“Don't want no short people ‘round here”: Confronting heterosexism's intolerance through comic and disruptive narratives in Ally McBeal

To illustrate how media narratives can challenge normative heterosexuality, this study analyzes an episode of the television dramedy Ally McBeal in which the life and murder of a young transsexual are situated within the comedic context of Randy Newman's bitingly satirical song, “Short People,” who, according to the lyrics, “got no reason to live.” The narratives strategically juxtapose comic and absurd scenarios with dramatic and tragic events, with the effect of disrupting heterosexual ideology and, in turn, offering spectators a humorous and non‐threatening media environment in which to experience issues of gender fluidity and the consequences of society's heterosexism, and its inherent intolerance of difference.