I have to give Glee credit where credit is due: it’s not easy to be progressive on TV, especially when your parent company is News Corp. Through the past season and a half, Glee has shortly approached a broad range of sensitive topics that many other current shows in it’s time-slot wouldn’t dare touch. Unfortunately, it always quickly steps away, afraid run with the issue. When Quinn became pregnant, the writers were quick to make it clear that she would not be getting an abortion, despite abortion being a consideration many viewers have to make at a young age and with little guidance.

The show hasn’t done much of a service for gay people either. Applause for the show’s gay characters shouldn’t exceed a polite golf-clap. Kurt, the gay character with the greatest spotlight, is the spitting image of America’s unfortunately stereotyped view of homosexuals. Other queer characters are offensive (Sandy) or their relationships are weak (Brittany and Santana’s strange bisexual connection.) True, these relationships and personalities do exist in reality, but they’re over-portrayed in media and do a serious disservice to the majority of gay people who don’t fit those molds. America-at-large only sees these outlandish and promiscuous bitches obsessed with pop music and fashion characters. No wonder LGBT people aren’t seen as equals.

All that changed with tonight’s departure from everything we’ve come to know from Glee.

While I appreciate Blaine, the exceedingly handsome object of Kurt’s current fickle dreams (and the first one who is actually gay), I don’t think he is the big news from this episode.

I know I wasn’t the only viewer shocked when Dave, one of the show’s two core bullies, grabbed Kurt during a confrontation and kissed him. Just like that, prime-time has a gay kiss, and nobody expected it to happen. It wasn’t fragile or shy, it didn’t come from an interior designer, and the character was most certainly not comfortable with his sexuality. This was an angsty teenage football player, afraid of who he might be, losing control of his impulses momentarily before ducking back to safety. It’s the first time I’ve been able to sympathize with a Glee character. I was never a bully, but I did plenty of things to avoid confronting my sexuality growing up.

The rest of the show was typical, a few Aesop’s Fables sprinkled through corny humor and a handful of delightful albeit over-engineered songs. Maybe T-Pain can have his auto-tune machines back when Glee goes on hiatus.