Tyler Clementi, Wheel of Fortune and social transformation. . .

After Tyler Clementi's suicide last month, I found myself wondering why it is so difficult for us to take each other as we come. I recognize some people have religious reasons for not condoning homosexuality, but whose God really expects them to harass sensitive 18-year-olds to death?

All this made me remember a memorable half-hour I spent last January watching Wheel of Fortune. 

I like Wheel of Fortune. As a journalist, my days are full of deadlines, malfunctioning equipment, complicated logistics, etc. At the end of a particularly savage day, I like to relax amid the pleasantness emanating from Pat Sajack, Vanna White, and the disembodied voice of their buddy in the booth. I have never, in twenty years of occasional viewing, heard or seen Mr. Sajack, Ms. White or the Voice say or do anything mean or snide or ungenerous—either to each other or to a contestant. I find their company as relaxing as I used to find double Manhattans, of which, sadly, I drank up my lifetime allotment years ago.

So what profound social transformation am I talking about?

That night on Wheel there were as usual three contestants lined up behind their counter like chickens at a feed trough. The two end ones said, as is customary for married contestants, that they were married to wonderful persons, and the middle one — Robert — announced he was engaged to a wonderful person.

Well, engaged Robert turned out to be a whiz at Wheel. He spun lustily, clapped prodigiously, and in due course won a trip for himself and his fiancée, quite a bit of money, and the chance to play for the ever-invoked “big money” in the bonus round — coming up right after some words from the show’s sponsors.

It has always seemed to me that the Wheel of Fortune ads say a lot about Wheel of Fortune demographics (the socio/economic norm of people who watch the show). Wheel ads are invariably for such things as dentures, depression medication, and pills for men in need of sexual enhancement — in other words they’re for things that appeal to regular Americans, leading regular lives. This show must be beloved by millions of people who, like me, find real life chaotic and turn to Wheel of Fortune for a dose of unchanging and unchallenging entertainment.

So, after a long set of such ads, we reconvened on the Wheel set to watch Robert do his best in the bonus round—during which he would have ten seconds to figure out a word or a phrase filled in with just the letters RSTLNE, plus 3 consonants and a vowel of his choice. I had my fingers crossed for Robert. Anyone who succeeds in the bonus round wins something extra grand.

It’s traditional for persons playing the bonus round to introduce the friends or family members who have come with them. So the camera parked itself on a smiling young man, Pat Sajak asked Robert who he was, and Robert said that the young man was his fiancée, Chuck. The audience and Vanna White clapped an enthusiastic welcome, Robert went on to nail the bonus round and win 40-thousand dollars. Chuck came running over and the two of them hugged, while the camera panned the audience who were all smiling like newly crowned Miss Americas.

I sat up straight up in my chair and and  looked at my husband. “Charlie,” I said, “this is truly a memorable month to be alive and American! First we inaugurate a black President; now we welcome an engaged, same-sex couple onto Wheel of Fortune.”

I remember so clearly being stirred to my counter-culture, anti-war demonstrating toes while listening to Bob Dylan sing that “The Times They are a Changing.” I watched Robert and Chuck celebrating their good fortune on Wheel of Fortune and asked myself if it could possibly be, after all these years, that the times have finally, really changed.

If so, I guess, that change has yet to trickle down from Wheel of Fortune into college dorms. Let's just hope we haven't degenerated as a culture to the point that people find the kind of cruelty visited upon Tyler Clementi entertaining.