By Emily Scott
Business and Op-Ed Editor
In the last decade, television networks have become more open to portraying homosexuality on their shows. From “Will and Grace” to more recently, “Modern Family”, it has been displayed in comedies more than any other genre.
As Netflix series’ begin to take over in 2014, “Orange Is the New Black”, breaks sexuality barriers by introducing a well-fashioned inmate, who just so happens to be transgender.
Enter Laverne Cox – an Alabama native – who began identifying as a woman during college and has gone through drastic changes in the past 15 years of her life. She began wearing skirts in high school and certainly received stares for it. “I’ve dealt with crazy amounts of rejection,” Cox said in an interview with an Alabama newspaper.
It is rare enough to find a transgender woman on such a high-rated television show, but even more unique for one of color. Cox plays a former firefighter, now Sophia Burset, who commits credit-card fraud to finance her sex-change operation and is now imprisoned in a woman’s correctional facility.
This Netflix series is not her first taste of television. She has been involved in reality series such as, “I Want to Work for Diddy” and produced/starred in “TransFORM Me”; both in which she embraced her sexuality. “Orange Is the New Black” could be considered her first breakthrough role; it is a more realistic outlook of a transgender woman in this society.
The comedy-drama series was created by Jenji Kohan –also famous for “Weeds” – and is based on a memoir by Piper Kerman, the main character of the show. It is far from your clear-cut dramedy that fits the perfect Hollywood stereotypes. It is realism that can be felt whole-heartedly and still is characterized as funny.
Cox is a transgendered actress, playing a transgendered woman. This is a triumphant win for all LGBT activists and the ratings do not lie; it being a top Netflix series.
The question lies in what does this mean for the future of the media and their portrayal of homosexuality and transgenderism? It means change, according to Cox.
Cox was a keynote speaker at the 2014 National Conference on LGBT Equality: Creating Change. She delivered a powerful speech on what exactly needs to be done to advocate such change – including love and justice.
She began with an introduction to her childhood “as a 6th grader who swallowed a bottle of pills because I did not want to be myself…and I was a ‘sin’ and a problem”. An important outlook of children growing up and realizing who they actually are, but don’t have the right support groups.
Cox addressed all the necessary topics for creating the change in the LGBT community. “There is no justice” she said of the crimes against her ‘trans-woman sisters’, which is an extremely relevant point she goes off of.
Cox goes on to discuss the importance of the portrayal of transgendered people in the media. She brings up an interview her and Carmen Carrera, a trans-woman model, had on the Katie Couric show. Cox discussed that the media needs to stop focusing on the invasive questions on the surgery and transitions into their proper gender; rather focus on the accomplishments they have made and how they are breaking barriers.
“We can set the conversation and how our stories should be told in mainstream media,” Cox said.
She is one of the few people in the acting world who is not afraid to show her true colors. In Hollywood, that is a hard characteristic to find.
Cox is changing the name for television. She is creating a much more open environment for all in the LGBT community.
This is the most important part of the work Cox is advocating, transgendered people need to know they are people and are loved.
