*deep breath*
[On the off chance that this comes up, newsletters please do not link!]
So, every now and then, this conversation comes around again:
"Gay men are the only people with authentic queer experience, and all you straight women slashers should be ashamed of yourselves for appropriating it!"
Some slashers respond, and sometimes there is interesting commentary on women writing about men and why this happens in a misogynist society, but by this point I have usually stopped reading because I have gone off to weep quietly to myself about the fact that I, being queer AND a woman AND a slasher, apparently do not exist.
So, since it seems to be that time of year, again, I am going to put this on record and link back to it every frickin' time this conversation happens:
Once upon a time, slash was my fricking lifeline because it was the only place I could find stories that reflected my experience of being queer. It represented my experience as a queer person better than the only other widely available representations of queerness I could find, which may have represented some gay men's experience, but sure as hell didn't represent mine.
So while I am totally on board with criticizing the failings of slash and slash fandom with regard to the portrayal of queer characters, anybody who thinks I'm not allowed to write or enjoy it, however flawed, or who wants to tell me that I, as a queer person, am doing queerness wrong, because I am not a man, can just STFU.
I am so freaking tired of being erased.
Crossposted from http://themadlurker.dreamwidth.org/61881.html at Dreamwidth.
comment(s).
So, every now and then, this conversation comes around again:
"Gay men are the only people with authentic queer experience, and all you straight women slashers should be ashamed of yourselves for appropriating it!"
Some slashers respond, and sometimes there is interesting commentary on women writing about men and why this happens in a misogynist society, but by this point I have usually stopped reading because I have gone off to weep quietly to myself about the fact that I, being queer AND a woman AND a slasher, apparently do not exist.
So, since it seems to be that time of year, again, I am going to put this on record and link back to it every frickin' time this conversation happens:
Once upon a time, slash was my fricking lifeline because it was the only place I could find stories that reflected my experience of being queer. It represented my experience as a queer person better than the only other widely available representations of queerness I could find, which may have represented some gay men's experience, but sure as hell didn't represent mine.
So while I am totally on board with criticizing the failings of slash and slash fandom with regard to the portrayal of queer characters, anybody who thinks I'm not allowed to write or enjoy it, however flawed, or who wants to tell me that I, as a queer person, am doing queerness wrong, because I am not a man, can just STFU.
I am so freaking tired of being erased.
Crossposted from http://themadlurker.dreamwidth.org/61881.html at Dreamwidth.
comment(s).