(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Former Trump adviser flips out over gay-themed The Last of Us episode [1] ['Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags', 'Showtags Popular_Tags'] Date: 2023-02-03 Watch: x Sebastian Gorka throws a tantrum over a gay romance in The Last of Us: "For 50 plus minutes we have a gay romance. Why? Less than 2% of the population are homosexuals" pic.twitter.com/UvOEPntUsk — Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) February 3, 2023 GORKA: “Fifty two minutes of the episode—52 minutes of this episode that’s supposed to be about zombies and saving humanity is a gay romance between two hirsute, bearded men—one a survivalist and one [laughs dismissively] a little bit more clearly homosexual. They’re naked, they get in bed, they have sex, they share strawberries. You can watch it yourself if you wish to. There’s a rule in story-making, whether you’re writing a book, a novel, a TV show, or a film. Every actor, every scene must have one purpose—to drive the story forward. If the actor, the character, the scene doesn’t drive the story forward, it must be jettisoned. For 50-plus minutes we have a gay romance. Why? Less than 2% of the population are homosexuals. … They had record viewership for this show. I guarantee you, millions of people, maybe tens of millions of people, switched off and maybe some of them canceled their HBO subscription. It is a culture war. They are hostages to their own ideology and they will ruin everything. Why? Because they have one goal. Whether it’s the mutilation of children with transgender, transition surgery, whether it’s the woke-ification of the military, the schools, Hollywood, TV shows, it is assault on the values that our civilization is built upon, and it is more directly an assault on the building blocks of our civilization, and that is the family. HBO, we know what you are doing. Do not support entities like HBO.” Now, you can certainly criticize the episode based on its quality if you want. Many people loved it. I felt it had some touching moments, with some really nice acting on the part of Offerman in particular, but as LGBTQ+-forward fare goes, it was hardly a watershed moment in television history. If you want to see a gay romance that makes you cry (and rejoice), try the wonderful Black Mirror episode “San Junipero.” If you want to see an LGBTQ+ love story that warms your heart and makes you laugh in the process, you could do worse than tuning in to Schitt’s Creek for the romantic exploits of David and Patrick. But it’s not really the screenwriting Gorka cares about here. It’s obvious he just doesn’t like gay romances—which, let's be clear, he’s not being forced to watch. That won’t stop him from projecting his own biases onto the rest of America, of course. First of all, it’s hard to say exactly what percentage of the country is LGBTQ+, but most estimates put it well above 2%. For instance, in March, Gallup found that “7.1% of American adults identify as “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or something other than straight or heterosexual.” Secondly, just because you’re not gay doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a gay-forward love story. It’s now a bit of a cliche to say “love is love,” but it’s true—and it’s true whether you’re talking about gay marriage or gay TV and cinema. Joy is joy, heartbreak is heartbreak, and loss is loss. It all comes from the same fundamentally human place. And sure, The Last of Us’ writers could have shoehorned in a tender heterosexual story, but neither Stormy Daniels nor Forbes magazine would sign over their rights. Also, ya know, LGBTQ couples have families, too. And they appear to be doing a pretty good job of raising their kids. Sure, they can’t produce their own shared biological offspring, but as I’ve always told people who feel entitled to ask me why I never reproduced, the one thing there’s definitely no shortage of on this planet is people. Or new Mountain Dew flavors, of course. We’ll see how many HBO subscribers really decide to cancel their subscriptions in the wake of this episode. I have a feeling Gorka is preaching to his own choir, none of whom have ever seen even one episode of Girls. Telling his fans to cancel their HBO subscriptions feels a bit like me trying to organize a boycott among my friends of Cracker Barrel or Kevin Sorbo movies. It sounds really scary and threatening, but who are we kidding, really? Check out Aldous J. Pennyfarthing’s four-volume Trump-trashing compendium, including the finale, Goodbye, Asshat: 101 Farewell Letters to Donald Trump, at this link. Or, if you prefer a test drive, you can download the epilogue to Goodbye, Asshat for the low, low price of FREE. 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