Ginia Bellafante of the New York Times got around last week to reviewing the new offering from the Logo network, “The Happiest Gay Couple in the World.” And she think it’s pretty lame, finding most of its humor in recycling stereotypes of gays and lesbians — and ultimately, for all its explicitness, being fairly conservative:

It says something that the grossest joke on ‘Rick & Steve’ thus far hasn’t been about illicit sex but about procreation … The difference-versus-equality debates that factionalized nearly every social movement of the 20th century seem well over in the gay and lesbian world. ‘Rick & Steve’ is just more proof of how forcefully one side has won.

I previewed the show myself a few weeks back — basing my observations only on the first episode — and I felt it was fairly radical. I can see where Bellafante is coming from but I think she is denying the power of normalcy.

Sure, within the gay community, the “equality” faction won. Rosie O’Donnell and others are out to prove that gays and lesbians and their families are no threats to the American mainstream (in fact, they are being posited as catalysts of it).

But within American society as a whole, “equality” is still a nebulous concept — just watch the Democratic candidates dance around the idea of gay marriage. Even if few heterosexuals tune into shows on the Logo networks, the message is still significant. Gays and lesbians are not just Rick and Steve or Dana and Kristen. They are your neighbors, your co-workers, your friends, etc.

If that message gets across, that would be make me, well, one of the happiest cultural critics in the world.