Why my story is not sexual (Yet)
The most ironic thing is that when I was writing my story is that I thought, "there's not enough sexual tension!" For two guys that are supposed to be kinda-sorta sexually attracted to each other, NOTHING happens in my writing. Nope, no comments on appearances or embarrassing reactions. Definitely part of this is my repressive readership, but it's probably mostly a "muddled, confused liminal view of sexuality from someone who does not understand nor try to acknowledge the entire depth of the matter." It isn't realistic, nor relevant, but that was it: "There's no sexual tension here!"
What I didn't expect was when I got my story back were the words "yaoi!" etched in indelible black ink on the pure white paper sheeting, disfiguring the words like an awful scar (hm...). In other words, everyone who read my story thought it was "gay gay gay gay gay!!!"
Now, I guess I do write some questionable stuff with my "confused, liminal view of sexuality." But this says a lot about the contemporary (read: my classmates') attitude on sexuality. There's the obvious homophobia (obligatory groan so you don't have to tell me about it), but there's also a reflection about how intimacy is automatically taken to be sexual in nature.
I suppose I should've seen it coming when I decided to tell people about my wonderful story in the first place. "There's a guy named Tony who has to live with his friend Steve forever!" Maybe a quarter of the responses I got back were, "Why do they have to live with each other?" Far more common was, "ARE THEY GAY???"
So, Steve and Tony were close friends (not as if the readers know that), and they've been through a lot together, so they're bound to be more comfortable with each other than the typical same-gender best buddies, like not acting like insecure middle schoolers when having to share the bed with each other ("Let's see what Steve and Tony do in bed with each other!!!"). And all of this is taken to be read as "zomg they want each other!" I'm glad that they can see the HoYay at least.
But actually, this goes way beyond my classmates.
So, I like slash and stuff. It's cute. But do I think it's canon? No, we can save that for fanfiction. But I don't understand it when I see so many people go, "They're totally jumping each other like rabbits behind the scenes!" Is some non-sexual touching really reflective of people's sexuality? But that's another topic for "later."
Oh, it's just me and my "muddle, confused liminal view of sexuality again."
I'm going to have to write a more coherent "treatise" on this later.
P.S. Hey classmate, Steve getting a girlfriend wouldn't rule out anything between them. Yeah guys, try to wrap your minds around that.
What I didn't expect was when I got my story back were the words "yaoi!" etched in indelible black ink on the pure white paper sheeting, disfiguring the words like an awful scar (hm...). In other words, everyone who read my story thought it was "gay gay gay gay gay!!!"
Now, I guess I do write some questionable stuff with my "confused, liminal view of sexuality." But this says a lot about the contemporary (read: my classmates') attitude on sexuality. There's the obvious homophobia (obligatory groan so you don't have to tell me about it), but there's also a reflection about how intimacy is automatically taken to be sexual in nature.
I suppose I should've seen it coming when I decided to tell people about my wonderful story in the first place. "There's a guy named Tony who has to live with his friend Steve forever!" Maybe a quarter of the responses I got back were, "Why do they have to live with each other?" Far more common was, "ARE THEY GAY???"
So, Steve and Tony were close friends (not as if the readers know that), and they've been through a lot together, so they're bound to be more comfortable with each other than the typical same-gender best buddies, like not acting like insecure middle schoolers when having to share the bed with each other ("Let's see what Steve and Tony do in bed with each other!!!"). And all of this is taken to be read as "zomg they want each other!" I'm glad that they can see the HoYay at least.
But actually, this goes way beyond my classmates.
So, I like slash and stuff. It's cute. But do I think it's canon? No, we can save that for fanfiction. But I don't understand it when I see so many people go, "They're totally jumping each other like rabbits behind the scenes!" Is some non-sexual touching really reflective of people's sexuality? But that's another topic for "later."
Oh, it's just me and my "muddle, confused liminal view of sexuality again."
I'm going to have to write a more coherent "treatise" on this later.
P.S. Hey classmate, Steve getting a girlfriend wouldn't rule out anything between them. Yeah guys, try to wrap your minds around that.