Sad but true!!! can’t wait for episode 2. Only watched it because my daughter had it recommended to her by her gay boy friend, both 17. Hope my gay son (at uni) watched it. Any program that includes homosexual themes and storylines are a good thing in my opinion.

As for stereotypical, I do agree that swishyness should not be edited out. Otherwise we would never have had the excellent Beautiful People! But it’s important to have the Eric in Gossip Girl types portrayed as well.

Kurt is actually a bit of a breakaway from the usual gay character portrayed in teen-based dramas – often the liberal sensibilities of the writers results in them producing a rather dull, beige inoffensive gay character (case in point, Jack from Dawson’s Creek). Perhaps there were young gay teenagers who did identify with that but there’s no reason why there aren’t young gay men who identify with Kurt – I know I would have as a gay teenager!

I also expect most teen gay characters to be stereotypical because most gay teenagers ARE stereotypical. Gay and lesbian people are a lot more visible nowadays and often young gay people use these visible images to try and develop their own identities. A lot of teenagers do this – it’s why teenagers have so many identity cliques and groups.

Anyway, rant over.