Glee's True Colors and The Performance of Sexuality

Let’s think about Glee for a minute. I’ve loved the show, always have – I like to think of it as America’s guilty pleasure, because I also like to have confidence in the intelligence of the average citizen. But lately, I can’t keep my critical eye off of those characters with which Ryan Murphy populates McKinley High. Apart from the fact that the average age of the Glee club cast is about 23, Glee is well known for its representation of subcultures and countercultures, and I think that unfortunately we’re so proud of Glee for showing all ages a demographically representative portion of America, complete with Latinos, African-Americans, and Asians, and presenting a generally positive and radical (for television) view of homosexual relationships, we forget that there’s some prime examples of racism and, for lack of a better word, “closemindedness” going on. Early Glee discussed race and sexuality in a feel-good atmosphere that assumed that high school was a safe place to practice identity:

But now, Glee is beyond the whole "true colors" feel-good representations of gender and sexuality. And there were quite a few oversights of the two in a recent episode. The episode I refer to is the disco-themed “Saturday Night Glee-ver,” where, among other things, the majority of the characters continue to be conflicted about their future and sing out their stress through a variety of disco songs that prove to us: 



Yes, Puck. Yes, it does. We thought those dark times were behind us.

First of all, what’s with this representation of transgender Wade (played by the Glee Project’s Alex Newell)? In case you’ve forgotten, Wade wants to perform a song while dressed as his “alter ego,” Unique (let’s look over the fact that the Glee writers have chosen a stripper name for Wade’s character; while the name might actually have some relevance and carry an important message, it hardly presents an accurate image of a transgender’s individual’s decision to change their name to someone who they really feel that they are inside. Point in case: Chastity Bono to Chaz Bono. The name of Unique diminishes the seriousness of Wade’s decision). The Glee characters try to discourage Wade from performing as Unique, which they feel is perfectly reasonable: as Kurt says, “It is Ohio.”

"Thankfully, though, it's okay for me to be a unicorn!"

But despite their doubts, Kurt and Mercedes are just students, so by the logic of the television show, adult Sue is free to bully everybody into submission. Wade performs as Unique anyway.

Here’s the problem, though. What is at risk with the way that the Glee producers have chosen to show Unique? To begin with, there’s the shock that the characters feel that Unique “actually looks like a woman.” And Unique doesn’t just look like a woman – she sings like a woman, passes as a woman, “fools” the audience.

And so the message here might be, it’s okay that Unique performs, because Unique does pass as a woman. If Unique looked more male, then, connotatively, her decision to dress up in drag would have been condemned. But in performing the female gender in a convincing way, everything is okay because Unique can, in fact, “fool” an audience into accepting a gender identity counter to the one biologically assigned to her. Thus, Unique is made palatable to the Glee audience because they do not know her biologically assigned sex, and made palatable to us as viewers because the gender she wishes to be is flawlessly performed. It’s a little disappointing, isn’t it?
Maybe I should be more understanding of the fact that at least Glee's writers trying to present a transgender characters to audiences. But the matter of representing a character like Unique isn't to be taken lightly, even in a show meant to be light entertainment.