Do you think that LGBT routinely kill to keep their ID secret?

[dsc]

This seems to have become a common theme in TV dramas. CSI Miami, Law and Order has done it on all three versions, the Closer is doing it tonight, and several other shows. I will admit, in high school I would have done quite a bit to avoid being outed. But I wouldn't have killed another person. Has this become the new, believable story about gays and lesbians? Does it ring true with straight audiences? It really seems a pretty distrubing meme.

I will put a spoiler below this.













It turns out that the gay guy didn't do it on the Closer.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

1. Don't forget The Talented Mr. Ripley

Of course, that was a '50s era book and movie. There may be in reality a few isolated incidents of people committing murder to avoid being outed but people kill for all sorts of whacked out reasons. Including to get insurance money or simply for thrills. GWB kills for Halliburton and his petty little ego.

Look at all the heteros who kill their mates out of jealousy.

[donco6]

3. I think that was a little different, tho . . .

At least in the movie - perhaps they were playing down the gay theme, but I felt Ripley killed from fear of losing the status he had gained by becoming the other guy. Not just from being "outed."

[mrreowwr_kittty]

5. But remember the end?

When Cate Flanagan and her family spotted him on the cruise ship? He strangled his lover in the stateroom. I mean, he was also pretending to be the guy he murdered but surely the gay thing wasn't going to go over too well either. :shrug:

[donco6]

6. Oh that's right.

I forgot about the ending. I was only thinking about when he bashed the guy who knew the rich guy (God I can't remember any of their names. . . )

[LeftCoast]

2. I wonder if there was some recent case or something?

Don't these crime drama's usually cue off of actual trials a lot of times?

I'm not a big fan of this genre so I hadn't noticed the new meme. Thanks for pointing it out.

[donco6]

4. Even when I wasn't "out", I never really considered it.

I just don't get that angry at people in general. Now, getting angry at stupid-ass IDEAS, yeah.

[JI7]

7. i never heard anything about this type of thing happening

i don't watch those shows so didn't know it was a theme . but it's not good.

based on the real life stories i have read about, it seems suicide is the worst thing that gays end up doing if they are so fearful of people finding out .

but i never heard of in real life or even from anti gay talk of killing others.

[Freedom_Aflaim]

8. Extremely few people routinely kill

Even far fewer outside of military (and the whitehouse)


But there is a small minority of people who haved murdered others and they do it for any one of a million reasons.

Considering that there are tens of thousands of people murdered each year, Im sure that at least some have been murdered over homosexuality secrets.

Those that routinely murder are people we call serial killers (of course)

While there certainly have been homosexual pedophile killers, I've not heard of any cases where a serial killer does so to keep his sexual identity secret.

[DeSwiss]

9. Such claptrap programs are examples of lazy writers

and the generally low-quality of television programming. Why try to be creative when you can just pickup a newspaper and create a script from real life? These tawdry examples are of the recurring theme of "The Other." Societies must always have: "The Other." And in them you'll find the components of society's current fixation, with the taboos and titillation being linked together: homosexuality, violence, death.

Earlier in TV history, people of color were the main "Other." We went from Indian "savages" to the untrustworthy coloreds -- alternately described as "inscrutable" "wily" "sexuality deviant with massive genitals" and the raping of white women was always central to this theme. They were made into "the ogres," the "unknown madmen" who couldn't be trusted and would kill if given the opportunity and must be watched at all times and kept in their places.

And now gay people have been shoved front and center into this role, now that its no longer exactly PC to do this with people of color. Gay people have been made fair game by the Religious-Right and conservatives. So now they're the new ogres who must be watched and controlled or society will fall apart. And these programs have all the elements in which those who support gay people can and say, "see this is what happens when gay people are ostracized -- they're driven to homicidal madness." And those who don't support gay people can say: "see this is what happens when people are allowed to flaunt their unnatural sexuality without government control and/or punishment."

A similar occurrence happened in the 70s when the movie "The Burning Bed" portrayed a beaten and abused wife. There were at the time, a number of cases around the country (and since then) which resulted in women being imprisoned for killing their husbands after having endured years of psychological, emotional and physical abuse at their hands. Such women briefly became "The Other" having deigned to break the chains of matrimony with homicide. Such an assault upon white male dominance could not go unpunished. At the time there was much discussion of just what justifies killing someone. You could kill someone who breaks into your home to steal your TV and you claimed you "feared for your life." But not someone who systematically tortured and beat you for years. That kind of fear you just have to learn to live with, I suppose. The only positive thing that came from it all was that domestic violence laws began to be written so police couldn't continue to simply walk away from what was then described as "a petty marital argument."

So these so-called writers, producers and the networks and cable companies meanwhile, use topical issues in the struggle of gay people to obtain full equality for financial gain, while arguing that their screenplays are prescient and vital to the national dialogue on the issue.

Here's what I think of that: :puke:

[newyawker99]

12. Hi DeSwiss!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[DeSwiss]

13. Hi newyawker99!!! and

thanks for the welcome. I've been a DU lurker for a long time and finally decided to get my feet wet.

And thanks for the brew.... :beer:

[MsUnderstood]

10. thanks for the spoiler

didn't vote but appreciate being told the ending of a show...couldn't quite avoid it.

[dsc]

11. What part of I am going to give a spoiler was hard to understand

I did label it. I am sorry but I fail to see how the words I am going to give a spoiler are somehow ambiguous. Incidently he gets eliminated fairly quickly. On edit I just opened my thread. The very last thing you see before paging down is I am going to give a spoiler below this. It is literally the very last thing on the screen. I am sorry but had you paid attention you would have avoided it.

[Forrest Greene]

14. Yes!

In fact, I personally was killed by one.

[ecstatic]

15. Can't put anything past the *extremely* homophobic

who engage in homosexual acts. However, the media really does tend to blow this type of thing out of proportion.

[Bretttido]

16. I read this incorrectly at first

I read "kill" in the non-literal sense and voted yes. Like, "I would kill for a beer right about now." Consider mine a No! :blush:

[notadmblnd]

17. in order to generate hate you have to demonize the people you hate

nt