It was not until the 1960s—after the flurry of post-World War II marriages, the baby boom, and widespread disappointment in the resulting domesticity of women—that a new movement for gender-role equality began. In The Feminine Mystique, author Betty Friedan’s descriptions of feelings of depression, guilt, and a lack of meaning resonated with many women whose lives were limited to the housewife role. In the 1960s and throughout the 1970s, feminism and the "sexual revolution" confronted the norms of previous decades. The oral contraceptive pill, introduced in the 1960s, and later the intrauterine device (IUD), morning-after pills, and spermicides gave women newfound security in pursuing sexual pleasure with greatly reduced fear of pregnancy (Ofman, 2000).
By 1965 the Supreme Court had made contraceptive use by married couples legal, and by 1972 contraceptive use by unmarried individuals was legal. The widespread acceptance of contraceptives and the subsequent availability of legal abortion by Supreme Court mandate in 1973 permitted sexuality to be separated from procreation as never before in Western cultures. The world had changed, too, so that many people were concerned with the ecological and economic costs of bearing children—costs that were not as relevant in the preindustrial world.
Masters and Johnson’s Human Sexual Response (1966) and Human Sexual Inadequacy (1970) illuminated women’s capacity for orgasm and propelled sex therapy into a legitimate endeavor. Sexual self-help books appeared, such as Our Bodies, Ourselves (Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, 1971) and For Yourself: The Fulfillment of Female Sexuality (Barbach, 1975). These books emphasized women’s sexual self-awareness, whereas The Joy of Sex (Comfort, 1972) highlighted varied, experimental sexual behavior for couples.
In the increasingly tolerant atmosphere of the late 1960s and the 1970s, attitudes began to change toward a long-standing taboo, homosexuality. Gays and lesbians began to openly declare their sexual orientation and to argue that such a personal matter should not affect their rights and responsibilities as citizens. In 1973 the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its diagnostic categories of mental disorders. Then, the early 1980s brought the first AIDS diagnosis. The so-called gay plague dramatically increased the visibility of homosexual individuals and amplified both negative and positive public sentiments toward homosexuality.
Current efforts taking place in election campaigns and in federal and state legislatures, both supporting and opposing civil unions or marriage for same-sex couples, exemplify the continuing disagreement in the United States about homosexuality. Almost every election results in both gains and losses on each side of the issue. Notably, Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration speech was the first by a president-elect to include "gays and straights" in his description of Americans, and in 2011 a CNN Poll reported that support for marriage equality broke the 50% barrier for the first time (CNN, 2011).
Mainly as a result of gay activism, by the mid-1990s, television began to incorporate gays and lesbians into programming. Gay and lesbian characters appeared on shows such as ER, Sex and the City, Roseanne, and Friends. Ellen DeGeneres’s coming-out show on Ellen was an event of the 1997 season. She currently has a daily TV talk show and in 2009 became CoverGirl’s spokesperson. In the footsteps of Ellen’s trailblazing lesbian lead character, Will and Grace had gay and lesbian story lines for eight seasons, with main characters who were likable, although at times they received some criticism for reinforcing stereotypes (Colucci, 2006). In 2010 more gay and lesbian characters appeared on television than in prior years, including in Modern Family, Glee, Weeds, Friday Night Lights, Desperate Housewives, Brothers & Sisters, Project Runway, and The Amazing Race (Alston, 2010).
Changes in the media’s portrayal of homosexuality illustrate how the media simultaneously reflect and influence sexual information, attitudes, and behaviors (Gross, 2001). What do the media say to us about sexuality? The following sections explore that very question.