DisenDeGeneres: Why Queers might quit Ellen DeGeneres

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Oct 17

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The Ellen DeGeneres / George W. Bush controversy has been weighing heavily on my mind lately. A lot of digital ink has been spilled on the topic over the past week or so, but almost everything I've read has missed one important point.

Ellen DeGeneres is a hypocrite who lacks integrity.

Ellen says be kind to one another. She says be friends with people who disagree with you. And she is. So long as her friendly homophobes are rich, famous, and powerful. When dealing with anyone famous or alluring, Ellen will turn her back on the gay community faster than a speeding hashtag.

Even before the recent cowboy controversy, I have been questioning Ellen's status as a leader and role model for the LGBTQ community. In 2018, there was her outspoken and vehement defense of Kevin Hart, whose public comments on the horrors of the possibility of one of his children turning out to be gay, although years past, were almost as bad as Tracy Morgan's, minus a call for violence, and also, critically, minus any sincere attempt at apology.

After being uninvited to host the Oscars, Kevin Hart branded himself as a victim of political correctness and what we are now calling "cancel culture." Ellen DeGeneres not only defended Hart passionately, but she also gave him a chance to talk about it on her show and once again paint himself as a victim of the culture and, as Ellen put it, "the haters."

She really said that.

As if that weren't bad enough, we also get to add a triple decker super fudge sundae of irony to this gay wedding cake. The year before Mr. Hart went down, Ellen very publicly and ostentatiously banned and cancelled a scheduled guest from her show. The guest, Kim Burrell, went viral right before her scheduled appearance (as a backup singer for Pharrell Williams) because of a video of her outlandishly making anti-lgbt comments at her holy roller church. Ms. Burrell had been working with Pharrell for years, and she and Pharrell were going to go on the Ellen show to promote a movie and soundtrack they had been working on together.

But Ellen wasn't having none of this. Instead of letting a controversial non-celebrity sing backup with Pharrell in the studio, she had Pharrell do a different song, and then sat him down on the couch so they could diss Ms. Kim in her absence. They went on and on talking about how love is love and hate will not be tolerated.

As if.

Imagine if Ellen had had the courage or integrity to have this same hard conversation with Kevin Hart. Imagine if she had been so gracious and profoundly kind as to invite Kim Burrell onto her show to have a similar discussion. (Burrell doesn't consider herself homophobic or anti-gay. Quelle surprise!) Imagine if Ellen had pushed George W Bush, albeit gently, on the issue of his legacy on LGBT issues.

And speaking of the devil, George W was not kind when he stole the White House from Al Gore or when he stopped the vote recount in Florida. He was not kind when, after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, used that tragedy as an excuse to lie to the American people and browbeat Congress into the unnecessary and calamitous Invasion of Iraq.

Most of all, George Bush was not kind when he, for over two years, went around this country and told the nation and the world that gay couples wanting to get married was going to destroy the fabric of the American family, culture, values and law and order. I am only barely paraphrasing.

So, not because of her friendships, but because of her hypocrisy and the lack of integrity in her responses to the controversies, Ellen DeGeneres is, in my opinion, no longer a role model or hero to the lgbtq community. She is a deeply compromised media mogul whose "be nice" milquetoast social philosophies have no substantive merit or applicability.

Ellen's heart used to be in the right place. Now it seems that her heart has no place at all except the stratosphere of celebrity.

We wish her well out there, but we will no longer look to her as a guiding star.

Ellen has, from the time she came out bravely and historically in 1997, been whining to anyone who will listen that she is not a leader of the LGBT community, nor does she want to be one.

Well, Ellen, I think it is finally time for us to take you at your word. You are not a leader and you are not a role model to our community. If you would like to Stockholm Syndrome yourself all the way into the Cowboys end zone for a social media touchdown, that is your business. I, for one, will not be tuning in.

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Scott King is an Atlanta-based writer, analyst, and political consultant. He eats a carbon-based diet and does not care if you are masc.

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