That was an adorable episode and I want to live in the gifs of it forever BUUUUUT it would not be Glee if there weren’t some distinctively terrible narrative problems.
I joked when Chord came back that with him being the Buttmonkey he was going to be the Xander Harris without all the fail.
Looks like he’s just going to be the Xander Harris (heart of the group, good nice guy that deserves and understands more than all those around him) full stop.
WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT? I MAY NEVER BE ABLE TO SHIP SAM/MERCEDES NOW. DDDDDDDDDDD:
JFC, this show needs to stop with moralizing straight white dudes telling the rest of us how to live. Because, fucking hell, what the fuck is this shit?
You can tell stories without one person being entirely right and another being entirely wrong.
You can have character growth without turning someone into a sanctimonious asshole or regressing someone else into a caricature of the fleshed out person you have gradually turned them into.
You can be a satirical comedy with a heart without reducing your characters to gross cliches and then beating them over the head with an unearned morality lesson.
This fucking show. Ugh.
I absolutely agree that we should be hearing about privilege from some of the other kids, and I’d love to see more dimensions to Sam’s character, but I don’t get why people are leaping on the idea that he’s behaving just like Will or Finn and thrusting misguided ideas on other people in the name of helping them.
The only storylines with emotional depth this season have been Santana’s coming out process and Mike’s issues with his dad — one of which was mishandled to a ridiculous degree, while the other had a backdrop of culturally ingrained stereotypes about Asian families. The majority of the season has been upper middle class kids elbowing each other out of the way in a mad scramble to get lead roles in a musical and win a school election, splinter into smaller groups and squabble over who is officially “the leader” of each, and pad their applications to elite colleges. The tragedy of Kurt’s repeated losses is that he might not get into the ONE highly-competitive performing arts college he has his heart set on, because he literally won’t go to any other school if he can’t go there. Ditto Rachel. Finn’s breakdown in “The First Time” was due to rejection from one of the best college football teams in the country.
I don’t see how it’s sanctimonious or inappropriate for the one canonically poor character to inject some real-world perspective into all of that. Especially since his only big moment here was criticizing Artie’s assertion that people just want — and should get — vapid escapism during the holiday season. If the sentiment came from Finn or Puck, it would be out of place and smarmy; coming from a character who spent the back half of season two living in a motel room with his entire family, it’s a reminder that some people have bigger problems than killer NYADA applications.
By no means am I trying to mount a case for Sam being the biggest marginalized victim to ever grace Glee — he’s a straight, white male character, and there’s no doubt that his privilege outweighs his lack thereof. But poverty is very real, and those suffering from it are an institutionally oppressed group. Acknowledgement of that by a member of that group (particularly as the basis of a Christmas episode, which is the oldest trope in the book) hardly makes Sam an asshole everyman preaching at the masses from his lofty cloud of privilege.
I think it’s honestly too early to tell how Sam will be used narratively within the show, because both Sam and Rachel were meant to embody Charlie Brown and Sally from Peanuts. Both Sam and Rachel have elements of those characters within them, but Sam was fully good and Rachel was fully selfish in the episode. I can see Sam and Rachel acting the way that they did to an extent, but the last time Sam shamed all of the glee club he only did so at the latest possible moment (Rumours), and I’ve never seen Rachel be so selfish about material things before, she’s usually only that way about the spotlight.
It’s also a bit disingenuous to talk about Glee’s white male savior problem without mentioning Kurt. He’s been the moral center of the show for a long time, and so far this season he’s been used to shame three female characters: Rachel for running for president, Santana for throwing the dodgeballs at Rory, and Sue for running the attack ads on Burt. The writers wouldn’t even show him shaming Finn for outing Santana.
(Source: sexyglances, via jude)
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orkummingandstaying reblogged this from jude and added:
I think it’s honestly too early to tell how Sam will be used narratively within the show, because both Sam and Rachel...
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jude reblogged this from agletthatiscracked and added:
I absolutely agree that we should be hearing about privilege from some of the other kids, and I’d love to see more...
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damiansdancingeyebrows reblogged this from agirlwholikescarrots and added:
thank you. Here’s my spin on it all. While cutesy Klaine is all sorts of fun to a lot of people, I was actually...
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myfoolisheart reblogged this from michelina and added:
#a+ #white savior!sam is becoming the biggest nuisance #well #second biggest #the lack of overtly coupley physical...
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It’s so funny because it seems like EVERY SHOW feels like they have to have this type of character yet this character is...
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keep saying people need...cutsie Klaine we got...realize...
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awaxwingslain reblogged this from sexyglances and added:
this. Everything. I’ve had...major problem with...“savior”...
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This…pretty much
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confettistan reblogged this from wishyouwould and added:
we need that “sloppy bastards” gif here somewhere
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sloppy bastard sometimes.
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only thing missing from this point based...how religion felt like
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