is bad. Though it is, kinda, I can’t say it’s not entertaining at times — but it paints such a bleak picture of gay life! And I’m not coming from a ‘GLAAD’ perspective here. I don’t think that gay men must, or should, be presented 'positively' in the media. Gay men are people; which means they are flawed. On that level Uncoupled is realistic; it represents the state of gay life right now -- it demonstrates how desperate all of us sad ol’ fags are for straight approval. I say this because Darren Star and his gang obviously yearn to impress on us how straight gay life is. Like, if you’re straight, what agony to have your partner/wife (whatever) leave you just before a surprise birthday celebration you so carefully arranged for them! And how lonely life is -- after the breakup! We all feel that -- because gays and straights are so alike, aren’t they? Um…no. Gay men have dicks. And they can go out and have sex anytime they want to, and although there is such a thing as ‘gay rape’ there is no gay rape culture, unlike heterosexuality — where rape and violence towards women is kind of a tradition. No. Gay life is not the same as straight life. Period. And no, AIDS did not stop us from hooking up. It just put it on line where we could lie about it and pretend we’re not. And besides -- there are still back rooms, bath houses, alleys and bushes — and yes urinals (unless they disappear with the advent of non-gendered washrooms). In other words guys can pull out their thingy-dingies at any time (as long as no one else is looking) and get off -- pretty quickly -- which they can, and will, do, whether they are straight or gay. (The only problem for straight guys is they have to persuade women to co-operate, which in a rape culture, can be tough). Men are men, which is not always a good thing — and must be challenged constantly — but is nevertheless a fact, because of our plumbing, which frankly leaks if we don’t pay enough attention to it. Where is this reality in Uncoupled? What is this fiction that after a breakup you need to find a lover in order to get laid? Or even to get affection? Gay men have something called fuckbuddies. (Some gay men have them and their partners don’t mind.) Our romantic/sexual lives are simply not like yours. And it’s not that we’re not romantic. We are exceedingly so, mainly because all the ideas we have about sex and love come from straight movies or gay porn. Uncoupled is fiction of the highest order — meaning it’s a double lie — i.e. it’s not real life but a tv show, and the lie it is telling is that gay relationships operate exactly like straight ones. It’s interesting though to think of Uncoupled in the context of Sex and the City, which I loved. I mean, yes, Uncoupled is a gay version of Sex and the City. But Sex and the City, as many have noted, was really about gay life, not about women. And is that a bad thing? Well, the fact is that Darren Star -- like so many gay creators -- writes better when he is not writing about himself (see: Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, etc -- though Star is obviously not in their league). First of all I enjoyed Sex and the City even more than some straight women, because whatever was inaccurate about it didn’t’ bother me. I could watch it without worrying whether or not it was accurate because I don’t know what it’s like to be a straight woman and never will. (But I can imagine -- and often enjoy doing so.) What I think was good about Sex and the City was that -- because it was gay life pretending to be straight -- it facilitated the depiction of straight women who were openly sexual and horny, something that we had certainly never seen on TV before. The tradition continued with Girls, and Lena Dunham got pilloried; we are still a very puritan, patriarchal culture and straight men just can’t handle women who crave ‘the dick’ —the bigger the better (and there are some women who actually do so). So will we ever get to see shows made by women, about women, that are truthful? Or shows by gay men, about gay men, that tell it like it is — not like gays wish it could be? Probably not. This is why we have art, i.e. lies. And yes, I am going to go on about how wonderful lying is yet again — because if you expect art to provide you with a moral prescription — that is to present you with an ethic that will help you to live a righteous life, well forget it. Shakespeare knew this. That’s what Titus Andronicus is about. A bunch of dumb folks who have read Ovid a little bit too much start trying to live their lives according to what happens in Ovid's poems. So, sadly, they end up raping people, cutting off their tongues and baking them into pies. It's kinda funny (kinda not). Shakespeare knew art should, and must, not present us with a lesson. I have no problem with the fact that Uncoupled is a lie, I just wish it was a better one, and not the one we hear all the time. Maybe I’m homophobic (and I am) but it’s embarrassing to watch the gay men in Uncoupled acting like a bunch of adolescent girls at a high school dance (should I return his glance? his caress?). But most of us gay men missed out on their adolescence, and therefore we are either too slutty or too celibate — which is what teenage girls are generally. If only people just had sex! And didn’t ever ever worry about it! (Sorry to paraphrase Marcuse, I know he's out of fashion) Anyway, is that too much to ask? And sex, of course, is not the answer -- that is, to everything. But Jesus, it sure helps.
