If you
have spoken to me, ever, you probably know I have quite strong opinions /
feelings about The CW's show: The 100. You may also know that this show, whilst
seemingly incredibly progressive a few months ago, in the span of about 3
episodes, became the most horrifying network show for minority representation.
So, The
100... Here's the low down. Basically, this event has become so much more than
"just a TV show." It has become a movement for nontoxic LGBT
representation in media.
For more
information, which is where I have copied a lot of the text in this post from,
visit:
A webpage
directly in response to The 100:
http://wedeservedbetter.com/
Or, their
partner webpage, which highlights the broader issue:
http://lgbtfansdeservebetter.com/
Head’s up: This is about 3000 words, but I cover
pretty much everything, from what happened, why it's bad (including
statistics), and what we can, and are, doing to make change.
<<
Content / Trigger Warnings >>
LGBT
death, POC death, SH/Suicide, Torture, Violence
<< What
triggered the outcry: >>
"The
tipping point was the unnecessary death of Lexa (Alycia Debnam-Carey) on The
100, a series on the CW Network which caters to genre shows and teen audiences.
Since the airing of episode 3×07 on March 3rd, 2016, forums and social media
outlets have been flooded with outcry over the mishandling of a beloved
fictional character who served as a beacon in the lives of many young LGBT and
non-LGBT persons. In that episode Lexa – the powerful and openly lesbian leader
of the show’s post-apocalyptic society – had just consummated her
long-simmering relationship with the show’s protagonist Clarke Griffin. In the
very next scene (64 seconds later), Lexa was accidentally shot dead by a stray
bullet intended for her lover."
<<
Some statistics: >>
"Lesbians
are not unfamiliar with dying—and dying violently—in the media. An alarming 31%
of lesbian or bisexual characters on American scripted TV shows between
1976-2016 ended up dead. A further 38% were simply guest characters or written
off with no resolution, whilst only 10% got a “happy ending”. With the list of
dead lesbian/bisexual characters now at 152 (and counting), LGBT fans demand
better from media creators."
This is
compared to the "26 lesbian and bisexual characters who got happy endings."
Source:
http://www.autostraddle.com/all-26-lesbian-and-bisexual-tv-characters-who-got-happy-endings-331601/
Source
for dead count:
http://www.autostraddle.com/all-65-dead-lesbian-and-bisexual-characters-on-tv-and-how-they-died-312315/
"as
of tonight with the lesbian couple from empire dying, here is the list of
lesbian and bi women characters killed on tv in the first just over 3 months of
2016
zora -
the shannara chronicles
carla -
code black
julie -
mao the expanse
rose -
jane the virgin
ashleigh
- janet king
lexa -
the 100
kira -
the magicians
denise -
the walking dead
nora and
mary louise - the vampire diaries
mimi and
camilla - empire
that’s
12. in just over 3 months. this report
(http://www.glaad.org/files/GLAAD-2015-WWAT.pdf ) from 2015 says there were 35
lesbian or bi women characters on television. so far in the first quarter of
2016, over one-third of them have been killed off."
Source:
http://universequartz.tumblr.com/post/142386269243/as-of-tonight-with-the-lesbian-couple-from-empire
<<
What was so bad about Lexa's death? >>
"Many
fans expected Lexa to appear in a limited number of episodes due to the fact
that Debnam-Carey is a cast regular in AMC’s Fear the Walking Dead. However,
they were led to believe, over the course of a year, that the character
wouldn’t be killed off, that they could have hope, and that this show would
make an effort to avoid known tropes and mistakes in telling Lexa’s story. The
message sent out by the showrunner was that this show was different, groundbreaking
and progressive, that they loved the character, and – most importantly – that
CW and AMC were able to work out a good deal that would allow Debnam-Carey to
continue her work on The 100."
This
plays into a concept called queer-baiting: wherein you promise positive
representation for the LGBT community, but don't deliver. And this is obviously
an extremely toxic mechanism to utilize against an already vulnerable
community.
You can
go check out the receipts on the webpage for just how far this queer baiting
went. But it went as far as one of the writers going into queer safe spaces,
and saying (paraphrased) "if you don't trust that we wont kill Lexa by
now, then you need therapy."
<<
Who is Jason? >>
Jason
Rothenberg is the showrunner of The 100, this means he gets to make all final
decisions regarding everything. He is directly responsible for this. But he
refuses to take responsibility, and instead defends his decision to have killed
Lexa. We all hate Jason.
<<
But shouldn't we blame the writers? They wrote her death. >>
Yes, but
the death was Jason's idea. Some of the writers have been extremely supportive,
and apologetic after episode 307. Javi has been exceptionally sincere. Kim?
Well... It really depends what day. Shauna? Absolutely horrible. She's the one
who was going into queer safe spaces... (To be honest with you, I don't know
how many more writers there are. But these three all have a really big online
presence with the fans.)
<<
The cast? >>
Leave
them out of it. They are bound by contracts. But have for the most part, sided
with the fandom, as opposed to Jason.
But they
can't do much, for risk of ruining their careers. Ricky Whittle literally had
to leave his job on The 100 because of the bullying he was experiencing on The
100. (I'll talk about Lincoln's death later.) And Lindsey Morgan's character,
Raven, has also experiences horrible treatment, which I will discuss.
<<
Can this show redeem itself? >>
No. The
show has toyed with concepts of immortality, afterlives, and reincarnation, but
bringing back the dead, does nothing to fix how wrong it was to kill them so
unjustly in the first place. Especially, given that the showrunner has shown no
remorse, and any "progressive" changes in the future would only be
attempts to regain ratings. We won't be used again.
<<
So how bad is it? >>
Really
bad. We were used [for ratings.] We were given false hope. We doubted for so
long, could it be real? Were we really going to see powerful women-loving-women
(wlw) on our television screens, and not have it end in tragedy? We didn't
believe it. But then, Jason made a tweet late last year, inviting fans to the
set where they were filming the finale, and low-and-behold, Alycia DC was
there, and her character was seemingly very much alive. We believed him. And
then it was ripped from us, brutally, by way of an overused and (historically)
very harmful trope, of "bury your gays." (Which I'm to believe was
once a propagandist slogan, that was used to bully and teach fear to the LGBT+
community, by showing their representation as evil and wrong and deserving of
death.)
But
//how// bad you may ask? What do you think happens when you destroy the only
hope of young queer people? I have witnessed the online devastation. I have
seen stories of people reverting to self harm. I have read suicide notes.
(Note: If any of you have seen Chloe Clark's, it is false. She is alive.
Someone [abusive] in her family wrote it.) I don't think this world understands
how vulnerable the LGBT community is; how vulnerable the youth are.
But if
anything, by now the world should understand the impact of media, and the
affect that constantly killing us has on screen, in reality.
<<
What are we doing about it? >>
Firstly,
we are doing everything in a power to reveal the true nature of the show. This
means down voting it on platforms such as IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes. It means
not watching live, or on official networks. It means not tweeting using
official tags. It means reaching out to publications for coverage. (You can
find a list of articles regarding this issue, on the sites I linked at the
start.) We have been recognised by some really major outlets; most recently
Forbes. This isn’t just a dead character. This is a revolution (or as some have
termed: queervolution, but I understand not everyone is uncomfortable with the
word “queer.”)
We are
reaching out to sponsors of the show (the companies that advertise during it.)
Target and Maybelline have already pulled their sponsorship.
But
perhaps our biggest accomplishment, is in under a month we raised over $100k
for The Trevor Project, the
only national (US) organization providing suicide prevention services to
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth in crisis. The Trevor
Project serves more than 100,000 LGBTQ youth every year with their life-saving
programs that include the Trevor Lifeline, TrevorChat, Ask Trevor and
TrevorSpace.
<<
What can you do? >>
Every week there is an official twitter trend, organised by wedeservedbetter
and lgbtfansdeservebetter. Jump on twitter, during the airing of The 100 (9|8c
Thursday), which is a bit after midday on Friday for us, and post as many
tweets as you can, that include the trend, with any relevant information. Keep
it respectful and educational.
You can
also write and send emails to sponsors, asking them to revoke their sponsorship
of the show. I believe, there is a list of sponsors and contact details, as
well as [maybe] an exemplar letter on one of the sites.
<<
You mentioned another death earlier? >>
I did.
Lincoln. Now this hasn’t sprouted as big of a movement, that I am aware of, but
it certainly deserves one. I think the reasoning for the lack of it being that
our resources are focussed elsewhere. But the brutal death of people of colour
is just as terrible. Lincoln was one of the purest souls in The 100 universe.
He was raised in the harsh “grounder” environment, yet still turned out to be a
gentle and loving person. But Lincoln was never treated well on the show, right
from the beginning. His scenes included being whipped and tortured. Being
turned into a raging zombie. Dying.
Being brought back to life. Being outcast by his own people, and then the
people who gave him refuge. And then dying again. His death wasn’t so bad, the
FIRST time. It was only for a few seconds, before he was hit by a high voltage
and brought back. The second time though, after he willingly surrendered to
save his friends, he was publicly executed, and his body was left in the mud.
The very episode after Lexa’s death. That’s two minorities unnecessarily killed
by harmful tropes.
This was
a horrendous atrocity, especially given the treatment of black men in the
modern world. Remember Ferguson? The violence and xenophobia never ended. It’s
not okay to casually show it on television, like it is “just another dead
body.” It’s not.
<<
What about the other character? Raven? >>
Raven
represents several minorities. She is a girl in a STEM field, she is Latina,
and she is disabled. Raven wasn’t disabled in the beginning though. That took a
bullet to her spine to disable the use of one of her legs. Raven has also been
strung up and publicly tortured. She has been tied down and tortured. It
doesn’t sound like it could get much worse for Raven. I mean, she took one of
the magical happiness pills, despite her better judgement, to free herself of
her pain. But if got worse. (These magical happiness pills are actually keys
for an evil Artificial Intelligence to gain access to your mind, thus removing
all your pain, and bad memories.) But Raven snapped out of it. She realised
losing her pain, wasn’t worth losing her memories. She figured out how to get
the AI out of her head. The AI didn’t like this, thus removing itself, and
returning all of Raven’s pain at once; more torture. The AI then came back and
said “I can make it better.” Raven gave in, and the AI started using Raven to manipulate
those who cared about her into submitting, including causing Raven to attempt
suicide. I think you understand how bad this is.
<<
I’ve heard about a guy called Bellamy. >>
This is a
sensitive topic. Bellamy fans are pretty intense, very loyal. Bellamy didn’t
start out so great in season 1, but he had some amazing character development
in the second season, which was all tossed away in the third season, when he
became coleader of a hate movement.
<<
Isn’t Bellamy a person of character? >>
This is a
controversial topic. Bob Morley, who portrays Bellamy, is half Filipino, and
therefore a POC. However, something called “white-washing” is going on,
where-in an actor’s ethnicity is ignored, in order to make their character
white. Bellamy’s sister, Octavia, is in fact white, and so was their mother. It
is in fact possible they had different fathers, hence Bellamy being a POC.
However, in flashbacks, little Bellamy was portrayed by a white actor, giving
reason to believe, that Bellamy is supposed to be white, but again, this is a
controversial topic.
<<
Are all the minority representations in the show tortured and killed? >>
No. The
others are villainized.
<<
If it’s such a bad show, why do you still watch it? >>
It’s
called addiction, darling. No, but in all seriousness. I keep watching because
I am emotionally invested in the characters. Clarke, Lexa’s love interest, and
the main character, is bisexual, and badass. Raven is incredibly smart. And
Octavia is unbelievably kickass. The actors do a phenomenal job of bringing
their characters to life. Especially Lindsey.
<<
It sounds like it has always been a bad show… >>
You are
absolutely right. The issue is, so many of us were so blinded by the
possibility of positive lesbian representation, that we ignored the struggles
of the people of colour characters, and disabled. We accept that that was wrong
of us. We campaigned so heavily for this third season, to see our beloved Lexa
more. But this isn’t our fault. It’s Jason’s. We were silent when we shouldn’t
have been. But we didn’t kill them, or torture them. Jason did.
<<
I read all of this. >>
I hope
you learned something. I hope you understand why I won’t stop talking about. I
hope you understand how harmful tropes like “bury your gays” are. I hope you
are sympathetic to this cause. I hope you understand that this issue is bigger
than just “The 100” and encompasses all forms of media, and the homophobic
attitudes ingrained in it. I hope you understand that the LGBT community are
fighting for more than just a TV character. We are fighting for ourselves, to
stop having the idea that we should die, perpetuated by films and television.
<<
Why haven’t I heard about this before? >>
I don’t
know. It’s a pretty big deal. We are getting some really amazing coverage. We
are making change.
<<
The future… >>
So, what
are we going to do to make this a full-on revolution? Keep up the media hype,
keep up twitter trends, all the stuff I mentioned earlier. The leaders of this
movement, who run those webpages, are arranging to advertise our movement on
billboards near the CW and WB studies in LA. They can’t keep ignoring us.
We won’t
see change for a while. 2016 has been a bad year. But it has already been
written, filmed, edited. But as new content is created and aired, we hope to
see change, but we can’t be certain, we can’t hide behind blind faith. We won’t
let hope make fools of us again. We will keep fighting.
<<
Where can I watch LGBT characters NOT die? >>
So, I saw
that list of dead wlw characters and their respective shows, and that list of
120+ dead lesbians.
Where can
I see good representation?
Honestly,
I am tired right now. I am not an expert.
This is
the only list I know off the top of my head:
7 Lesbian
Films That Actually Gave Us Happily Ever After
Personally,
I would also recommend Sense8, on Netflix. It has lesbian characters, gays,
trans, people of colour… Really good show.
<<
Disclaimer >>
I don’t
claim to be an expert. I apologize if I get some things wrong. I also don’t
know enough about all the other shows whose audiences have experiences similar
trauma to Leksakru and Clexakru.
