glazomaniac

i just want to say that the dean is my favorite character on community in no small part because he's the first flamboyant, over-the-top, pansexual imp on television with any depth. i love that you bring humanity to such a character, and i love that he has created/is part of/been accepted by a place that takes his outward oddity in stride.

the show doesn't have a perfect record, but it certainly has the best record on television of treating a character like the dean not as the butt of the joke, but as real person. the fact that the show seems to go out of its way to do that has always impressed me. i made a similar comment to dan harmon when he did an AMA, but i thought you deserved to hear it, too.

as someone whose gender is somewhat fluid, whose sexuality doesn't fit into a box, and who yearns to be accepted, i just wanted to thank you.

are you familiar with the concept of genderqueer? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genderqueer

i have identified as GQ/transwoman for a long time, though i have never really taken steps toward it more than in mind and occasionally in dress.

the character of dean pelton continually amazes me in his complete destruction of gender norms while being in what (in a regular college, anyway) would be a position of power. he's cartoonish and occasionally, the show slips up into areas where it seems a little too far, but on the whole, he has been a breath of fresh air.

i think there are a lot of people who laugh at his character for wearing "ridiculous outfits," but i have always found that the funniest part of those outfits isn't the fact that he crosses genderlines. it's the fact that he's the dean of a college dressing in costumes for frivolous reasons. it's never "oh, how silly, he's dressed as tina turner." it's "oh, how silly, he's dressed as tina turner for daylight savings."

and then, in virtual systems analysis, he comes out dressed as the dualidean of man, which is played for laughs a bit because of how absurd it is not because of what he was dressed as entirely but why ("what am i going to tell people? that i had good news and bad news?"), and then you come back around in the end in the most amazing way. when he came back in and talked about how he had one of the deepest conversations of his life...

i have no idea what his conversation was, but i appreciate that it was left up to our imaginations. in that moment, i felt like someone got it. the fact that he could, in the universe of greendale, go to the bank dressed as a man and a woman and end up having a deep conversation suggests a lot to me about the level of acceptance that exists in your work of art.

i find that the idea that the whole show is about seven very different people forming a community despite of their differences resonates all the more strongly because the concept of acceptance seems to pervade every layer of the show. the fact that gender identity, even in the absurd fashion of the dean, is part of your universe warms me.

it makes me feel that acceptance. it's beautiful.

i know i am rambling a bit, but i don't really know what to say except "thank you."

i wish i had a good question to follow this up with, but i can't think of anything. thank you for responding!