Everybody Loves Fairies

As I finished reading Boy Meets Boy, I had the TV on and was listening to Everybody Loves Raymond in the background. The episode was one in which the twin boys were performing in their school play as fairies. Toward the beginning of the episode Ray's father has a huge fit about the boys' role in the play, making the statement that they're going to "turn gay". Ray defends it, stating that it is perfectly normal and it is something they had to do for school. Eventually Ray's views shift closer to that of his father and he forces the boys to switch their roles to rocks as part of the scenery. Her name escapes me, but Ray's wife talks to him about how the boys being fairies in the play does not automatically make them gay, and that he should be supportive of them because she thought it would be something fun for them to be involved with. Ray eventually turns around and helps the boys learn to dance--but he doesn't do it because he necessarily thinks it is OK, he does it because the director of the play tells him the boys aren't good enough to be fairies.

This makes me look back and wonder how families react to "gay tendencies" that are seriously stereotypical in our society. How does that make their children feel? Do their childrens' feelings even really matter in the more grand scheme, or is it the reputation that comes from having children who are homosexual... or "act" that way. This was a really interesting episode and it fit very well with reactions some of my friends parents had when they first started the coming out process.