#The queer media is important

[matiasthecamilion]

For a long time I didn't understand why I was so obsessed with lotr, especially the relationship between Sam n Frodo, as the years have gone by I can only come to the conclusion that as a 14 year old queer kiddo who just It had been discovered a few months ago and that continued to scared a lot even feeling uncomfortable for what them little self was, I came to feel safe, secure and understood on levels that I had never felt before.

It wasn't just that they acted gay or said sweet things to each other, it was that I saw myself in them, I could finally see that people like me have always existed, that they have always loved each other. Seeing how they cared for each other and expressed their love made me think I was not alone.

I wasn't the only one to feel this way because they loved each other too. Bc I grew up in a conservative family I thought I wasn't worthy of love, but seeing them made me realize that that kind of "love" I felt has always been there.

Sam n Frodo are not just a ship for me, they are an important part of my path to self-acceptance. Thanks to them I learned that I was not wrong.

(a cute drawing made my dearest friend Fergii that is part of a reencarnation au we have on wattpad)

[thottybrucewayne]

For as much as I love Paris Is Burning (1990) (It was foundational in my getting into ballroom history and learning more about the ballroom scene in my area when I was in my early 20s), I feel like we barely mention its spiritual sequel How Do I Look (2006) even though it gives a much better look into ballroom and how the popularity of Paris Is Burning affected the scene. It also touches on the issues participants of the og Paris Is Burning doc had with the handling of the og doc and the way the mainstream has been trying to exploit the ballroom scene since the second they found out about what it is. While Paris Is Buring is a deeply important part of our history, it should NOT be your first and last stop when learning about ballroom culture.

[bunubunss]

victor, you'll always be loved ♡

[p-h-a-n-t-a]

Nimona was the first piece of media i found after realizing i was nonbinary that spoke to me, i read the webcomic every wedsneday in my history class in 7th grade. Middle school was hard for me because i was one of two kids in my whole grade that was out as some form of queer (pan, i didnt come out as nb until high school) and i lost a lot of friends from it. But also from just being "weird." I tried to come out to my dad at one point and heard nearly the same line balister says to nimona in the new movie "wouldnt it be easier to be a girl?"

I am now 21, working in a library where i see kids gravitate more and more towards graphic novels and we have the nimona graphic novel on our shelves, and i have waited so long to watch the movie, that when i finally watched it, i could not believe it was not just speaking to me, but screaming to me. Im a nonbinary individual that loves men in a queer way, and yet has been a weird little girl outcast for things other people did not understand. I have seen grown adults attack children online for not being straight or cis, and seen them say it is under the guise of protecting their kids. In the time between now and reading the webcomic in my history class, i have felt so many different ways about my identity and my existence, and holy shit does the nimona movie speak to me. In almost every stage of my life.

N D Stevenson, and all the people who made this movie survive and be possible, you were able to reach into the core of my being and make me feel just as seen as i first did when i laughed about shark boobs in a middle school computer lab. Thank you so much!!

[rosegardenpink]

“love, simon sucks!” “heartstopper is immature!” “first kill is so bad!” shut up shut up shut up shut up stop shitting on shows because it doesn’t live up to your impossible standards for “good queer media”. not every goddamn show starring lgbt people needs to be the next moonlight or brokeback mountain. y’all need to take a chill pill and stop being so fucking negative all the time. not every piece of queer media is going to check off every single checkbox on your thousand item list of what makes “good representation” and that’s okay. let people enjoy something for once jfc.

[twopercentboy]

y'know as much as I love silly gay ghosts, I do think it'd be really cool and really good rep if Edwin and Charles stayed platonic (after)life partners

like idk about y'all but I rarely see any best friend duo in media, let alone boy best friend duos, have this level of devotion, love, and trust for eachother, especially teenage duos and I think it'd be great to see that canonically on screen. and maybe I'm a little biased bc every time I see my best friend and myself in a duo it's a romantic couple and I just want to see a friendship like ours on screen, but like idk I think Edwin and Charles have great potential to be (queer) platonic partners and it'd be really sweet

[genderkoolaid]

tbh its not entirely fair to paint all blatant rep as poor in comparison to queercoding (altho i do love some good queercoding). i think the reason so much blatant rep is Like That, while queercoded stuff feels so much more meaningful and real, is because the blatant rep we often experience is made to Market To The Queers. while it may have queer creatives working on it, the reason its created is to make money off of queers. its trendy. so just write a fairly surface level fluffy movie about white queer teens and get some cash! its blatant, which means it will be treated as a groundbreaking queer media especially by liberals.

while queercoded media on the other hand (intentional or not) cant or wont just slap two conventionally attractive teens on screen and make them kiss and get those rainbow dollars. its an expression of queer silencing, the quiet thats left when you arent allowed to say what you desperately want to. when you cant spoon-feed your audience queerness you have to. yknow. actually think about what it means and how to express that artistically. you have to show and not tell.

thats all to say, there is blatant queer rep that is good. but you probably aren't gonna find it on amazon prime. that kind of rep is being made by queer artists making indie films. i promise you its not either "blatant queerness that feels shallow" or "deep queerness thats not allowed to be blatant". theres a secret third option and its "capitalism will never liberate you and you need to actually support indie queer artists and actively reject queer capitalism to experience the breadth and width of what queer art is capable of being and doing."

[bisexualfagdyke]

People only care about character's implied sexualities if they're implied to be lesbian / gay . As soon as a character is implied to be bisexual (e.g. explicitly attracted to / involved with both men and women) suddenly they're "lesbian / gay with comphet" .... what if I killed you with a rock 🩷

[soulless-bex]

it’s so painfully hard to get actually good aroace representation in media, because those characters, whether it be by the writers or the fandom, always get their identity erased.

jughead is a prime example of that. we could have had such an important character to represent us, but noooo

wednesday could have been perfect as aroace (especially with how she said she’d pity any man who fell in love with her in the old movies), but that would be too much too ask for

and i’ve seen too many fans asking for yelena belova and kate bishop to be made into a couple for my taste. THATS LITERALLY HER CANON SEXUALITY IN THE COMICS

[impulsivesuperrobin]

me, gnawing at the bars of my cage: richie tozier is smart!!! he gets good grades!!! he understands bill better than anyone!!! he thinks bev is so tough!!! his impressions are fucking awful when he’s a kid!!! he hates his glasses but thinks it’s cool that buddy holly wears them!!!! his parents don’t always understand him but they love him so much!!! he’s scared of clowns and werewolves and being forgotten!!! he dances with bev in a school talent show!!! and their friendship gives a time traveler hope for derry!!!

[risesthenight]

i HATE it when people excuse shipping certain characters despite their sexualities just because they’re fictional characters..

like YEAH they are, but they’re important representation to us..?

[whim-prone-pirate]

interviews with oliver stark that i really really really think you should all read

https://tvline.com/lists/911-buck-tommy-gay-kiss-explained-season-7-episode-4-recap/tommy-casting-explained/

https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/911-buck-tommy-kiss-queer-episode-100-oliver-stark-interview-1235956913/

https://ew.com/911-buck-tommy-kiss-bisexual-oliver-stark-interview-8624837

none of them are extremely long and altogether its only a few thousand words. if you are as elated and envigorated and affirmed as i am, oliver's words are only going to help.

[bluejayblueskies]

on the one hand i really enjoy romantic john/arthur esp. in nuanced ways where it explores like. what does romantic love mean for john, who maybe hasn't experienced it before? what does a romantic relationship look like when the two people involved share one body? what are arthur's feelings about being with another man, and how does the time period he grew up in influence those feelings?

but on the other hand, the fact that canonically john and arthur aren't in a romantic relationship and won't be in the future is very important to me (and i know a lot of other people as well). a large part of it is of course that as an aromantic person, it's so refreshing to have the main pairing in a piece of media be both a) extremely close and intimate with each other, as well as loving one another and b) not involved romantically. body sharing aside, relationships like john and arthur's are rare in media, and it's really nice to know that it's going to stay that way and isn't going to 'take the next step' [derogatory] into a romantic relationship at some future date.

even from a non-aromantic perspective (because i'm not trying to say that either john or arthur are canonically aromantic, just that it's nice that i can headcanon them that way and it fits into the canon narrative), a platonic relationship (and esp. one between two men!) being the main focus of malevolent is a choice i'm really glad harlan made. i'm not going to delve too much into this because his explanation is better than mine, but essentially, two male characters being vulnerable with one another and putting their trust in one another while not being romantically involved is something i definitely think we could use more of in media as a whole.

finally, i wanted to talk about the 'and yet you love him' 'i suppose so' dialogue between arthur and the king in ep. 20. (i think about this exchange a lot y'all--one of the best moments of the podcast imo.) 'love' is such a romantically charged word, especially when used in situations similar to this in other pieces of media. for complete transparency, the very first time i heard this scene, i thought it was meant to be romantic love because that's the kind of weight i ascribed to 'love confessions' based on the precedent set by other media and by real life as well. (i consider this moment a love confession because it's the first time arthur uses that word to describe his feelings toward john, even if he himself doesn't actually say it--literally a confession of love.)

finding out that it wasn't was a 'huh, interesting' moment for me, because i just hadn't really seen anything like it before! there was no precedent! hearing a love confession used in a context like this, where arthur's love for john is narratively important and something that can be used against him but is also platonic, not romantic, just ... it blows me away every single time i relisten to this episode.

in conclusion: i love them <3

[sendmepicturesofthemoon]

they are nick and charlie you can go argue with a wall

(screenshots from in a heartbeat)

[hotwaterandmilk]

I'm still not well so this isn't going to be articulate, but I wanted to say something anyway.

In the wake of Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies (amongst other titles) being purged from streaming I've seen countless posts saying "This is terrible, we need to stop this practice -- they might purge a good show next!" and yeah, for sure a lot of titles being impacted by streaming purges/lack of physical media/a decline in archiving right now aren't going to be remembered for changing the world.

However, I think it is vital that we fight to preserve these titles for their own sake not just because "What if next time it's something we actually like?!" There is value is preserving things widely regarded as "bad" not just because I have firm beliefs about the absurdity of taste, but because who gives a shit if something is deemed "good?" Actual human people put their time and energy into realising these artistic visions. Even if the results are arguably not "good" or "popular", should the efforts of these artists be lost to the sands of time? No, no they fucking shouldn't.

I share a lot of art on this blog from titles very few people consider culturally important or valuabe. However, I don't look at the things I collect & share like that. Even some of the most objectively absurd titles I own are still pieces of art that were developed, published, and consumed by humans in the real world. Whether they've turned out to be broadly memorable or not is irrelevant because they existed and that in itself makes them worthy of preservation so that others can choose to familiarise themselves with them long after the original creative team is gone.

So yes, we should all be trying to preserve the media that's important to us and not let corporations try to stamp out every trace of a financial (though not necessarily artistic) misstep. However, it shouldn't take the threat of something we, personally, like being taken away to stir us into giving a shit.

Even the demise of less admired works should concern us and make us start to burn copies of Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies because it might not mean anything to you or I right now, but to some kid in 20 years it could be a seminal experience that leads them to follow their dreams. Or it could become a cult classic that people reflect on at watch parties years in the future. Or it could continue to be a footnote in the history of television that nobody really cares about.

Ultimately I don't think it matters what level of value we arbitrarily assign to media now or in the future, we should be trying to preserve as much of it as possible so that generations from now people can enjoy the option of engaging with these titles should they so wish.

[starthelostboys]

no the lost boys or sam aren’t “canonically gay” in that there’s never a scene where they outright state their sexuality, but the subtext is there, down to the end of the movie and the themes of the entire film centering around the perceived threat of a group of gay men, when in actuality the threat is a conservative man causing harm in the name of the nuclear family model. to me that’s as canon as a scene where they say that they’re gay.