Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Jumping on the Glee Train to Stop Bullying


I have always been a Gleek since the day Glee first started airing. Although I do have to admit, in my opinion, i think the show has been slowly going down hill the last couple of seasons. I always watch and keep up with every episode because I still love it. It's based off a music club at a high school, so it goes along with my "Music" blog. The season 3 winter finale aired last week February 21, 2012 and although this season wasn't the best, they defiantly ended on a great episode that pulled on the heart strings the entire time. Glee covers various topics kids go through when in high school  ranging from what prom dress to wear to peer pressure to do drugs and alcohol. Glee frequently covers the topic of bullying that goes on in high school particularly bullying that happens to kids who are gay. This season finale, "On my Way", dealt a lot to do with bullying that gay teens deal with in high school. I hate to spoil what happens, but it happens in the first couple minutes of the show. The show opens up with Blaine on the stage singing "Cough Syrup" and flipping between camera shots of Blaine singing and video shots of David Karofsky being bullied about being gay at his new school. As the song is ending you watch David Karofsky crying, dressing up in a suit and making his belt into a loop. At this point, it was clear what his intentions were. I was yelling at the TV trying to stop him as I watch him look upward at the ceiling, and you then see his feet step onto a chair and the scene ends. Here's the link to the video of "Cough Syrup" from the episode. I and probably many others were holding back tears at having just watched Karofsky commit suicide, or at least attempt. Luckily, his dad caught him in time and saved him. Regardless, I thought it was the saddest episode ever covered by glee. I wanted to believe that this was an exaggeration of an outcome of bullying but I very well know this happens in real life, which is so unbelievably sad. The ruthless bullying that goes on in the world and at schools is just awful. Even though this episode was extremely sad and heartbreaking to watch, I applaud Glee for opening up some peoples' eyes to some of the outcomes of bullying. The littlest actions can hopefully make someone feel slightly better and worth it. Just caring about other people in any way possible can hopefully brighten someones' day. The episode continues going on and you see Glee compete against their rivals, the Warblers, at Regional's. For once, both teams are on the same page during the competition, that it's not about winning, it's about helping each other and realizing bad actions have bad consequences. Like I said before, not only has Glee's episode topics been going down hill for me, their song choices have too. There wasn't a song choice problem for me this episode though. I loved the songs both teams sang at regional's and they related so well to the topic, like usual. My favorite performances in this episode were the Warbler's Regional's performance of "Stand" and "Glad you Came" and than also the performance of "Stronger" sung by the Glee club.
The other two performances I loved, "Glad you Came" and "Stronger", can be watched here along with some other Glee performances. 

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