#Female homosexuality in antiquity

[jeannereames]

Cut the Old Queers Some Slack

This post brought to you by a review of Sandra Boehringer’s Female Homosexuality in Ancient Greece and Rome, which recent translation I posted about earlier with no little excitement. The BMCR review annoyed me for a couple reasons.

First was an assumption that when a book is translated, the author should retool it to modern terminology.* In the end, the reviewer said maybe just the forward from Boehringer should have addressed trans issues—which isn’t an invalid point—but other parts of the review seem to slam Boehringer for not doing more revisions for the new English translation (from a French original published in 2007). This leads me to….

Second issue: this assumes a uniquely Angliphone understanding, and even more, a British one (the reviewer teaches at Leeds), where the issue of TERFs is more pressing than in the US. Here, transphobia and transmisogyny is rooted more in religious objections than a subsect of radical feminists (who may not be religious at all). It’s not that the US has no TERFs, but it's not nearly the issue (ime) as in the UK.

Every country has its own quirks of bias. And the author is French. If I’ve learned anything about Queer culture in my almost 60 years on this planet, it’s that the pressing issues in one country are manifestly not the pressing issues in another—particularly across language lines. To assume they are (or should be) centers Angliphone culture in a way that annoys me.

OTOH, yes, especially US English-speakers have poor linguistic skills to read non-Anglophone scholarship as a result of bad public-school language education. But access to good language education is a matter of MONEY, which gets us into issues of social class, et al. That’s a different kettle of fish (which deserves its own post about wealth gate-keeping in academia).

But I do my best to remain cognizant that the ways we talk about queer culture and concerns differ even in Anglophone countries, never mind those of non-English speakers.

So that was my second big issue with this review.

The reviewer acknowledges that the original came out in 2007, and queer scholarship about the ancient world has moved on, particularly as regards recognition of non-binary ancient figures. But she can’t seem to keep from knocking Boehringer for not magically keeping up.

Folks, grant the Old Queers some slack here? When I was young, it was just LGB. Then LGBT. Now it’s an alphabet soup. I’m quite sure young queers who read “An Atypical Affair: Alexander the Great, Hephaistion Amyntoros, and the Nature of Their Relationship,” could take exception to my phrasing in places. Hell, I’ll revise portions of it for my bio on Hephaistion and Krateros.

But it was published in 1999! And I actually wrote the thing in 1996 as a class assignment, then revised it in 1998 for that 1999 publication date.

Remember, some of us have been in this fight a while. I do my best to keep up with current terminology—and do genuinely want to do so—but it’s kinda gauche to slam authors for material previously published, especially in such a rapidly changing field.

To expect an author to substantially retool a prior publication for a translation is uncool. Real revision takes a lot of time. Not something I think many people fully understand. It’s not a matter of a couple weeks’ tweaks. If she were to produce a revised/second edition, that might take years. I’d rather have the book translated than wait five years for Boehringer to revise it. I can take it in the spirit of its original publication date: 2007. Could she have been more straightforward in her new forward? Perhaps. But French concerns aren’t British ones.

——

*Let me also say—as someone whose work is currently being translated—we may not have as much control as readers assume. I sent a letter to the Italian publisher, all but begging them to PLEASE keep the Greek transliterations of names and Greek words with Dancing with the Lion. They said they would, but I can’t force them to do so. For all I know, the Italian translation could be a dumpster fire. I hope not, I trust not, but translations are dicey. And if academic translations are quite different from fiction, be aware of the limits original authors face with translations.

[lesbianarthistory]

Statue of Idet and Ruiu (1480–1390 BC) The two women are depicted in a form typical to married couples. Idet is given priority by the artist who placed her on the right, and is given the title "Lady of the House".

[planet-gay-comic]

Kings and Their Lovers

Male Kings and Their Homoromantic or Erotic Relationships from Antiquity to Modern Times History offers numerous examples of male rulers who had homoromantic or erotic relationships with other men. These connections were often complex and influenced by cultural, societal, and personal factors. Here are some remarkable examples:

Antiquity

Alexander the Great (356–323 BC) The Macedonian king and famous conqueror had a particularly close relationship with Hephaestion, his childhood friend and confidant. Plutarch described Hephaestion as "Alexander's lover." After Hephaestion's death, Alexander was inconsolable and ordered a nationwide mourning. The Persian eunuch Bagoas is also mentioned in ancient sources as Alexander's lover.

Emperor Hadrian (76–138 AD) The Roman emperor is known for his passionate relationship with the young Greek Antinous. When Antinous drowned in the Nile, Hadrian was devastated. He had his lover deified, founded the city of Antinoopolis, and erected statues of Antinous throughout the empire. These actions testify to Hadrian's deep affection and grief.

Middle Ages

Richard the Lionheart (1157–1199) Richard I of England had a close relationship with Philip II of France. Contemporary chroniclers described how the two kings "ate from the same table and drank from the same cup every night" and "slept in the same bed." Although the exact nature of their relationship remains disputed, such reports suggest a very intimate connection.

Edward II of England (1284–1327) Edward II had an intense relationship with Piers Gaveston, which chroniclers of the time described as excessively intimate. Later, he developed a similarly close relationship with Hugh Despenser the Younger. These connections led to political tensions and ultimately contributed to Edward's deposition.

Modern Times

James I of England (1566–1625) James, also known as James VI of Scotland, had several close relationships with men. Particularly notable was his connection with George Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham. In letters, James called Villiers "my sweet child and wife" and "my dear Venus boy." This correspondence indicates a passionate and intimate relationship.

Louis XIV of France (1638–1715) Although the Sun King is primarily known for his female mistresses, there are indications of intimate relationships with men. The Duke of Saint-Simon reported in his memoirs of several homosexual affairs at court, including one between Louis and his brother Philippe, Duke of Orléans.

Frederick the Great of Prussia (1712–1786) Frederick had close relationships with several men, particularly Hans Hermann von Katte in his youth. Although Frederick married, the marriage remained childless and distant. Instead, he surrounded himself with a circle of close male friends and confidants.

Ludwig II of Bavaria (1845–1886) Known as the "Fairy Tale King," Ludwig II had close and presumably romantic relationships with several men. Particularly well-known are his connections to Richard Hornig, his stable master, and Paul von Thurn und Taxis. Ludwig's homosexuality was an open secret during his lifetime and contributed to the accusations that led to his dethronement.

Modern Era

Tsar Nicholas II of Russia (1868–1918) Although later married, the last Russian Tsar had a close relationship as a young man with his cousin, Prince Nicholas of Greece. In letters, he described their "special friendship" and the "wonderful nights" they spent together.

These examples show that same-sex relationships among rulers were not uncommon. The nature and perception of such connections varied greatly depending on the cultural and historical context. While some relationships were lived relatively openly, others remained hidden due to societal norms and political implications or were only hinted at in documentation.

It is important to note that modern concepts of sexual orientation and identity cannot be directly applied to historical figures. Many of these rulers would not have identified themselves as homosexual or bisexual, as these terms did not exist in their time. Their relationships must be understood in the context of their respective culture and time.

Nevertheless, these historical examples offer important insights into the diversity of human relationships and show that same-sex love and affection existed even at the highest levels of power.

Text supported by GPT-4o, Claude AI

Image generated with SD1.5. Overworked with inpainting (SD1.5/SDXL) and composing.

[ineffable-opinions]

Fumi Yoshinaga is known for her big hits including Ōoku: The Inner Chambers, which depicts the rise and fall of the Tokugawa family in the world where the Ōoku becomes a harem of men serving the female shogun, Antique Bakery, a story about a bakery where only men work and What Did You Eat Yesterday?, a slice of life series focusing on a gay couple. 

Excerpts (emboldened - for my own benefit)

Ever since I was a little girl, Patarillo! has been my favorite, so I enjoyed reading stories about male and male relationships. I didn’t think of it as a homosexual story at the time.

However, when I was in junior high and high school, bullying was a social problem, and I thought that if I stood out, I would be bullied. So I tried my best to hide the fact that I was an otaku so that it would not be obvious. Although I read major popular manga to keep up with everyone, I tried to avoid talking about the manga I really liked outwardly.

I had friends who were otaku, but when I graduated from high school, not only me but also all of my otaku friends “mimicked” normal people by reading the atmosphere. I dressed as normal as possible so that I didn’t look like an otaku, and I didn’t join manga club. I would go to coterie events, though (laughs).

Since then, I have not been able to do anything other than creating fan-fictions, and I even went to graduate school to continue my doujin activities for as long as possible. During that time, various BL magazines sprang up. A friend I met through doujin activities became the editor of one of the BL magazines called Hanaoto. And the opportunities I have been given to be involved in it have helped me build the career I have today.

Also, at the time of my debut, the term “BL” was coined and there was an atmosphere in which the entire market was gradually gaining momentum.

At the time, it was seen as pornography for adult women. Although I was embarrassed in the sense that I was creating erotic manga, I had no special feeling about the fact that I was depicting male/male love stories.

[...]can easily broaden my imagination as to stories starting from “comradeships,” “master-slave” relationships or the kind of friendship that becomes too passionate and then turns into romance.

Nevertheless, although I debuted as a BL manga artist, it was not at all easy for me to draw many variations of romance.

Even though I was drawing BL, love is love. At that time BL was basically short stories, characters in manga met and fell in love each time. I was troubled by the fact that they were another kind of love stories after all. Also, due to the policy of the magazine, I had to include sex scenes, which was very difficult for me. So I tried to move to a general magazine soon.

About All My Darling Daughters

In this work, I straightforwardly express the feelings I have had since childhood, such as the oppression I received from my parents and the speculation that I could be happy without falling in love. I didn’t want to use manga as a means to convey my ideas, but I was conflicted because I had to touch on these feelings in the creation of the story.

Sayako, who has no romantic feelings for anyone

She is what we now call “asexual,” but I didn’t even know that category at the time. I think it is very important to be named and recognized. It has certainly made life easier for many people.

It all started when a friend said to me, “I pay my taxes, I take out the garbage on garbage day, and I live a decent life, so why should I feel as if the world is blaming me just because I am not in love?”

I nodded deeply at her statement because I too had been uncomfortable since I was a student because I was not passionate about love. I guess I had to go with the flow of society, where people who have never loved others are considered to be living a pitiful life. I have been skeptical that loving someone is the highest good. If I say, “I don’t want a boyfriend,” people say, “Don’t try to act tough!” so I had to pretend to want a boyfriend, which is too much of a bother (laughs). I felt like I was mimicking them all the time in my life.

Gay people

I drew my BL and other works thinking that gay people might read them. So when gay people read my works, they may think “this is different,” but I was careful not to make them feel that they were being denied. I thought it was still okay to be unrealistic, but I never wanted to portray them in a way that might give an unusual impression to the readers.

But Ono [in Antique Bakery] was in a way the only exception. I had no intention of making him a laughingstock, but I felt bad if I had given readers a mistaken impression about gay people by portraying him in a funny way.

I have a gay friend who reads my works. When I apologized to him for how I portrayed Ono, he said, “If you get angry at every little thing like that, you can’t live as a gay person,” which baffled me. At that time, I felt very sorry. Since then, I have been careful not to change the attitude mentioned above. As for the depiction of gay men, I am not really conscious of whether it is realistic or not.

I think there are not many male-female love stories that depict realistic dramas. Rather, I enjoy reading them while thinking, “How could this happen? ” or “I hope this kind thing really happens in my life.”

What did you eat yesterday? & serialization of it in the youth magazine Morning

At first, I presented the idea to the editor of a BL magazine, but that person didn’t respond well to it. In the context of BL, the relationship of the two who have already gotten together was not interesting. There is no description of sex, no indication that the two are growing closer. For the readers of ordinary BL manga, there is no part of the story they want to read.

The editor-in-chief of the gay magazine also contacted me politely and said, “It is epoch-making for a story like this to be published in a youth magazine like Morning, so please feel free to ask me anything if you have any questions.”

I was just drawing what I wanted to draw, which was not much different from what had been published in BL magazine, so the objective opinions made me raise my consciousness and feel horrified at the same time.

One thing I changed was that I made sure to draw the recipe and ingredient quantities properly because I received a postcard from a reader saying that she had made the strawberry jam that appears in the piece. Although I was able to make some adjustments to it in the aspect of cooking manga, I thought I couldn’t change much about the setting of the gay couple, so I continued the manga as it was. However, the editor-in-chief of Morning changed around the time I published the second volume, and when I greeted him, I was surprised to hear from him that Morning is a conservative magazine for middle-aged men.

expressing yourself in a place where many people would see your work & fear of hurting someone

Doujinshi is simple; people who want to read it read it, but that is not the case with commercial magazines, so I was worried in the beginning.

When I was young, I once told an editor that I wanted to draw a manga that didn’t stand out in any way, and he admonished me, “That won’t make for an interesting work” (laughs). As long as it is a concrete expression, it will definitely hurt someone. So, in a way, I gave up on that point.

I think I am probably in a kind of trance when I am drawing. I am outputting what I wanted to read and reading it myself, so there’s definitely an adrenaline rush. That kind of pleasure is what keeps me going with this job.

Changing world, changing manga

I think that the range of content that we can depict has become much wider. Even in terms of BL, there are now not only love stories with sexually explicit descriptions, but also love stories in which couples gradually deepen their relationship. Manga featuring argumentative but attractive girls are also popular. The number of stories that do not depict romance has also increased dramatically. But as a reader, I also love romantic stories.

The range of manga I enjoy reading has expanded and now I like manga even more than before. As a reader, I look forward to the future.

[pumpkin-knots]

Hnnnnnng, I think I just found my life's passion

So. You know that really annoying thing were (typically older) classicists take characters and figures in antiquity (e.g. Achilles, Patroclus, Sappho, Catullus, etc.) who are seen by a lot of modern audiences to have ambiguous (or unambiguious) queer aspects to them and the older classicists are like "um, actually, the Greeks and Romans didn't even have the word gay, they had really deep concepts of same-gender friendships and also poets were expected to write about a female subject so, no, the Greeks *weren't* having a fruity fruity time back then". Like, yes, all of those things you said are true, but they also don't mean that even thought there wasn't a word that is exactly equivalent to the modern identity of homosexual that there weren't any people at all who loved people of the same gender, and yes poets were expected to write to about a female subject, but that doesn't mean that a woman who wrote poetry absolutely could not also be attracted to women, and yes the Greeks had really deep friendships, often between persons of the same gender identity, it was even one of their eight words for a type of love (φιλία - friendship or brotherly love) BUT ALSO just because not all people who did any of these things were queer, does not mean that absolutely none of them were queer.

What does this have to do with my life's passion, you say? I'm glad you asked! As some of you may know, I am a gay gay homosexual and a transgender genderless boyish femboy catboy dogboy thing meow uwu (he/they). I ALSO really like ancient Greece (and Rome, I guess, if you're a POSER /j) and I recently switched my major back from Art History to Greek Latin and Ancient Mediterranean Studies with a focus of History and Archaeology of the Ancient Mediterranean (which is what I was majoring in when I started college but made the mistake of taking both introductory Latin and introductory Greek at the same time which I do not recommend for anyone who likes having free time or good mental health and fled into the arms of the Art History department for like a semester-ish). I have decided that I am going to spend my life arguing with slightly homophobic classicists that maybe Achilles and Patroclus *were* having a very fruity time back then. I don't know, I wasn't there, were you??? Will this bring me riches? Absolutely not. Will this give me a clear career path? Academia? Maybe? I don't know! But will I get to spread the gay agenda for the rest of my days while also pissing off classicists and other supposed classical enthusiasts for being really weirdly attached to the fact that Sappho is NOT a lesbian? Yes. Yes I will.

Vote Percy as your favorite gay little sailor man from ancient Greece in the next election

[classicschronicles]

Hi lovelies,

Guys. This blog. Is one years old today! Woah. Icl I’m really bad at sticking to things so the fact that we managed to get a post every week for a year is pretty cool, so thank you all :)

As it’s pride month (happy pride!!) I’ve been seeing a lot of things on Twitter celebrating queer figures from classical antiquity, and whilst there were definitely queer figures to be celebrated, I think there is a lot of misconceptions about sexuality in the ancient world (especially Greece and Rome). So today I thought it would be cool to talk about male and female sexuality in the Ancient Greece and Rome. Quick trigger warning, there are mentions of pro5tituti0n, r4pe, and sl4v3ry, so read at your own risk and please stay safe <3

Okay so just some quick things to understand. The term ‘homosexual’ wasn’t coined until the the late 19th century, and the word bisexual until 1892. In regards to Ancient Greece, it was a largely homosocial, if not ‘homosexual’.

So starting off with Ancient Greece. Potential sexual partners for men included other free men (in the realms of pederastic relationships), wives, pro5titut3s, and both male and female slaves. Pederastic relationships were the main form of homosexual relationships and it was basically a socially acceptable, educative and erotic relationship between an adult male (mid-20s to 30s) and a younger male (mid-to-late teens to early-twenties). The older lover was called the erastes (lover) and the younger was called the eromenos (beloved). The erastes had to pursue the eromenos (usually at the gym) and it was his role to provide education for the younger in the areas of politics, philosophy, rhetoric, and social customs (basically how to be a good citizen). In return, the eromenos would provide the erastes with sexual pleasure, but key point it wasn’t penetrative pleasure because (oh no) that would be too gay. Stupid I know, but basically penetrative s3x would, to them, make one of them ‘feminine’ and in a highly highly misogynistic society that just wasn’t the done thing. But there is evidence to suggest that quite a few men ignored this social convention. For example, in Aristophanes Frogs, they mention a politicians called Cliesthenes who has broken this tradition and in Plato’s Symposium, Pausanias and Agathon. Anyways! The erastes was chosen for his beauty, so the more beautiful you were the better erastes, and therefore education, you would receive. It is really important to note that for the erastes, this wasn’t allowed to be his primary sexual relationship, in that it was expected of him to be married and that his primary relationship was for the purpose of childbirth. Another partner for men in Ancient Greece was was pro5titut3s, and there were two levels of this. The first was the pornoi, who were ‘street workers’ and were slaves (male or female) owned by br0th3l owners. The second levels was the hetairai who were highly educated female courtesans, a mix of free women and slaves, and were primarily seen at drinking parties.

There is little that is know about the sexual partners of women in Ancient Greece but its largely agreed that women could only have male/female relations with their husbands, but as long as it didn’t get in the way of having children, they could also engage in relations with other women. Sappho’s works suggest that this was often the case before marriage.

In Ancient Rome, the potential sexual partners for men included their wives, infames (male or female), slaves (male or female) and extra marital affairs. So starting off with infames, this was a person- that because of their profession) had no legal status in Rome (so actors, gladiators etc…). Because of the focus on the active and passive members of the relationships, the free man always had to be the ‘active’ and the infames the ‘passive’. Generally when it came to homosexuality, romans did not have pederasty and if a roman man wanted to have sex with another man they could as long as they weren’t the passive one, because if a freeman was the passive one it would damage his virtus. Again, like in Ancient Greece, this wasn’t a mans primary relationship and he is still expected to have a wife for the purpose of childbirth. Because of this, relations with male slaves became popular and the term ‘puer delicatus’ (delicate boy) was often applied to slave boys brought specifically for this purpose. Similarly to Ancient Greece, it was encouraged for men to have relations with pro5titut3s and exploit household slaves. Adultery was, however, outlawed but the Lex Julia. BUT, this was hugely hugely unpopular and historian Gaius Suetonius described the reaction as ‘open revolt’. This suggests that extramarital affairs were accepted and popular. Ovid literally has a whole book about pursuing married women and succeeding, which tells you all that it needs to.

In regards to women in Ancient rome, there again isn’t a lot that is known. But Ars Amortia book 3 suggests that women did have extramarital affairs and some form of sexual liberty.

In all, heteronormativity wasn’t as enforced in the ancient world because, in all honesty, they cared more about who took on the ‘feminine’ role, and so their sexual liberty didn’t come from acceptance, but straight up misogyny. Also I read this really fascinating thing that basically said that in todays world where we enforce heteronormativity, we can’t assume that everyone who says they’re straight, is in fact straight. In the same way, to the ancient world where (and forgive my use of modern terminology) homosexuality was expected, you can’t assume that everyone who said they were ‘homosexual’ or ‘bisexual’ actually was. Sexuality has, and always will be, flexible and diverse and deeply fascinating and so you can’t enforce labels on the ancient, or indeed modern, world. It’s fluid and whatever you want it to be, but either way, I hope you all found this interesting!

Thanks for sticking with my awful ramblings for the last year, I love you all loads, and I hope you all have a lovely rest of your weekend <33

~Z

[mademoiselle-red]

Reading the Renault fandom dissertation, part 4: the online TC fandom analysis begins…

An academic decided to write about us, online fans of Mary Renault’s works, for her phd dissertation in 2018, and as the subject of her research, I will be covering & commenting on what she wrote over a series of posts ✍️📑 (Here is part 1, part 2, part 3, part 5, and part 6)

For part 4, we begin to delve into Chou’s analysis of the online TC fandom, which she calls the “millennial fandom” because it sprung up in the new millennium (the mid-2000s).

“While Renault’s works have mostly lost their relevance for readers of historical fiction and gay literature, Renault has found a new fandom in internet communities. On LiveJournal.com, the social networking website that has been a platform for many fandom communities since 1999, there are two major communities devoted to Renault and her works: maryrenaultfics (since 2004) and maryrenault (2005). While these communities have become less active due to decreasing popularity of LiveJournal itself, Renault fandom is still active on more recent fandom platforms such as Tumblr and Archive of Our Own”

So far this checks out. These are all the places we have congregated in.

“Renault’s new fans are not the “older gay men” who have gone digital, nor are they the “serious-minded teenagers” interested in classical times, or the academics who are finally paying the author her long-overdue attention. The cult popularity that Renault’s works achieved in the community of online fan “prosumers,” especially for those who are interested in “slash”—fantasy about male homoeroticism largely produced for and by women—demands a renewed examination of how Renault’s works could be reread and re-evaluated.”

I’m pretty sure there are middle aged men, academics, and serious minded history-obsessed teens among us. But cis women (and bisexual folks) do comprise half of the fandom (according to an informal poll I ran a while back).

“According to Fanlore Wiki, one of the largest Wikipedia websites about English- speaking fan activities, one of Renault’s LiveJournal community has been in existence since 2004, aptly named “Mary’s Handmaidens.” On the Fanlore page about “Mary’s Handmaidens,” a passage describes the gender and sexual constituent of the online community: “The community includes members of both sexes, with (by comparison with many other fandoms) a notable contingent of men, though the majority of writers of fan fiction are women. Various sexual orientations are represented among the membership.” The statement about a “notable contingent of men” is a curious one compared to the “handmaidens” in the title of the community. Despite its consciously inclusive taglines (“the community includes members of both sexes”, “various sexual orientations are represented”), the community adopts a female persona as its identity.”

This is a fair point! The handmaidens group name really wasn’t inclusive. And cis women did and still do comprise the largest group in Renault fandoms (and slash fandoms in general).

“Another example of Renault’s Internet fandom is The Theban Band’s fan arts based on Renault’s novels (see fig. 4). Among fan artworks on Renault’s works by The Theban Band, one piece based on The Charioteer illustrates serial lines of flights from the fans to Renault, from Renault to her characters, and then from her characters to antiquity (see fig. 5). The artwork demonstrates the fantastical disposition of the simultaneous disidentification and cross- identification with otherness, which in the scene depicted is embodied in a leap to another time and place. This artwork captures the moment in which Ralph and Laurie’s flirtatious book-exchange takes place in The Charioteer.”

What about this above image demonstrates disidentification and cross-identification with its subject matter? It appears to be a just a faithful visual rendition of the scene from the novel.

“If Ralph is attempting to initiate Laurie to homosexuality, it is interesting that the knowledge of homosexuality that he passes on (instead of homosexuality itself) is explained as a fantasy. In this scene of erotic initiation of a young boy, the only physical contact between the two characters is through a book that is “just a nice idea.” In the same scene, the two are depicted as dangerously close to a kiss In the passage, Ralph merely makes an “outward movement” and then steps back. What takes place in between, the “[h]alf-remembered images” of “the tents of Troy, the columns of Athens, David waiting in an olive grove for the sound of Jonathan’s bow” preoccupy Laurie’s mind strangely more so than the immediate presence of Ralph.”

I guess she is on the no-kiss team for chapter 2. 😚

“Together with the Phaedrus that Laurie physically receives, the fantasy of a homoerotic past mediates the modern, homosexual relationship between Laurie and Ralph throughout the entire story. In this sense, Phaedrus functions for the two characters much like how Renault’s books function for her readers. The Charioteer is an adoring look to the past clothed as a story about the inner struggles of a modern homosexual, or, more precisely, about how the struggles must be negotiated through a fantasy of the past. Renault’s books were for her mid-century gay readers “a badge of homosexuality” in much the same way Plato’s Phaedrus is for Ralph and Laurie: a communication about desire in the present through a collective fantasy of a past that contains the ideal form of that desire. […] Laurie looks back into a mythical past in order to contextualize his homosexuality, and Renault herself turns to the idea of Greek Love to write about male homoeroticism. In a similar way, the 21st-century fans locate in Renault’s works a kind of male homoeroticism that seems unavailable in the here and now of post-gay sexual politics.”

What are post-gay sexual politics? In what way precisely is the kind of male homoeroticism in Renault’s works, and in TC in particular (since this passage focuses on TC) no longer available in the here and now? While things have improved a lot for queer people, especially here in the west, homophobia has not gone away! Do all LGBTQ people in the Americas and Europe (where Renault’s books are published) no longer face familial and social ostracism after coming out? Readers both in the old livejournal and here on tumblr have mentioned how they could relate to TC because they come from homophobic families and communities. Through TC and the Greek novels, people can read about characters experiencing similar emotions and situations, across time, space and sometimes gender, and feel comforted, knowing that they are not alone, that this love exists, it is real, and it will find a way.

“The three-fold leap in time for Renault’s millennial fans constitutes a fantasy that is thrice removed from the “reality” of sexual desire. If Ralph and Laurie could be said to negotiate their own identity through an ancient Greek philosopher, and if as critics have argued, Renault masks her own lesbian identity by male homoeroticism located both temporally and cultural distant from her own, it is much more difficult to argue that there is a sexual truth being filtered through Plato, Renault’s characters, and finally Renault herself for the millennial fans.”

While Laurie & Ralph and the mid-century gay readers use The Phaedrus / The Charioteer to communicate their sexuality through “a collective fantasy of a past that contains the ideal form of that desire”, the “millennial fans”, according to Chou, are too far removed from the “reality” of sexual desire to receive “a sexual truth.” This assumes that the millennial fans do not use The Charioteer to explore and understand their own sexuality and cannot relate their own sexual realities to the same-sex desires depicted in the novel. This, as I said in the paragraph above, is not true, since many readers in these online communities do identify as LGBTQ+ and can relate to LGBTQ+ experiences. It is true that many of the millennial fans are not specifically gay men using these gay books to reveal their sexualities to each other. And there are indeed straight women among us, but in my experience, we are definitely NOT a majority straight-women group. Most of us are queer people who, like Ralph/Laurie and the mid-century gay readers, have found each other through this book (as friends and as lovers ❤️)

My commentary on Chou’s online TC fandom analysis continues in part 5, and a tumblr username familiar to many of us here makes a surprising appearance in the dissertation 👀👀👀

[seyvia]

Tagged by @oatberrytea Thank yuh!🌼 I want to do Fable <3 no one can stop me! <3

Bold The Facts

The rules are simple! Tag people and name a character you want to know more about! If you want to let the person you tagged decide who to showcase, then don’t name a character and they can pick somebody. Easy! The person who is tagged will then bold the remarks below which apply to their character &, if they want to, include a picture with their reply!

[ PERSONAL]

$ Financial: wealthy / moderate / poor / in poverty

✚ Medical: fit / moderate / sickly / disabled / disadvantaged / non applicable

✪ Class or Caste: upper / middle / working / unsure / other - she runs her ma's old antique shop & her father was a fisherman all his life, I think she would be a bit of both mid & working?)

✔ Education: qualified / unqualified / studying / other -her mom taught her her trade. has highschool diploma.)

✖ Criminal Record: yes, for major crimes / yes, for minor crimes / no / has committed crimes, but not caught yet / yes, but charges were dismissed

[ FAMILY]

◒ Children: had a child or children / has no children / wants children -she strikes me as the type who loves babies)

◑ Relationship with Family: close with sibling(s) / not close with sibling(s) / has no siblings -that she knows of?) / sibling(s) is deceased

◔ Affiliation: orphaned / adopted / disowned / raised by birth parent / not applicable

[ TRAITS + TENDENCIES]

♦ extroverted / introverted -you can be good with customers and still wanna hide in a closet) / in between

♦ disorganized / organized / in between

♦ close minded / open-minded / in between

♦ calm / anxious / in between

♦ disagreeable / agreeable / in between

♦ cautious / reckless / in between

♦ patient / impatient / in between

♦ outspoken / reserved / in between

♦ leader / follower / in between

♦ empathetic / vicious bastard / in between

♦ optimistic / pessimistic / in between

♦ traditional / modern / in between

♦ hard-working -not being able to do things bc of her health can get her upset. she is giving Virgo vibes lol) / lazy / in between

♦ cultured -in flea markets & trade!) /uncultured / in between / unknown

♦ loyal / disloyal / unknown

♦ faithful / unfaithful / unknown

[ BELIEFS]

★ Faith: monotheist / polytheist / atheist / agnostic

☆ Belief in Ghosts or Spirits: yes -she saw one on the beach when she was kid and was afraid to go near it for a while. she's seen one too many now) / no / don’t know / don’t care

✮ Belief in an Afterlife: yes -its comforting for her to think she will see her parents again one day) / no / don’t know / don’t care

✯ Belief in Reincarnation: yes / no / don’t know / don’t care

❃ Belief in Aliens: yes -her father had shown her some really weird fish!) / no / don’t know / don’t care

✧ Religious: orthodox / liberal / in between / not religious

❀ Philosophical: yes / no

[ SEXUALITY & ROMANTIC INCLINATION ]

❤ Sexuality: heterosexual / homosexual / bisexual / asexual / pansexual

❥ Sex: sex repulsed / sex neutral / sex favorable / naive and clueless

♥ Romance: romance repulsed / romance neutral / romance favorable / naive and clueless / romance suspicious

❣ Sexually: adventurous / experienced / naive / inexperienced / curious

⚧ Potential Sexual Partners: male / female / agender / other / none / all

⚧ Potential Romantic Partners: male / female / agender / other / none / all

[ ABILITIES ]

☠ Combat Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none

≡ Literacy Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none

✍ Artistic Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none

✂ Technical Skills: excellent / good / moderate / poor / none

[ HABITS ]

☕ Drinking Alcohol: never / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / Alcoholic

☁ Smoking: tried it / trying to quit / quit / never / rarely / sometimes / frequently / chain-smoker

✿ Recreational Drugs: never / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / addict

✌ Medicinal Drugs: never / no longer needs medication / some medication needed -or just love) / frequently / to excess

☻ Unhealthy Food: never -she was raised on a strict diet, now unhealthy foods can taste strange, but this could change) / special occasions / sometimes / frequently / binge eater

$ Splurge Spending: never / sometimes -when she can't haggle it down like mom taught her lol) / frequently / shopaholic

♣ Gambling: never / rarely / sometimes / frequently / compulsive gambler

(I'm gonna add this little fun fact spot.💌 you can ignore it if you like.)

Fable's tattoo: she always wanted to get one, but her mom would always talk her out of it saying; her skin was to delicate, but at the age of 21 she made up her mind and told her mother that she would be getting a tattoo of her moms favorite flower, because she needed a reminder to herself that her will is stronger then her skin, and that her mother helped her get there.

(her dad did too, but I couldn't find a fish tattoo I liked)

Tagging: @rebelangelsims @devotedsims @aliengirl @aries-sims if you want to, and you reader<3

[veilchenjaeger]

Who are some of your favorite wlw in myth? What about non-explicit women in myth you believe to be wlw and why?

Ohhh, this... touches upon an entirely different topic that I'm pretty passionate about, which I happen to want to make my Actual Research Focus, a.k.a. queerness in ancient history. Disclaimer here that I'm literally only vaguely knowledgeable about Greek mythology, with a tiny bit of Roman on the side, so that's what I'm going for here.

The thing about wlw in Greco-Roman myth is that they're rare. I recently read Female Homosexuality in Ancient Greece and Rome by Sandra Boehringer, which is a book that frustrated me in parts but is still a very good, very detailed introduction to the topic of queer women's ancient history. Boehringer lists... two myths, I believe, that she thinks actually talk about desire between women. (I agree on both accounts.) Only one of them is explicit.

What I think gets lost a lot in the discussion on Greco-Roman history and mythology and how queer it was (which btw is a hellscape of a discussion in the first place; ancient Rome was not a queer utopia in the slightest) is that sexuality between women was seen in a completely different light from sexuality between men. It's true that the concept of homosexuality and heterosexuality, as in "the capability of a person to be attracted to a certain gender", essentially didn't exist in ancient Greece and Rome. People apparently were aware that some people are only attracted to certain genders and not to others, but there was no clear opposition made between homosexuality and heterosexuality, or even homosexual and heterosexual behaviour. Relationships between two men did not automatically belong in the same category because they were happening between two men. (More on this in Roman Homosexuality by Craig A. Williams.)

And while all this is true and thus certain kinds of male/male relationships were socially accepted in Greece and Rome, the situation was completely different for women. Boehringer essentially argues that the concept of homosexuality did exist for women in Rome, because any sexual relationship between women was automatically unacceptable. It's more complicated in the case of Greece, partially bc Greek history is stupidly long and varied and partially bc we don't have sources. After Sappho, it's very rarely talked about. There are some sources that acknowledge sexuality and love between women, and it apparently wasn't seen as something to be mocked the way it at times was in Rome, but what I'm getting at here is that we just don't have any stories about wlw in myth akin to, like, Apollo and Hyacinth or Zeus and Ganymede or even Achilles and Patroclus.

THAT BEING SAID! I support Artemis and Kallisto in their lesbianism, but what really gave me brain rot was Boehringer's reading of Iphis and Ianthe. Which is afaik the only truly explicit myth about wlw, given to us (in an apparently edited version; this is not straightforward mythology as in "a story told in this way for generations") by Ovid.

If you're familiar with Iphis and Ianthe, you probably know that Iphis is a girl raised as a boy, falls in love with a girl, and is in the end turned into a man by Isis so that she can marry Ianthe. I'm using she/her pronouns for Iphis pretty deliberately here, because while the whole metamorphosis of her sex does happen, Iphis is pretty solidly a girl and identifies as a girl until the end of the story. (There is imo evidence for trans people in classical antiquity, which is something I still have to read up on, but I don't think Iphis and Ianthe is that. (Although it can of course be adapted in that way for a modern audience, that's cool and valid.)) The way Boehringer reads this story, which is a reading that compels me a lot and that I'd tentatively agree with, is that Iphis' struggle is not with her gender but with her own attraction to another girl. In her monologue, she points out that her own father, Ianthe's family, Ianthe and herself all want the wedding to happen, that nothing stands between them at all but the fact that they're both girls. She calls her own desire monstrous, worse even than Pasiphae's desire for the bull. She's in love with Ianthe and Ianthe is in love with her, and still this relationship and this marriage absolutely cannot happen because there is no man involved.

From a wlw perspective, I don't think this myth has a happy ending. It's necessary for one of the girls to become a man in order for them to be together, which is... oof. But I also think that from a modern perspective, it reflects a feeling I think a fair number of wlw have experienced - that pervasive idea that erotic love for women is inextricably linked with men, that loving women makes you less of one or that you can't truly love women if you are also a woman. It also reflects the whole bullshit we have still going on in society re.: wlw relationships not being real relationships.

And like, I want that happy ending. If I were to write about Iphis and Ianthe, it would be about Iphis discovering that changing her body did not change the way she feels about her gender, that she's happy with Ianthe but not happy as a man. I like to imagine that she comes clean eventually, and that Ianthe and Iphis, AFAB AMAB cis trans woman, can live their best queer life in the privacy of their home. That's my personal favourite outcome here, but I also think this story could be adapted in a number of ways that reflect wlw experiences. I think it would be cool as a story about butch experiences, for example, or trans lesbian experiences.

So, my current favourite wlw in myth are Iphis and Ianthe, only partially bc there aren't really many others.

I'm also what I call vaguely pagan, so speculating about the sexualities of Gods in ways that might go against the way they were worshipped (e.g. Athena as anything but a virgin Goddess) is not something I usually do, but if I were to write a myth adaptation about these Gods, I might portray Athena and Pallas as pretty dang gay just bc it'd be sad and romantic, and looking at the Kallisto myth, I think there's a pretty solid basis for making Artemis a lesbian. What does "virgin Goddess" mean, anyways? How was virginity conceptualised in Ancient Greece? These are things to read up on.

Anyways, this is probably way too long and not at all what you asked for, but thank you for the opportunity to talk about Girls!!

[jeannereames]

Hello! Do you have any resources you would recommend for learning more about the sex lives of the ancient Greeks? Not so much pedastry, but other topics like homosexuality in general, prostitution, husband/wife sex life, beliefs towards different sex acts (oral, penetration, etc.), pre-marital sex, bigamy, etc. I've heard some people call them liberal minded while others say they were more conservative than we think.

Yes! I’ve posted on all these things a few times. Here are, I hope, some useful links!

Some important bibliography, albeit largely on Greek homoeroticism (including female)

Ancient Greek Sexuality for Dummies

A basic overview perhaps of just the type you're looking for.

Did the Closet Exist in Antiquity? (explains some differences between them and us)

Plutarch, Moralizing, Alexander, and akratía (despite the title, this looks at ancient ideas about continence and sexuality)

[infinitemonkeytheory]

“My goal is for students to take courage and hope from knowing that same-sex relationships and gender diversity have existed in various guises for millennia. In antiquity, homosexuality was not considered an identity category the way it is today, making it hard to determine if and how LGBTQ-like people were discriminated against, but they certainly were not always met with contempt. For example, the body of Hermaphroditus, a god whom Greeks sought out for help with fertility and child care issues, combined female and male characteristics.

I also want students to connect with the past as a way to feel rooted and validated. In this, I took a cue from trans activist Leslie Feinberg, who wrote in the 1996 book “Transgender Warriors,” “I couldn’t find myself in history. No one like me seemed to have ever existed.””

[yanqings]

very funny to be that i had to make a list of academic interests but chose to exclude women’s sexuality/female homosexuality in antiquity. im not telling you im interested in knowing how long women have been scissoring each other for. I dont know you like that

[zooterchet]

The Sopranos (Favorite Characters and Analogs)

Furio: Furio is a Hamas Islamas, found through defending a mobster’s wife, from a cop stalking her to steal her.  An Islamas, is an Irish Witch, and a Hamas, is an alternative to the British-run Fatih Party; either Hamas or Fatih, will use a cartoon cipher, not on themselves, but implanting them in someone else, to temporarily induce sociopathic behavior.

Ralphy: Ralphy, is the Jewish representative, inside the Soprano Family.  Constantly enraged with the Italian Gentiles, working a meat contract on union lawsuit to a Jewish political management firm, he’s savage and ugly, and doesn’t get along with anyone, having the cultural moralities of a woman, as a chauvinist misandrist, like any woman would be.  He is savage and cruel, like you wish you could be.  He’s already fucked, from being put in with Gentiles, that act on men’s culture, but through the extension of an uterus, a suit’s court in Arabic culture of Islamic state (the default defeat of a man, to steal his wife).

Chris: Chris, is the addict.  Smart, clever, a natural business scholar, he was placed in AA or NA, for having the same problems as the rest of his friends and family, but being able to get out of the petty crime they were all trapped in.  They thought he “looked cop”, so an author picked him up, and now he makes music and art on the side, not discussing it.  There’s a deep, hateful resentment in Chris, which was why the pamphlet guy in the crew, Ralphy, put him in AA; he didn’t understand a Jewish convert, Jake is part Native; he didn’t know Ralphy was Jewish, he was stoned on pot.

Jake: Jake, has unwittingly lured himself into gay culture.  Tony Soprano’s son, he was popular in his class, for having money and being a gentle thug, with all the Italian culture from the Arab states in antiquity, the Jewish culture of Sicily placed under Italian Catholic rule, by homosexuals, those without pork in their mother during pregnancy.  Hence, he’s been placing in event planning, likely as a class council or class extracurricular, unaware that the events and harmonics are intended to make you homosexual, through sexual assault of female’s lover on a college campus, a member of the professor’s circle and doomed to marry a kidnapped male spy, forced transgender by the standards of Ireland, under Shane O’Neill, only dodged for making a pact with the “Fiddies”, the British Intelligence Services.

Carmella: Carmella, married Tony Soprano to get a better man, listening to movies and film and television, mistaking them for male, actually for families.  Deeply dissatisfied with her family, marriage, and surroundings, she’s a pederast, not a pedophile, a female pedophile setting up a fake cop and killing them with two pair sets, an “X”, a friend to the homeless, but is otherwise a pederast, a clan matron, an inappropriate role, as it mimics canine culture; the kidnapped dog, from the wilds, tamed by an ‘overbuer’, a homosexual cat lover.  By myth, an ex-convict, actually a cop, a ‘sluggard’, someone so deep and depressed and ‘blue’ (a little boy mimicking a rape victim, his own mother, to repeat Carmella).

[audreydoeskaren]

do you know Chinese symbolism for homosexuality?

tw homophobia, pedophilia

Hi again, for gay men there are a couple really well known ones but I’m not sure if they were real or fabricated, because all the articles describing them always cite the same couple sources from Antiquity... I tried to verify them but the only articles that didn’t copy and paste from the same source came across as extremely homophobic, so I decided to give up. The most common and reliable one is probably 断袖 or “cut sleeve”, which I mentioned in a previous ask. I would like to use this opportunity to talk about some tangential but more important topics regarding homosexuality in China though.

As a followup to my previous ask where I said I'd look through some Ming and Qing novels to see how homosexuality was perceived at the time, the conclusion I (unfortunately) came to was that homophobia was very much alive and well in Chinese literature and society. A lot of people like to argue that gay people fared pretty well in China historically by either pointing to emperors who were or were rumored to be gay or time periods where gay sex was prevalent as a form of consumption. This is extremely shallow and also kind of Orientalist in my opinion, these arguments always go for the emperors and do not take nuance into consideration or dive into wider societal discourses on homosexuality in imperial China. If you research homosexuality in Europe by only looking at royalty, you’ll find plenty of homosexual behavior too, does that mean gay people had it very easy in Europe historically?? Not to mention that they usually don’t differentiate between dynasties, let alone centuries or decades, even though public opinion on homosexuality in China (or anywhere in the world tbh) could change very quickly. This is also sort of Orientalist, assuming “imperial China” to be a never changing entity with a never changing stance on homosexuality. Since I know nothing prior to the Ming Dynasty I’ll share some of my random findings on homosexuality and homophobia in the Ming, Qing and 20th century.

Gayness as disease

Nowadays the symbol of the cut sleeve is just a benign historical allusion but historically it seems that it was used in a negative and condemning sense, implying that people thought of homosexuality as a disease or deviation from the norm. The common phrase used for the cut sleeve is "断袖之癖", usually translated as "the passion of the cut sleeve" nowadays, but the meaning of the word 癖 here leans more toward "fetish", "obsession" or "hobby" with pathological connotations. I thought maybe this word had a different, nuanced meaning historically but it seems that it was used to describe what it means :(( The only silver lining is probably that with the progression of language it isn’t offensive anymore.

In a lot of popular novels from the Ming and Qing, homosexuality was depicted as a "perversion" and a decadent lifestyle that plagues morality, and gay characters were often either killed or straightened out by the end of the story. An example of this is the story 黄九郎 Huang Jiulang from the series 聊斋志异 Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio by 蒲松龄 Pu Songling written in the 17th century. In this story, one of the protagonists was gay; he died after confessing his love to the other guy in a very fast paced bury your gays arc which somehow reminded me of the Supernatural finale, and reincarnated as a straight man because of his piety. Thanks I hate it. Pu uses the symbol of the cut sleeve to refer to the protagonist, presumably in a negative manner.

Gayness as power/status symbol

Another thing was that historically in China a lot of people confused homosexuality with pedophilia. This is a global thing, but its presence in China is often overlooked. This could be seen in the popularity of another term for homosexuality, "娈童", meaning something similar to "pederasty". I read somewhere that since the late Ming, pederasty was considered a type of tasteful consumption for high society, along with things like fashion, food, music and art. This was not equivalent to the "cut sleeve" or homosexuality as we know it nowadays, which refers to a personal sexual orientation, pederasty historically often refers to an imbalanced power dynamic where a wealthy, privileged man takes advantage of a young boy as a leisurely activity. It’s more to show off that someone in a position of privilege and wealth has the power to procure sexual objects, gender and age don’t matter much in this regard. I cannot help but cringe violently whenever someone brings up pederasty as proof of China’s historical “openness” toward gay people. Talk to me again when in this time and place you could marry someone of your sex (not a minor) and be considered a respectable couple instead of two jerks with a degenerate fetish (not saying that gay people have to marry, it’s just that the ability to do so is an important indicator of equality imo). Pedophilia and homosexuality are not one and the same good heavens.

I hypothesize that the reason why Chinese society was historically homophobic despite having no religious condemnation of homosexual individuals was the idea that having many concubines and male children was a status symbol for men. Women of marriageable age were seen more or less as commodities and male children could supposedly "continue the bloodline" 传香火 and were vessels for passing down prestige, so having them were of utmost importance to a privileged man. Being just gay or lesbian, however, meant that you didn't perform the "man strong working woman weak making babies" heteronormative family prototype, and was thus prone to criticism. When gay men didn’t have children they “couldn’t continue their bloodline” and were emasculated, when gay women didn’t have children they failed to “fulfill their duties as a woman” and were shamed.

It kind of makes sense considering how being bisexual was never a problem in comparison, especially for men. If you were a rich guy who had both male and female partners, you would still have children and concubines both male and female so nobody gives a shit. Emperor Zhengde of the Ming (reign 1505-21) was presumably bisexual and had both male and female lovers, nobody had a bone to pick with that; he famously liked to fuck around but those who criticized him did so for his debauchery instead of focusing on the gender of his partners.  This is different to homophobia in Europe where same sex attraction was considered evil and immoral in and of itself because of religious reasons, in China it was rather the other practical implications of homosexuality (not having children or a family) that attracted hate.

By the way can we just take a moment to talk about bi erasure in Chinese history. From all accounts of Emperor Zhengde I’ve read he comes across as extremely bisexual, but a lot of people try to make him a gay icon? I mean, he liked women too.

One interesting homophobic angle in ye olde China which I find kind of funny was straight women who wanted to climb the social ladder by marrying rich men talking shit about them after figuring out they were gay lmao. Historically, there were not so many work opportunities for women, so the easiest way to improve social standing was to marry a rich and powerful guy. Not saying that women didn't work, they did but their upward social mobility was restricted because they couldn't enter the imperial examination system which was how men became rich and powerful. This angle is relatively benign and kind of helps illustrate that historical Chinese homophobia was indeed fueled by classism and patriarchy.

Gayness as crime

I used to think that there were no anti-sodomy statutes in China (laws prohibiting sex between gay men), but it turns out that there was one decree in the Jiajing era (1521-67) and one in 1740, and private gay sex was not actually decriminalized until 1957. Same sex marriage is still not legal in China at time of writing. I couldn’t find detailed information on what these laws entailed or how they were enforced, but they’re enough to prove that homosexuality in China was legally punishable from the 16th century onward. On top of that, even when there was no law prohibiting private sex acts between people of the same sex, displays of gay affection such as kissing or holding hands could still be legally punished under “public indecency” or “hooliganism”, which was frequently what happened in the 20th century. 

[acelor-acetaylorswift]

So I went down a rabbit hole today, trying to learn more about theories that Emily Dickinson was lesbian or bisexual. I've heard about this before, but never knew what to make of it because I now always wonder whether someone was homosexual/bisexual or aspec bi/homoromantic, but because of lack of education, people just assume the former.

What struck me was first how people would toss the word "asexual" around as some sort of insult and antiquated way of viewing a person because you wanted to sexually repress them due to your discomfort with the idea of them being sexual or due to homophobia.

Inwardly, I cried out for broader understanding of asexuality and aromanticism and more representation so that people don't make these painful characterizations of us, so we get the respect for our sexual identity that we--like EVERY human--deserve, and so that asexuality is not stigmatized. Stigma creates shame and hurt and leads people to live in the closet or love in denial (or even ignorance of their orientation), harming them in so many ways.

I'm tired of seeing asexuality used in antiquated ways, implying someone is a robot or killjoy or not fully human or uptight or repressed. Many of the articles and social posts I came across acted like the idea that Dickinson was asexual was distasteful and so she must must must be lesbian or bisexual instead.

I read some excerpts of Dickinson's letters to her love interest, Susan Gilbert (her sister-in-law), and found myself wondering, "How can we know this is a sexual relationship? Why can't it be a romantic one?" This may sound homophobic, but I say this to advocate for those of us who are, say, biromantic but not bisexual. To make room for other types of relationships besides the traditional sexual romantic marriage-baby carriage idea of love that has been pushed on us all, superceding all other forms of love and being treated as the only valid form of partnership. And expanding our ideas to see, "maybe I am not physically attracted to women, but I would rather be in a committed relationship with a woman than a man. Or maybe I don't want a relationship at all... I've just felt like I had to. I have just gained valuable information about myself and what makes me happy, potentially side-stepping a thorny path of trying to force myself to fit into a heteronormative, autonormative society, and searching for a relationship that meets my needs."

I don't want to invalidate celebrating public figured and characters for being (or possibly being) LGBTQ as a way to empower people, I just want to raise awareness that there is an A to consider too. And that considering that could deepen our understanding of those people, but also allow others to explore their own identity.

I don't know enough about the subject to make my own judgments about Dickinson (and I'm not sure we should say anyone's sexuality with 100% certainty who hasn't outright proclaimed it...goes for straight people too.) But my mini research journey highlighted some troubling tendencies I see in the world outside of aspec community. I feel people could benefit from knowing about the split attraction model.

I admit some of this comes from a place of my first intro to the aspec community being from having strong feelings for a female friend. I was confused; I was not sexually attracted to her, but I found imagining spending my life living with her, even getting married. A friend recommended I look into the asexual spectrum, and since then I've been on quite a journey. One that has been invaluable to my happiness and well-being.

I haven't even touched on quasiplatonic relationships either. All that to say, I feel erased from the world and the scholarly narrative seeing that these types of nontraditional romantic and platonic relationships aren't explored or are even spat on because it would presumably be shameful to be asexual or have a platonic or solely-romantic love.

Again, I don't want to make this a debate about Dickinson herself because I don't feel qualified to speak to that, but this whole thing raised some questions and frustrations for me that I've felt before.

[mafaldaknows]

All this talk of shamming and how it’s a necessary evil – it’s not – made me think about Richard Madden and how much I respect him for how he manages his career and private life. Granted, Timmy wants a career on a different level but Richard is the living proof that you can have your cake and eat it too. Hopefully Timmy’s team won’t be that greedy and understand that mental health is more important than box office results in the long run. And Armie and his (non-existent) team get it that it’s okay to not be constantly attached to a female and super duper straight in public. Richard is still following Armie – even after his scandal – so maybe Armie should hit him up about some advice because let’s face it, the people around him are complete shit at it.

Hello, Anon:

If shamming is not a necessary evil, then why do the powers that be in Hollywood still insist on it, even in the 21st century? I would like to think that most reasonable adult moviegoers don’t care what actors do in their private lives or with whom, they just want to watch a great movie. But deep-pocketed investors, and the producers and studio execs who must pander to them don’t want to risk alienating audiences in countries where homosexuality is against the law.

I saw DUNE twice in the last two weeks and not once during the entire 2 hours and 35 minutes either time did I pause to consider any of the details of the cast members’ personal lives.

Somehow someone decided that even in this day and age that antiquated morality clauses for performers were still necessary in order for movies to succeed at the box office. I couldn’t give a 💩 about who anyone in a movie goes home to at the end of the work day or spends their weekends with. Only the most judgmental of assholes could possibly care about such an inconsequential detail about someone else that’s none of their business to begin with, and that has no bearing on their own lives.

I don’t get it either, Anon. I would love to see more performers defy this bigotry to find the confidence and strength to live their lives freely, on their own terms, like Richard Madden. But there is also something to be said for playing the game well enough to gain the leverage and power to change the system from the inside out.

Patience, darlings. These things take time.

Thanks for your comment. 💜🌈❤️🧿