Last month, the mid-90s to mid-2000s tv show Friends found its way to U.K. Netflix viewers’ screens.
While the show is on tv reruns constantly, this allowed fans to just watch all 10 seasons at their own will/pace, but sadly that caused some problems.
Viewers quickly went to Twitter to share their complaints about the series’s storylines. They called the story homophobic, transphobic, and misogynistic.
For instance, fans complained about Chandler’s discomfort and sometimes outright disgust towards his biological father who had come out as transgender.
“We don’t talk enough about how Chandler had 2 moms,” one person wrote on Twitter. “It was erased because Chandler was a homophobe and a transphobe, so he still called her his “dad”?”
In addition, others were not ok with Ross for being so hung-up on masculine gender norms such as being upset that his son was playing with a Barbie doll.
“I was just watching the friends male nanny episode and Ross is so rude and homophobic and problematic I hate him,” one person wrote.
“Re-watching “Friends” on @netflix is very enjoyable, but MY GOD was Ross Gellar a misogynistic homophobe,” another tweet said.
“Virtually every episode of Friends features a homophobic joke, the 90s were wild,” another tweet said.
Now after all the tweets have come out, and honestly after the buzz around this story had already died down, Matt LeBlanc is coming out to defend the show.
“I’ve heard those rumors too about people taking pot shots at Friends, but I don’t want to get into that. I disagree with all that.
“On Top Gear we tend to steer clear of any sort of political content, nothing too topical.
“On Friends we steered clear of that kind of thing, too. Friends was about themes that stand the test of time – trust, love, relationships, betrayal, family and things like that.”
On top of that, LeBlanc shared that even in his personal life he tries to steer clear of political or social justice discussions.
“I’m not in the business of making political jokes, politically incorrect jokes.
“I don’t want to make jokes that make people go ‘Ooh, that’s not my bag.’ I don’t like that, I run from that kind of stuff.
“Because that joke isn’t going to be relevant in six months. You talk about ‘Hey man, you lied to me,’ or ‘Wasn’t that fun?’ – that’ll always be relevant,” he added.
I don’t think he is a whole
I don't think he is a whole lot brighter than Joey Tribbiani. Just say Friends is a product of its time and leave it at that. It obviously treated transgender people, gayness and lesbians as punchlines. Denying it just makes you look like an @$$hole.
I love Friends. Critiques are
I love Friends. Critiques are fair, but remember that those leveling them are looking at a 90s show through the prism of what they find acceptable and where society has evolved to TODAY. The older the show, the more there will be to criticize on account of moral progression. We should be thinking 'look how far we've come since then!' I mean, if we want to criticize older shows through today's moral compass, let's go back to the The Honeymooners and I Love Lucy, and I'm sure we'll find much more to anger us.
Mr. LeBlanc thinks it’s
Mr. LeBlanc thinks it's "political" to make a tv show that's not transphobic, misogynistic or anti-gay? That's the sad thing about actors: sometimes they play wonderful characters but off-screen with no script to read you discover they're clueless gits.