I guess I’ll see you at the movies. An examination of gay and post gay media representation experienced by Dutch queer audiences

Recent years have shown a dramatic shift in representation of queer identities in both film and television. Within that rise, character’s sexuality often became more incidental to the plot, instead of the center of the story – a notion sometimes described with the late 90’s concept of ‘post-gay,’ which considers sexuality to no longer be a defining characteristic in any way and sets out to disentangle queer sexuality and struggle. Although this increase in representation of LGBTQ+ characters in mainstream media has been celebrated, some scholars have criticized the politics of said representations, arguing that post-gay neglects societal reality and depoliticizes real queer experiences. This thesis examines these claims, centering queer audience’s experience of these representations, through qualitative research. Through a series of semi-structured interviews and by drawing on Uses and Gratification Theory, this thesis demonstrates the way queer audiences adopt an actively critical lens when consuming (queer) media, whilst also consuming post-gay media to fulfill the specific need of tension release. In doing so, it showcases the ineffectuality of the concept post-gay, as well as the potential post-gay representation has for queer audiences.