Bullying 'Glee' Creator Caricatures Blacks & Christians, Publicly Trashes Artists Who Don't Want Their Music On His Show

Glee is the worst show on television, and its creator Ryan Murphy is the most unabashed bigot in television. We saw Kathy Griffin portray an egregious Tea Party stereotype last week (and, remember– this character was supposed to highlight Murphy’s “inclusiveness” toward conservatives), and Murphy has continued this winning trend by making friends and influencing people mouthing off about artists who have actually created the popular music he parasitically exploits. I’m sensing a pattern here; anyone who dares to challenge Murphy gets publicly insulted, even with hateful portrayals on his show (including shockingly racist ones– but more on that later).

I will admit, when it was first announced, I looked forward to the show, because it was promoted as an offbeat comedy featuring Jane Lynch, who’s normally hilarious, but it’s nothing of the sort. This is a soap opera of the worst kind– it’s the ultimate wet dream for the kind of people who actually believe that gays should be more outraged at high school bullies than Shariah-ordered executions. It’s nothing but blatant wish fulfillment for TV executives who are at the top of the world but can’t get over some hangup from high school. Your glee club wasn’t that great and didn’t get any funding in school? Aww, poor baby, let’s make a show where everyone in the glee club would be a final contestant on American Idol! You got picked on in high school? That’s okay, you can write a show where the homophobic bully is secretly gay! Don’t like Christians opposing gay marriage? No worries; we’ll just create a stupid, belligerent, superstitious, overweight, violent black character to mock them:

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And, even worse, it’s a musical. Not a musical in the sense that characters express themselves through songs– it’s a musical where the characters extraneously break into glammed-up, severely auto-tuned covers of hit pop songs. It’s all about leeching off the success of those who create in the music world…

… and some in that world have begun to publicly denounce it.

When the band Kings of Leon quietly rejected a request to license their music to the show, Murphy shot back by telling the band “F— you,” calling them “self-centered a–holes,” then accusing them of the unforgivable sin of neglecting him “arts education.” Slash of Guns ‘n’ Roses rightly dissed the show as an insult to musicals, and Murphy tactfully declared, “people who make those comments, their careers are over; they’re uneducated and quite stupid.” That’s odd, because the rather popular and prolific Damon Albarn of Blur and Gorillaz didn’t have nice things to say about Glee, either. Nor does Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters: “f— that guy for thinking anybody and everybody should want to do Glee.”

I’m glad that a Glee backlash is building in the music community; Murphy is little more than a bully with simultaneous messiah and victim complexes. A normal, well-adjusted adult would recognize that not 100% of the music community is going to want to hear its work turned into pitch-corrected teenybopper jams and accept the fact that not 100% of his licensing requests will be accepted. However, Murphy interprets these as insults, not only against him but against his mission, as if a vapid primetime soap opera is crucial to “arts education” in America (“Allow me to butcher your songs… it’s for the children!”).

And his need to publicly embarrass anyone that gets in his way is disturbing. Kings of Leon frontman Caleb Followill responded to Murphy’s outburst, “This was never meant as a slap in the face to ‘Glee’ or to music education or to fans of the show. We’re not sure where the anger is coming from.” Drummer Nathan Followill was a bit less generous, but the point stands that Murphy publicly singled out and insulted the band just for denying his requests.

It’s a trend we’ve seen on the show, as well. Since the start of the second season, the show has included plenty of sucker punches against conservatives: a pregnant cheerleader’s one-dimensionally evil dad is a Glenn Beck fan; Sarah Palin is mocked as stupid; Ann Coulter is listed as a negative influence on young women akin to Lindsay Lohan; now the crazy Tea Partying birther homeschooler. And Murphy’s insistence on mocking the groups he’s set up as his existential enemies has also manifested itself as a vile, cruel racial caricature.

I will admit that I watched Season 2, Episode 7 because of the buzz Gwyneth Paltrow’s guest spot was generating. There were plenty of eyeroll and facepalm moments, but around three-quarters of the way through, I was just simply stunned at what I saw. In a hackneyed flashback to explain some current character flaw (I’ll take Screenwriting Cliches for 2000, Alex), Paltrow’s character details how she was attacked by a black teenage girl (described by the narrator as “like an attractive Biggie Smalls”) who is so offended by the concept of learning algorithms (because “I’m a Christian,” she says) that she punches Paltrow (see video above).

Murphy and the writer of this episode, Ian Brennan, have no leg to stand on if they ever claim that they or Glee are about promoting tolerance or diversity. They are all about politically correct, one-dimensional stereotypes; groups they like are pure good, groups they dislike are pure evil. And they have some explaining to do. I see why they’d want to mock Christians: Prop 8, those who purport to be believers like the Westboro Baptists– yeah, yeah. But why inject race into it? And why would such rich white men do it with such a hateful stereotype against black women?

It’s because they’re thin-skinned, bigoted bullies. They demand everyone submit to whatever they want; if they don’t, there is retaliation– public shaming through stereotypes, insults, and vitriol unbecoming of anyone, much less a media figure claiming to promote education and inclusion.