Grammys And Gay Twitter Wars

A couple of Grammy comments before we get to...the War of the Gays on Twitter!

I am not a big fan of the Grammys. It's bad enough that this awards show is mostly full of performances instead of actual award presentations. Only ten Grammys were actually given out during the 3 hour, 30 minute show. And I don't know how they decide which ones (besides the obvious majors, Record/Song/Album of the Year, Best New Artist) make the cut. Besides the big four, we saw two Pop, two Country, one Rock and one Rap presented. The entire R&B genre, among others, was ignored. Of those 10 awards, all but one went to someone who performed on the show. (Fortunately, that one was given to Train for that awful "Hey, Soul Sister" thing.) And to have Arcade Fire perform both before and after winning Album of the Year just screams out, "FIX!!!"

(By the way, the Grammys need a host. The awkward ending of the show, with the one Arcade Fire member saying "we have to go perform another song...everyone leave to this song" or something really points out the need for a host, even a bad one.)

I don't respect the Grammys as an award or as an awards show. It's mostly performances. Had it not been for Lady Gaga, I probably wouldn't have watched at all. She was a lot less over-the-top in her performance, by Gaga standards, despite being inside an egg from the time she arrived at the show until the time the egg "hatched" on stage at the start of her performance of "Born This Way." So it was good, but not outrageously so -- like the song itself, although it is growing on me. It was a solid performance but I think she's been better.

Now, on to the War of the Gays!

Not-So-Quick Review: The Dilemma

Yeah, not so quick. There's some writing going on here...

Remember the controversy over the initial trailer for "The Dilemma," the Ron Howard film starring Vince Vaughn and Kevin James? It had the joke in which Vaughn's character, Ronny, says that "Electric cars are gay. I mean, not homosexual gay, but my-parents-are-chaperoning-the-dance gay." After GLAAD (the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, in case you don't know) complained, the studio removed the joke from the trailer but deferred to director Howard, who wouldn't remove it from the film itself because of artistic integrity or something. I wasn't thrilled by that, though I can understand someone not wanting to be harassed into making changes they feel aren't warranted. But Vaughn made some comments in response to the uproar that really turned me off, and I decided that I did not want to pay money to see this movie.

Still, I was a little curious. So when I went to see "The King's English" last week, I "multiplexed." That's the term I use for "sneaking into another theater to see a second movie without paying." It's something I've only done a couple of times, and once it was just to re-watch the end of another movie I had already seen (and paid for). But Hollywood owed me one for over two years: "The Spirit" was such complete garbage that I walked out more than halfway through. With "The Dilemma," I collected.

Well, I collected in that I stayed throughout the entire film. But it wasn't easy.

The film's premise is that Ronny and his best friend Nick (James) are partners in an auto design firm who get a meeting with GM to make a pitch for an electric car that seems like a muscle car. Hence the "electric cars are gay" joke --

Wear Purple Wednesday - Phantoms Or Otherwise

I think this idea just developed organically -- I saw a number of different Facebook "events" posted for it, and I have one friend who is "attending" every single one. Tomorrow, as a way to remember the kids who were bullied to death by their "peers," their "adult" authority figures and dirtbag politicians of every stripe, and especially to show a visible sign of support for those kids who are still alive but going through bullying of their own, you're encouraged to wear purple. Purple in the Rainbow Flag symbolizes "spirit." So tomorrow is now "Spirit Day." GLAAD -- the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation -- has links on their website for you to make your Twitter and Facebook profile pictures purple.

I have one piece of purple clothing. I didn't think I had any, but I remembered that I went to Game 4 of the American Hockey League's Calder Cup finals in 2005, when the Philadelphia Phantoms won the Cup in a four-game sweep (which helped make up for the NHL's year-long absence due to their infamous lockout), and all fans were given t-shirts going into the arena. I feel like maybe I should wear it inside out because the hockey stuff on the front might dilute the message of the purple, but I probably won't. I hate that look. The tag belongs on the inside, not the outside, people.

So I'll be going for my comic books tomorrow and, beyond that, just walking around a lot, making sure my t-shirt is visible. Hopefully it's not too chilly. I'll have a long-sleeved tee-shirt under the Phantoms shirt. Maybe I'll take a jacket or zip-up hooded sweatshirt as well, but I'll keep it open -- after all, what good is the purple t-shirt if the purple isn't visible?