"Yep, I'm Gay" Sexuality Identity and Confession

In “Imitation and Gender Insubordination,” Judith Butler explores the notion of sexuality, by stating that “compulsory heterosexuality sets itself up as the original, the true, the authentic” (Rivkin and Ryan 722). In 1987 the television sitcom “Ellen” starring Ellen Degeneres featured the character of Ellen Morgan. Morgan was a likable young woman struggling to define herself in many aspects of her life. The show regularly focused on social relationships and workplace experiences. One element featured in the show were the regular pressures the character faced to date, “find a good man,” and become involved in a romantic relationship. This sense of “compulsory heterosexuality” was resultant from societal and familial pressures upon the title character – but also from within herself. Butler’s assertion that sexuality is performative was reflected by the character’s earliest presentation in the series which featured her wearing make-up, a softer hairstyle and more feminine clothing choices.
Throughout the course of the show, Ellen Morgan became more frustrated with the challenge of trying to find a relationship, and more overwhelmed and by the constant pressure to meet up to societal ideals. Butler would argue that the Ellen’s attempt to fit into the heterosexual ideal “is always the process of imitating and approximating its own phantasmic idealization of self-and failing” (Wexler 2) Ellen’s romantic relationships were bound to fail because she was not being true to herself, and was allowing socially constructed ideas of normative behavior to define her identity.
In History of Sexuality, Michel Foucault examined the different cultural perceptions of sexuality and how they were framed in both religious and scientific terms. Foucault discussed the notion of “unnatural” sexuality being sinful, and later the need to confess evolving out of a religious act into a need for processing identity through speech and self acknowledgement. In the following scene from season four, Ellen is recalling a dream she had in which the lesbian references and stereotypes are abundant. Her desire to conform is so strong that she is only able to access her true identity during a subconscious dream state. Though the scene is constructed in an entertaining way, Foucault would recognize this as Ellen’s desire to not only hide her true desires from society, but also – more poignantly, from herself.

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Several times during the scene Ellen is referred to as a gay woman or lesbian. As she begins to take on this identity, she is no longer described as simply a person or a woman, but as a gay woman or lesbian. Foucault wrote that those who assumed or declared their identity as anything disparate from the norm, became the other – “The ‘perverse’ became a group, instead of an attribute,” (Wexler 2) in fact, Foucault went so far as to say that these “others” were so separate that they were actually viewed as a separate “species.”
The scene concludes with Ellen turning to the mental health provider for clarification or validation of her obvious desires. Foucault believed that the science of sexuality was instituted as a way of ordering or regulating “other” sexual behavior. But in this process, the individual who struggles with their sexual identity may finally voice or confess their true desires, and in doing so, the dirty shameful secret of “other” sexuality loses its taboo and stigma.

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The notion that talking about sexuality causes it to lose its power is validated by the groundbreaking decision of the writers of the comedy series to confront the struggles of a featured character not only being gay, but inviting the viewer to accompany the character along on the search for identity. In 1987, homosexuality was rarely referenced on episodic television, and no regular featured characters were depicted as gay, and in little over twenty years it is easy to point to multiple examples of gay characters and exploration of homosexual issues on shows like Friends, Brothers and Sisters, Will and Grace and Grey’s Anatomy. This representation of homosexuality in a more personalized form helped many viewers to challenge their constructed views of lesbian and gay men as something more that "other", allowing them to challenge their own ideas about identity and sexuality.

Works cited - under construction.

Michel Foucault and Self Imprisonment in The Handmaid's Tale

Michel Foucault’s “Discipline and Punish” provides an example of a city whose viability has been challenged by a natural disaster (plague). This situation, which could potentially result in chaos and disorder, offers agency for the government to assume total control of its populous – while acting in the guise of protector. This scenario is similar in many ways to the systemic domination and subjugation of the citizenry described in Margaret Atwood’s novel, “The Handmaid’s Tale.” In this story, governmental chaos and natural catastrophes serve as a catalyst for a group of extreme religious fundamentalists to overtake the United States government. The newly formed government then makes sweeping changes to law and effects societal conventions.
Foucault’s text examined the power structure in society. In his Panopticon example he outlined the necessary modalities for effecting individuals to become prisoners internally, monitored and controlled by their own sense of control and discipline. He described four practices –establishment of a power hierarchy segregation, training, and military surveillance which may be seen illustrated in The Handmaid’s Tale. In the novel, the citizenry is divided into hierarchical groups and labeled – Wives, Commanders, Guardians, Handmaids, etc. These characters are designated by title and also by specific wardrobe which serve as constant reminders of their position and power level in the society envisioned in the fictional Republic of Gilead. The handmaid, who serves as narrator in the novel, describes the practice of separating the segment of society to which she belongs – essentially alienating them. The women, proven childbearers, are culled and then taken to “Red Centers” where they are then indoctrinated into their new purpose. These practices provide “the great confinement on the one hand; the correct training on the other” (Foucault 553). The handmaids are then subject to regular medical examinations and rituals which regularly reinforce their position in the new society and insinuate a global control over the lives of the handmaids. The handmaid’s are also aware of the ever-present “Eyes,” governmental spies, whose purpose is to reveal illicit behavior which is punishable by torture or death. This constant state of fear reaffirms the notion that “each individual is fixed in his place. And, if he moves, he does so at the risk of his life…or punishment” (Foucault 551).
The layered control and loss of individuality by those who are controlled by such a power structure lose any sense of agency and therefore lose any internal drive to fight against the oppressive structure or control. Foucault wrote that “he who is subjected to a field of visibility, and who knows it, assumes responsibility for the constraints of power… becomes the principle of his own subjection.” This notion of inability to effect control can be seen in the character of handmaid Offred who has several opportunities to shape her outcome (by spying for the resistance movement, stealing a weapon and using it to defend herself or escape, etc.), but her sense of self and power has been so meticulously diminished that she becomes complicit in her subjugation.

Works Cited

Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale. New York: Random, 1986.

Foucault, Michel. “Discipline and Punish.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. Eds. Julie Rivkin and Michael Rivkin. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. 549-565