Beyond 'Heather Has Two Mommies'
The future of gay characters in children's entertainment.
by Brett Berk
February 10, 2009
Another subset of the new Queer Lit for Kids mimics the Ferdinand mold, revolving around characters who are confronted with difficulties for not conforming to traditional gender roles. Two of these stories — The Boy Who Cried Fabulous (Tricycle, 2004) and Harvey Fierstein's The Sissy Duckling (Aladdin, 2005) — are about young males whose inflexible and macho fathers deride them for being, well, fabulous sissies: wonderfully nelly fellas who are no good at sports, love to cook, and run about exclaiming how simply dazzling things like stilettos and cheerleading pom-poms are.
Unlike many real-life tales of femmy gay boys growing up in provincial locales — which entail relentless torture at the hands of family and peers, a need to hide one's true self, and eventual escape to an accepting community — both of these stories end upliftingly, with the locals learning a valuable lesson from the little queens. But where Sissy is radical in its unrelenting truth to itself — it ends with its protagonist proclaiming, James Brown-like, "I'm a BIG SISSY and PROUD!" — I found Fabulous' similar message diluted by its bland metered verse, fussily stylized illustrations, and incredibly cloying protagonist. I couldn't wait for that loud-mouthed, brown-nosing kid to be ostracized out of the book, or at least told to turn it down below volume eleven for a sec.
The Different Dragon (Two Lives, 2006) tells much the same tale, but adds a clever narrative twist. In it, a little boy is told a bedtime story about a Dragon who, like our famous bull, doesn't want to act tough, and who is relieved when he's instructed that there are "lots of different ways to be a dragon." But the twist comes in who is telling this story: one of the little boy's two lesbian moms. So it becomes a fable about embracing difference told as an open-ended plea for tolerance. I liked the book's casual acceptance of the boy's family unit, and desire not to make an issue out of it. But I felt like the "fictional" bedtime story could have been more powerful if it was related directly to some sort of conflict in the boy's life: bullying, the moms' horror at their son's terrifying butchness, a manufactured peanut allergy. It felt a little abstract to me.
Its protagonist proclaims, James Brown-like, "I'm a BIG SISSY and PROUD!"
Our final category is a sort of odd catchall that I call Sapphic Delusion. The first example is the illustrated book Flying Free
(Booksurge, 2004) a story narrated from the perspective of a firefly (?!!!??) who is caught in a jar in order to be used as a nightlight by the daughter of a lesbian couple. The bug hides, tries to escape, and is — at the mothers' behest — eventually released. The story was slight and inane, and seemed to contain a misplaced slavery metaphor. Not to mention the fact that the characters looked like they were drawn by a third grader and modeled on her collection of Bratz figurines. But I did like the book's casual lesbianism. We're just two women with a kid, the story seemed to be saying, and we just happen to look like slutty dolls.
Finally, we have Dottie's Magic Pockets, a truly extraordinary DVD that proclaims itself "The First Children's Program for Kids in Gay & Lesbian Households." I was under the impression that kids of Gay & Lesbian parents could watch whatever they wanted, but I dutifully screened the disc's two episodes, and while I applaud the creators for attempting to make a kids' program concerning a lesbian couple with a child, I'm totally puzzled by the show's premise.
©2009 Brett Berk and Nerve Media
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