Sierra Skelly

                  2017 has been a big year for GLBT representations in media. Many top-rated network shows such as Modern Family and Empire situate gay characters as central to their narratives. “Hollywood now offers more GLBT-themed movies than ever before, some which garner Academy Award attention” (Ross, pg. 201). Just this year, the Academy Award for best picture went to Moonlight. A movie not just about two gay men, but two gay black men that struggle with their black male identity and its conflicts with sexual identity. While this was a huge step in new media representations for minorities, it still does not accurately represent the struggles that they face. I am going to analyze the popular Showtime series Shameless and explore how it is one of the only shows that do not demonstrate the LGBTQ community as something that is black and white, but dynamic and fluid.
                  We’ve seen lesbian, gay and bi representations in media, but what there is an absence of is the ‘Q.’ A majority of the shows that depict LGBT characters, such as Orange Is the New Black and Modern Family, are fixed in heteronormative family frameworks. If you are gay, you are gay. If you are lesbian, you are lesbian. That's it.  Shameless is one of the only shows that portray sexuality as something that is not set in stone. “According to Fejes (2000), the typical gay man in contemporary advertising, film, and television is young, urban, white, muscled, handsome, well-educated, and intelligent” (Ross, 263). While gay character Ian Gallagher in Shameless is an attractive white male, he comes from a broken home with an alcoholic father and an absent mother. He also suffers from bipolar disorder (which there are many misrepresentations of in the media). Throughout the series we see Ian struggle with his sexual identity and mental health. When he first comes out, he endures an abusive relationship with a boy named Mickey. Ian and Mickey’s relationship is full of love and passion but is influenced by external factors. Their relationship begins as a secret because of Mickey’s emotional reluctance and fear of coming out to his domineering homophobic father. Ian and Mickey’s relationship does not represent all gay relationships, and that is exactly the point. It accurately defines some key obstacles that LGBTQ people face when coming out to their friends and family. While Ian’s family was very accepting of his sexuality, Mickey’s was not and that caused a lot of problems in their relationship.
                  Most people, even those that identify as LGBT, are blinded by ignorance and fail to see the actual intricacies that follow queer identities and practices. Ian Gallagher’s character development is not like anything that has been represented in media before, which is why Shameless is one of the only shows that have gotten a queer narrative right. From the beginning the audience has been able to see Ian struggle to come out to his family, cope with a loving but abusive relationship with Mickey, resort to sex work when he is a homeless, queer young person, and later fight against his bipolar disorder in order to pursue new relationships. In the most recent season, Ian Gallagher begins a new relationship with a man named Trevor who is transsexual. According to Jessie Jobe’s thesis and analysis of transgender representations in media “nearly all samples utilized negative stereotypes of transgender people. Many samples focused on transgender characters in a joking nature, making light of transgender struggles and reinforcing common misconceptions and negative stereotypes of what it means when a person is transgender.”  The transgender community, as a whole, often gets misrepresented in media. However, Shameless does a good job of getting it right. When Trevor first came out to Ian as transsexual, Ian was skeptical. In the beginning season Ian was faced with prejudices against his sexuality, and now he was on the other side of it. This conflict brought about a lot of open and honest conversations between the two. For one, they were both “tops” in the sexual side of the relationship which ended with awkward conversations, shopping for dildos, establishing a safe word and each experimenting on the bottom. As someone who is uneducated on what it means to be transgender, this brought to light a lot of issues I had no idea people in LGBTQ relationships faced. Watching Trevor and Ian grow in their relationship painted a more accurate picture of queer and trans people.
                 Introducing a character like Trevor isn’t uncharacteristic of the Shameless producers. What is groundbreaking is that they cast the role of the transgender as an actual transgender actor named Elliot Fletcher.  Executive producer Nancy Pimental weighs in on her decision saying “to cast an actor authentically who is trans to play trans, I think that everyone was nervous that the pool of actors to look at would be small. For me, the naturalism and charm and fierceness that comes with who Elliot is and the commitment to the character made him the obvious choice.” This is a big step for Shameless because none of the other actors/actresses identify as part of the LGBTQ community. Casting a transgender to play a transgender role adds some realism and gives the storyline credibility. Several shows have tried to attempt storylines such as this one but in a more straight to the point kind of way. What is significant about this addition to the narrative is that the producers are not making it the main centerpiece of the season - Pimental describes it as “just another relationship that the Gallaghers experience.”
                 Media makes implications about sexuality and assumes a critical part in the way we comprehend the role sexuality plays in our individual identities, history, and everyday lives. According to chapter 15 in the Ross book, “Queer theory’s goal is to resist categories of sexual and gendered definition, but it is used as an umbrella term for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, and other non-heteronormative and gender-normative identities” (Ross, pg. 243). Shameless is one of the only shows that represents each community and in an honest and authentic way.
 
References
Whitney, Alyse. "'Shameless': How a Transgender Storyline Brings the Show Back to Its Roots." The Hollywood Reporter. N.p., 23 Oct. 2016. Web. 06 Apr. 2017.
 
Jobe, Jessica N., “Transgender Representation in the Media” (2013). Honors Theses. 132. http://encompass.eku.edu/honors_theses/132

Ross, Karen. The Handbook of Gender, Sex, and Media. Chichester: Wiley Blackwell, 2014. Print.  
 

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