In an attempt to avoid spoiling Razor for those who haven’t seen it yet I’ll put this below the fold. From a reader:

Okay, I’m sensing you think having Cain be a lesbian is some big, contrived, PC deal. But you’re the one making it such a big deal. It actually fits if you didn’t have your own PC code. Adama, Apollo etc all have person story lines. And Sharon’s betrayal had extra sting to Adama because of the father/daughter/mentor type relationship. Well, Cain and #6 are two adult women and cylons are excellent manipulators (and of course used sex before with Baltar). Also it expains some of Cain’s allowance of such harsh treatment on Pegasus. In season two. Cain kicks an already broken #6 in front of Baltar. I don’t think the torture and humiliation were actually getting much information. I know Cain already had good enough reason to be outraged (the whole 99.99% human race dead thing) but she did seem particularly pissed.Unless your’re just against any mention of a gay character on TV, some characters will “just happen to be gay” and I think this case made sense.

Me: I think this gets everything just about exactly backwards. First, I don’t think my objections have anything to do with political correctness in any sense. Indeed, one irony of the Cain-is-a-lesbian storyline is how cliched it is and how much it plays into anti-gay stereotypes. Some may remember in the 1990s how gay groups protested negative portrayals of gays in the movies. The prince in Braveheart was too flouncy. Sharon Stone was too insane to be a lesbian in Basic Instinct (though she was really just bisexual, and the movie was bi-stupid). Well here’s admiral Cain, the mannish, brutal, unfeeling bitch and — ta dah! — she’s a lesbian! Maybe it would have offended gay groups more if they gave her Mitt Romney’s haircut and made her strap on a tool belt?

Regardless, my reaction the lesbian angle had nothing to do with any of that. What I didn’t like about it was that it was such a transparent sop to the fanboy chorus. Oh, they’re lezzzzzzzbianss. Mmmmm. Maybe in the uncut version they’ll don their Daisy Dukes and wash a Viper and get all sudsy in the process.

Update: From a reader:

I’ll admit I did think it was stereotypical to see Cane portrayed as a lesbian, and it did feel a little ‘thrown in’. What I did like about it was that it showed that even in a relationship, it wasn’t Cane that gave the codes to 6 – she was still too ‘by the book’ (well, except for the relationship with a subordinate). Instead Shaw looked at the relationship as a sign SHE could break the rules and give the codes to 6.
I thought that was an interesting twist.