The student researcher, Paul Nowak, spoke with Joystiq.com about the survey.

Joystiq: A gay gamer survey has been done before, why do it again?

Paul Nowak: Since Jason Rockwood’s survey in 2006 was the first of its kind, it got stuck with the burden of proving to the academic community that the gay gaming community even existed. Now that he’s been successful at that, we can make a more in-depth study of what exactly gaymers want from their games.

What do you hope to learn from this new survey?

Ideally, I want to learn what exactly it is that gaymers want from their games and how that differs from their heterosexual counterparts. I’ll take that information to develop guidelines the industry can use when trying to make gaymer inclusive games that don’t become offensive or insulting to any gamer regardless of sexual orientation.

Read the entire interview at Joystiq.

Mike Fahey at Kotaku.com then picked up the story and added his two cents.

As for the survey’s motivation, I find myself a bit conflicted. I’ve just never thought of gaming as a pastime that sexual orientation figures into. Nowak makes a valid point about the industry’s stumbling first attempts at reaching a female audience, but are homosexual gamers that much different from everyone else that they need to be catered to specifically? I’m not saying they shouldn’t be…I suppose I am asking if they really want to be.

Read Fahey’s entire piece at Kotaku.

I find two of Fahey’s statements of particular interest.

First, “are homosexual gamers that much different from everyone else that they need to be catered to specifically?” His choice of language is interesting and disturbing. It sounds like the video game variant of the argument that gay rights are special rights. Second, he asks “if they really want to be.” And amazingly, there’s not a clearcut answer to this. There are gay gamers who couldn’t care less, and even gay gamers who sometimes express discomfort with gay content in games.

Joshua Meadows has written an eloquent article entitled, “Missing the point: why we need more LGBT visibility in gaming.” In direct response to Fahey’s statement, “As for the survey’s motivation, I find myself a bit conflicted. I’ve just never thought of gaming as a pastime that sexual orientation figures into,” Meadows writes:

Well no, Mike; as a presumed heterosexual male I guess that wouldn’t be something you’re likely to think of, given that the default sexuality is always straight, whether we’re talking about TV shows or movies or games. As a gay man, I didn’t come out once; I have to come out of the closet constantly because it’s assumed that I’m straight and it’s on me to correct that assumption, unless I want to make things easier by camping it up to such a degree that the assumption is changed to “oh yes, he’s got to be gay.” As an outlier to the default I am constantly face-to-face with how I am different, so “sexual orientation” is going to be a bigger deal to me in places it won’t matter to straight people and I’m going to notice the glaring lack of representation in places straight people didn’t realize something was missing. I would think that this is easy logic to follow but apparent it isn’t, since other gamers constantly wail about how it’s injecting something irrelevant into their particular hobby.

Meadows goes on to encapsulate why gay representation is important, even in video games:

Ultimately it’s just an issue of visibility. Gay characters (and explicitly stating that you, yourself, are a gay gamer) might be irrelevant to many or most heterosexual gamers (and sadly some gay ones; come on guys!) but it is still an elevation for awareness that has a very tangible effect on the people who see it. If one gay teenager living in middle America can look at such a representation, whether from video games or movies or TV shows, and feel less alone because they see themselves reflected in a way that seems “normal” and “okay” then that is a powerful accomplishment. If one straight kid sees the same thing and it changes how they react towards gay people for the better, it’s an improvement for our rights and treatment in a way that political lobbying will never match. That is why this stuff is important and why dismissals about it being irrelevant or out of line hold no weight.

Read Meadows entire op-end here.

As always, my favorite bits of these conversations are found not in the commentaries themselves, but in the comments they engender. (All comments below are from the Kotaku piece)

From Zhivagod:

I do not feel that a gay NPC would be relevant to any storyline unless the story is somehow sexually oriented.

Ed: Okay, when I said “favorite bits” I meant “the statements that madden me the most.” This comment is very common to all media, not just video games, but it adds an extra twist on the end. First, gay people don’t occur in real life where they’re “relevant.” They just exist. That’s like saying you’d only include a black person in a storyline if race was somehow relevant to the story, which is ridiculous and, in itself, racist. Then Zhivagod adds the sexualization bit, reflecting the perception of homosexuality as homeSEXuality. But being gay is a total, encompassing experience. It’s as much or more about affectional attraction and identity than sexual attraction.

From Showmeyomoves!:

So gay people are attracted to people of the same sex… Unless we’re talking about dating sims here, I don’t see how this would be relevant to videogames. Do gay people only watch gay movies, read gay books and listen to gay music?

Ed: Only? No. But sometimes? Yes. As Meadows states, heterosexuality is the default. By default, movies, books, music and games are all heterosexual, and heterosexuals take for granted just universal those media include explicitly heterosexual relationships. Heterosexuality does not just occur in dating sims. Why should homosexuality?

Trigger2 makes an excellent point along this line of thought, by pointing out games that offer het relationship options, but no gay options. (Emphasis mine)

there is a certain type of game where I find myself annoyed with the lack of choices – RPG’s and open-world “grow your own character” style games. In most of those games it quickly becomes obvious that heterosexuality is the ONLY choice.

For example: Saints Row 2 and GTA4. I found myself a little disgruntled that the majority of the options for your in-game personal life are strictly geared to str8 guys, even though both games flirt with the idea of gayness.

In GTA4, why not let Nico use the dating web-site to go on dates with dudes? Who cares? The fact that he could cruise the guys on the site on the computer but the game only let you date the ladies bugged me. I know Nico is “supposed” to be str8, but it actually would have made Nico MORE interesting to me if he could’ve hooked up with dudes on occasion. Why force the issue? If the gamer wants him to date only girls that’s fine. If the gamer wants him to be bi, that’s up to them. But to force the issue like that seemed a little harsh.

Saints Row 2 is alot of fun and gives you alot more freedom, which is why it was slightly annoying that when I upgrade my crib, suddenly there are pole dancing ladies in my crib, and girly posters and photos. It would have been a simple matter to be able to switch out the chicks with dudes etc. Or at least have made the pole-dancers and photos as separate upgrades.

The point is, when games start giving the player more and more freedom to customize, it quickly becomes apparent that the developers have designed all the options around the straight male.

Chagrin makes a good point:

Additionally, it’s easy to forget this if you’re not in a minority – even I tend to forget it, since I’ve moved beyond this as I’ve grown up – but a positive portrayal of a gay character can mean a great deal to a young guy or girl questioning their sexuality. Nevermind video games, there’s still a lack of gay role models in all media. It’s changed a lot, but not enough to wash out the taste of what came before it, really not all that long ago, where being gay in a film (for example) was at best a death sentence. Usually not without having been a lecherous, despicable villain to begin with. (I’m looking at you, Hays Code.)

And beyond all that, there’s a simple reason why it’s a good thing: storytelling in games could use improvement across the board. Nuanced plot, characters, themes.. how many times can we see characters lifted straight out of the Gears of War mold? I don’t mean that as a knock against that franchise, for which it works within the context in which it’s presented; but game developers could stand to broaden their concepts to eschew falling into the same patterns, the same accepted tropes, and produce works which explore different ideas.

So, I guess my point is.. why shouldn’t games be made with a potential gay audience in mind? Not necessarily targeted to them, but at least accommodating of them.

Video games have grown up a lot in the last few years, “but we still haven’t seen the kind of normalization [of LGBT characters and story lines] that we’ve seen in movies and on TV for some time,” laments Brenda Brathwaite, a veteran game designer and the author of Sex in Video Games. “We still haven’t had our Brokeback Mountain moment.”

Read the whole piece here.

[A new black comedy about life as a teenager as seen through the eyes of three characters,] Dare premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and is one of the most honest films about being a teenager ever made. It is also part of a trend at this year’s festival, and perhaps among films in general — gay films that aren’t actually gay films. Some may call them “post-gay,” but call them what you will, the death knell of the coming-out film has been ringing for some time, and each year there are articles written and panels organized exploring the question “What next? What is the future of gay cinema?”

A year ago I moderated a panel at the Queer Media conference in Los Angeles that asked this same question, and the answer then was that LGBT storytellers would continue to mine different aspects of queer life: the intersections of sexuality and religion, sexuality and race, etc. And many films — Save Me, For the Bible Tells Me So, Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom — have done just that. But if this year’s Sundance Film Festival is any indication, the next wave of films will be about the fact that the evolution of homosexuality in American culture has gone so far as to call heterosexuality into question.

Click to read the rest of “The New Wave of Post-Gay Filmmaking.”

My blog concerns itself with portrayals of gay people in all forms of media, but I don’t often discuss music. Still, I came across a fascinating MSNBC op-ed about Katy Perry and her songs “UR So Gay” and “I Kissed a Girl.” Tony Sclafani argues that the songs are “gay-unfriendly” and goes on to lambaste the media for celebrating these songs and sending mixed messages to impressionable young minds. Click here to read “Katy Perry and the media’s ‘Kiss’ of hypocrisy.”

I’ve never liked “UR So Gay.” The whole song is a put down. It takes the expression “That’s so gay,” uses the word gay as a derogatory term, and applies it to a person. That’s hateful. It equates “gay” with “bad.”

I was once at a store with a friend looking at Halloween decorations, and she didn’t like one. She said, “That’s gay.” I gave her a surprised look, and she shrugged it off and said, “You know what I mean.” But no, I actually don’t. How is using what I am as an insult, not an insult to me?

I hate the expression “that’s so gay” more than the term “fag.” At least people recognize that “fag” and “faggot” are offensive terms, on the lines of racial epithets. “That’s so gay,” on the other hand, is insidious. It poses as a socially acceptable statement, but it’s no less prejudicial than calling someone a “fag.”

By contrast, I think “I Kissed A Girl” is a fun song. A couple of lines stand out as potentially problematic: “It’s not what good girls do / Not how they should behave.” But the next two lines are: “My head gets so confused / Hard to obey.” In other words, we’re talking about a girl who has been socially programmed to believe that good girls don’t kiss other girls. Who hasn’t received that kind of social programming in our culture?

So she breaks the programming. That’s what every gay person has to do! It’s one of the struggles of being gay. And then: “I kissed a girl and I liked it.” She describes the experience: “Ain’t no big deal, it’s innocent.”

I just don’t see the same homophobia in “I Kissed A Girl” that’s present in “UR So Gay.” It’s interesting that these two songs came from the same artist, which leads me to think that “UR So Gay” is unintentionally homophobic, that is, she just didn’t think through what she was really saying. That doesn’t make it less homophobic, but it does make me inclined to be a little more forgiving.

Here are the lyrics to “UR So Gay”:

(Verse 1)
I hope you hang yourself with your H&M scarf
While jacking off listening to Mozart
You bitch and moan about LA
Wishing you were in the rain reading Hemingway
You don’t eat meat
And drive electrical cars
You’re so indie rock it’s almost an art
You need SPF 45 just to stay alive

(CHORUS)
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like boys
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like…

(Verse 2)
You’re so sad maybe you should buy a happy meal
You’re so skinny you should really Super Size the deal
Secretly you’re so amused
That nobody understands you
I’m so mean cause I cannot get you outta your head
I’m so angry cause you’d rather MySpace instead
I can’t believe I fell in love with someone that wears more makeup than…

(CHORUS)
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like boys
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like…

(BRIDGE)
You walk around like you’re oh so debonair
You pull ‘em down and there’s really nothing there
I wish you would just be real with me

(CHORUS)
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like boys
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
Oh no no no no no no no
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like boys
You’re so gay and you don’t even like boys
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like
No you don’t even like…
penis!

And “I Kissed a Girl”:

This was never the way I planned
Not my intention
I got so brave, drink in hand
Lost my discretion
It’s not what, I’m used to
Just wanna try you on
I’m curious for you
Caught my attention

I kissed a girl and I liked it
The taste of her cherry chap stick
I kissed a girl just to try it
I hope my boyfriend don’t mind it
It felt so wrong
It felt so right
Don’t mean I’m in love tonight
I kissed a girl and I liked it
I liked it

No, I don’t even know your name
It doesn’t matter
You’re my experimental game
Just human nature
It’s not what, good girls do
Not how they should behave
My head gets so confused
Hard to obey

I kissed a girl and I liked it
The taste of her cherry chap stick
I kissed a girl just to try it
I hope my boyfriend don’t mind it
It felt so wrong
It felt so right
Don’t mean I’m in love tonight
I kissed a girl and I liked it
I liked it

Us girls we are so magical
Soft skin, red lips, so kissable
Hard to resist so touchable
Too good to deny it
Ain’t no big deal, it’s innocent

I kissed a girl and I liked it
The taste of her cherry chap stick
I kissed a girl just to try it
I hope my boyfriend don’t mind it
It felt so wrong
It felt so right
Don’t mean I’m in love tonight
I kissed a girl and I liked it
I liked it

What made this exchange so frustrating and disappointing is that it’s 2008 and I’d really like to think we’re past thinking of presenting gay folks on television as metaphors to explore feeling different and to show how tolerant the main heterosexual character is, not to mention I really am not interested in seeing myself represented as a hunted creature. Oy.

It irritates me as well whenever writers/producers/directors justify the absence of gay characters or themes because it has to be somehow “relevant.” It reminds me of a quote from Ronald D. Moore regarding Star Trek:

“We have no plans to [include gay characters], chiefly because dealing with one’s sexual orientation in Gene’s 24th century is kinda simple: ‘Hey, Captain, I think I might be gay.’ ‘Okay. Now get back to fixing those transtators.’ It’s not really an issue to these people, so ‘exploring’ it doesn’t hold much promise” (1).

Perhaps the homophobia is unintentional, but at the very least it falls into GLAAD’s category of “defamation by omission.”

“One of the major reasons for public ignorance of, and bigotry toward, LGBT people is our history of invisibility in the media. The tremendous increase in recent years of media coverage about our issues has demonstrated the value of visibility. When society-at-large begins to discuss LGBT people, it also begins to understand how anti-gay oppression affects all of us, how people are frequently discriminated against solely on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity, and how, in reality, we are everywhere. Ultimately, public opinion shifts towards acceptance” (2).

Read the whole AfterElton.com article here.

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(1) “Answers,” Star Trek News, 16 July 1997, http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6952/ron41.txt (retrieved 11 June 2008).

(2) “Monitor and Mobilize,” GLAAD.org, http://www.glaad.org/programs/monitor/monitoring.php (retrieved 21 July 2008).

The original review was written prior to J.K. Rowling’s announcement that she conceived of Dumbledore as a gay person. I have (finally) updated my original commentary and analysis of the Harry Potter franchise with this new information.

The Gay of Harry Potter: Subtext and Omission