One of my favorite television shows ever is Survivor, and I accept that. I accept that Mark Burnett, the big creator guy or whatever, is a creepy fundy who hates a lot of what I stand for. I accept that Survivor is a "reality" show, in which stuff really happens but is often manufactured. I really don't give a shit; I love the show, and in fact I recently applied to be on it.
Tonight, a big thing happened on Survivor. During the Tribal Council, Jeff Varner turned to Zeke Smith and said, "Why haven't you told anyone you're transgender?"
I gasped. The people at tribal council gasped. Doves flew in terror.
Not because Zeke is trans, but because Jeff outed him like that.
And I'm happy to say that the outrage of the tribe and of most of what I've read online so far is that Jeff outed Zeke, not that Zeke is transgender.
I really believe however, that CBS would not have aired this part of the tribal council if Zeke had not agreed to it. Jeff Probst, Executive producer, really isn't a monster, I don't think. If that's true, Jeff outed Zeke only to Jeff Probst and their other tribe members. Which doesn't make it right, but at least gives Varner some vindication in his choice to GO THERE.
Then again, this is TV. You're on camera; anything can be used. If you say it on camera, it exists in the wild.
Zeke, to his credit, was very quiet and classy throughout the whole ordeal. It may have indeed been the case that media savvy Zeke recognized Jeff's comment as his national outing no matter what he wanted. And he was OK with that. In that case, I just respect him for respecting the inevitable.
Or it could have been that he was just fucking outed by someone he trusted and he thought his best bet was to take the temperature of the room and go from there.
Thankfully, when Zeke was outed, the immediate outrage from the rest of the tribe was directed at Varner for outing him. Not one person was outraged that Zeke hadn't told them he was trans. Special support was provided by Sarah, who admitted that she probably thought trans people were weird from her upbringing, but seeing that oh, THIS is what a trans person looks like takes all of that away.
I think this was good. Zeke may have gotten thrust into a position that he didn't exactly ask for, but on the other hand, he ended up an outstanding ambassador.
So the next thing Survivor should do is cast me, right?
