Raising Gays: On Glee, Queer Kids, and the Limits of the Family

Taking critical aim at an emergent cultural demand for family “acceptance” of queer youth and at the trope of parental love offered “no matter what,” this essay resists the occlusion of long-standing traditions of queer pedagogy and acculturation in contemporary “pro-LGBT” discourses. Via an analysis of the musical sitcom Glee, the essay tracks how an insistence on parental acceptance displaces the knowledge, experience, and instruction of other gay people, as well as the cultural practices and traditions that have long sustained queer lives. Focusing on the coming out of gay boy Kurt Hummel and the outing of girl-loving cheerleader Santana Lopez, I highlight the aesthetic and discursive strategies that permit young queers to resist the demands associated with parental acceptance or at least manage and survive its inadequacies.