I was curious to see The New Normal. Created by Ryan Murphy, the maestro behind Glee and American Horror Story, it's the first network show to put gay dads front and center; NBC even cheekily billed the show as "the post-modern family." The pilot starts off promising. In a video message to his baby, Bryan looks lovingly into the camera and says, "This...is to show you how desperately you were wanted." We later flashback to the moment when Bryan knew he wanted to be a father, while shopping at Barneys. "Oh. My. God. That is the cutest thing I've ever seen. I must have it!" he exclaims. We think he is looking at an item of clothing and then see he's locked eyes with an adorable baby being pushed in a stroller. In recalling the moment to his partner, David, he explains, "When I saw that miniature person—whose skin was flawless, by the way—I really got it. I want us to have baby clothes and a baby to wear them." "You can't return a baby to Barney's," David tartly replies. David's the gay "straight man" in the couple, a grounded counterpoint to Bryan's flamboyant material girl. I had to wonder: After the battles the LGBT movement has fought these last 40 years, are these representations the ones to celebrate?

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I understand that characters like Bryan are often blown out of proportion to fit the conventions of sitcom. In Modern Family, Mitch and Cam represent only one of many loveable stereotypes that fuel the show's comedic success. Predictably fussy Mitch and overdramatic Cam are no more clichéd—nor less endearing—than Gloria, the much-younger, busty, thickly-accented Latina dimwit married to Mitch's dad. But you do have to wonder: Did the mothers and fathers of the same-sex movement—the down-on-their heels transvestites who pushed back police at the Stonewall Inn in 1969, the men and women who sparked the 1979 White Night riots in San Francisco—get beat up for... this?

Yes, I realize we are talking about fictional characters on primetime network comedy, but when same-sex marriage is on the ballot in four states next week, representation of gay families in the media is important.

My dad was married to my mother when he came out, with a child on the way. That didn't stop him from founding a chapter of the Gay Liberation Front and marching in a dress down the streets of Atlanta, Georgia, hardly a "sissy" act in 1970. After my mother died three years later, he moved us to San Francisco, where as a critic and editor, he nurtured a community of writers who explored issues of sexuality and identity in their work. Before he died of AIDS in 1992, friends said my father used to urge young writers and artists to take themselves seriously. Not just to have fun but to create something of cultural importance, to contribute to civilization. To be gay wasn't just to be attracted to someone of the same gender; it was to align yourself with a history of outcasts and renegades, people like Oscar Wilde and Allen Ginsberg, who took countercultural stands, often at great risk to their lives or careers, all in an effort to be true to themselves.