Religion, morality and the soap opera

Katy E. Shrout, over at Religion Dispatches, reflects on the role of morality and religion in the classic American soap opera, as one of the classic series comes to an end.

This week, the world will stop turning; or at least it will for the daytime soap opera As The World Turns, which officially ends after 53 years. With its ratings plummeting for more than a decade, As The World Turns is only the most recent casualty of a changing daytime market. The American daytime soap itself, that long-maligned and much-loved genre, seems to be on its deathbed.

For those interested in the relationship between religion and American popular culture, the soap opera has been a fascinating case. Soap operas, like most media marketed to women, have long been preoccupied with right and wrong.

And while the soap has tended to promote a conservative emphasis on continuity, heterosexual romantic love, family, and Christian piety, the explicit use of religion in soaps (while certainly notable) is generally subservient to questions of morality.

Even when the plot seems ludicrous, characters are frequently put into situations that raise questions important to their audiences: Do I choose my true love or my career? Is it right to pursue a relationship with someone my family doesn’t approve of? Are there times when it is right to be dishonest? Is good behavior always rewarded with happiness? Can evil people truly be redeemed?

Posted by Andrew Gerns on September 17, 2010 6:00 PM | |
Comments (2)

And we must not forget One Life to Live's sometime Senior Warden of St. James Episcopal Church, Victoria Lord Burke Riley Buchanan Carpenter Davidson Banks who, if nothing else, proves that the remarriage canon of the Episcopal Church is alive and well -- at least for straight people.

Posted by Paul Woodrum [TypeKey Profile Page] | September 17, 2010 6:53 PM

And while the soap has tended to promote a conservative emphasis on continuity, heterosexual romantic love, family, and Christian piety, the explicit use of religion in soaps (while certainly notable) is generally subservient to questions of morality.

All the more notable then, that last year, one soap opera (which expired last year, Sigh) combined all of the above list (inc. family and Christian piety) with a story celebrating lesbian romantic love: "Otalia" (which stands for "Olivia + Natalia") on Guiding Light

[See my ecstatic paean, mid-obsession http://notquiterevjph.blogspot.com/2009/04/as-culture-turns.html" rel="nofollow">here. The show is over, but the Otalia love lingers on! ;-)]

As far as (specifically) As the World Turns goes, they had a notable m/m romantic story, known as "Nuke" (for "Noah + Luke"), in their final years.

I'm only recently (and slightly ambivalently! ;-/) introduced to the world of the daytime drama (Just as it seems a dying art: that's so *me*, to find 'em now!). At their best (and that's still infrequently), they have a way of both reflecting back the culture, AND nudging the viewers into a slightly more expansive, less judgmental, perspective (after a while, the "Log of the Other vs the Splinter of Me" distinction all but desolves. At base in our humanity, we're ALL a bunch of Drama Queens! ;-p)

JC Fisher

Posted by tgflux [TypeKey Profile Page] | September 17, 2010 7:15 PM

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