Others."
This is the use of minorities as humble and willing to accept
personal sacrifice in a gesture of atonement for the sins
of their oppressors. To cast minorities in the roles
of those who willingly give up their lives for the white man
ultimately assuages any residual guilt American popular viewers
may harbor over their own racism and homophobia.
The Savage and the American Hero
[5] In his foundational analysis of
the development of the American frontier myth, fundamental
to understanding how Americans treat those who are considered
different or alien, David Slotkin explains that the indigenous
people were objectified by the early colonists in response
to the difficulty of life in the New World. This resulted
in a need to control the Savage either through violence, conversion
or sometimes both. The need to achieve heroism by killing
Indians was a way to prove to their sponsors at home that
they were still true Englishmen and were not yielding to savagery.
As we can observe in the genre of Puritan narratives, "...
the first American mythology took shape¬a mythology in which
the hero was the captive or victim of devilish American savages
and in which his (or her) heroic quest was for religious conversion
and salvation." 6To
achieve this conversion and salvation, one must conquer all
elements that could possibly pull you away from "civilization,"
a concept that included orderliness, control of the body,
modesty and a hierarchy of power. Slotkin concludes that in
order to remain in a saved state, the colonists had to create
a new set of measures by which to define civilization.
But this was far easier to achieve "through attacking or condemning
alien elements in their society." All those "whose ideas
were strange or whose behavior smacked of an Indian-like lack
of orthodox discipline" were cast out.7
[6] As the colonists overcame their
fear through control of the wilderness environment, there
developed a "love-hate" relationship with the Indian:
"The whites appreciated and envied what they took to be the
Indian's ease of life and sexuality, the facility with which
he adjusted to the land, the fidelity and simplicity with
which he worshiped his wilderness gods, and the gratification
of mind and body such worship brought him."8 At the same time, the Puritan
mind feared the savage, and as is seen in the captivity narratives,
could gain a control of this fear and at the same time, achieve
a kind of purification from having been tainted by the savage
and one's fear of him, by not only hunting and conquering
the savage, but also by surviving captivity.
[7] There is then, deep in the American
psyche an abiding need to maintain control. This need
to control or conquer fear is a means of achieving salvation.
The early frontier myths laid out a pattern of "regeneration
through violence" that includes sacrifice by shedding blood
of the "Other," controlling through appropriation of culture,
or by creating stereotypes that are conducive to supporting
the "civilized" structure of the hero. Another way is
to allow oneself to endure the captivity of the savage and
to emerge untainted.
[8] This brief foray into the conflict
between the Puritan and the Indian and the mixed metaphor
of salvation, control, being controlled and purification provides
us with some understanding of why Queer Eye for the Straight
Guy is a perfectly legitimate way of "handling gay-ness"
in a civilized manner. The converts on the show always
end up better than they were, but better only because they
endured the touch of homosexuality, while becoming better
straight men. The Other is acceptable because he does
not threaten the prevailing structure, heteronormativity,
but actually ensures its privilege. This may explain
why a largely straight audience has defended the show as valuable
and constructive. Comments abound on the internet that
argue the series demonstrates that not only can gay men and
straight men get along, they can even touch each other because
there is nothing to fear. Not only are straight men
converted, but, the argument goes, so are homophobes.
But questions are raised about what kind of gayness is useful
for this salvation metaphor to work just as they were about
the use of the Indian as supportive of the salvation of the
civilization of the Puritan. What needs to be interrogated
is the necessary sacrifice by the Other for this symbiotic
relationship to continue. The "Magic Negro" syndrome gives
us some answers.
The "Magic Negro" and the Queer Messiah9
[9] African American critics have
reflected deeply on the "Magic Negro" phenomenon, or the way
Black characters have been given magical roles and supernatural
powers in film, seemingly empowering a marginalized group,
but actually exploiting them. One answer to the question
why this is popular with dominantly white audiences, comes
from Anthony Appiah. Appiah speculates that the way
black characters, but particularly black men, have been used
in film "works" because the "Magic Negro," the "Magical African
American Friend" (MAAF) is portrayed within the belief that
"suffering is ennobling,"10[13]
Kempley, "Movies' 'Magic Negro' Saves the Day. which is part
of the Puritan salvation scheme
[10] The Gospel according to the Magic
Negro has been around since late 1950s when Sidney Poitier
sacrificed himself to save Tony Curtis in The Defiant Ones.
The term "Magic Negro" refers to what critic Todd Boyd, author
of "Am I Black Enough for You?" and one of the coauthors of
"The Wood" (1999) sees as "black pawns".11 These characters
are one dimensional men who have supernatural powers even
though they are in some way outwardly or inwardly disabled,
either by discrimination, disability or social constraint.
The supernatural powers seem to be granted for only one intent:
to "... help white people figure out what's going wrong and
fix it."12 Ostensibly, this seems like
the "coloured man" has finally made it to the top, honored
as the all-American Saviour, Martin Luther King's dream
come true, a black Jesus, yes, misunderstood and sacrificed,
but so that others may live. But as Rita Kempley and
others have pointed out, what is actually sacrificed goes
way beyond the bodies of Black men: "It isn't that the actors
or the roles aren't likable, valuable or redemptive, but they
are without interior lives."13 In other words, what is sacrificed
is the complexity of race, showing the inability of the white
dominant society to understand blackness or to confront the
insidious racism that still persists in American institutions
and the resultant nihilism experienced by many young Black
males. Kempley quotes Cedric Robinson, author of "Black Marxism"
who says of the portrayal of black males in American Hollywood
film, "The black male simply orbits above the history of white
supremacy. He has no roots, no grounding. In that context,
black anger has no legitimacy, no real justification, The
only real characters are white. Blacks are kind of like
Tonto, whose name meant fool."14
Racism is continued and white hegemony assured by the Magic
Negro, or to use Christopher Farley's preferred term, the
MAAF (Magical African American Friend). Farley adds
this insight, "MAAFS exist because most Hollywood screenwriters
don't know much about black people other than what they hear
on records by white hip-hop star Eminem. So instead
of getting life histories or love interest, black characters
get magical powers."15
[11] If we examine two episodes from
Queer Eye which represent the typical pattern of the
show, we can see some remarkable similarities in the use of
MAAFS and the Fab 5 and the ways both minorities fit into
the salvation scheme which raise the same questions raised
by African American scholars about the salvific role of the
black man. Can the acceptance of gay men in Queer Eye for
the Straight Guy be explained because the salvation scheme
ultimately sacrifices the homosexual and resurrects the straight
man? Is the seemingly exaltation of gay men working in the
same way the Magic Negro does for Black men, simply reflect
yet another example of society's failure to confront or understand
the really important issues of race, gender and sexual orientation?
[12] This lack of knowledge of the
Other is condoned as necessary on Queer Eye.
Just as the norm in relationships between Black domestics
and their white female bosses was that domestics knew every
spot on the underwear and bedsheets of the white family, the
whites knew nothing about their Black employees. Similarly,
the gay guys on Queer Eye know all the dirty little
secrets of the hapless straight man, yet he knows nothing
of the five gay men. Although you can get a brief
synopsis of the Fab Five's paths to stardom on Bravo's Queer
Eye page, the men are careful on the show not to reveal
anything of their own personal lives. We never see their
bedrooms, the status of their bathtubs, the contents
of their closets. This distance is important
for the magic to work. It actually makes these messiahs more
mystical, believable and able to perform miracles, rather
like the Markan son of man who quips "a prophet is not without
honor except in his own country."16
[14] Ignorance of the Other is necessary
in order to sell the Finity as true saviours. The American
expectation is that the Messiah is one who must make a sacrifice,
in this case the sacrifice of an interior life. Black
film critic Anthony Appiah has reflected on whether or not
behind the saintliness of the Magic Negro lurks the "theodicy
that draws on the Christian notion that suffering is ennobling."
17 He asks whether or not "... the black
person who represents undeserved suffering in the American
imagination can also, therefore, represent moral nobility?
Does the Saint exist to address the guilt of white audiences,
afraid that black people are angry at them, wanting to be
forgiven, seeking a black person who is not only admirable
and lovable, but who loves white people back?"18
Heather Hicks interprets Appiah to mean that "for white
audiences, a saintly black character is the moral equivalent
of a 'normal' white character on screen."19
Could this phenomenon also explain the success of Queer
Eye? Are straight audiences so in need of redemption
from their homophobia and underlying misogyny that they will
gladly watch five gay men playfully make one poor straight
guy "be their bitch for a day?"20 But the question is whether
or not this kind of sacrifice ever changes anything.
Is society healed of their homophobia? Are the straight
men simply turned into metrosexuals? Is this just another
infomercial, as some have concluded, while none of the real
issues of heterosexism or classism have been addressed, while
characteristically the gay men are sacrificed in a more sophisticated
way, unblemished lambs led to slaughter? Interviews
with the Fab Five suggest that none of them feels oppressed,
not in the least, but what if they suddenly lost all of their
money, contracted AIDS, or were mysteriously reincarnated
becoming five of those many nameless, faceless and powerless
men who do not dare come out of the closet for fear of their
lives? Is this simply another version of what Ed Guerrero
has called the "... schizophrenic way of representing black
males as concentrated at the poles of celebrity and pathology
[which] leads to a dangerous array of perceptions and assumptions"?21
[15] Unlike the Black man, who Appiah
noted "orbits around the white man," in Queer Eye,
the gay men, flit like angels, not above, but around
the straight man. But as is true of Appiah's Magic Negro
description, they too lack roots and history. They exhibit
no interior life, except in the service of their mission.
Yet, they work their magic with childlike joy, not anger.
"Playing the fool" is essential to their redemptive purpose.
According to Carson, the most outspoken of the Finity, this
"hetero 'make better' hour, ... the reality show that could...
[has been a success] because we have no political agenda.
We're all just about having a good time and making people
feel better about themselves." He adds, " I'm also pretty
amazed at how much we're able to get away with on this show."22
As Hicks has said of the African American Hollywood saviours,
they do not have to be saints to do miracles.23
The Finity intrudes with determined purposefulness, making
mockery of the Sinner who has lived like a pig and hasn't
seemed to notice. They cajole, rip, ridicule, and deliberately
harass, Jesus cleansing the temple, but the whip is wielded
with the wit of a comic dominatrix, evidenced by comments
such as this:
Ted: Well, we did braise a jockstrap,
you have to admit.
Carson: That's good times.
Thom: But jockstraps do not qualify as sex. I know that
surprises you.
Kyan: Besides, what's so unnatural about that? You find
a dirty jockstrap. What do you do? Of course you boil
it.
Carson: Make it clean and puritanical.
Thom: Amish.
Kyan: Our Quakers love us. We're big with the Quakers.
It's all about cleanliness.
Ted: Yeah, we're huge amongst the Pennsylvania Dutch.24
[16] Such comments compliment the
theory that as long as the dominating ones, even if they are
the savages, ultimately support puritanical standards,
salvation for the straight man can be achieved. All he must
do is endure. Even though the Fab 5 are "savages in
disguise," and not saints themselves, they are accepted even
when they consciously make sexual innuendos, playing with
the anticipated fear of the one straight male surrounded by
five gay men. The gay men touch constantly, yet ever
so gingerly, and tear down, metaphorically and literally the
straight man's entire outward life. This destruction
is a necessary component if it is to interface with the American
Christian salvation paradigm. Destruction and death
mark the preamble for resurrection and life, being "born again."
Specific moments in a few key episodes demonstrate this.
In episode #109, "My Big Fat Greek Haircut: from Fabio to
Romeo," the Finity descends on the apartment of George the
body builder. Jai exclaims in dismay as he looks around,
"I have nothing." This lack of usable material is necessary
for the Judeo-Christian God to begin "His" work, for this
god is unique in that he "creates out of nothing," ex nihilo.
In episode #108, "Law and Disorder," the Finity look at a
New Year's Resolution list posted by their potential convert,
Cop John V. They judge it mercilessly, approving of
John's intention to get his finances in order and lose his
belly. But this is not enough, they conclude. Intervening
grace is needed. They summarize what John needs to do:
"Grow up." Following the Christian paradigm, intervening grace
is needed, and they are there to help John do more than grow
up. Deification is the objective, which cannot be done by
the straight man alone.
[17] Yet in all of this destruction,
there is no overt maliciousness or intent for revenge.
The message is "We are just like you guys in every way.
Our sensibilities are just keener, but we're here to show
you the way." They manifest the Lord's work by portraying
the Incarnation in the spirit of Dogma's "Good Buddy
Jesus" - some might say the pop culture's version of Bonhoeffer's
cheap grace saviour. But if we look at the unfolding
of the giving of grace, which may or may not "take," we observe
a sincere seriousness in the work of the Fab Five. In
episode #109, Carson, clearly the Holy Spirit of the bunch,
gives George a tee shirt with the name of his future body
building gym, and tells him the purpose: "If you can see it,
you can be it." Carson exclaims over George after he
is coiffed and dressed, "You are a Greek god!" But the
images that surround George in the preparation for the evening
and the final scenes are more reminiscent of Jesus feeding
the Five Thousand. In the preparation for the supper,
when Ted is teaching George to cook, he leads him to the new
outdoor grill and tells him, "The Weber grill, worship it!"
And on the altar, he is instructed to cook lamb and lays out
a table so the people can sit down. When his mother
sees her only son for the first time, she exclaims, "It's
a miracle!" But the Finity is careful to admonish the
convert that the transformation is not a passive one, not
cheap grace after all. Carson tells George solemnly,
"Everything we've given you, you gotta own it!" and George
obeys. "This is me!" he exclaims as he shows his Mom
around his new place. The Finity, watching from their
unnamed domain on high where Queer Eye observes its
finished work: "No higher praise." It is as if to say,
true worship is to obey, to own it. The work of salvation
seems sincere, the Finity full of conviction. They do
not seem to be only concerned with selling products, quite
the opposite. The "Lord's work" is to make better heterosexuals.
And this innocence and proclaimed ultimate goal might explain
why the American audience accepts the show. It is a
salvation myth that acknowledges the need for material pleasure
and sexual attractiveness, but only if there is a sacrifice,
a humbling, and ultimately, the salvation of "love." But of
course, the sacrifice is not equitable. The Captive
allows himself to be handled by the one he fears. That
is his sacrifice. That humbling is seen as ennobling,
but the Captors' sacrifice, which is far greater, is an interior
life which they are not allowed to reveal.
[18] When we look closer, however,
we find that there are scenes we do not see, more sexually
intoned, and deliberately excluded. According to Carson,
there is a lot more sexual foreplay than is actually taped
or shown and the scenes that are kept are deeply revelatory
about the fear many heterosexual men have of potentially homoerotic
moments, which is the foundation of the disgust they feel
towards homosexual men. The scene most illustrative of this
fear is from episode #108, "Law and Disorder." In the opening
scenes, Officer John V. is clearly nervous and keeps the Fab
Five as far away from him as he can. He does not make
eye contact. In the now famous tanning booth scene with
Kyan, the two men have disrobed and are wearing disposable
underwear. John is clearly uncomfortable. "Oh,
my God," he blushes, "This is so gay." He is not even
able to look in Kyan's direction. Kyan says, "This
is gay" (pointing to himself), but what is gay about us together
here?" "You don't understand," says John. Is it
the witness of the camera? The woman who is going to
"tan" the two men? Why was the scene left in?
Is it because the majority of the audience would clearly sympathize
with John's embarrassment? Yet the real fear that perhaps
John would feel arousal is left unaddressed. In a later
interview, the Five are talking about that episode and how
much John changed during the filming. Carson claims
he licked him, but the scene was cut.
Carson: I was licking his arm at
Lord & Taylor.
Ted: Yeah.
Carson: They edited it out. Can you believe it?
Kyan: They edited it out?
Carson: Yeah.
Ted: No way.
Carson: The lick that changed the world has been edited.
25
The scene was edited and the world remained
unchanged. The chance for sexuality to actually be confronted
by the audience was dismissed. However, there are moments
when it seems that the straight men in the episodes are actually
transformed. John V. for example is obviously moved
when Jai gives him tickets to "La Boheme." Misty-eyed,
he says to Jai, "Thanks, bro." Later, during the celebratory
meal with his girlfriend, John says something uncharacteristic,
"This is divine," and later he looks into the eyes of his
girlfriend and gives praise, "Thanks to you and these guys,
I have a spark in my pants." The exposure to the gay
men from Queer Eye clearly affects the straight men,
but questions remain. Is it a true conversion? " Would
Officer John call Jai his "brother" out on the streets?
Is there is real change or is the acceptance we see
simply due to the realization that heterosexuality is not
disturbed, that things will go on like before, in which case
they are still in charge and can afford to be generous?
[19] The Fab Five rebut these questions
and argue against their critics that the show is making progress
in overturning homophobia. Kressley mentions several encounters
at a horse show in conservative Louisville, Kentucky where
closeted gay men have spoken to him favorably. 26 An interview in The Advocate
shows that the Finity are not hiding anything, nor deliberately
acting out stereotypes; they are just being themselves and
this is having a positive effect:
Carson: We always get the stuff
about us engendering every gay stereotype. And one thing:
Hi, it's a reality show. We're not cartoonish and we're
not pretending to be supergay or superstraight or whatever.
We're just being ourselves, and I'm not going to make any
excuses for who I am, and I don't think any of these guys
are either.
Jai: It's rude, because you're
commenting on who we are as people. We're not playing a
role.
Kyan: Just to play devil's advocate,
even if we are embracing a stereotype that gay guys are
effeminate or whatever, so what? A gay guy can be effeminate.
It's OK. If somebody has a problem with it, they need to
lighten up, and they need to open up their minds.
Ted: So far the response has been
so staggeringly positive, and if it turns out that there
are going to be a couple people who don't like the show,
whatever. That's fine. You're entitled to your opinion.
As far as backlash, you know what? Bring it on. We're OK,
we can take it. We're not going to be worried about negativity.
We're going to keep doing our thing and doing the best job
we can and I think let people respond the way they want
to respond.
Kyan: This whole stereotype issue
may force the gay community to look at our own homophobia.
Carson: Exactly.
Kyan: I'm all for guys being butch
and guys being men. I identify with that and appreciate
that. But if I'm going to stab my gay brother in the back
who isn't butch and who maybe acts a little bit more effeminate,
what good is that?
Thom: It's part of the deal. I
have straight friends who are more effeminate than my gay
friends.
Kyan: If being gay is only OK
if you're straight-acting, why are we letting them set the
standard?
Carson: We're being homophobic.
Ted: Being gay is such a huge
diverse mix of types of people. Let's not forget it's the
drag queens who started the whole liberation movement in
the first place. We have to honor those -
Carson: Snaps for the drag queens
who paved the way. [He snaps his fingers, and they all
join in].
Ted: Snaps for Stonewall.
Carson: Snapping. Furious snapping.
It appears that the Fab Five have it all
together, just like good saviours should:
Carson: We're being ourselves.
And there's nothing more liberating and more confidence
building and also more flattering than being yourself. If
you listen to the feedback and they say, "You're too this"
or "You're too that." I'm beautiful, damn it, if I may quote
Bette Midler in Uncanny Alliance. You know what?
God made us all to be a certain way, there's nothing wrong
with it, and the only time it's bad is when you're not being
yourself. That's the worst thing you could do. 27
Taming the Savage Beast: A Salvation Metaphor
[20] The question then remains, what
makes gay men "being themselves" comparable in acceptability
to straight white audiences, especially females, and why?
If we apply Heather Hicks' critique of the Magic Negro in
film to the Finity's phenomenal success on Queer Eye,
we find some similar issues concerning economics, demasculinity,
and the feminization of work. In her analysis of Unbreakable
and The Green Mile Hicks notices three characteristics
of Black Magic protagonists that are useful tools for answering
these questions. She notes first that the black protagonist
needs a white man in order to do his magic. In other
words, without the white man and the mission of his salvation,
the black man is of no value. Secondly, it is the white
man's success that is paramount and the central theme.
Thirdly, it is the childlike nature of the black man, or the
demasculinizing of the black man that allows the miracle to
be successful. Hicks' conclusion about the friendliness of
MAAFS is that this reduction of blackness to a childlike magic
suited only for the transformation of white men shows that
they are not friends at all, "... Nor are they saints.
They are ghosts, or, at least, tips of a historical iceberg
jutting into the present. As such, they are provocateurs,
forcing latent troubles into the light of day."28
The nostalgia is for the former times, one might say, when
marginalized, silent voices knew their place, before Women's
Liberation and Malcolm X, when there was clear good
and evil, when white men were really men and knew what
was expected of them and knew what to expect of women, supermen
who got the girl. "Yet," she continues, "along with this nostalgia
comes the haunting presence of other lingering histories:
black men systematically excluded from public, paid work because
of the threat to white male hegemony they might pose if they
had economic power." 29
[21] Similarly, the Finity may be
seen in the same way, as "provocateurs" of a time before Stonewall,
when homosexuals were kept under control, when homosexuals
in religious traditions hid instead of forcing heterosexism
out in the open, in front of the altars and communion tables.
The ironic twist is that these "faux women," as gay men have
typically been viewed, get away with straightening out their
elect by "feminizing them." The Captors tame husbands
and boyfriends so that they become narcissistic, childlike
and vulnerable, which could be the ultimate triumph of the
gay man. This trump card of the Fab Five, to play the
stereotype, participate in the salvation metaphor, but with
the covert mission of transforming the straight man into someone
more like them and making money on it, places the five in
the tradition of the "trickster." This is the role the
Magic Negro has also performed, as Jay Edwards observes in
his article, "Structural Analysis of the Afro-American
Trickster Tale." 30 Concerning the African
American in film, he writes that the trickster tale was "...
a cultural cognitive model which enabled Afro- Americans to
reflect on the moral dilemmas imposed upon them under conditions
of servitude and economic bondage ... [the black men are]
power brokers "31 who "interact with their white counterparts
not for selfless reasons, but to fulfill their own needs.
Whether that need be to confirm one's own identity, to share
one's burden of suffering, or simply give a powerful white
man his comeuppance, each of the transactions between black
and white men that these films imagine is the sort of 'exchange
of value' that typifies a trickster encounter."32
Within this framework, the Christian paradigm of salvation
no longer fits, but this may be part of the trick, to use
the framework and "turn a trick." If the audience is
duped, all the better.
[22] But don't heterosexual audiences
know that there is an exchange of value going on? Popular
reviews seem to reflect that the audience knows this quite
well, so why does it work? There may be several answers
for this. First of all, the religious imagination of the American
audience is programmed to receive this kind of "salvation"
scenario regardless of the trickery. But as Damon Lee,
actor in the film Undercover Brother, comments, the
magical, or miraculous transformation may be the final ingredient
that sells the portrayal of the flat superficial character:
The White community has been taught
not to listen to black people. I truly feel that white
people are more comfortable with black people telling them
what to do when they are cast in a magical role. They
can't seem to process the information in any other way.
Whoever is king of the jungle is only going to listen to
someone perceived as an equal. That is always going to be
the case. The bigger point is that no minority can be in
today's structure. Somehow the industry picked up
on that.33
"No minority can be in today's structure."
This seems to be the message of the magical salvation of the
Fabulous Five. As long as they are rich, stylish, somewhat
feminine, as long as they do not rock the boat of society's
structures, make no demands or have a life of their own, and
as long as they continue to be the body servants of the heterosexuality,
and make changes that tease albeit playfully, as long as they
continue "to offer the possibility of grace to all the bigots
in the audience,"34
then they are acceptable, even adored. In the end, salvation
for the gay man, lesbian, transgendered or bisexual is still
out of reach. But any minority alone cannot exist, that
is, be understood and accepted in all the complexities of
her or his life and be of value. We still live, like
the black man, with "a double consciousness." As Ed
Guerrerro writes concerning the lack of real representation
of the black man in the media:
... the psychological complexity of the
black man's outlaw subjectivity and how that subjectivity
gets worked out through the lens of what W.E.B. DuBois called
a black "double consciousness," and Richard
Wright, "double vision." Applied to transactions and
negotiations of daily life, these terms come down to constantly
having to think and see double: as the black Other, marked
and relentlessly locked out of the American Dream, and simultaneously
as Being beyond the stigma of Otherness, striving to realize
the perks, privileges, and humanity of that Dream.35
The Consequences of Sacrifice of the Other
[23] Guerrerro also points out that
portraying only stereotypes provokes a schizophrenic image
of race. in the case of Queer Eye, showing gay
men as singular characters, rich, attractive, slim, successful,
and always positive, provokes a similarly schizophrenic image
of sexualities:
The schizophrenic way of representing
black males as concentrated at the poles of celebrity and
pathology leads to a dangerous array of perceptions and
assumptions. To follow the visual argument of our
media screens, the spectator is invited to ask the simplistic
and bogus question, "if Quincy Jones or Bryant Gumbel can
'make it' in America why can't all those black men we see
standing on inner-city street corners?"36
If the Fab Five can make it, why didn't
Mathew Shephard? Why not the countless, nameless faces, who
are harassed, often assaulted and sometimes killed make it?
If the Fab Five on Queer Eye are indeed the Finity,
then why does Canon Gene Robinson, the first openly gay candidate
for the episcopate in the Episcopal Church receive death threats
daily? Why did a gay couple recently get dismissed from
the church choir in a Roman Catholic church when they proclaimed
their fidelity in a marriage ceremony in Canada?
[24] From the preview of Radio,
a recently released film about a developmentally deranged,
but inspiring black man who is instrumental in the victories
of white Southern men, it seems that the "Old Black Magic"
still sells. But how long will "gayness" sell?
Negative reactions to Queer Eye have so far been innocuous,
but how long will this last? It is not simply that the
Religious Right might prevent their network affiliations from
not showing the series, but what more severe consequences
might be in store? Going back to the analysis done by Richard
Slotkin of the American mythic psyche, we find a disturbing
development. "Captivity psychology left only two responses
open to the Puritans, passive submission or violent retribution.
Since submission meant defeat and possibly extermination,
New England opted for total war, for the extirpation or imprisonment
on reservations of the native populations." 37
The first episode of South Park's current season,
episode #708, "South Park is Gay" may serve as a prophetic
warning of what is yet to come if the Finity changes its mission
to save heterosexuality. As the South Park episode
unfolds, Queer Eye for a Straight Guy is enormously
successful in mythical South Park, Colorado. But it
is too popular, converting the majority of the male
inhabitants into "metrosexuals." At first the women
are happy that their men have cleaned up, look good, and are
taking care of their appearance. There are some not
so accepting. The resident homosexuals, Mr. Garrison
and his lover, are not happy because their "culture," like
the Afro-American culture has been appropriated. Gay
men are no longer unique. Kyle, one of the boys doesn't
like it either because his friends disown him for not embracing
the new "hip" style. So far, the show exhibits some
sensitivity to the misuse of marginal groups and the alienation
such "trends" can cause. However, the story takes a
sinister turn. The women decide they do not like what
is happening to "their men." What is happening?
In short, they are taking on characteristics that could be
labeled, "feminine." They are becoming "faux women,"
although not self-identified as gay. The women ultimately
destroy the Fabulous Five by beating them mercilessly.
However, the show seems to assure us, this is not so bad,
because the gay men are not really men at all, but "crab people,"
aliens attempting to take over the world by converting heterosexuals
to meterosexuals.
[25] Although South Park never
intends to reflect the values or feelings of mainstream America,
the plot of this episode is very revealing and can be illuminated
by some of the closing comments made by Heather Hicks concerning
the portrayal of race and gender in Hollywood films.
What she has observed, we recall, is that blackness in the
service of whiteness, is an acceptable script, for it assures
the continuation of the supremacy of white maleness.
In her response to the film Family Man she makes some
valuable insights concerning race, gender and economics.
After a convoluted plot wherein Jack, the male protagonist
has to decide between autonomy and economic success on the
one hand, and domesticity, on the other hand, a decision aided
by the Black Magic Negro, "Cash," Jack ultimately chooses
to "bond with the feminine," captured in the declaration,
"I choose us." Hicks analyzes this film which "superficially
celebrates a new, more integrated social role for male workers,"
but she adds, "it also makes available a reading in which
conventional notions of white masculinity are threatened by
a collective ideology associated with femininity and blackness;
an ideology that, by celebrating family and disavowing materialism,
threatens to suck white masculine subjects - be they men or
women - into the mass existence that effaces their distinction."38 Hicks concludes that
the black "angels" of Hollywood films "work" as long as they
concretize white male hegemony. The black male steps in to
"magically bolster the crumbling fiction of autonomous masculinity
[which] only temporarily defers the deeper fears the works
reflect: that the other construction, whiteness, might itself
be equally tenuous." She adds, "... perhaps the very
yearning for miracles these films express must serve as a
measure of how dire the condition of both constructs is, and
in that regard the ascendancy of the MAAF might be good mojo."39 If we translate her analysis to the
potential prophecy of the South Park episode, we notice
a couple of things. First of all, gays are accepted
as long as they do not try to convert a heterosexual male
to a homosexual. Secondly, if heterosexual men go "half
way," becoming somewhat "feminized," essentializing the feminine,
a necessary ingredient in maintaining "hetero-normality" is
threatened. In the end, it is the women who do the murder,
and ultimately, the homosexuals, the "crab people" who die.
No Transgression; No Deconstruction
[26] Queer theory emerged in the 1980s
with the rise of political activism bolstered by the influence
of the French postmodernists, Lacan, Derrida and Foucault.
As Robert E. Goss contends, the early theorists Eve Sedgwick,
David Halperin and Judith Butler, gave the movement "a contentious
edge" which eventually influenced what has come to be known
as "queer theology." This edge Goss and others have
claimed is "transgression." If queer theology has one
thing in common, it is to challenge "heteronormativity" which
Goss explains as that worldview which "creates a gender/sexual
fundamentalism that pathologizes gender and sexual differences
and fails to accept the fluidity of gender and sexual identity."40
Goss, as well as many queer theologians suggest that in order
for real conversion to occur, queer activists, whether religious
or secular, must provoke change, not collude with dominant
systems. This is done not by participating in maintaining
the orthodoxy of hetero or homonormativity, but by transgressing
all attempts to construct new discourses that only appear
to be transgressive.
[26] Black womanist theologian, Kelly
Brown Douglas agrees that because the sexuality of black people
has been feared and therefore controlled by white society,
the task of "Black and womanist theologians [is] to engage
in and promote a sexual discourse of resistance ..." in order
"to liberate Black people from the cycle of White sin."
This means to engage in discussion about sexuality, including
homosexuality not as a "vessel of sin and evil."41 Both black and white theologians
are concerned with serious examination of sexuality and how
heterosexism has prevented the full achievement of human rights
for sexual and racial minorities. When we examine the
"Lord's work" of the Fab 5, we see some destruction, but no
deconstruction; trespassing, but no transgression. Instead,
unless these are tricksters intent on eventually having the
last joke, the "good news" of the Fab 5 is that "Do not be
afraid. We are just like you." Recent comments by gay activist
and writer Martin Duberman, a historian at CUNY and author
of twenty novels, reflect a frightening trend towards collusion
with a society that continues to use minorities as servants
and victims:
In general, there seems to be little sympathy
in our community for radical analysis - and that worries
me. The country is going to hell in a hand basket,
and most of us are devoting our energies to assuring mainstream
America that we're "just like you," "just folks," just as
committed to a shallow, callous, and dumbed-down national
set of values ... Why aren't our leaders and organizations
loudly condemning imperial arrogance, endemic poverty, joblessness,
soul-destroying minimum-wage work, racism and gender inequality?
Why are our leading publications far more concerned with
floor shows in Las Vegas than with homelessness among the
transgendered? Why do we seem so grateful for Will &
Grace when queer people of color go largely unrepresented
in the media?42
[27] The Gospel according to Queer
Eye for the Straight Guy is that heterosexuality and consumerism
rule, and that homosexuals, as long as they do not claim any
real power to change these structures, will be accepted
and cherished. But the sacrifice is precisely what Ed
Guerrero identified in his analysis of the portrayal of black
men on the screen: the "empty space of representation" which
he says "we need ... to fill... with many more black dramas,
family films, films with black men in loving relationships,
but also with science fiction and horror films and dramatic
transcripts from black intellectual and political culture
and African American history."43
Meanwhile, the real "reality TV" about gays, lesbians and
transgender people is that there is no place for you in our
institutions, you are a sinner, and even in danger if you
cease to know your place, which is no place. The real magic
is yet to come, a glance, a hope, a flicker of possibility,
a Gospel that offers change for society. The real mojo is
when fear is confronted, when institutionalized evil is rooted
out, and when anger is recreated. But this is not the
scheme for salvation the American audience is programmed to
accept. The Magic is yet to come:
It's a kind of magic, One dream, one soul,
one prize,
One goal, one golden glance of what should
be,
It's a kind of magic,
One shaft of light that shows the way,,,
The waiting seems eternity,
The day will dawn of sanity,
It's a kind of magic,
There can be only one,
This rage that lasts a thousand years
Will soon be gone...
It's a kind of magic.
http://www.bravotv.com/Queer_Eye_for_the_Straight_Guy/About_Us
Notes
[1] This
is a quote from Carson Kressley from an MSN TV review and
interview by Ray Richmond, "The 'Queer' Phenomenon: 'Queer
Eye for the Straight Guy's' Carson is ready for play in prime
time," 9/22/03
[2] Ibid.
[3] From
the home page of the Queer Eye for a Straight Guy website:
http://www.bravotv.com/Queer_Eye_for_the_Straight_Guy/About_Us
[4] For a
full discussion of the "meterosexual," see Mark Simpson, "Meet
the Metrosexual: He's well dressed, narcissistic and bun-obsessed.
But don't call him gay," Salon.com Arts & Entertainment,
October 7, 2002.
[5] The classic
work by Richard Slotkin, Regeneration through Violence:
the Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600-1860 (Middletown,
CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1973) is the foundation work
for these studies.
[6] Ibid.,
21.
[7] Ibid.,
22.
[8] Ibid.,
26.
[9] When
the show was first created, one of the Fab 5 was a black man,
Blair Boone. He was dismissed and replaced by Jai Rodriguez,
an Hispanic American. The producers' reasons for the
dismissal was that Blair was "not working out." Before
Boone, another African American, James Hannaham was tested.
He too did not make it into the final cast. The fact
that an African American gay man never "works out" is an interesting
issue and would be worth pursuing. We can find a few
hints from an interview with James Hannaham in an article
by Keith Boykin from his webpage, August 27, 2003:
As a gay man you're freer to embrace your
stereotypes with humor and a sense of performance, whereas
black folks who try to fit stereotypes claim they're "keeping
it real" and expect to be taken very seriously.
Boykin comments that it is true that many
minority groups want to maintain certain stereotypes.
An African-American gay responder, "Damian" adds this comment:
We do not share the advancements of a
group that does not embrace us ... and still must struggle
to seek acceptance within a race that does not wish for
us to live our lives in truth.
It could be that gay male stereotypes
are acceptable, but not gay black male stereotypes. This reality
about "reality TV" is something I plan to explore in a larger
project. http://www.keithboykin.com/arch/000819.html
[10] Anthony
Appiah, "'No Bad Nigger': Blacks As the Ethical Principle
in the Movies," in Media Spectacles, ed. Margorie Garber,
Jann Matlock, and Rebecca L. Walkowitz (New York: Routledge,
1993), 81.
[11] Comments
from Boyd are quoted in a review in The Black Commentator.com..
Rita Kempley, "Movies' 'Magic Negro' Saves the Day¬but at
the Cost of His Soul," Issue 49.
[12] Boyd,
see above.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Christopher
John Farley, "That Old Black Magic: Hollywood is still bamboozled
when it comes to race," Time 27 (November 2000), 14.
[16] Paraphrase
from Mark 6:4.
[17] Appiah,
83.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Heather
J. Hicks, "Hoodoo Economics: White Men's Work and Black Men's
Magic in Contemporary American Film,"Camera Obscura 18.2
(2003), 28.
[20] This
phrase comes from an online commentary from Matt Wells, "Pink
is the Magic Colour," The Guardian, Monday, September
1, 2003, who, in reviewing the British version of Queer
Eye now being filmed refers to a moment when in the filming
of a scene, Dierk, the culinary expert in the show was explaining
to the straight guy that he is to be his "sous-chef."
When Dierk asks him what he thinks that means, the guy replies,
"That means I'm going to be your bitch for the day."
[21] Ed
Guerrerro, "The Black Man on our Screens and the Empty Space
in Representation," Callaloo 18:2 (1995), 396.
[22] An
Advocate.com exclusive interview, "Excessive Outakes,"
August 18, 2003.
[23] Hicks,
51.
[24] "Excessive
Outakes."
[25] "Excessive
Outakes".
[26] MSN
interview (see note #1).
[27] "Excessive
Outakes."
[28] Hicks,
51.
[29] Ibid.
[30] Jay
Edwards, "Structural Analysis of the Afro-American Trickster
Tale," Black American Literature Forum 15 (1981), 159.
[31] Ibid.
[32] Ibid.,
160.
[33] Kempley,
"Movies' 'Magic Negro' Saves the Day."
[34] Farley
suggests that the film industry not only has manufactured
MAAFs but also the BHG, the "Bigot with the Heart of Gold,"
"...to embody the notion that not all racists are bad people."
[35] Guerrero,
399. Guerrero refers the reader to two references regarding
this issue: Gerald Early, "Introduction," Lure and Loathing,
xi-xxiv; Bernard W. Bell, The Afro-American Novel and
Its Tradition (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press,
1987), 3-36.
[36] Guerrero,
396.
[37] Slotkin,
145.
[38] Hicks,
50.
[39] Hicks,
52.
[40] Robert
Goss, Queering Christ: Beyond Jesus Acted Up (Cleveland,
OH: The Pilgrim Press, 2002), 224.
[41] Kelly
Douglas-Brown. Sexuality and the Black Church: A
Womanist Perspective (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1999),
121.
[42] Martin
Duberman, "The Unmaking of a Movement,"The Gay and Lesbian
Review Worldwide 11,1 (January-February 2004), 22.
[43] Guerrero,
398.
[44] "It's
a Kind of Magic" by Queen was played during the final credits
off Queer as Folk while Justin is shown drawing, episode
118.
