Why I Hate CNN: Gay in America

I will tell anyone who listens that I detest CNN (and all the other 24 hour news networks including CNBC, MSNBC and FOX News) because I believe they do a disservice to Americans seeking unbiased news coverage.  But my recent giant glass of ice cold Haterade is lifted to CNN not necessarily for being biased, but for simply being dumb.  Now, I am never one to deny someone a check, so hats off to Soledad O'Brien for getting hers, but really CNN?  You have the nerve to call a series Gay in America and then treat us (and I use the word VERY loosely) to a documentary on one gay couple's (anticlimactic) journey to having a baby. 


CNN continues to traffic in stereotypes and positions gayness as urban, white and male.  Then it goes one step further and positions it as at the very least middle class by featuring a couple that has AT LEAST $38,000 lying around to spend to have a baby ($8,000 for the egg donor and $30,000 for the surrogate -- this is to say nothing of travel expenses, medical bills and legal expenses).  CNN has effectively positioned gay parenting as something that is available only to gay, white, middle class couples in their construction of gay parenting. 

Certainly becoming a parent is something that gay couples (and all couples for that matter) have to consider from an economic perspective, but by presenting a documentary called Gay in America, CNN managed to make it seem as if spending at least $40,000 is the only way to have a child.  To the contrary, I know gay men and women who have adopted children and lesbian couples who with the assistance of a male friend and a turkey baster have made a baby.  

Had CNN focused on one person for its Black in America series, the world would have been in an uproar. So, why is it then OK for them to present what it is to be gay in America as one white, middle class, urban gay couple?  I will be the first to admit that there is no way that one show can represent all things to all people, but it would be great for the feeling to be that there was at least an effort made to represent gay people from many walks of life.

What is problematic with shows like this is that they heavily traffic in the politics of respectability.  Perhaps the intent was to show that "those gays are just like us 'normal' people" and show that they, like many of their heterosexual counterparts want to have children.  But what is problematic (even with the show's subtitle) is that you have positioned the show as Gay in America (i.e., what it's like to be gay in America).  And what you've managed to show is only what is certified as acceptable by the "powers that be" in the "gay community."  Of course one member of the couple is a self-proclaimed gay activist who lives in New York -- what else could/would he be?  Heaven forbid that there is a gay person of color, not living in New York or San Francisco, allowed to speak for and represent the "gay community."

It goes to show that investigative reporting (as presented by CNN, at least) is never meant to illuminate anything (perhaps I am too much of an insider on this particular piece?  But, I don't think so).  It really helps to reinforce the stereotype that what it means to be gay in America is to be white, middle class and male.  

So, CNN does in fact, manage to fuck it up again.   And this is why I continue to hate CNN.