es misses out on opportunities to confront homophobia. Inlast week's episode, "Earthquake," Cam and Mitch took shelter under the table dressed in costumes for an Oscar Wilde-themeDGSDVXd bXVBruncGDhX. Mitch insisted the couple couldn't die in the quake because "if they find us in these outfits it's goingimplication that the man was simply deluding himself.And inan episode earlier this season, a nasty fight between Mitch's nieces Haley Dunphy and Alex Dunphy reached a touchy note when Haley suggested that Alex was a lesbian. Haley's mother chastises her for using sexual orientation as a slur, but how much more interesting would the scene have been if it had occurred in front of Cam and Mitch? There's no sign that Haley doesn't love her uncles and her airmed for me. This is actually more glaring than the lame kiss or the bungled identity issuesespecially since the show is set in and around Los Angeles, where Mitch and Cam could have gotten legally married at some point. Their need for the legal protections and benefits of marriage may not be particularly urgent as long as the show sticks to generally light-hearted topics (somehow, I don't seeModern Familyconfronting issues like hospital visitation rights). But given that the couple is raising a daughter, the legal state of their relationship has implications for her well-being and future. As of 2005, more thadopted cousin. Her slip into a casual, homophobic teenage mindset isn't shocking. It's an example of the kinds of compromises straight Americans make around sexual orientation all the time, loving family or friends without fully committing to their struggles for legal and societal equality.

While the parents in the other two families regularly touch, kiss, and demonstrate clear, ongoing sexual lives,Modern Family's creators made a big deal over creating a storyline to explain why Mitch and Cam are rarely seen touching, much less flirting, kissing, or displaying other obvious signs of sexual attraction. And in that storyline, the show whiffed. Rather than having Mitch overcome his fear of public displays of affection,the episodeshoehorned in a sly kiss so quick that many viewers missed it. It's alright for the audience to know that gay couples kiss. But apparently, the calculation is that, we're just too jumpy to actually watch a very realistic middle-aged and half-overweight gay couple share even a relatively chaste smooch on center-screen.