Friday Feature: Glee and Political Correctness

Friday Feature: Glee and Political Correctness

When your musical dramedy's characters are referred to as "wheelchair" "Asian" "other Asian" "gay kid" or "Aretha [Franklin]", you have jumped over the lines of political correctness. Fox's Glee is about as blunt and politically incorrect as a show on a mainstream channel can get- and American audiences love it. Glee is popular, critically acclaimed, and talked about- everything a news channel wants to be. News and news commentary, however, are traditionally politically correct and unbiased. Would moving the national conversation in Glee's direction- making it less politically correct- be a positive change for news media?

There would be less talk of elitists or the 'liberal media elite', certainly, and there may be a slight profit increase for some of the more sterile stations, because controversy sells. But would the loss of professionalism and respect be worth it? Fox News seems to have taken the jump, as its stars like Glenn Beck pride themselves in their blatant political incorrectness. "...the politically correct world we live in, a world where, you know, I can't even show a picture of a missing student because he's Egyptian, 'Oh, don't. What? You hate all Arabs?' No! It doesn't allow you to publicly talk about stereotypes or sensitive questions about age or race or religion. You can't even say anything about it or just ask an honest question," says Beck.

However, the insensitivity and unprofessionalness that would be projected by the media if they were to move towards a more Glee-esque conversation would be extraordinarily detrimental to America's image. The small financial gains would not outweigh the serious turn to bias and rudeness by the overall news media.