Will & grace did more for you than queer as folk. Discuss.

"Will had as much sex on camera as anybody on Friends had on camera. It's a sitcom. Nobody has sex on camera. Will had lots of dates. Will was dating Patrick Dempsey and he married Taye Diggs. ... I think that a lot of the rhetoric in the kind of anti-Will & Grace press was misguided and was from people that had stopped watching the show about three years earlier. A lot happened to Will with regards to romance, with regards to relationships and, like I said, he walked down the aisle in his own apartment with Taye. I think the show actually ended up being -- as much as it got very outrageous near the end, it also got more outspoken. And I think that we weren't necessarily a show for the gay community alone; we were for America to maybe start making some inroads. So, while Queer As Folk or something might have been a more true representation of how the gay community, particularly in cities, lives, I don't think you could find as many young gay people that would say, "Because my parents watched Queer As Folk, I was able to come out to them." What they do say is, "Because my mom loved Will Truman or thought Jack was funny, I was able to tell them when I was 15 or 17 that I was gay," and the show broke ground in that way."- says Eric McCormack, who played Will Truman on Will & Grace, in an interview with Rex Wockner.

I perhaps watched an episode or two of Will & Grace a long time ago; but I think it does deserve it's criticism; it was repressed and contentless. My homophobic mother watched it, and it didn't change her mind about a thing--neither did queer as folk, as they were just more television mindlessly watched to people like her. Queer as folk definitely touched on real social issues, was diverse and intelligent; w/g was not.

QAF US was well written and it did show a wide array of different gay people, lifestyles, perspectives, relationships. It is television, and I don't believe television is socially transformative in itself--and I don't rely on it (or watch at all.) I don't think it's wrong to criticize representation in media, but clearly it isn't an end all and won't eradicate social conditions existing in the real world--that should be evident to everyone by now.

I agree, Will & Grace is groundbreaking, just like Sex and the City was.

It's a shame both shows ended.

I liked both shows very much. Straight friends of mine actually enjoyed watching both shows after I recommended them. I miss both shows. They helped crack some barriers for those of us in GLBT community.