sing poets and sing singers at the alter of the straight

[frith_in_thorns]

There is a growing prevalence at the moment for Neal/Diana fic. This upsets me a lot, and I'm going to talk about why.

Disclaimer: I am not censoring anyone (since I am not a government entity, it would be literally impossible for me to do so). It is everyone's personal choice to write what they write. I am just trying to explain why this

Comments

[veleda_k]

I have little to say other than, "Yes, this," so... yes, this.

and so many media narratives glorify the gay-identified person finding that they "just happen" to fall in love with someone of the opposite gender

Yes. Writing a gay character fall in love with someone of the other gender isn't a bold statement on the strangeness of love and the shifting of identity. Maybe it will be someday, but for now it's the same old unpleasantness.

[frith_in_thorns]

Exactly. It's just reinforcing a bad stereotype.

[winterstar95]

Actually I want to comment on this-
"Coming out is hard, and it isn't a one-time event -- if you're lucky enough to have passing privilege you have to come out again, and again, and again, to each new group of people. It's SCARY. Even then, it can be really hard to get people to respect your identity -- think of all the "you just haven't met the right man/woman yet" bullshit."
Because - wow I had no freaking idea people still thought this way. I am probably a nut case because I walk around thinking people think like me in this regard.

I don't give people's orientation a second thought. It is what it is. As a mother, though, I can tell you that it is a difficult thing to teach your children that they can love who they want to love. My boys are very young and don't understand things. I continually have to explain that boys can love girls, boys can love boys. Either is okay. I just wonder how long it will take for acceptance to become common place.

[frith_in_thorns]

To be honest, I'm pretty surprised that people can manage to *not* be aware of how homophobic our society is. That must be nice.

[winterstar95]

Wow, I don't think you actually got my meaning here. I understand how homophobic society is - I just don't get why though. I do walk about each day figuring that things are better but then posts like your smack me in the face and I realize that - no they aren't.

This is very much like racism. I treat people like people - I don't give a shit what color their skin is - but in the end I supposed I should because African Americans still deal with this every freaking day. I don't, but then again, I don't see anyone as black or white or what not, I see them as people.

I guess my point I was trying to make is - wow, why can't people just be people and not categories. but your point is well taken, because society doesn't allow that. I get it, I do. I didn't mean to offend. I just wanted to show that I wish people were more like me????

[frith_in_thorns]

Ah, right! I'm very used to hearing about how someone manages to ~rise above~ noticing how lack of privilege affects other people. Which is where we get into situations like the one I'm ranting about -- if we were starting from an equal playing field where all orientations were treated alike, then writing Diana/guy wouldn't be a problem, but we're not, and therefore not accounting for categorical oppression (race, sexuality, gender) just maintains it.

[anonymous]

*sadly, sadly +1s this*

Getting a little personal here, but as someone who identifies (quite strongly) as asexual, I know this feeling so much, from a different point of view. (I'm looking at you, Moffat's Sherlock. And New Doctor. Except we so rarely even get unambiguous ace characters so it's harder to even say "They were established as this; can't people respect that?") And it's one of the feelings I gravitate so hard to genfic, because it lets me have intimate, volatile, important relationships and interactions without silently predicating everything on "But there HAS to be sex/romance or else it's not REALLY intimate or volatile or important!"

Which is just kinda... Neal and Diana have a relationship which is complex and multifaceted and charged and does not need sex or romance in order to be completely amazing. I feel like there would be no reason for it to be there even if it wasn't completely steamrollering some hard-won representation.

[frith_in_thorns]

Yes! I adore Neal and Diana's friendship -- it's so multi-layered and interesting. And can be explored perfectly well in gen fic.

I join you in clinging desperately and with bitterness onto the few representative characters we actually get.

[embroiderama]

I would agree with you if this were a situation where canon introduced a male love interest for Diana, but I think that in fanfic it's okay to explore all kinds of things. This, to me, is like saying that deathfic is a bad and hurtful thing to write, even though in canon and in the majority of other fanfic stories the character remains alive. I think it's okay to write a story in which a gay character is in an usual situation and questions whether they might not be way, way, way at one end of the Kinsey scale or even acts on those questions. The experience and expression of sexuality *does* often change through a person's life--not because anything is a phase or not real or anything else other than the fact that people don't always stay the same and they aren't always as 100% gay or straight as they had assumed. There's nothing wrong with that.

[frith_in_thorns]

I'm not saying that people aren't allowed to write this -- I'm saying that a lot of people find writing gay characters in het relationships hurtful and offensive, for the reasons I've explained in the post. Writers are free to weigh that against their desire to write those fics, and decide which side they want to fall on.

I'm not preventing anyone from doing just that.

[embroiderama]

Well, of course you're not. I was just talking about a different way of looking at it.

[veleda_k]

The problem is the context. When someone writes Diana/guy, they may be intending to say something original on sexuality and the nature of love. But there's nothing original about the lesbian who only needed the right man. And even if that's not what the author intends, they are still feeding into that stereotype. Queer people are made to feel all the time like their identities are invalid, and Diana has always been very clear on who she is.

I would ask an author what they want to accomplish. I get that someone might want to write a story that challenges ideas on sexual identity and attraction. So, isn't it better for them to know that for many people, Diana/guy doesn't read as challenging at all, but merely a continuation of an extremely toxic narrative? And if someone just wants to write Diana/Neal because they think it's hot, then no one's is going to stop them, but we are going to have opinions on it.

[sahiya]

I feel like you make a lot of blanket statements in this post that should qualified with "for me." Neal/Diana (or whatever) is not a kick in MY teeth, and I'm queer and a woman. You start off saying that you don't speak for any group and then you proceed to state opinion like its fact. Well, it isn't. The existence of Neal/Diana does not cause an existential crisis for me, and I don't see why it should.

Also? Not thrilled with being told what I should and shouldn't write. Kind of really pisses me off.

[frith_in_thorns]

I made a disclaimer saying I was speaking for myself and then I... spoke for myself? It's much less messy than writing "for me" every sentence.

And I'm glad for you that you're not upset by this trope, but the fact remains that it upsets a LOT of people, including me. I'm not thrilled with being told that I shouldn't protest offensive things, personally.

[frith_in_thorns]

I'm actually unsure what your main point in this comment-space is, unless it's that people/I shouldn't speak up when they're hurt/upset by the prevalence of a problematic trope? (Which I hope it isn't.) You're justifying a lot about why we SHOULDN'T be hurt by this, but the fact remains that a lot of people ARE.

My main point with writing this post is that surely it's better to know before you write something that it will upset people? And then if you chose to do it anyway, you do it knowing that hurting people is one of the inevitable consequences. Whether you think this should happen or not has no bearing on whether it does.

[sahiya]

Okay, this is my last comment on the subject, mostly because I am now home from vacation and getting slammed by RL and I just don't have the bandwidth anymore.

Saying that you don't like something is fine. Where I draw a line, and where your post really got under my skin, is when you basically asked people not to write it. And yeah, okay, you say that's not what you're doing, but you sure went out of your way to make people feel bad for writing it/having written it/wanting to write it. The guilt trip at the end of the post is what really tipped me over the edge and made me kind of angry, especially since not everyone feels the way that you do. Not everyone who's queer feels like that pairing necessarily, by its very existence, invalidates them in some way. I don't. And in fact, I can envision a form of Neal/Diana that might actually validate my own experience (not that I've ever slept with anyone as pretty as Neal, but that's not the point