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Why culture’s ‘queerbaiting’ leaves me cold

From Taylor Swift’s new video to M&S sandwiches, everyone is capitalising on Pride. Is it cause for concern?

When Taylor Swift released her video for You Need to Calm Down, it was satirical news site the Onion that delivered the funniest and most poignant response: “Taylor Swift Inspires Teen To Come Out As Straight Woman Needing To Be At Center Of Gay Rights Narrative”.

The video, directed by Drew Kirsch and Swift herself, was designed to make a statement: it sees the musician parade around a campsite with a bunch of celebrity LGBTQ+ friends. There’s a same-sex wedding, a drag pageant and a food fight – a parade of out and proud behaviour provoking the video’s “redneck” protesters who hold placards with slogans such as “Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve”. With cameos from Ellen DeGeneres, Laverne Cox, Jonathan Van Ness, Adam Lambert, Billy Porter and the crew from Queer Eye, it certainly brings out all the LGBTQ+ big guns. But as you watch them cavort around fulfilling gay stereotypes (tea parties for the gays, forearm tattoos for the lesbians) in a nauseating set, you wonder why they agreed to it.

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from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2xhnd7W
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