#people think of sexuality and think gay straight bi. or gay lesbian straight bi

[bringthekaos]

are you gonna keep writing jayvik now that viktor is confirmed straight?

Gunna answer this one diplomatically, even though this ask was clearly sent with malice. Warning for Act 2 spoilers (and possible Act 3 spoilers, since the footage used in the "The Line" music video is most likely from Act 3).

First, when I continue to write Jayvik, it will probably have to be an AU anyway, because I have about 2% confidence that both of them make it out of this show alive.

Second: he is still not confirmed straight. He was depicted taking Sky's hands as she fades away for a second time. This means nothing, romantically. It means he regrets this is happening, he knows it's his fault, and he wishes to bring comfort to her in her last moments.

And that's if it even is her, and not a manifestation of his guilt, given that she doesn't look like herself at all in his hallucinations, or whatever it is. Her eyebrows are thinner in the hallucination, and her hair is wholly different: not as high on her head nor as tightly bundled or curly. This points to a suggestion that this manifestation is his best effort of representing her in his mind, and it is wrong because he didn't know her well at all.

Not to mention, in the very few interactions that they had (before Jayce's Progress Day Speech and when she asked him to walk home together), he was shown just... not receptive. It could have been read as disinterest because he is gay (which obviously many people did), or just that he has a very one-track mind on his research at the time, and isn't even cognizant of the missed social interaction. But either way, there was no foundation for connection, intimate or otherwise, between them. Certainly not enough for the heavy-handed and forced connection depicted in season 2.

THAT SAID, I am a very ship and let ship person. I have certainly fabricated ships from less. Hell, I've shipped characters that never even interacted in canon. And I have no problem with the SkyVik ship, given that his sexuality was never confirmed one way or the other. Honestly, if it had been built up better in the writing, there is potential there! Both of them being from Zaun, and clawing their way into the Academy, which as Jayce said has a success rate of 3%. But it is not groundbreaking or even remotely incorrect to say that this ship is fabricated (and not in a negative sense. It's just fact). There wasn't enough to support it. He brushed her off multiple times. And he only seems to give her the attention after she is dead, which again points to a motivation of guilt: he wishes he'd gotten to know her and her aspirations and dreams before her life was cut short by him. But it's too late.

And lastly, the thing everyone needs to understand is this: Jayce and Viktor were released in League in 2012, and Jayce was specifically built as the mirror to Viktor. It was honestly quite a poetic "formed from the rib" kind of release for Jayce, who came 7 months after Viktor. These two had no canon romantic involvements in that time beyond mere speculation, so naturally they had very queer undertones for almost ten years before Arcane came out. And I don't think it's much of a leap to be disappointed when the producers and distributors of the show decided that they couldn't make their show "too gay" for mainstream audiences. Especially when the pre-established League fanbase consisted of 87% men (source), and a lot of cishet men are threatened/disgusted by/afraid of gay men, yet fetishize lesbian sex. So yeah. The Jayvik shippers get understandably disappointed when their 10-year old ship gets no-homo'd at the finish line.

So to answer your original question. Yeah. I am probably gunna continue to write Jayvik. Yes, even if they're both "confirmed" straight. I will hit them both with the bi hammer. And I will tag my stuff accordingly, and "stay in my lane" so to speak, and everyone is welcome to block me if they don't wanna see it. I'm not gunna go around harassing SkyVik shippers, just as I have never harassed MelJayce shippers. And I'm sure this will be called "misogyny" by many who'd like to assign a moral high ground to their attempts at eradicating the JayVik ship. Trust me, if I could have my ship without disregarding two amazing women, I would do it. But I can't, because someone at the decision making table decided to give two characters who never had any romantic involvements in League the no homo treatment.

And of course, as always, the season is not over. Some of this could change. But my love of the JayVik ship won't. Block me if you don't like it.

For obvious reasons, anon is now off ✌️

[contagious-watermelon]

sometimes being aro really is like. hm. I just don't have a sexuality. someone ripped it out one day and now I feel nothing for no one

[werecreature-addicted]

internalized biphobia is crazy "Maybe I'm just faking it, I really do like guys what if I'm straight" I dated a woman for three years. that's not "faking it for attention" behavior

[theprinceandthewitch]

The self hating bisexual TOH fans are really something else

[here-there-were-dragons]

my mother is absolutely convinced of some nonsense conspiracy theory that (in her words) "originally humanity lived in peaceful all-woman societies of goddess worshippers who took care of eachother and lived in harmony, while males were roving loners that had no society and never cooperated. that changed when the men banded together and overthrew the peaceful woman-dominated societies, and enslaved us all." and, according to her, this is proof that a woman-dominated world would be innately more peaceful, and that men are innately violent and evil and should be either barred from holding any legal power or leadership roles or at least should be (again in her words) "gelded like bulls" to remove their testosterone before even being considered for such a thing.

she also evidently believes that the problem with all religions today is primarily that they aren't "goddess worshippers", because she seems to think goddess religions are inherently peaceful and pure too and seems to be especially obsessed with "Isis" in particular. the very very few times she's openly considered it unambiguously bad for some population or another to have been exterminated (she's got a bad case of devil's advocating genocide brain), she's gone out of her way to make up some crap about how said people were a peaceful society of goddess-worshippers, almost always of isis. delusions of isis-worship seem to be the only thing that ever causes her to consider any arab or middle-eastern culture, society, or ethnicity to be relatively uncomplicatedly undeserving of extermination, in fact, because every fucking time she doesn't immediately start devils-advocating it and making remarks about how "the rest of the world should box them in and let them blow eachother up" it's when she's whinging on about how whatever specific micro-ethnicity she's thinking about are or were traditional persecuted isis-worshippers.

the sole major exception to her weird fixation on isis worship justifying worthiness of life is the whole israel thing going on, in which she has consistently made very obvious that literally the only reason she's against the genocide of palestine is because it gives her an excuse to even more openly hate jewish people than she already did. and honestly i'm not sure even that's true because i think she's made some offhand remarks about palestinians having probably been peaceful isis worshipers before the jews infected them with christianity or something anyway.

so for the last, however fucking long it's been i've been constantly having to listen to her go off about how this behavior is in the jew's blood or whatever and that they literally invented all genocide because somehow the concept didn't exist before them and wouldn't have ever been invented by the rest of humanity without those jewish aliens dropping it in i fucking guess apparently and she furthermore goes on about how every single genocide and mass-oppression movement in history is directly inspired by them, ESPECIALLY the nazis, and THEN i have to listen to her rant about how, basically, wwii was something they entirely brought on themselves by "dominating the economy and treating everyone not them like shit" and the nazis were just "using their own tactics back at them". and then she goes on a rant about how the people the original jews exterminated back in the day (aka the first ever genocide, which they invented, because jews invented genocide and hate according to her) in the middle east region were peaceful matriarchal isis-worshipers.

and then she starts making comments about arabs being backwards and palestinians either being mysogynist muslims that should be boxed in to blow eachother up with everyone else or secret peaceful isis worshippers corrupted by men's cruel hand, sometimes in the same sentence, entirely dependent on which group she's more in the mood to hate at the time.

it's exhausting. beyond exhausting. her sole purpose in existence seems to be to have the singularly most exhausting set of politics physically possible to fit into one person.

just, sometimes i think, if there really is anything at all to the incredibly stupid and inexplicably popular idea that anyone or anything has a Purpose tm to exist for, i feel like my mother's purpose is to be walking proof to me of a Type Of Guy That Is Real, cause i sure as fuck would have trouble inventing this mess if it wasn't standing right in front of me spewing confusingly bipartisan hate. all of her thoughts and opinions are these long winding nonsense chains that feel like if that man carrying thing sketch about the friend with confusing politics was a person. on meth.

[oarfishing]

Alright, I'm sick of seeing TERFisms on my dash, so here's a handy list of TERF dogwhistles and talking points to think about before you reblog a post.

I've seen a few of these before, but it doesn't hurt to make more. Especially when we're seeing a lot of radfem rhetoric popping up in LGBT spaces from people who might not know better.

SCREENNAMES: these are terms that commonly appear in radfem usernames across the web

rad or radical

fem or femme

vulva, clit, uterus, womb, ovary, vagina, etc.

febfem

anything along the lines of "angry woman"

xx or chromosomes

wombyn, wimmin, womyn, etc.

LGB

feminist

BIOS: things that show up in radfem bios

♀ or ⚢

febfem

female separatist

female, human female, adult human female

xx

something along the lines of "the scary feminist you were warned about"; being an angry woman, being sick of being silenced, being an evil woman, being an angry lesbian

detrans (NOTE: detrans people are absolutely not always transphobic)

dysphoric female

males/men do not interact

LGB✂️

misandrist

feminist (NOTE: again, very few feminists are actually terfs, but this is commonly in terf bios alongside some of these other terms)

TERMS: terms that radfems use in their circles

TIM - trans-identified male, a way of saying transfems, trans women, and other trans people

TIF - trans-identified female, same as above but the other way around, less commonly seen

DSD - disorder of sexual development, a way to avoid saying intersex and to categorize intersex people as "still male or female" (you might see "males with DSD" or "females with DSD" for example)

females or males instead of women and men

alternatively, women and males to dehumanize men

"peaking" or "peaked" - referring to becoming radicalized as a radfem or TERF

womyn, wombyn, wimmin, wo**n, and any other spelling that takes "man" out of the term woman

mentally ill men/women

sex-based oppression

gender critical

"TIRF" - trans-inclusive radical feminist (don't be fooled by the name, they're very much not)

TRA - trans rights activist, derogatory

sex-based rights

female separatism/"women's land"

WBW - womyn-born womyn

autistic girls/children

troon - (ridiculous) slur for trans people

RHETORIC: general ideological themes in radfem rhetoric

men are inherently more violent than women

women don't or rarely rape men

(woman on woman rape is ignored by almost all radfems)

being nonbinary is a way to "stop being" your assigned sex while still acting as your birth sex

lesbians are not attracted to men/penises and can never have sex with men/penises (otherwise, you're bisexual)

men can and will never be lesbians

there is no such thing as a bi lesbian, only lesbians and bisexuals. labels are rigid and sex-based

all of the world's suffering is driven by men

women would be better off separate

an all-female society is utopia

sex is binary, and intersex people are "glitches" or "still male or female but DisorderedTM"

men should expect to be feared by women

female/female relationships are safer and more pure than straight or gay male relationships

men and women are more different than similar

intersex people should not be allowed in sports

intersex people and trans men are never in men's sports

terrible world events wouldn't have happened if women were in charge

men are stupid and aggressive

being a man is not a positive thing

men's problems are lesser than women's

penises are disgusting and vaginas and vulvas are beautiful

trans women are performing at being girls

trans men see themselves as above lesbians

attraction is sex-based

porn is rape

porn is inherently violent

watching porn makes you predisposed to inflicting abuse

BDSM is inherently violent and misogynistic

transitioning children (whether socially or medically) are being abused

"bitch" and "cunt" are slurs against women

only gay men can say faggot and only lesbian women can say dyke

When you see a few or more of these together, RUN! It's a terf.

[gayestcowboy]

can i be so honest? i don’t really understand why some people seem to hate it so much when romanceable video game characters are “playersexual”/always bi or pan/always attracted to the player character. like yeah of course gay/lesbian representation is really important, i don’t think i have to stress that point at all, but if games have romance options specifically, doesn’t it just make the most sense to have them be bi/pan? because everyone wins? it’s so refreshing to be able to romance any character regardless of your own in-game gender in games like bg3 after coming from games like fire emblem where you’re forced to be straight or have extremely limited gay options. and most obviously, bi/pan representation is also important. there isn’t a finite amount of space for queer representation in fiction, and i don’t see any harm in making specifically romanceable characters bisexual for the sake of inclusion/player satisfaction rather than having distinct individual sexualities. it’s not like all fictional characters should be forced to be bisexual. like is there something i’m missing or are people just weird about bisexuals

[cardentist]

people fixate on bi-lesbians as being problematic despite bi-gay men existing (as well as any and every combination of sexuality and romantic attraction you can think of) because terfs and radfems deliberately don't want bi women to associate with lesbians and are deeply invested with framing attraction to men As Bad. a sentiment which has invaded queer culture inside and out, intentionally And incidentally.

people fixate on straight cis aromantic men when straight cis aromantic women exist because framing aromantic people as inherently predatory and dangerous by the simple nature of existing is easier to do when you intentionally force the association with predatory dangerous behavior displayed by (and associated with) misogynistic men.

people are still bigoted against bi-gay men and woman aromatics (and any flavor of trans within these groups), but pay attention to the way these conversations are Framed and it's clear the way gender essentialism is being used as a tool to control the narrative.

radfems' gender essentialism says you're supposed to think men are inherently scary, inherently take advantage of women, so Naturally (it is assumed) a man who is sexually attracted to women but not romantically attracted them Must Inherently be predatory and scary. and now you're being asked to take that feeling of unease you've been manipulated into feeling and associate it with the entirety of a sexuality.

bi-lesbians are threatening to radfems because they want to draw inherent lines between these two groups. insist that attraction to and with a man is inherently dirty and dangerous. the same reason why "gold star lesbian" is a radfem concept. if it turns out that the lines between sexualities, between identity as a whole, is blurrier than they want it to be then that Must be framed as inherently dangerous.

if a single Kind of a marginalized group is being singled out to convince you that this group is dangerous or that they don't belong It's For A Reason. they're trying to manipulate you based on Biases (their biases and the ones they hope you have). the reaction to this isn't to abandon the type of person they're convinced are the worst of these groups, it's in solidarity.

aromantics who are men aren't any different from aromantics who are women, bi-lesbians deserve to live in peace just as much as bi-gay men. don't let people control the narrative Either by cutting down vast array of experiences that exist within any given identity, Or by convincing you that particular kinds of people within your communities are lesser than.

[feministakari]

Every time there's something about "straight passing" couples being not experiencing homophobia then bi people get pushed further away from their rightful community. Also this idea that trans men can perfectly pass and gain all privelages of a cis man.

People really need to take a good look at how much emphasis they place on the supposed "privelages" that someone who appears more cis and straight or male has over other LGBT people.

"Passing" in any way is entirely conditional and can be taken away the instant something slips or a stranger scrutinizes you enough. Walking on eggshells and hoping you aren't found out and risk facing violence is not this great privelage you may think it is.

Remember the trans panic defense? That realizing a sexual partner is trans is used as a defense to murder them? So they "passed" until they didn't, and it actually led to them being killed. Passing did not protect them.

Also there's this idea that any couple that appears to be man + woman will never get clocked as queer. That they can never be queer. That bisexuals don't have the same level of queerness as a lesbian woman or a gay man. But they do. They can be flamboyant, butch, femme, anything that any other queer person can be.

[letters-to-lgbt-kids]

My dear lgbt+ kids, 

“What should we do about people who are clearly not straight but insist they are?”

Well, nothing. We do nothing about that. 

Don’t get me wrong, I understand the frustration. No matter if this is a situation where they have a full-on fling with you and still insist that they are straight, or if it’s your friend who jokes so often that she wishes she could just be a lesbian that you don’t really think it’s a joke anymore, or even if it’s a celebrity who talks about how they had experiences with women and men and then goes on to call themselves a straight ally - sometimes you just wanna grab someone by the shoulders and tell them they are clearly lying to themselves and/or are not aware bisexuality exists. 

There’s nothing wrong with that feeling. Especially if you yourself had a difficult time coming to terms with your sexuality, you may want to save others those years of confusion. And there ARE people who lie to themselves or are not aware bisexuality exists. 

But - and this is an important but - coming to a point where they are able and willing to come out to themselves? That’s a journey everyone needs to go on themselves. 

Maybe you look back and wish someone would’ve grabbed you by the shoulder and went “You are gay, accept it”. It’s a comforting fantasy but in real life you can’t force an epiphany of self-discovery like that. You can’t have their epiphany for them. You can offer an open ear and share some information with them if (and only if!) they ask you for advice - but that’s all you can do. 

Next to “You can’t force an internal coming-out on someone who isn’t ready to have one yet”, there’s also another important point we need to consider here: It’s not our place or business to do anything about it. 

Maybe you feel like you see “all the signs” in that person, but it’s not your call to make. You don’t live their life, you can’t decide how they feel or how they want to label it. 

You can’t force a label on someone, and that goes both ways. You can’t tell a gay person they are actually straight, but you also can’t tell a straight person they are actually gay. Experiences do not always equal attraction, sexuality is a complex spectrum and feelings are messy anyway. 

This is of course especially hard to accept if there are feelings involved on your part, for example in that “making out with you at parties and then going home to their heterosexual partner” scenario. You may tell yourself you just need to wait until they are ready to come out as gay and then they’ll want to be with you for real - but that journey we talked about, that may also just end in the realization that, yep, they are straight. Questioning your sexuality, or even experimenting with it, doesn’t always end in a coming-out as gay/bi. 

With all that said, it really boils down to this: 

You can generally(!) advocate for things that make the journey easier for people to go on (for example more accessible education on sexuality). But when it comes to any one specific person, you don’t do anything - unless they explicitly ask you to. 

You can listen if they want to talk about any confusion they may feel regarding their sexuality, you can offer information and support if they ask you for help in figuring it out. But if they are not asking for help, you just accept they are on their own journey and know themselves best. 

With all my love, 

Your Tumblr Dad 

[rouge-the-bat]

people tend to be like "lol this guy is sooo in denial" if a straight person has sex with someone of the same gender, but actually. they really might not be.

people can have sex with others without being attracted to them, and they just want to have fun having sex.

or hell, they could just have the occasional exception of gay attraction, but its rare enough that theyd find it inaccurate/misleading to tell others theyre bi (and dont have interests in microlabels). them going on a dating site and saying theyre bi would expand the dating pool to a lot more people they would just have no interest in.

or, they may be bisexual but heteromantic, and when looking for relationships, they want to persue both romance and sex, so theyll just use straight to make it easier.

sexuality labels are used different from person to person, some use it to describe action, others use it to describe attraction, or a mix, or otherwise, or even use it just as a "close enough" to get whatever they want about themselves across to others simply.

i know "straight man who has sex with a man" and "straight woman who has sex with a woman" may initially come across as contradictory, or that theyre bi or gay in denial, but identities and their applications/uses are more complex than just a few set labels.

and i think we should trust what a stranger decides to identify themselves as, they know themselves better than others would. you can talk it over with them if you suspect they truly ARE in denial, but if they dont want to or still end up saying theyre straight, just accept it and move on.

and of course, this also applies to gay men who have sex with a woman or lesbians who have sex with a man. its not just "internalized biphobia" as the answer every time, and saying that its always that is very assumptive of people you dont even know.

other peoples lives and experiences can always be different than youd expect, and may even not make sense to you, but its THEIR life and identity to define. you can give them advice, but you cant force it on them, and certainly cant say what their identity TRULY is. only the person themselves can have a say in that.

[doubleca5t]

What do you think gay men are attracted to in men that they can’t be attracted to in women?

It can’t be anything about femininity or masculinity obviously. That’s both sexist, and cultural so can’t be what drives men-only attraction.

It can’t be anything about stated identity because someone could lie just as easily as they could tell the truth in such a statement, and it makes no sense because homosexuality and heterosexuality exists in other species with no stated identities. It’s not like other animals without gender are all pan.

Saying idk it’s the vibes or some indescribable trait men have that women can’t but “I can’t explain” is a nonanswer.

Soooooooo what is it? Or do you think any sexuality but bi/pan is just cultural performance or an identity rather than an inborn orientation?

- [ ]

see I can tell that this is a bad faith ask because I've been getting an influx of terfs on TikTok lately but I'll take the bait and answer this legitimately. I think the *actual* answer here is that sexuality is complex and even though we put a lot of labels on it, those labels are ultimately never going to account for every possible corner case and so rather than constantly redefining the terms of our sexuality I think it's better if we just embrace the messiness of it all as part of the game.

Like I consider myself a lesbian (and you would probably consider me a straight man) which *should* mean I'm only attracted to women. But I've also found myself attracted to drag queens and femboys and some non-binary folks who identify more on the masculine side of the spectrum. Does that mean I'm actually bisexual? I don't think so, because I don't feel any attraction to dudes (cis or trans) who aren't actively playing with gender in a way that's either flirting with femininity or wholeheartedly embracing it.

I imagine plenty of gay men have a similar experience seeing women who present very masculine or a non-binary person who's more on the femme side. And before you accuse me of insisting that lesbians can be attracted to men, there is a HUGE difference between saying that gender non-conforming people throw a wrench into people's sexual identities and saying that "lesbianism includes men".

In short, the reason why I don't have a definitive clear cut answer to your question is because I think human sexuality defies such an answer. I just so happen to be ok with that because I think it's a better, easier way to live

[turn-my-hollow-purple]

AOT Sexuality and Gender Headcanons

idc that no one asked for this you guys can chill I just wanted to share... may or may not have projected on a few... *cough* Annie *cough* Hange *cough*

Eren: straight; he/him pronouns; he’s an ally but he’s very clueless about it all; “Armin what’s a pronoun? OH! Yeah just normal one’s- well not that the other pronouns aren’t- I just… fuck. Yay gay! Wait, is that offensive?”

Mikasa: bisexual with a preference for men; she/her pronouns; her interactions with Sasha, Historia, and Annie were her bi awakenings fr, however her man Eren always comes first. 

Armin: okay controversial, but he’s panromantic guys, he just loves people; I could also see him being demisexual, only having sexual relationships with people he really really is intimate with; he/him or they/them pronouns, but he’s not necessarily nonbinary or gender queer, he just doesn’t care; “Do I like men and women? I like anyone even if they’re nonbinary! It’s about their hearts.”

Sasha: straight; she/her pronouns; definitely an ally; she buys Jean and Armin the craziest shit during pride month and thinks it’s so fun; wears a “my best friends are gay!” shirt to pride rallies

Connie: AROACE KING!; he/him pronouns; he literally couldn’t care less about sexual or romantic attraction, he just loves people platonically and that’s just not a problem for him

Jean: Maybe also controversial… but he’s bi with no preference; he/him; he just doesn’t like making his sexuality a big deal; he likes boys and girls because both are hot and that’s all there is to it

Annie: I feel like there’s not a lot of commentary on her sexuality, but I think she’s panromantic and asexual; pronouns are she/they; I just feel like she doesn’t like to be perceived… she just exists and it’s not that she doesn’t have sex, she totally would with her partners, she just doesn’t experience that sexual attraction, it’s just romantic and personality based

Reiner: bi (probably gay he just doesn’t know it yet) and internally homophobic (kind of joking…); he/him; he just… he’s confused guys, he’s trying his best right now

Bertholdt: I lowkey have no thoughts on him and I think that’s fine. I love him, however he’s probably one of the token straights, but one of the ones who doesn’t care; “Oh damn it’s pride month… yay!”

Levi: alright fam, as much as I love this fucker, he’s probably gay… *sighs*; he literally never talks about his sexuality or romantic relationships though, so it’s just not a big deal to him…. The only people who know his sexuality are Erwin (duh) and Hange; he/him pronouns; “what the fuck is a valentine…?” 

Erwin: he fluctuates in my mind between bi and gay so do with that what you will; he/him pronouns; he enjoys teasing and flirting guys what can I say!; “you’re looking especially dapper today Captain Levi” (said with the intent of sleeping with Levi tonight)

Hange: YIPPEE MY LOVE!; probably omnisexual though I have no idea what their preference would be (hopefully fem enbies not projecting or anything); obviously they/them pronouns, I think they’re both nonbinary and gender queer; “wait, not everyone is gay???”

Ymir: LESBIAN OF COURSE?; she/they pronouns; she just exists in a realm where her only love is Historia or else she’s not alive (awkward….); “I hate straight cis men”

Historia: she also teeters in my opinion… I don’t know if she’s fully lesbian or just bi so again, do with that what you will; she/her pronouns; “I just love love! But mainly Ymir”

[cr1mson5returns]

Although I enjoy a good "Jack Drake is a physically and mentally abusive asshole and deeply homophobic" fic as much as the next ex-Catholic lesbian, I have to admit that I have a way softer spot in my heart for "clueless blundering ass who makes everything worse" Jack Drake.

Maybe it's because my own parents were deeply homophobic in a very different way to others. If you asked them, they'd tell you they have no problem with queer people. They don't care what anyone does in the privacy of their own home, really! Therefore they're not homophobic! But they just don't think you have to make it your whole personality. You don't have to shove it in everyone's faces. And all these new labels for things, what's up with that? Isn't it enough for people to just be gay or straight?

So because I do be projecting, I have a soft spot in my heart for Tim coming out to Jack as bisexual, and Jack just sort of...short-circuiting, for a hot minute. "Well, I'll always love you, son." And Tim thinks that this went pretty well, actually. But Jack later is maybe telling Tim that there are ground rules for him and his dates. Can't bring boys back to the house, strict curfew, has to let Jack know where he is and with whom at all times. Jack doesn't kick Tim out or anything, or call him names, but it's uncomfortable living there now in a way that it wasn't before. Jack has a weird vibe about him when Tim talks about a boyfriend or a male crush. Shuts down the conversation really quickly and won't entertain it any longer. Jack starts being critical of Tim in ways that he wouldn't if he didn't know about his son's sexuality; he asks why Tim feels the need to have a bi pride flag in his room, or why he has to make this his defining characteristic now. And Jack never actually says the word "bisexual." It's always "this." How they just need to leave "this" alone for a while, they need to not make every conversation about "this."

Because Tim is such a person to let a person's good characteristics speak miles more than their bad ones, if they're close enough to him. He has plans in place if Batman goes rogue, but not for his own protection, never for himself. Always for everyone else's benefit. He can live with what happens to him if he's wrong. So of course he'd never call his dad a homophobe, that's not - his dad didn't kick him out. Doesn't hit him or call him names or say mean things to him. It hurts his feelings sometimes, but he takes worse than that from street thugs every night. It's not like he can't handle his dad being a little weird about things.

Right?

[canichangemyblogname]

Hot take? A show with queer people in it from the beginning was never queerbaiting and— very literally and technically— never could. In the first episode, a gay man comes out to his family. And he doesn’t stop being gay after that; it’s a major plot point and part of his character going forward. You’ve had a married lesbian couple from the jump who are proud and unapologetic about their love for each other. The story has also portrayed several queer couples and stories in episodic plots, including featuring queer weddings.

Buck didn’t suddenly “become” bi. Queerness is not when straight people “turn” queer. He has been attracted to men the entire time; he has always been bi. Understanding yourself and your sexuality as a queer person is often so difficult under heteronormativity. Sometimes, it takes time.

Hell— Buck checking a guy out some time in season 3 or getting flustered by the idea he might like a guy, etc, etc, are not even examples “queerbaiting,” nevermind how the show already features queer stories.

I genuinely think some of y’all are just mad that he’s not sucking face with the man you want him to, and are being weirdly homophobic about it. “Buck kissing this man is kinda off-putting, lmao.” “Buck and his bf’s relationship is awkward. IDK, but it weirds me out.” “There’s something so cringe about Buck’s relationship—” “Who dates someone they haven’t been friends with for years first? It’s kinda creepy…” “I think their relationship is a weird mess. It’s not as meaningful as a slow burn.”

Life isn’t fanfiction and fanfiction tropes don’t make good writing. Most relationships start out with a “hey, I’m interested in you, let’s get to know each other.” You’re just transparently uncomfortable with two men expressing that interest in each other outside the arbitrary rules you’ve established to make a mlm relationship “legitimate” or “meaningful.”

[Fanfiction] tropes— from “there’s only one bed” to “we’re forced together, but fall in love anyway”— are responses to the sex-negativity and purity culture norms forced upon gender and sexual minorities. They provide a workaround for these norms but never a direct challenge. It’s like the Family Guy episode “Prick Up Your Ears,” where conservative Christian abstinence-only sex education leads to kids having ear sex. Ear sex is the workaround to the abstinence and purity rules they’d been taught, not the challenge. We still have stringent rules around who can touch whom and under what circumstances. Tropes reflect this. So, a trope like “there’s only one bed” provides the characters with a justification for their intimacy without directly challenging why it is taboo.

You’ve convinced yourself that shipping— and thus the tropes it employs— is more subversive than actual representation, and the people caught in the crossfire are actual queer people.

Also— for the love of fuck— stop comparing every mlm relationship to RW&RB.

[ms-demeanor]

i really liked OJST in the mid-2010s but i didn’t stop reading cause of the cuck comic - wasn’t there also a comic erika moen wrote about (functionally) harassing lesbians with her now-husband?

In the mid 2010s closet-keys criticized one of Erika Moen's early diary comics and described Erika Moen as "Reassuring a cishet partner that it’s totally okay to use hate speech towards wlw at Pride" and condoning the harassment and fetishization of lesbians because of a 2007 comic that she had made as part of a webcomic she had written about gender and her interactions with her queerness.

The hate speech in question is the partner asking "are you sure you want to hold my hand with all these dykes around?" while they are pretty clearly at a Dyke Day event during pride, and the reassurance that 'it's totally okay to use hate speech toward wlw' is Erika responding "sweetie, I'm proud to be with you."

The comic is still up with a disclaimer that it was written at a different time, and I know that's probably not going to fly with a lot of people but if you were a bi woman in the early to mid 2000s it was pretty common to use statements like "lol yeah i'm into women my boyfriend is fine with it as long as I take pictures" to diffuse the biphobia from straight people AND to say shit like "I'm not a party bi, I actually love pussy, thanks" to diffuse the biphobia from queer people. (if you were a bi guy in the early to mid 2000s i'm sorry and I'm sorry now because we got LUG but that mostly went away and you *still* have to deal with the "gay in waiting" bullshit).

That comic ends with Erika and her partner looking at a woman and saying "I'd totally do her" while the woman thinks "pigs" and if you think that means that they literally sat on the street and vocally commented about lesbians passing by them or that they condone harassing lesbians (in, I cannot stress this enough, a diary comic written by someone in their early twenties who is realizing they are occasionally interested in some men some of the time after identifying as a lesbian their whole life), then I'm gonna go ahead and recommend signing up for some variety or other of literary analysis class. Do we think that Erika is seriously implying that she is going to make her boyfriend gay if she fucks him in this comic from a year later?

If this comic bothers you and you see it as a straight-passing couple giving the go-ahead to harass lesbians, you do you, I'm not saying you have to read the comic or enjoy Erika Moen.

I am saying it's a bit of a stretch, though, and certainly the least charitable explanation possible, and that we should probably give people some space to say awkward things about their sexuality and to make missteps when discussing it in their early twenties and not call them lesbophobic fifteen years after the fact for a college comic.

Moen also gets called transphobic because she has described trans men as adorable/cute in a way that could be read as patronizing in one comic and because she made a comic about wearing a packer for fun and for sexual gratification with her cis male partner as a cis woman.

Appropriately, all of these things feel very "late twenty teens tumblr callout post."

If it bugs you, you don't have to read the comics but I've talked about Moen before and I've gotten the anons in my inbox calling me lesbophobic for recommending her comic when in 2007 she made a comic about catcalling lesbians and condoning street harassment.

Which is frustrating because Erika Moen writes a comic about sex toys that has incredible body and gender diversity and is interested in making sure that people of all sexualities are having safe, enjoyable sex and talking openly about it. This is Rebecca Sugar condones war crimes level discourse over a creator who makes a genuinely good comic and gets dismissed as cringe by people who hate open discussions of sex and gets dismissed as a bigot (in ways that I think are incredibly unfair given the vast majority of her work) among people who *claim* to love open discussions of sex but who *actually* love witch hunts.