Art critic and TV personality, Brian Sewell, has hit out at the excessive number of homosexuals, transsexuals, and teenage lesbian characters on popular TV soap Coronation Street.
Mr Sewell, who is himself bisexual, said the programme is being used to push minority issues, and “the result is a minority preaching to us from some supposed moral high ground.”
He also attacked the same-sex storylines on the BBC’s EastEnders. He said soaps were being used as “sexual propaganda”.
Too much
Writing in a national newspaper he said: “There’s too much, not only of gay men … but also of lesbians, bisexuals, the trans-gender community, cross-dressers and everyone else with some sexual quirk or fetish.
“It is not just Coronation Street — EastEnders is at it, too, with, last month, boys in bed together, apparently naked.
“The dear old egalitarian BBC protested that its policy is to portray gay and heterosexual relationships in exactly the same way, both equally suitable for pre-watershed viewing. But are they equally suitable?
Propaganda
“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?”
He added that pushing minority issues “is fundamental to the philosophy of those in charge of TV. As a result, TV is far too politically correct. It fosters all minorities and gives them a disproportionate amount of airtime.
“In every kind of programme — be it drama, news, debate or for children — in this land of equal opportunities, minorities are given the opportunity to punch above their weight.
Preachy
“This is precisely what has happened in Coronation Street — and the result is a minority preaching to us from some supposed moral high ground.”
In May it was reported that the cast of the show was becoming increasingly irritated by the soap’s growing number of same-sex plotlines.
One Corrie insider said: “It’s not a happy place to be at the moment – and there is growing unrest that the show is losing its way.”
Unrealistic
The soap currently features two lesbians, four homosexual men and a transsexual.
Former Corrie star Nick Cochrane, who played Andy McDonald, said: “It’s unrealistic. Would one road in a working class area generally produce that number of gay people?”
“I’ve got plenty of gay friends”, he explained, “but they don’t all live in a street full of gay people.
Far-fetched
“How many streets in Britain would have schoolgirl lesbians, gay married couples, a transsexual and children to gay couples? It is a little bit far-fetched.”
He said the soap was not “the right platform to highlight so many gay issues all at the same time”.
And Corrie legend Jean Alexander, 85 – who played Hilda Ogden for 23 years – has said three homosexual storylines is “excessive”.
Platform
In January a homosexual producer of Coronation Street admitted that he uses the show as a platform for pushing homosexual issues.
Phil Collinson told The Sun it is “an amazing platform” that really makes “a difference to the way people think”.
He said: “What’s transmitted on Monday night people talk about in pubs, clubs and at work the next day.” He added: “this show has always had a gay sensibility.”