Children should be introduced to homosexuality from an early age on TV, according to a BBC report.
The report said “incidental portrayal” of lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people should be incorporated within programming aimed at children.
The Corporation has already faced controversy over its LGB portrayal in dramas, including popular sci-fi show Torchwood.
Targeted
In interviews with homosexual and bisexual organisations the BBC heard that it “should seek to incorporate the portrayal of LGB people within programming targeted at children, to familiarize audiences through incidental portrayal from an early age”.
The groups also told the BBC that it should be “validating children who are going through their formative years and who may be LGB”.
The BBC said it would “target commissioners and editors in particular” with the report’s findings.
Explicit
In September last year hundreds of viewers complained to the BBC about explicit homosexual sex on popular sci-fi show Torchwood.
More than 500 viewers complained to the broadcaster about some scenes in the show, branding them as “pointless” and irrelevant.
BBC Three’s Lip Service has also caused ructions with its portrayal of two women having sex next to a corpse.
Propoganda
In July last year art critic and TV personality Brian Sewell attacked same-sex storylines on EastEnders and ITV’s Coronation Street. He said soaps were being used as “sexual propaganda”.
Mr Sewell, who is himself bisexual, commented: “Are soaps, watched by pre-pubescent children — who may still have some tattered remnant of innocence that we should cherish — really a proper platform for sexual propaganda and special pleading?”