Anderson Cooper Talks Trans Kids, Still Mum On His Sexuality
As we near Transgender Day of Remembrance (November 20), it’s fitting Anderson Cooper is devoting today’s episode of his syndicated daytime talk show, Anderson, to transgender children.
While children hardly have to consider themselves transgender to be bullied for their perceived gender identity, parents can find themselves at a loss when trying to reach their trans kids. To help, Coop is bringing on Dr. Diane Ehrensaft, an expert on gender-nonconforming children and the author of Gender Made, Gender Born; Tammy Lobel, an 11-year-old girl who was born male; Domaine Javier, a transgender woman recently expelled from college for applying as a female; and trans basketball player Kyle Allums.
We can all bitch Cooper isn’t more open about his sexuality, but at least we can rest assured he won’t have nutjobs from the Family Council or other hate groups on the show to explain how these kids are ruining America.
Nikki Finke reports ‘Anderson’ was renewed for a second season.
This snooze-fest is proof in the post-soap opera era, the networks will put anything on during the day including ‘Anderson’ and ignore the ratings. My guess is, if his ratings continue to tank, Cooper will save coming out for sweeps week.
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I always thought that Anderson was asexual. He’s stiff like that.
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Cue all the Anderson Cooper fangirls to come in here with their normal list of lies and excuses.
1. He IS out! Just because he doesn’t flaunt it (Or admit it) doesn’t mean he isn’t out!
2. He never talks about his personal life, he doesn’t want to be part of the story! (Apparently writing a book and talking about his father, his brothers suicide and being the son of Gloria Vanderbuilt isn’t considered talking about his personal life)
3. Asking him to come out is BULLYING! (Yes, just talk to the parents of the kids who are dead and I dare you to make that comparison to them.)
I actually like Cooper, but I’m under no illusions that he isn’t purposely staying closeted.
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I things would go a lot smoother for Cooper if he did just come out publicly. At this point, it’s the pink elephant in the room. At one point I think he could have argued that he was the reporter, not the story. But with his new show, we know more about his personal life than ever. I can’t think of many things more personal than a sibling’s suicide, yet he presents that for America. We also know his diet is really weird. But he draws the line at saying he’s in a relationship with a pretty nice guy.
That said, I certainly don’t see him as an enemy to gays (some in the LGBT community do). He’s done some wonderful stories about LGBT issues, introducing those issues in a sensitive and non-sensational manner to middle America. I give him credit for that.
But I still wish he would just come out and be done with it.
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@christopher di spirito: His ratings are OK actually, and they’ve been improving over time which will look promising to networks. This year’s other new talk shows have not been doing as well. Talk shows are inexpensive to make (a lot cheaper than soaps, for example) so they don’t need very high ratings to be profitable.
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@rrr: Cooper’s syndicated daytime talk show for Warner Bros TV, Anderson averaged a 1.3 rating a 4 share in its second week. His target audience is women 25-54 years of age and of course, his gay fanboys.
But one thing you said was accurate. A daytime program doesn’t need a huge audience to be profitable. Advertisers sell in blocks and they’re desperate to whore their products.
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He should have Queen Latifah and Dan Savage speaking about how it gets better. Riiiiight.