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As the former head writer for Dawson's Creek, Greg Berlanti is probably a fountain of insights into whatever led a pre-assimilated Katie Holmes to ditch her once promising career for a life of home-imprisonment and engineered-child rearing. AfterElton recently interviewed the openly gay Brothers and Sisters EP, but instead chose to focus on the show's matter-of-fact approach to gay content. And to what can we attribute those refreshingly frank, four-way conference calls in which the titular siblings gossip candidly about their gay brother's recent one-night stand? Why, the mere fact that the really gay-sounding dude who used to answer the phones at ABC back in '97 is now their VP of Drama Development:

AE: So you think it's behind the scenes — younger studio execs — as opposed to viewer reactions that are driving increased gay visibility on television? It seems to me — I'm looking from the outside of course, so you can tell me if I'm wrong — but there doesn't seem to be a lot of negative public push-back to Kevin's love life on Brothers & Sisters.

GB: Absolutely, and I think because the people who were assistants 10 years ago have become executives now, they are less afraid of what people are going to say because they've seen now that it's not such a big deal. Whereas the last batch of execs was maybe living with their fears of 10, 15 years ago.

Often referred to as the Dark Age of the Self-Loathing Executive Gay, the 90s were responsible for the proliferation of the mythical Gay Eunuch, who roamed sexlessly across the TV landscape, offering heartfelt advice to their far sluttier female friends and acquaintances. Who could have guessed that the much-abused call-rollers of the era, while being reamed for failing to provide their TV exec bosses with a room-temperature can of Crystal Pepsi as requested, were secretly thinking to themselves, "One day, I'll be in that chair—and I won't be too much of a pussy to show two guys tonguing in primetime, either!"