Joy Reid, a celebrity hitherto unknown to me, since I don’t get cable, is in danger of being stripped of her celebrity status on the grounds of anti-gay wisecracks she ran on her blog some 10 years ago. Among other things, it appears that she repeatedly accused former Florida Governor Charlie Crist of being a secret sissy.
Excuse me, but isn’t that exactly what Jon Stewart used to say, and Bill Maher is still saying, about South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham? I recall Jon doing a “hush my mouth, Miss Thing” approximation of Lindsey’s speech patterns that today might not pass muster.
And what about self-proclaimed gay icon Kathy Griffin? Didn’t her act—before she beheaded Donald Trump, I mean—consist largely of outing people like Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Hugh Jackman, and, above all, Ryan Seacrest? Or (to continue) what about Tina Fey’s legendary 30 Rock, with its endless snickers at the expense of gays n’ lesbos, particularly doesn’t know he’s gay Devin Banks (Will Arnett)? Or Saturday Night Live, whose every other sketch premise ran pretty much as follows: A high school gets a new teacher, and he turns out to be gay! A soap opera gets a new actor, and he turns out to be gay! Dr. Frankenstein creates a new monster, and he turns out to be gay! Or, currently, Tony Hale’s “Gary Walsh” on Veep, whose one joke consists of the fact that he’s, you know, totally gay?
Is a pattern starting to emerge? I think so! I definitely think so! It now seems that Joy has befouled her own nest by claiming she was hacked, which was not smart. But the sins that Joy is now most ineffectually trying to conceal don’t strike me as peculiarly her own.
