Morning Edition - 10/5/06

Noah's Arc Season Finale; Recap




It would appear that Patrik Ian Polk, creator, writer and director of Noah’s Arc is hell-bent on “feminizing” most of his characters. Last night’s season finale was no exception. In the opening scenes, we’re treated to Quincy, Noah’s new sometime love interest preparing for a ball (a gay-centric fashion show/category variety show). Noah is teaching Quincy how to walk the runway and in doing so, Quincy is told to “Omi” his walk – short for turn-it-out like supermodel Naomi Campbell. Why?! Here is this six foot plus hunk of a man attempting to awkwardly sashay for the delight of fem-queen Noah. Fast forward to the main issue at hand; the drama-filled storyline of Wade and Noah. Hopelessly in love, but caught in the quandary of “Do I love you enough to overcome the pain of your betrayal?” or more importantly, “Could I ever trust you?” The question comes to a head – and for those that didn’t watch, I’ll play nice and hold back retelling the juicy tidbits. Suffice to say that there is an obvious disconnect between character’s personality traits and how Polk has them handle situations. Initially, I noticed this problem with Alex – drama-mama character with the fast-forward mouth and no nonsense demeanor who ended up being punked and diminished by former schemer and attempted-man-stealer, Guy. The finale highlights this same disconnect. Dre is not true to his personality when confronted with betrayal and we’re treated to a somewhat predictable ending. Notes for next season: Don’t kill-off Dre; doing so will cement the wedge between Noah and Wade and prove that Wade is no better than Noah at doing what is right. Enough with the Junito and Ricky open relationship. Let Junito be gone. Ricky can’t appreciate being loved and it’s making my stomach hurt just watching the ridiculous back-and-forth between these two. As for Trey and Alex – get your relationship heated up again before you bring a child into it. Didn’t we just get rid of one, very upsetting, dependent? Resident partners Eddie and Chance – finally a partnership that appears to thrive. Let’s make it hot and send in Kenya’s mom…maybe someone wants their parental rights back?

Foley Faux-Pas…Why the Gay Issue?
Mark Foley through a representative announced he is gay and had been molested while serving as an altar boy when he was a young boy. My question to the former Republican congressman is “What the heck does this have to do with him sending inappropriate instant messages and e-mail messages to teenage pages? In Foley’s defense, the underage young men in question were not children. Though this case is being portrayed as one involving pedophilia, the truth is the boys are at or above the legal age of consent in Washington, DC (16). That said, the story has gone from being a story of an inappropriate, hypocritical freak caught misusing resources, to this-probably-happened-because-he’s-a-repressed-gay-man. As a gay man, I’m outraged. Let us not forget that statistically speaking, 71% of pedophiles are heterosexual men. To be clear, pedophiles have sex with children, while gay men have sex with men. For the Republicans to allow the subject to now revolve around Foley’s homosexuality is absurd. Would this be a more or less heinous incident and embarrassing situation if Foley were straight? Let’s keep to the real issue at hand. Republicans knew that Foley was alleged to be engaging in inappropriate conduct with young pages years ago and did nothing – not even remove him from his position as head of a subcommittee for missing and exploited children. The issue is simple, Foley and those that were in the know and did nothing about this abuse of power and government resources need to be shoved as far from our elected posts as public servants and the cock-and-bull smoke screen of homosexuality as a front burner issue needs to be squashed. Keep it real.

On Blast
We recently tackled the love and pride issue, but there is yet another issue affecting love that this season of Noah’s Arc hinged on…love and trust. Do love and trust work hand-in-hand or is love able to flourish within a relationship without trust? One friend stated to me that without trust his relationship would dissolve among the worry of what his partner was doing when out of his sight, while other friends have mentioned that they have simply adjusted to a relationship that turns a blind eye to trust in the hopes of maintaining the love of their lives as their partners. What is your take? Does love require trust to survive within the confines of a relationship?

Keep passin’ the open windows…