#is heavily male dominated with a Lot of very disgusting type of men

[bakingmoomins]

very dumb pet peeve is when math and techy things and shit like that are referred to as straight ppl things

[pseudowho]

Hi Haitch!

Firstly, I’d like to preface this with saying that I really appreciate the community atmosphere you’ve created on your page; the “shoot the shit” vibes you have with mutuals is genuinely so refreshing. It also has helped someone like me, who is generally too anxious to interact with people online, feel comfortable enough to dip my toes into asks a bit more (albeit anonymously for now lol).

Anyways, this all goes to say that I recently watched a video essay that made me think, “I want to share this with someone right now”. And, as someone who has written a lot of pieces (which btw: 15/10, *chef’s kiss) and explored the genre, I figured why not send it your way! https://youtu.be/cjG2OqCKDc4?si=ouISfbT97deriKmC (“the unknown pleasures of problematic romance”).

There’s no requirement to respond to this or anything btw! Just wanted to drop a quick message of appreciation and share some (hopefully interesting) food for thought. :)

I'm so pleased my blog is a safe space for you. I'm as sincere about it in life as I am on my blog. Please feel free to always interact with me, as you know I don't bite.

I'm watching this video as I type, and honestly, she's got a lot of great things to say! Thank you for sending it to me.

I have to say, the toxic trope exploration has always had two purposes in my mind; fantasising in a safe place about things that would be terrifying or dangerous in real life, and deconstructing our own fears by reading them in type.

I think, what a lot of women around me find frustrating, is that a lot of the traits that we see as desirable in a male partner (protectiveness, the wish to be a caregiver, the wish for them to take charge), have been heavily built into the wider "toxic male" expectation, and this wider "toxic male" tends to come with far less desirable traits.

Either that, or these desirable traits come with the expectation of exchange, like:

"You want protection? I own you, then."

"You want to be cared for? Take the lion's share of the mental and emotional household burden, then."

"You want me to take charge? All or nothing, then."

With the heavy heavy advancement of anti-women movements (incels, red pill, 'not all men', Andrew Tate, etc.) there has been a progressive and rapidly growing attitude that women are stupid and don't know what they want from a man, that they're users, that they 'predate' men to take advantage of them financially, and many other bundles of filth.

This movement has been popularised so badly, I think, that there has been a societal shift towards conditioning very young women to look for a 'dominant', and often older and wealthier, male partner. While this is displayed as being in our favour, it is, rather, a further attempt to disenfranchise women, and place them in relationships where they will be more vulnerable to being abused, under the guise of being 'cared for'.

There was also a spectacular interview with Gillian Anderson about her new book, which is full of confessions of womens' sexual fantasies. Anderson raised how acutely she was shamed for discussing her fantasies in a public forum. This is, of course, another way women are routinely attacked; mens' sexual fantasies have been given public forum (and women have been expected to cater to them) since time immemorial, and once more, in a very Victorian fashion, women are disgusting for voicing sexual desires.

In other words, in other words...women are routinely exploring sex and relationships through tropes, and many men hate it, because if there's one thing many men hate, it's women putting their heads together and recognising that they're not the problem.

I'm not here to 'not all men' by the way, so don't come at me with that crap. When women talk about this, we know exactly the type of men we're talking about, and if it's not relevant to the men in your life, move on.

Love,

-- Haitch xxx

[mizukagami-takamagahara]

After seeing the ass post. I personally think Blazblue is actually a bit more tame with it‘s fanservice at least in the main story. Most fanservice takes place in the gag reels if I remember correctly (and in the animation sprites).

Personally I see the fanbase as the most unhinged horny part of Blazblue. ( granted there are the infamous art books so I guess the dev tram is guilty too).

What is your opinion on the male fanservice. Which male characters fit more to the female gaze? I get the feeling that Hibiki and Hazama are usually pretty popular.

Fanservice is such a fascinating topic. Each country and culture has different standards and levels of „shame“ I‘d call it for certain fanservice. Beauty standards also often differ. I mean japanese media has always been more infamous for its more overt fanservice in its media.

This opening is going to sound pedantic, but I PROMISE you, it’s relevant, and- spoiler- it’s going to be used to confirm your theory about Hibiki and Hazama!

The concept of the “female gaze” arguably doesn’t exist, from the same academic standpoint as the male gaze does! The media phenomena we call the “male gaze” is a product of the culture the media is produced in- it is the specific way that female characters are influenced by being produced and consumed in a patriarchal, or heavily male-influenced, culture. By that definition, there in no female gaze, because we just don’t live in a society with such an overwhelming Heterosexual Female influence.

Though on that same point I would present the counterpoint that we DO have a way to see ‘female gaze media’- look at fujoshi/yaoi circles. Yaoi circles are dominated by women, many of whom are attracted to men, and since fujoshi culture has been such a taboo subculture for so many years, it has had to exist on the fringes- in a space with incredibly little influence from male fans or producers. Of course, I’m using generalizations here, you have to to discuss the ‘gaze’ phenomena, but do you see what I mean??? The “boy’s love” or “mlm” genre has historically disgusted male producers and consumers. Their resulting insistence on avoiding or crushing the genre has created an incredibly unique subculture of media.

In a lot of conversations, when people (often men) think about “female gaze” as a general consumer, not really studying it as a media term- they tend to approach the female gaze, and attraction, as a direct counterpart to the male gaze and male attraction. This leads to inaccurate conclusions, trying to categorize a fanservice-y male character by the same metrics as the agreed-upon traits of a fanservice-y female character; things like lots of exposed skin, a sultry air, or exaggerated proportions. With these (inaccurate) qualifiers, we get shirtless guys like Bang or Azrael, or flirty guys like Kagura.

But when you actually look at consumer statistics, fan polls, etc., you find that the most popular characters with women are the characters most popular in yaoi content. The big muscle-y “chad” types actually cater to the male gaze just like characters like Litchi, Bullet, and Nine do, they just address a different fantasy. The big booby women are attractive, a thing male fans/producers see as desirable to have, while the big beefcakes are what they want to be, how they want to be seen. Characters like Bang and Azrael are actually more popular with gay men in the fandom, where they are ADORED, than they are with most women in the fandom, who often ignore them entirely.

Your observation that Hibiki and Hazama are popular with women are spot on! Apparently, Hibiki Kohaku of all characters is the king of the female gaze in BlazBlue. In the west he’s not very popular at all, but in the Japanese fandom he reigns supreme. Hazama is way up there too- remember the bathtub scene from the CS gag reel? Lastly, Jin is also HUGELY popular with women. I’ve seen some fun memes about Sumeragi drawing Jin, and the differences between her work for the official series, vs her personal work for her fellow fujoshi. It’s wild to see it, but I guess this is the effect of the female gaze! This is what it looks like!

I don’t see the appeal personally, but I am a massive Hazama simp, so clearly I’m not as exempt from the “ladies love twinks” theorem as I like to think I am.

Welp, I think this post is long enough. I’m sorry I couldn’t cover every point in your ask- it really got me thinking about a lot of things. I wanted to talk some about the interesting cultural perception and, as you said, shame, of fanservice as a concept in general. But. Like. ~700 words is probably enough words for now. And if I try to cover to many topics in one post, I’ll end up muddying my points.

I used to be massively squicked by yaoi, and I’m still not a member of the fujo community, but over the past few years it’s been fascinating to learn more about this kind of stuff. Though since I am still an outsider, my understanding can’t cover the full picture of this topic. I do have a friend who would be more qualified to speak about this, as she is both a Woman In Fandom and a student of media, art, and culture! If anyone is particularly interested in this discussion, I’d be happy to loop her into the conversation to share more.