Most popular show for repub women ages 18 to 34, Will and Grace.

[wildeyed]

There was an intriguing article in the NYT today about media buys and the election. The whole article is worth reading, but I found the most interesting part to be toward the end.

The data also yielded unexpected insights. One of the shows most popular with Republicans, especially Republican women ages 18 to 34, turned out to be "Will & Grace," the sitcom about gay life in New York. As a result, while Mr. Bush was shoring up his conservative credentials by supporting a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage, his advertising team was buying time on a program that celebrates gay culture.

snip.....

Mr. Goldstein said Republicans did not customize their message because they had one basic point. "If your message is 'Kerry is bad,' you don't have to tailor it," he said.

The Democratic strategy was to focus on swing states and tailor the Kerry message to the market. In Pennsylvania, for example, the campaign ran commercials in Pittsburgh with workers talking about their jobs; in more liberal Philadelphia, it ran commercials with the actor Michael J. Fox, who has Parkinson's disease, talking about expanding embryonic stem cell research.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/06/politics/06strategy.html?pagewanted=1&th&oref=login

So my opinion, dems don't need to sacrifice our issues, we just need to change the way we talk about them. It is about marketing and branding, not issues. The people are not paying attention, issues and the truth don't matter to the majority. Dems just need to get a clear, moderate message and stick to it.

[madison2000]

1. NBC rejected the UCC ad because homosexual unions

are too controversial but they have a show like Will and Grace. I just don't get it.

[Siyahamba]

2. It's okay to portray gays in comedic situations

As long as we don't have to deal with them in real life.

[AP]

5. It's OK because W&G is about normalizing gay men by having them have

best friends who are women and having those friendships reach the point of practically being marriages.

The only thing that Will and Gace don't do that heterosexual couples do is have sex and...oops...there was an entire season about whether they would have a baby.

[wildeyed]

7. I have only watched the show a few times.

The first time I watched, I didn't know anything about the premise. I could not figure out why a gay man and straight woman were married. Took me another episode to figure out that they were just roomies.

[AP]

8. Exactly.

The show presents them exactly the same way you'd present a married couple.

The show is basically I Love Lucy, with the Mertzes and the Ricardos except that Fred and Ricky happen to be gay and aren't married to the women with whom they spend most of their time.

[Ms_Mary]

14. I had this conversation one night with a couple of friends

who happen to be gay. It's okay to use homosexuality for entertainment purposes, but it's not okay to present people's normal lives. It's not okay to show everyday real live gay people as normal. They have to be funny, or entertaining for the general public to accept them. And just the fact that the conservative public can laugh at homosexuality on sitcoms doe NOT change their overall reaction to real life gay people.

Big double standard, but that doesn't seem to bother them.

[AP]

15. I agree for the most part. Although I'm willing to give sitcoms...

...a lot of room not to portray reality, the part of the story that W&G conspicuously leaves out is about the relationships between gay men and the people they love the most. For example, Everyone Loves Raymond, I Love Lucy, Cheers, Bernie Mac, and all the other shows about family and relationships have at their core stories about conflicts between people who are married and/or have sex which each other, even though they are about relationships between a lot of different people. Cheers is about a bunch of friends at a bar, but Sam's heterosexual relationships were the center around which the shows revolved.

W&G puts all those relationships on the sidelines. They talk about them. But you don't see very much of them. Even Sex in the City spends more time showing two people who have sex with each other in the same shot, developing those relationships, even though it's mostly about the relationship between the four women. It would be interesting to compare the % of all the time spent showing Will and what's his name in the same shot with someone with whom they're having a sexual relationship to the % of time those relationships are given screen time on other shows, like Sex and the City.

I think W&G must be very comforting for conservatives because it says that you can have gay people out there, but they're not threatening traditional relationships and the family -- even though they may think about having sex with men, most of their life they have traditional-appearing relationships with women (and it doesn't get in the way with their consumption either).

[The empressof all]

12. Will & Grace is OK only because.....

It's about Gays in NY. All the "real Americans" know that Gays should be in NY, LA and maybe Las Vegas. They're fun to look at but --just don't want them next door. (Like Bears in a Zoo)

(Just want to clear that this is an observation--not my opinion)

[sui generis]

3. go figure - Grace is the most shallow, hypocritical, selfish,

self-interested creature they could have dreamed up. In fact, they all are.

Where oh where did Rosario go? I miss her.

[Mike Daniels]

6. I thoroughly loathe the show and it has nothing to do with the gay angle

Actually, I have a feeling that if it wasn't for the gay angle the show wouldn't have lasted as long as it has.

The characters are hateful and mean to everyone including each other, the humor is repetitive, and Karen and Jack are the most grating characters to be featured in a sitcom since Lumpy Rutherford from Leave it to Beaver.


I know that Seinfeld's characters weren't much better as far as self-centered and selfish go, but that show had a certain something that W&G totally lacks.

[212demop]

16. She was on big last week and I rarely watch

I'm an OC girl now

[KurtNYC]

4. Will & Grace is stereotypes

The actor who does the bit isn't gay. It is the equivalent of early vaudeville where white actors used blackface. They pander to stereotypes.

[Aristus]

9. Points all well taken, but......Megan Mulally is the sexiest actress

on TV!

[TheDonkey]

10. Repukes are disgusting people, they love to laugh at gay people

but heaven forbid they treat gay people equally. Reminds me about the mentality black people had to face, they are fine entertainers but.... don't really need to be in the same bathroom as whites. WTF?

Oh, I also read in Newsweek the creator of Desperate Housewives is a "conservative" republican. Yea, they aren't hypocrites.

[David__77]

11. I do enjoy this show.

I understand and agree with some of the criticism of the show. It is a bit on the "minstrel-ish" side with its ridiculous stereotyping. I think it perpetuates a myth that most gay men are affluent and centered on things like interior decor, shopping and the such. Being gay, I can say this is definitely not the case!

However, I still think that the show is good for gay people in the country. Those same women watching the show have probably, in many cases, modified their views of gay men for the positive. My right-wing female co-worker, for instance, while thinking "civil unions" are the way and not marriage equality, supports adoption by gay couples and an equal-in-all-but-name recognition for gay couples. She thinks herself "enlightened" for the position. I believe it's a better place than she would potentially be.

[leftofthedial]

13. it is not about issues at all

it is about slogans

it is about demonizing and ridiculing your opponent

it is about telling the Murkans whatever lies they need to hear in order to push your button on "election" day.

BUT FIRST, it is about restoring legitimate elections to Murka. Without that, it's not about anything but the current junta maintaining power and the illusion that they were "elected."

[212demop]

17. they love it b/c Will and Jack remind them of their husbands who are never

home- working late, honey

:)

[RightWingLoonie]

18. My thoughts.

I don't see the big deal. Would you find it hypocritical for someone to watch the Sopranos while still believing that mafia members should be locked up? Not saying that being gay is a crime but it seems like the same arguement.

[Kathy in Cambridge]

19. It's not the same argument. The hypocrisy is believing that gays are

subhuman and denying them rights, while enjoying a sitcome that depicts gay life.

[AP]

20. People like shows about the Mafia because it appeals to their desires...

...to live in a world where you can do anything -- where the law doesn't apply. But the interesting thing about mafia movies and TV is that they're all about rules. You break the rules of the mafia, you die.

Will and Grace I guess is similar in that it lets straight people think they're getting insight into the world of gay people, but it reassures them by saying that gay people are still all about having opposite-sex relationships.

[Cocoa]

21. that show is more about materialism than gayness

the gayness is secondary, what really jumps out at me is the luxurious Manhattan lifestyle and materialistic values.