"Santana! Wheels! Gay Kid! Come on move it! Asian! Other Asian! Aretha! Shaft!"
If there exists any evidence that Fox's hit dra-mu-dy "Glee" is anything other than one of the gutsiest shows of modern time, I haven't seen it. For those unfamiliar with the drama-musical-comedy that is "Glee" check out the hilarious Fancast commercial. In a tweet: Think Grease 2.0 minus the pedal pushers, times two "pregnancies," plus one black girl who can blow equals so awesome it hurts.
Last night's "Throwdown" episode opened with Mercedes Jones, the club's resident diva asking, "Could we maybe try something a little more… black?" "It's glee club not crunk club," snaps back Rachel, glee's Streisand in-training. Upon learning that the "minority students don't feel like they're being heard," cheerleading coach and a capella arch nemesis Sue hatches a scheme to become "the rainbow tent" to glee coach Mr. Schuester's "storm of racism." That's when she runs down the "names" on her minority roll call: "Santana! Wheels! Gay Kid! Come on move it! Asian! Other Asian! Aretha! Shaft!" The list would be so offensive if it wasn't so funny. The kid in the wheelchair? Really? After a few commercial breaks a Jewish football player and a Dutch cheerleader head over to Sue's dark side.
The whole thing comes to a kumbaya close when instigator Mercedes, announces, "I don't like this minority business. I may be a strong proud black woman, but I'm a lot more than that. I'm out!" Then the curly-haired and clueless Mr. Schue says, "You're all minorities!" and everybody loves everybody again. I figured the zeitgeist would be all twitter today with the post-racial underpinnings in between the liner notes of Glee's best episode to date. Buuuuut not so much. Vulture over at New York Magazine loved it. As did the LA Times' Show Tracker. Folks mentioned the diversity diversion but not in a "this is sooo Obama" way but in a "Eh. Stereotypes are fun" sort of way. The former may be the best evidence of the latter.
HELENA "something a little more black" ANDREWS
Helena Andrews is a contributing editor at The Root and author of Bitch Is the New Black, a memoir in essays. Follow her on Twitter.