The 2019 Emmy nominations were announced yesterday and queer artists made a strong showing.
Season One of Pose scored big in major categories, as did the lesbian thriller Killing Eve, Rupaul’s Drag Race, and Russian Doll, the surreal Netflix series co-created by out-lesbian Leslye Headland. Some of the LGBTQ artists who scored nominations include Billy Porter, Ellen Degeneres, Kate McKinnon, and Laverne Cox, just to name a few.
All that is great! Unless you’re Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill.
Merrill, who is currently running a 2020 Senate candidate, thinks modern television is the root of all evil and is eroding America’s moral fiber by making people too “preoccupied with homosexual activities” and “the wife swap shows.”
Speaking at a town hall over the weekend, Merrill, who is one of five Republicans hoping to unseat Sen. Doug Jones next year, was asked about the country’s cultural shift and what he thinks is the cause of it.
“How have we allowed it to happen? There are no more good TV shows on like ‘Gunsmoke,’ ‘Bonanza,’ ‘The Virginian,’ ‘Andy Griffith,’ ‘I Love Lucy.’ We don’t have those shows anymore. We’re too interested in homosexual activities,” he said.
He continued: “We’re too interested in seeing how this family’s finding a way to mess on this family or to see how people are trying to date on TV, or having wife-swapping on TV. That’s what we watch.”
The solution?
Merrill offered: “When we push back against that, and we quit allowing it to be in our homes–that’s how those changes have occurred because we’ve allowed them to slowly but surely come into our lives.”
Speaking to Al.com Monday, the 55-year-old expanded on this idea. While he couldn’t offer any specific examples of the “homosexual activities” he mentioned during his town hall event, he did say he believes “the foundational principles which we have grown up as a nation are no more.”
He added that TV shows are no longer “based on biblical foundations… shows that promote family and culture with a father, a mother, and children based on biblical teachings and biblical principles on which our nation was founded.”
We would be very curious to hear his thoughts about The Apprentice.
Chrisk
Lord. I was waiting for the predicted God talk (hey it’s Alabama) and of coarse he didn’t disappoint.
Juanjo
Of course, he’s coarse.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
Me thinking she doth protest waaaaay too much…….
Pretty sure Miss Gay Face has a definite secret weekly viewing appointment of Modern Family….
truckeralex
Miss Gay Face!!! I thought the same thing!
Juanjo
Great Christian shows like Gunsmoke where the marshall is carrying on an affair with a bordello madam in a saloon she owns even though he fathers a child on a woman he had a one night stand with elsewhere.
Michael007
I had to laugh. Yes old Matt did all those things plus shot people! Not a good example for the man to point out. Now, I CAN agree on Andy Griffith!
LubbockGayMale
Does he really expect Middle America to watch shows from the ’50s & 60s???? Even MASH had a gay soldier come through! Get real, sir!!
Maleko50
What an idiot. Bonanza & Gunsmoke reruns are being shown on MeTv. I have a new fondness for these great programs.
Bytemenow
Ben Cartwright is the patriarch of an all-male Nevada ranching family. Set during and after the Civil War, “Bonanza” is the story of life on the family’s thousand-acre spread, known as the Ponderosa, near Virginia City. Ben has his three sons, each with a different (and deceased) mother. Serious eldest son Adam hopes to follow in his father’s footsteps; middle son Hoss is a gentle giant — physically strong, but sometimes naive; and youngest son Little Joe is the most impetuous and romantic of the offspring.
Hmm. A house full of half-brothers with Little Joe being the most impetuous and romantic of the offspring and no female? Can you say circle jerks a plenty. I’m fine having shows with all hot, good looking, male casts. Yeah, not too gay. This guy has a cowboy fetish.
JamJewel
Simply put, Bonanza was the ratings hit it was because of Michael Landon’s crotch shots. “Amigo” “Alias Joe Cartwright” “[something] [something] Cochise” are some of the best crotch shots episodes…. if you’re into that type of thing.
Bubbleandsqueal
The wholesome “The Wild, Wild West” also made a huge impact on Mr. Merrill.
JamJewel
Notice… they are all crotch shot heavy…..
OzJosh
You can still watch most of those show either on nostalgia channels or box sets. So if he wants to live in the past that badly: problem solved.
ray444
Every single one of the four series Merrill mentioned is available on various streaming services, besides being available in reruns in numerous cities via syndication. I read in Entertainment Weekly just the other day that CBS still rakes in $20 million per year from “I Love Lucy” alone, 62 years after its last episode premiered on May 6, 1957.
If he’s wondering why there seem to be no conservative Christian-style TV series being produced, it’s probably because when one of those does get on the air it bombs because it gets extremely low ratings. People want to be amused, intrigued and drawn into a provocative or funny story, and they also like watching great-looking people wearing not much clothing–they don’t want to be bored to death by tedious, shallow, preachy morality plays featuring one-dimensional characters that make “Father Knows Best” seem as edgy as “Deadwood” by comparison.
And I agree: There’s nothing like a nice crotch shot.
Terrycloth
He can sit in his home and play the Christian claymation Davy & Goliath..or call up Mike Pence and ask him what he watches..I bet Adam like to watch eve boobs as she ran through eden
whitakerk861
RIP Tammy Faye
one more thing
There’s over 600 channels, I’m sure he can find his type of shows he just needs to stop watching the more interesting gay shows!
Al
Hell yeah, Little Joe with those tight moleskins and that low slung gun belt. He filled many a teen boy’s dream.
Rex Huskey
oh yeah
Tombear
I’ll have you know Miss Kitty might of been a brothel madame and whom Matt Dillion partook of her favors several times as I recall from many years ago. Just because Miss Kitty was a “lady” you liberals want to smash her reputation. Oh you liberals, want to make everything about Miss Kitty’s sex life! Oh most people didn’t notice Miss Kitty was a madam? Oops, never mind.
Goforit
I was going to point out the obvious problems with Gunsmoke and Bonanza but others beat me to the punch. But if you really want to watch Merrill’s head explode, lets do a gay revival of The Andy Griffith Show. You can name your own cast but might I suggest….
Russel Tovey as Andy. Sexy, masculine (I couldn’t resist) big ears and probably a power bottom. Jim Parsons as Barney. Duh. In his younger days, Neal Patrick Harris as Opie, Nathan Lane as Aunt Bea, Divine as Otis Campbell (the town drunk) Not sure who should play Floyd the barber, Howard or the love interests of Andy and Barney. Gee, I guess I watch to much Cozi Tv.
Brian
The principles on which our nation was founded? Television didn’t exist, women couldn’t vote, slavery was legal, and we burned “witches.”
MikeGinMN
Come on! It’s like a broken record with these guys. They go to their local ultra white conservative 1950’s fantasy meeting, and try this pandering crap.
The reason shows like Bonanza and Gunsmoke and the Andy Griffith Show aren’t on TV anymore is simple… MONEY.
TV is driven by ratings, ratings drive sponsors, sponsors pay money…. or in the case of the new TV… popularity and content drive contracts with providers… no popularity, no contract.
NO ONE in the industry is going to try to bring back shows with NO appeal to the majority of Americans (and the world).
Didn’t there used to be a “network” that catered to these prudish morality driven people? Pax TV?
What happened to that venue? Hmmmmm
RandomGuy
I wonder where he keeps his pool boy.
Viktor Zavadsky
no people accused of witchcraft were ever burned in any of the colonies that became the US – those who were deemed witches were hanged or pressed (rocks were piled on top of a wooden board under which laid the convicted witch so that he or she was crushed to death) – but no burning – however, hundreds of black men were burned alive by white christian mobs who did it for the entertainment of white communities in the southern US in the 19th and 20th centuries…
rbernard
If Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill is suggesting our great and diverse nation should be more like the miracle economy and social paradise the bigoted Republicans architected in Alabama, I say no thank you, not now, not next week, not ever !
John Merrill vision of power is fire up the masses and distracted them with social issues so they don’t notice the Republicans financial policies are picking their pockets.
James
GROW UP YOU STUPID IDIOT JOHN MERRILL. YOU ARE ONE BORING TROLL.