[Niamh.]

Originally Posted by cub

It's not that long ago that you would have one lonely and sad gay and a few (straight) sympathetic/patronising friends. Having an Equal Opportunity attitude means more than having a 'token gay' in it.

Would you say there are too many blacks or asians in a soap? No, because that would be seen as racist.

That's a good point, having alot of gay characters in the soap, takes the spot light off the fact that they're gay and they don't stand out as being different because of it, they can have other storylines beside the fact that they're gay and I think it's a great way of taking the one dimensional view off gay characters, the fact that they're gay becomes less significant and they can actually have a proper personality/character. I think it's a great step forward and will help to stop the homophobic attitudes that older generations grew up with.

[MTVN]

Originally Posted by cub

It's not that long ago that you would have one lonely and sad gay and a few (straight) sympathetic/patronising friends. Having an Equal Opportunity attitude means more than having a 'token gay' in it.

Would you say there are too many blacks or asians in a soap? No, because that would be seen as racist.

That's exactly what the guy who produces Midsomer Murders said, and most of the people who commented on it here on this forum defended it

But besides it's a different situation, not employing someone because they're black is racist, not employing someone because they're gay is homophobic, but it would not be homophobic to not make a character gay. They're manufactured, they're fictionalised, if the characters are gay then that is the concious choice of the producer, unlike if an actor is gay, or if an actors black