Jill Smith- "Trivialization" and "Chuck and Larry"

Interestingly enough, I watched "I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry" over the weekend. This movie really tied into the discussion that we had today regarding main stream homosexuality. The movie is about two heterosexual firefighters who pretend to be domestic partners in order for Larry's kids to be taken care of in case something should happen to Larry. Larry's wife died three years before and he wants to make sure that the kids get his pesion and that Chuck can retain custody of the kids because he is the only person that Larry trusts. The movie itself was quite enjoyable, it was extremely funny as one could imagine. The interesting part about the movie is that Larry is a homemaker for his two children, he is the all American father. Chuck is the ladies man bachelor who is with quite a few different girls every night, yeah, that's right, the most girls that I counted in one scene coming from his bedroom was six. Larry's children, a boy named Eric and a little girl named Torry are healthy and happy. Eric however, may indeed be gay, he is very flamboyant, wears feminine clothes, is into musicals etc, very steriotypical "homosexual" traits. Larry loves his son very much, but still he tries to push baseball and masculine traits on him. Chuck on the other hand, the more masculine of the two kind of encourages him to be himself, making him tap dancing shoes, practicing a musical with him, etc. The only female actually protrayed in the movie is their lawyer, Alex protrayed by Jessica Biel. She has a gay brother and is very comfortable with the homosexual lifestyle. That being said, she treats both Chuck (who is majorly into her) and Larry like they are her girlfriends. She is free to be what ever she wants because there is no threat of masculinity. She is a lawyer and independent of a man's support so she can be seen as being a strong woman who is also very active in gay rights.
This movie is a prime example of the trivialization that McKee talks about. Because the media brings all of the controversial topics to the forefront, movies like this are becoming more and more popular and kind of becoming necessary as a way for people to become comfortable with the new social "norms." The news uses sound bites all the time involving celebrities "coming out of the closet," they use them as a ploy to get the publics curiosity going so that they will sit there and see who is gay. The media knows that the public is fascinated with celebrities and they use it to their advantage, can you blame them?

Unfortunetly we live in a time when nothing seems to be private anymore. At least not for people who are in the public sphere. Brittany, Tom and Katie, and poor Heath Ledger are all products of the public sphere. They chose to become movie stars, therefore their life is not private. Fortunetly for us "normal" people, we can still be considered private citizens and have our little secrets without the entire world finding out about it. I believe that Habermas' idea about having a private and a public sphere is valid, however, I believe that it is somewhat unatainble for some and quite possibly guarenteed for others. There will always be certain issues that would like to stay private that need to be a matter of public information, they are just unavaoidable. Certain topics such as abuse, child molestation, rape and even homosexuality need to be taken seriously therefore, they need to be brought into the public sphere. It is important that society is aware of issues that go on in their backyards so that they can educate themselves and educate their children.