Deep thoughts
Note: This doesn't really lead up to anything; the manga I was reading tonight just somehow led to me rambling at great length. And missing sleep again. Damn you, must-know-what-happens-next-regardless-of-quality syndrome!
I doubt it will surprise anyone if I say that I enjoy yaoi, slash, BL, shonen ai, or whatever other name is currently in vogue for romantic stories about gay relationships. However, it may surprise you if I say that in high school, I deliberately avoided the few gay books that were shelved in the library's young adult section, and considering the fact that the whole section was only a couple bookcases and I went over them regularly, it's not like I didn't know which ones they were.
Why the avoidance? Well, some of the usual teen unwillingness to be remotely associated with anything potentially tease-worthy (newly tease-worthy, anyway - the usual ribbing I'd already figured out how to handle, by why add?), but mostly because I associated gay stories with depressing plots and angst. I do not like depressing things.
Angst I can handle, even enjoy, but only in the context that it's leading up to some kind of payoff. Angst over a character's death only to have that character turn up alive a chapter later, for example, I quite like, especially when it comes with a sobbing confession and a full-page spread. Angst over a character's death because that character is dead and life will never be the same, on the other hand, I shy away from if at all possible. (For one, it makes me cry.) Worst, however, is angst because someone did something stupid to hurt someone else, knew they were doing something stupid, and did it without any good reason anyway. I should note that "good reason," in my book, is pretty much limited to the fate of the world hinging upon the character's decision, and even then I'd rather they take a third option. It's fiction, for crying out loud.
Where was I? Oh yes. Shying away from the gay books at the library. Anyway, eventually I went to college, watched Gravitation, and realized for the first time that these stories could also be funny and romantic and didn't have to end in tears after all. If there is one thing I love, it's the internet romantic comedies. True, I wasn't a big fan of the implied rape scene in the middle, or what Yuki's tutor did to him, but at least those weren't problems caused strictly because the characters were gay and doing everything they could to deny their feelings - no, those they were pretty damn open about. So I liked it. I like it when people are in love and go to great lengths to be together and make speeches about being together forever, even if that speech is delivered after tunneling through the earth to New York in a dog suit. (Gravitation was crazy, wasn't it? Ah, memories.) After Gravitation came FAKE, which had no worrying scenes at all and a highly satisfying ending, and I was hooked.
This "yaoi," as it turned out, is predominantly written by women (or, as manga teaches us, hot gay men using pen names), and many of these women like and dislike the same things I do. Every now and then, however, I accidentally find myself reading a series that's intended to be "realistic," and a great sigh escapes me. Depending on just how "realistic" and how far in I've gotten before the realization sets in I'll still often end up finishing these series (BL manga is usually short, after all), but they leave me feeling vaguely dirty afterwords.
Complex is such a manga. It was recommended on some blog I was reading, and the whole thing was up on Anta Baka, so I figured what the hell. I should really have made note of the fact that it was written in the 90s, but FAKE and G-Defend make me forget that BL back then wasn't usually all smiles and roses (well, both of those series are actually more cops and bomb threats, really, which is a funny coincidence when I think about it, but you know what I mean).
The first chapter I did not like at all, as the first character introduced is a creepy teacher with a nasty habit of molestation. (Fun!) This character is properly treated as evil and we get rid of him soon enough, but had I been thinking, I would have noted the loud warning bell: "Caution! Implementation of every depressing gay cliche you can think of dead ahead!" The fact that the series follows the two protagonists from age 11 to 80 should also have been a tip off that drama was coming, since nobody gets to be happy all the time in manga like that. But the rest of the first volume was pretty cute, so I ignored cliche-I-don't-like #2 ("I obviously can't tell my best friend I love him so I'll sleep with this other, older guy I don't love instead"), and by then I was invested in the characters. (Oh, and I guess cliche-I-don't-like #3 was also in there - the old "I can't sleep with you for a ridiculously silly reason involving insecurity"; in this case, a scar.)
So imagine my complete and utter disapproval when, after the characters manage to successfully navigate high school, college, and getting jobs, suddenly there's angst about the gay lifestyle again, and one of them goes and sleeps with a lesbian co-worker. And gets her knocked up. And then marries her. And would have stayed married to her, had she not conveniently died of cancer seven years later, but not before telling the gay partner (who'd dropped out of sight, because he has sense and was rightly heartbroken) to take care of her husband and son once she's gone - after telling him that she was determined to keep said husband for herself and not let him go. (Should I point out as that she's the one who came on to the guy in the first place, not that he couldn't and shouldn't have said no?)
I can understand why, in real life, people might disregard promises to love one person forever for a night of "Hey, what's a vagina really like, anyway?" I can understand then trying to "do what's right" even if it means a loveless marriage (and he grows to love her anyway, which I actually didn't mind because if you're going to get married you really might as well). I can also understand going back to your lover after he completely abandoned you now that his wife's dead and carrying on as if those seven years didn't happen, because that's what some people do when they love somebody else more then themselves.
That does not mean I like it. In fact, I loathe it with a great passion. Cheating is such a ridiculous thing to do in my opinion, and the second you cheat I consider the relationship to be forever tarnished. Yes, maybe that's idealistic of me, but unless you're trying to pull off poly-amory (which I don't think can work anyway because I think all three people would need to love each other exactly the same amount or else someone's stuck being the third wheel) there is absolutely no logical reason for it.
It's stupid, stupid, stupid on the part of the cheating party. And how can you ever make up for it? You've as good as outright said that you don't love your partner enough to be faithful, and if all it takes is a mopey lesbian wondering if her all-girls school education is the reason for her orientation to make you break your vows, even if those were just vows made personally and not in front of the official of your choice, I don't think that's proper love. Love shouldn't be only at your own convenience. And what if the wife hadn't died, eh? More tragedy all around? Good thing cancer runs in her family! Ugh. (Really, it does. That's why she had insurance for it.)
Oh, but it's different because he's gay and it's only natural he'd want to try sleeping with a woman once, right? Or to try and be "normal"? That's totally a different kind of cheating! After all, he wasn't in love with her. ::rolls eyes:: (Also, if we're going to be "realistic," what's up with the convenient death twist?)
I like BL for the extra barrier to forming a relationship ("Wait, we're both guys! But I love you enough not to care!"), but I don't want to see that barrier be a real barrier. Gay tragedy is not for me. I want it to be like the angst I described above, where in the end it turns out they didn't need to be angsty at all and everything's just fine. There's this one doujin I read for Naruto where Shikamaru's asking Naruto and Sasuke if they have anyone they like/are going out with, and both cheerfully say no even as they hold hands under the table. I don't like that. You don't have to tell everyone who it is you're going out with if you don't want to, but denying entirely even that there's someone you love I do not like. (Exception: if Akito is planning to do something horrible to Tohru if he figures out you love her.)
This is why I did not see and never will see Brokeback Mountain. Again, I can understand choosing to stay with your wife and kids over your cowboy lover, but I can't condone having a torrid affair in a tent anyway. If you're not truly in love, don't get married. (Hell, I don't even see the point in long-term dating in that case, but I know I'm in a small minority when I say that.) If you are in love, don't have a torrid affair. It is possible to control these things. Also, divorce. You don't even have to ask the pope these days.
Complex, fortunately, avoids cliche-I-don't-like #36 ("One partner commits suicide to fully illustrate the tragedy of and atone for their forbidden gay love"), but I feel like this grey cloud hangs over the whole thing anyway, because they're only back together because his wife died. And even then! He's trying to keep it a secret from his son, who figures it out anyway because kids aren't really that stupid. Way to put yourself and your partner through additional, completely unnecessary heartache there. If you're considerate of everyone else, why can't you be considerate of the person you say you love?
I realize most people probably don't worry about this so much (and I do take it to kind of an extreme - I wasn't pleased when Lawerence was sleeping with what'shername or Temeraire was playing hooky with that girl dragon either, which Vicki probably rightly thought was weird). But when I'm reading a romance and presented with this kind of storyline and told "look at all the hardships they endured; it must be true love!" I get very grumpy and apparently write quite lengthy posts on LJ.
Complex's ending really was very sweet, though, for all that, and of course the damn thing made me cry.
So, umm... Did anyone else vote today? I voted in the Iowa Democrat primary. My politician of choice did not win, but I wasn't especially invested in the outcome (I made my choice last week by skimming through the talking-points comparison chart in our paper) so it's okay. Really I just want to see Grassley (one of our senators) replaced with someone who is not Grassley. I suppose he could be worse for a Republican (he did vote for some of the financial reform), but he could also be a whole lot better.
I doubt it will surprise anyone if I say that I enjoy yaoi, slash, BL, shonen ai, or whatever other name is currently in vogue for romantic stories about gay relationships. However, it may surprise you if I say that in high school, I deliberately avoided the few gay books that were shelved in the library's young adult section, and considering the fact that the whole section was only a couple bookcases and I went over them regularly, it's not like I didn't know which ones they were.
Why the avoidance? Well, some of the usual teen unwillingness to be remotely associated with anything potentially tease-worthy (newly tease-worthy, anyway - the usual ribbing I'd already figured out how to handle, by why add?), but mostly because I associated gay stories with depressing plots and angst. I do not like depressing things.
Angst I can handle, even enjoy, but only in the context that it's leading up to some kind of payoff. Angst over a character's death only to have that character turn up alive a chapter later, for example, I quite like, especially when it comes with a sobbing confession and a full-page spread. Angst over a character's death because that character is dead and life will never be the same, on the other hand, I shy away from if at all possible. (For one, it makes me cry.) Worst, however, is angst because someone did something stupid to hurt someone else, knew they were doing something stupid, and did it without any good reason anyway. I should note that "good reason," in my book, is pretty much limited to the fate of the world hinging upon the character's decision, and even then I'd rather they take a third option. It's fiction, for crying out loud.
Where was I? Oh yes. Shying away from the gay books at the library. Anyway, eventually I went to college, watched Gravitation, and realized for the first time that these stories could also be funny and romantic and didn't have to end in tears after all. If there is one thing I love, it's the internet romantic comedies. True, I wasn't a big fan of the implied rape scene in the middle, or what Yuki's tutor did to him, but at least those weren't problems caused strictly because the characters were gay and doing everything they could to deny their feelings - no, those they were pretty damn open about. So I liked it. I like it when people are in love and go to great lengths to be together and make speeches about being together forever, even if that speech is delivered after tunneling through the earth to New York in a dog suit. (Gravitation was crazy, wasn't it? Ah, memories.) After Gravitation came FAKE, which had no worrying scenes at all and a highly satisfying ending, and I was hooked.
This "yaoi," as it turned out, is predominantly written by women (or, as manga teaches us, hot gay men using pen names), and many of these women like and dislike the same things I do. Every now and then, however, I accidentally find myself reading a series that's intended to be "realistic," and a great sigh escapes me. Depending on just how "realistic" and how far in I've gotten before the realization sets in I'll still often end up finishing these series (BL manga is usually short, after all), but they leave me feeling vaguely dirty afterwords.
Complex is such a manga. It was recommended on some blog I was reading, and the whole thing was up on Anta Baka, so I figured what the hell. I should really have made note of the fact that it was written in the 90s, but FAKE and G-Defend make me forget that BL back then wasn't usually all smiles and roses (well, both of those series are actually more cops and bomb threats, really, which is a funny coincidence when I think about it, but you know what I mean).
The first chapter I did not like at all, as the first character introduced is a creepy teacher with a nasty habit of molestation. (Fun!) This character is properly treated as evil and we get rid of him soon enough, but had I been thinking, I would have noted the loud warning bell: "Caution! Implementation of every depressing gay cliche you can think of dead ahead!" The fact that the series follows the two protagonists from age 11 to 80 should also have been a tip off that drama was coming, since nobody gets to be happy all the time in manga like that. But the rest of the first volume was pretty cute, so I ignored cliche-I-don't-like #2 ("I obviously can't tell my best friend I love him so I'll sleep with this other, older guy I don't love instead"), and by then I was invested in the characters. (Oh, and I guess cliche-I-don't-like #3 was also in there - the old "I can't sleep with you for a ridiculously silly reason involving insecurity"; in this case, a scar.)
So imagine my complete and utter disapproval when, after the characters manage to successfully navigate high school, college, and getting jobs, suddenly there's angst about the gay lifestyle again, and one of them goes and sleeps with a lesbian co-worker. And gets her knocked up. And then marries her. And would have stayed married to her, had she not conveniently died of cancer seven years later, but not before telling the gay partner (who'd dropped out of sight, because he has sense and was rightly heartbroken) to take care of her husband and son once she's gone - after telling him that she was determined to keep said husband for herself and not let him go. (Should I point out as that she's the one who came on to the guy in the first place, not that he couldn't and shouldn't have said no?)
I can understand why, in real life, people might disregard promises to love one person forever for a night of "Hey, what's a vagina really like, anyway?" I can understand then trying to "do what's right" even if it means a loveless marriage (and he grows to love her anyway, which I actually didn't mind because if you're going to get married you really might as well). I can also understand going back to your lover after he completely abandoned you now that his wife's dead and carrying on as if those seven years didn't happen, because that's what some people do when they love somebody else more then themselves.
That does not mean I like it. In fact, I loathe it with a great passion. Cheating is such a ridiculous thing to do in my opinion, and the second you cheat I consider the relationship to be forever tarnished. Yes, maybe that's idealistic of me, but unless you're trying to pull off poly-amory (which I don't think can work anyway because I think all three people would need to love each other exactly the same amount or else someone's stuck being the third wheel) there is absolutely no logical reason for it.
It's stupid, stupid, stupid on the part of the cheating party. And how can you ever make up for it? You've as good as outright said that you don't love your partner enough to be faithful, and if all it takes is a mopey lesbian wondering if her all-girls school education is the reason for her orientation to make you break your vows, even if those were just vows made personally and not in front of the official of your choice, I don't think that's proper love. Love shouldn't be only at your own convenience. And what if the wife hadn't died, eh? More tragedy all around? Good thing cancer runs in her family! Ugh. (Really, it does. That's why she had insurance for it.)
Oh, but it's different because he's gay and it's only natural he'd want to try sleeping with a woman once, right? Or to try and be "normal"? That's totally a different kind of cheating! After all, he wasn't in love with her. ::rolls eyes:: (Also, if we're going to be "realistic," what's up with the convenient death twist?)
I like BL for the extra barrier to forming a relationship ("Wait, we're both guys! But I love you enough not to care!"), but I don't want to see that barrier be a real barrier. Gay tragedy is not for me. I want it to be like the angst I described above, where in the end it turns out they didn't need to be angsty at all and everything's just fine. There's this one doujin I read for Naruto where Shikamaru's asking Naruto and Sasuke if they have anyone they like/are going out with, and both cheerfully say no even as they hold hands under the table. I don't like that. You don't have to tell everyone who it is you're going out with if you don't want to, but denying entirely even that there's someone you love I do not like. (Exception: if Akito is planning to do something horrible to Tohru if he figures out you love her.)
This is why I did not see and never will see Brokeback Mountain. Again, I can understand choosing to stay with your wife and kids over your cowboy lover, but I can't condone having a torrid affair in a tent anyway. If you're not truly in love, don't get married. (Hell, I don't even see the point in long-term dating in that case, but I know I'm in a small minority when I say that.) If you are in love, don't have a torrid affair. It is possible to control these things. Also, divorce. You don't even have to ask the pope these days.
Complex, fortunately, avoids cliche-I-don't-like #36 ("One partner commits suicide to fully illustrate the tragedy of and atone for their forbidden gay love"), but I feel like this grey cloud hangs over the whole thing anyway, because they're only back together because his wife died. And even then! He's trying to keep it a secret from his son, who figures it out anyway because kids aren't really that stupid. Way to put yourself and your partner through additional, completely unnecessary heartache there. If you're considerate of everyone else, why can't you be considerate of the person you say you love?
I realize most people probably don't worry about this so much (and I do take it to kind of an extreme - I wasn't pleased when Lawerence was sleeping with what'shername or Temeraire was playing hooky with that girl dragon either, which Vicki probably rightly thought was weird). But when I'm reading a romance and presented with this kind of storyline and told "look at all the hardships they endured; it must be true love!" I get very grumpy and apparently write quite lengthy posts on LJ.
Complex's ending really was very sweet, though, for all that, and of course the damn thing made me cry.
So, umm... Did anyone else vote today? I voted in the Iowa Democrat primary. My politician of choice did not win, but I wasn't especially invested in the outcome (I made my choice last week by skimming through the talking-points comparison chart in our paper) so it's okay. Really I just want to see Grassley (one of our senators) replaced with someone who is not Grassley. I suppose he could be worse for a Republican (he did vote for some of the financial reform), but he could also be a whole lot better.