“American Idol” runner-up Adam Lambert ignited a firestorm of controversy over his American Music Awards performance, but his biggest critics may be in the gay community. Still Madonna did it, why not Adam?
Jennifer Vanasco, editor in chief of website 365gay.com, said his performance hurt the cause of gay marriage in the eyes of mainstream Americans “who think gay life is exactly what (he) portrayed on the American Music Awards.”
Lambert, 27, performed the single from his new album, For Your Entertainment, and the number included heavy sadomasochistic overtones. He led dancers on leashes, pushed another dancer’s face into his crotch, simulating oral sex, and French-kissed a third dancer. All were males.
ABC claimed it received more than 1,500 complaints, and cancelled Lambert’s scheduled appearance on Wednesday’s “Good Morning America” show.
CBS jumped into the fray and booked Lambert for morning rival “The Early Show.” Lambert offered no apologies during the interview.
While CBS showed the performance, it blurred the controversial scenes, which also provoked an outcry in the gay community.
Gay rights groups blasted CBS for hypocrisy. In the past, it has played unedited video of Madonna French kissing Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera at 2003’s MTV Video Music Awards.
The move “reinforces an unfortunate double standard that is applied to openly gay performers,” said the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD).
Television shows have been more open about portraying lesbian relationships, but when it comes to gay men, they typically fall back on the stereotype of an ineffectual, sissified man.
Lambert hardly fits that image, and he did not shy away from the controversy during his interview.
“If it had been a female pop performer doing the moves that were on the stage, I don’t think there’d be nearly as much of an outrage at all,” Lambert added. “I think it’s because I’m a gay male.”
As for CBS and ABC, faced with the controversy, they decided to take a stand on their wallets, rather than on artistic freedom.
While CBS acknowledged that Madonna-Britney had aired countless times without censorship, it said “the Adam Lambert image is a subject of great current controversy, has not been nearly as widely disseminated, and for all we know, may still lead to legal consequences.”
In short, both networks are afraid the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) may fine them for airing “indecent” footage.
Under the Bush administration, the FCC was rabid about so-called indecent television scenes, especially during the so-called family hours, between 8 pm and 10 pm.
It its most telling case, it fined CBS $550,000 after Janet Jackson’s breast was momentarily exposed during the 2004 Super Bowl half-time performance.
A federal court threw out a $550,000 fine against CBS for the split-second television exposure, but in May the Supreme Court ordered a further review of the case. Whether the Obama FCC pursues the same aggressive posture remains to be seen.
More than half a million people complained at the time, but many complaints were later proved to have been organized by right-wing religious groups.
Despite all the hoopla, or maybe because of it, sales of Lambert’s debut album are brisk.
It was No. 3 on the iTunes U.S. album chart by Wednesday night, and was expected to sell as many as 225,000 units in its first week.
A performer must know his/her audience and adjust the performance to meet minimum standards of decency for the occasion. Lambert’s explicit material would have been fine for a mature audience who paid to see him push the envelope. Not so for a general audience in prime time television who had no expectation of that kind of behavior. The same could be said for Jackson’s crotch grab, etc. The AMA invited these performers to SING, not to push their own personal agendas. Perhaps the AMA should protect their own integrety by having their stars stick to the theme of the evening—music which showcases the stars’ singing talents. In the long run, this lack of respect of the general audience will hurt the AMA’s viewership and the stars’ sales.
I think Adam helps your cause. He hit a nerve thereby exposing what our “real” problem is when not wanting to give gay people their rights to marriage. Now you can sit down and address the issues.
I agree with “islasands” and “irisita69″. Can you guys (ANYONE) imagine being this kid right now? I mean all he wanted to do was promote his first album, give a really great performance live on TV on the AMAs. All after doing a photo shoot where “Out” magazine editor calls him out for not being Gay Enough and not wanting to pick up the Gay Cause as their Poster Boy. Out Magazine wants him to help the Gay Cause. Then you have the AMAs where folks start screeching his performance was to Gay and is now hurting the Gay Cause. This kid is damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. Thank gosh he has a great dance crew and stronger band to help him live and endure during such a frustrating time. Folks want to persecute him for being the real Adam and part of Adam is his sexuality and his owning that. When women performers own their sexuality it comes out in their performances. Not one single performer on that stage didn’t radiate their sexuality whether they meant to or not. Even Daughtry who stood still and sang, a bit off key mind you; oozed out I’m a dude and I’m straight whether he meant to or not. Kelly Clarkson stood there and sang but acutally I couldn’t tell what way she goes. Each and every other artist was easily one way or another and that was part of who they are, comes out in their songs, is part of their energy. You want to deny that part of Adam too? So look, the Gay Community needs to rally behind Adam, not over pressurize the kid and give him some slack. He is learning everyday how to live not only as a person in Hollywood but also as a Rock God. Back in day when Rock was everything Sexuality was clearly shoved down folks throats, pun intended. He is learning, give him a break. There is a double standard. I love his music. I loved the music video FYE. I love his CD. Yes, I love Adam Lambert. And HUGE FREAKING PROPS TO HIS KEY BOARD PLAYER TOMMY! Kissing Adam Lambert back like that was so hot and powerful my house was in an uproar! I tell you a man really has to own and know his sexuality is his own when he can do that in the name of Rock. Dude you made mega points and came off as such a stud after that. Way to go. I know dozens of chics who want to score with you now.
Sheila, you’re an idiot. Please go trip, fall and die. Thanks.
This is in response to Jennifer’s other article on Adam, claiming, among other things, that he has hurt the cause of gay marriage:
http://www.pridesource.com/article.html?article=38948
now, the media is reporting that Adam’s antics have divided the community! So who’s actions are more hurtful? a Glam-rocker doing what he does, or a LGBTQ journalist indulging in her own homophobia to slam his actions? Should Adam let homophobes dictate what he does on TV? She is being quoted as being a spokeperson for the community. She doesn’t speak for me.
The double-standard that Jennifer Vanasco indulges here is shocking, and more offensive than anything a queer glam-rocker can put on stage. Basically, she’s putting the idea forward that we Queer people need to act more straight and moral so that Queer people can win the fight to get married. Considering that straight people have no moral “test” when they get married, and that the actions of sexually-charged rock & rollers of the last decades have had zero impact on hetero marriage, her argument is fatally flawed. She merely reinforces the homophobia that we are already coping with, and the whole misplaced concept of a “moral guage” that gets applied to us.
Adam is a glamrocker. What he did was take the standard rock & roll macho male swagger, and Queered it up. I say, about time! What he is achieving by taking a typically hetero male archetype and turning it on its head, is smart, political, and timely.
Remember – it was the outrageous Queens of the world that started fighting back first. Most of you owe what rights you have to people who refused to be anything other than what they truly were.
Adam rocks.
Homophobia is the problem, not gay people. The person from 365gay is attacking the wrong place.
QUOTE: Jennifer Vanasco, editor in chief of website 365gay.com, said his performance hurt the cause of gay marriage in the eyes of mainstream Americans “who think gay life is exactly what (he) portrayed on the American Music Awards.”
What exactly does the performance by a male artist (who happens to be gay) have to do with the cause of gay marriage? Vanasco is herself reinforcing stereotypical views about people who happen to be gay by conflating sexual orientation with gender type. i.e. she believes that what Lambert does with his private bits cannot be separated from what he does publicly – as a male artist.
Everyone, gay or straight, wants a piece of this man’s private life, when all he is offering to the public is his “entertainment”.
As a private person, Adam Lambert is not free to marry and raise a family, and that is a cause worth fighting for. Now it turns out he is not free to explore his artistic vision without referencing, in terms of ‘accountability”, that private identity. It is the views of people like Vanasco that reinforces the notion that being gay is a way of life. Lambert is not a gay person on stage. He is a singer.
I object to Vanasco’s use of the generic description “gay community” in expressing her views. Vanasco does not speak for me or for other gay people who are involved in the fight for gay rights. As far as entertainment is concerned, she can only speak for herself.
And it doesn’t stop there…
GMA just decided that while they cancelled Adam Lambert’s concert they are very willing to have Chris Brown on their show.
(Yep, the pop singer who was just convicted for assaulting his then-girfriend Rhianna!)
The message here is all too clear:
It’s perfectly okay to brutally beat up a young woman but being gay is not aceptable.
This is insane.
What have our morals decended to? I know that Adam Lamberts’s preformance on the AMA show is widely accepted in todays world, but it is Sodum and Gommora all over again and you know what happened there. Why is this type of behavious necessary as entertainment? It can only be entertaining to the very depraved in our society. Please give our people a better class of entertainment that is truly entertaining. This world has become a very scary place to live expecially in the USA.
Adam Lambert is gay, but not gay enough for “Out” magazine,
too gay to win American Idol,
to sexual for children watching AMA with their responsible parents,
and too who the hell knows what fot the causes of the gay community?
Whatya Want From Him????!!!!!!!!