Degrassi:The Boiling Point:

Yeah! Degrassi has finally gotten back to well at least a place of pseudo-going there! Again yeah!

I am mainly writing because I think it is very interesting that Degrassi decided to choose a transgendered teenaged storyline. It is about time. There are always gay and lesbian characters on television and even teeny-bopper t.v. shows! But finally somebody went there portraying some of the realities of a transgendered teenager.

What I liked about the storyline the most is that in the beginning when we first meet Adam, he is not introduced as transgendered, but as just another dude trying to fit in at Degrassi. I would say that it is definitely somewhat obvious that Adam is the trans character, but at least they do not automatically assert his storyline in a one-dimensional way.

When they do finally do explore Adam's storyline I think they did a pretty decent job. In the episode, "My body is a Cage" they show Adam binding breasts, and the problems that arise in families trying to deal with this new "coming-out." I also like that they show Adam flirting with Bianca, because at some point he is going to need to date someone, so as to not be asexualized, since none of the other characters are. Even the gay ones get dates and smooches! I however, detest Bianca's homophobic/transphobic attitude upon finding out that Adam is a transman.

The other thing I like about it, is Adam's extremely supportive brother, Drew. I didn't realize they were related until these episodes when upon finding out that Adam is harassed, Drew tries to fight the a-holes that did the beating. The rest of his family is also pretty supportive at the end with the whole burn situation at the end.

What I was not a big fan of-his mom's reaction to introducing Adam to grandma. Forcing him to choose to arrive at dinner with granny as Gracie was honestly something of cognitive dissonance. But at least the mom sort of comes around in the end.

Looking forward to seeing more of Adam's character development, which they started doing more of even just at the end of the season. The whole disaster with Fritz or whatever his name is at the end, the fight club stuff, all of that adding to the complexity of what it means to occupy the subject position of trans.

Oh Degrassi

I thought it would be fun to take some silly Degrassi quizzes cuz I love that show...it's kind of silly but they do deal with some serious issues and the issues do not always get resolved-they carry over to different episodes. Plus they have gay and lesbian characters (even if it only lasted like a hour...) and they deal with cutting, rape (in a couple of ways) school shootings, suicide, cheating, family issues and relationships. But my favorite thing is that it really deals with friends and creating and maintaining those despite everything else.


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