#and creating queer ships bcs we LACK representation

[secretsofthewilde]

About your post about misogyny in fandoms and shipping spaces, I do 100% agree how a lot of female fans do have internalized misogyny based on how they navigate fandom spaces. It doesn’t have to be extreme like hating all women, but people do have biases where they tend to gravitate to more male-dominated shows or would justify why they hate m/f or f/f bcuz it’s uncomfortable for them to write about the female body due to personal reasons. Which i used to be as a teenager but overtime i learned to come to terms with my own version of feminitity and became more comfortable with writing m/f ships. Sometimes when i see that brought up, im like “okay dont u see there is a problem there? like u discomfort of the female body has some ties to misogyny and u cant just write it off as an excuse for the majority of female fans.” Even the defense of the lack of female characters is also flawed due to the fact that some ppl would desperately two male characters together even tho one character was in two scene for less than 2 minutes yet completely ignore the other female ccharacter that has more interactions with the male lead. You could also throw in racism as this is also always used for WOC and justified as “oh not everything has to be about shipping” when those the same ppl that ship anything and everything in other fandoms

Yes, you are so very right!! And thank you for giving me an excuse to continue to talk about this. (Post anon is referring to is here x)

I tried not to generalise too much in the initial post bc I think there's different reasons and I guess flavours of internal misogyny which contribute to individual fans dismissal of f/f. Your example isn't exactly relatable to my personal experience, but it is one that makes sense to me and is something I assume is the case for many others too (including one of my best friends actually!). For me personally, I knew I was queer around the same time I got into fandom (so quite young), but despite being aware of this I still found myself feeling uncomfortable or even guilty for looking for anything f/f. I think that this was bc there was this ingrained fear that by engaging with female characters in any way I was sexualising them*. Which is ridiculous in retrospect, considering there's no sense of guilt for so many of us to engage with male characters in ways that are actually sexualising them.

Bc of the patriarchal society we live in we tend to see male characters as "neutral" ones (the same way whiteness is considered "neutral"**). By engaging with male characters repeatedly and normalising both the general celebration of them but also the sexualisation or queering of them, we ended up somehow creating an environment where male characters being queerified in fandom is seemingly more neutral than doing so with female characters - by which I mean that we expect to see people in fandom creating and celebrating m/m or m/f ships of male characters in any given fandom regardless of who they are canonically, whereas to do so with female characters is often considered to be unconventional or strange. I mentioned briefly in the post about the projecting of self onto male characters, and I think that's because they offer us a "neutral" character to explore queerness but also just multifaceted characters in general. There's so much more fanworks exploring things like the nature of morality or mental health issues using male characters than there are with female ones. That's because our engagement with female characters is kind of stuck in this area where we can't be neutral with them.

With the way that fandom discourse works nowadays we often analyse our characters as being figures of representation***. This means that even though we are now getting more media with female characters at the front of it, we often view them through the overly critical lens of "how is this representing us?". Even something as shallow as a joke about the character enjoying retail therapy then becomes something that is used as an excuse to tear the character apart, because we don't want to be seeing what we have been taught to view as negative female traits on our screens. Women can be bitchy, they can be jealous, and even evil. We need to learn to recognise that our discomfort in seeing them portrayed as such on our screens isn't always due to being upset about the representation of all women, but rather our discomfort in seeing these traits within ourselves.

*There's something particularly difficult about combating internalised homophobia when you're young and also learning about feminist ideologies where we want women to not be viewed as sex objects. I think this may also be a huge contributing factor for queer fangirls' tendencies to subconsciously project themselves onto male characters.

**'The Matter of Whiteness' by Richard Dyer explains this theory really well and is an academic essay that I highly recommend everyone read. I also think it's a pretty good starting point if you're not familiar with reading academic texts and are interested in intersectionality, racial bias, media analysis etc

***I'm borrowing from Dyer's theory here, which essentially argues that a black character's existence will always be viewed (and judged) as a representation of all black people. In comparison we will watch white characters and view them as their own individual character. To apply this to my above points; we don't question whether it's bad representation for our male lead to enjoy watching action films because we just view that as a character trait of his, whereas we will be critical of the female lead who enjoys watching chick flicks because we will then view her as a shallow representation of women.

[variousxcruelties]

Have you considered that some asexual people take comfort in the thought that even someone who is asexual can still be in a happy relationship? Even if you're aroace, that shouldn't mean you're doomed to be alone. QP relationships exist. It's not harming anyone, so why shame people for it?

Wasn't even going to dignify this with a response but the last line really got me heated so here we go.

I'm tired of pretending that rabid shippers and entitled fandom culture, especially here on tumblr, aren't harmful. It's all extraordinarily harmful. It’s lowkey disrespectful to Brennan and the players, specifically Murph and Lou re: FabRiz, who spend countless hours on whack schedules not only filming in order to give us this fucking awesome story but also spend countless hours off camera planning and working with sensitivity consultants to ensure that they are engaging with a great deal of topics in the most ethical way and offering true-to-form representation and respect for their audience but that’s not even all of it.

Have you considered that Riz is a literal teen character that has an entire hypothetical lifetime to figure that out, but is extraordinarily canonically happy with the *platonic* relationships that he has right now and has expressed zero interest in any of the bad kids or NPCs beyond that *platonic* relationship?? To imply that if he doesn't have a defined QP relationship at the least in order to not be "doomed to be alone" is honestly kind of disgusting and reductive?? Like, what a complete devaluation of family, found family, and straight-up platonic relationships?? How do you view QP relationships if you need to use them as a scapegoat for your shipping of a queer character that has expressly stated that they have no interest in romance, sexuality, or relationships beyond the friendships that they currently have? Is QP just the fancy word you use for your need to simulate a dichotomy of a monogamous romantic relationship because purely platonic relationships simply cannot ever suffice in your opinion? Because, I'll tell you, for all of the hypothetically "QP" FabRiz content I've seen, not a single one acknowledges the poly aspect that would be involved given that Fabian is explicitly not aroace and is currently canonically engaged in some kind of romantic/sexual relationship with Aelwyn. So do y'all actually want a complex QP relationship dynamic that benefits both of them or do you just want simulated monogamy in an MLM relationship that you pretend is QP but secretly hope is romantic and/or sexual in nature because you feel that Riz not having that means that he is inherently lonely and sad?

Have you considered that there are also aroace people that take comfort in characters that don't have a want or need for anything beyond their family and close friends, which at this point could also basically be defined as an extensive found family? Have you considered that you don't respect or find value in that so you project onto Riz and/or FabRiz in order to make their relationship more palatable to you?

Maybe it's time to look inward instead of sending anon messages to people that say it is harmful to take aroace identified characters and shove them into ships for your pleasure. Maybe your ships don't exist in a vacuum and you need to figure out why the hell you're pushing this weird rhetoric that aroace people are "doomed to be alone" if they aren't in a defined relationship beyond general familial or platonic engagement <3

Because I absolutely will continue to shame you for it.

[alma-berry]

1) I think it's really dangerous to suggest that a non-straight character being popular is tied to their 'pornographic value' and blatant proof of mass fetishisation bc it achieves the exact opposite of normalising lgbt ships (it pushes them to the margins/silences discussions centred on them) and it creates a damaging narrative of lgbt characters being nothing but their sexuality and having no hope of ever being recognised as more than their sexuality/romantic inclination.

(I’m gonna answer each part of this ask individually cuz this is long and I have a lot to say)

2) I rarely see these kind of discussions aimed at straight ships. I've never seen someone imply that Julian is a fan favourite because he's with Emma and had sex with her. The mixed reactions Jace and Clary got, and are still getting, have little to do with their sexual orientation. Most people I've talked to are side-eyeing the J/C/M triangle bc a lot of us are over love triangles, not because Cordelia is getting in the way of J/M.

I couldn’t agree more. Our need of queer characters is not in order to create our own little bubble. We need queer narratives to be normalised, such as queer identities. Normal not in a form of “same as” but in a form of “just as valid as”. That why you’re so right, and we need to be very careful in the way we phrase ourselves and our demand for more queer representation. This world consists of so many kinds of people, and each and every one of them should be appreciated on its own, by its own right and its own story, and not just as a title or a box that should be checked.

3) As far as wlw ships are concerned, the silence around them is in part the result of Cassie's own treatment of her (sparse, so so rare) wlw characters. There's very few of them and the ones we do have, Cassie's own investment in them is lacklustre. They are sidelined, barely mentioned, rarely involved in the main plot. Exiled, chained to a sickbed, they don't get to shine as protagonists braving their own adventure.

Leaving Anna aside (who so far is a remarkable character), I agree with you completely. Intentionally or not, this is the case. The wlw representations in TSC is weak, inconsistent (I spoke before of how Helen is a completely different character in RSOM than she was in Tales and TID) and lacking of authenticity. The story of how Haline met in RSOM fell so flat to me, almost as a gag. They have some beautiful moments in TID which I truly love, but as a whole I’m disappointed of how they’re portrayed. But, we can ask what the reason for it might be. Is it because CC has something against wlw ships? I don’t think so. I think the problem is planted in that they interest her less than other ships. Or, we might say, ships with men. I’m NOT saying this is a woman-hating thing, not at all. But I have a lot of criticism towards the way she writes female characters, and I think this specific lack of authenticity in her wlw ships is originated there.

4) Cassie could have made Cordelia a lesbian of colour. She could have matched her with Lucie instead. She could have made Kit, the lost Herondale, a girl instead. Could have written Ty as an autistic, gay girl. Heck, she could have made Julian a girl! She had plenty of mains to choose from as potential wlw rep and she didn't. She either made them straight or mlm and it was her decision. If there's a bias in the fandom, it certainly echoes the one in her books.

Now, this I don’t agree with. There’s a story, and the story has to make sense. Making some characters female or wlw just for the sake of it is not something I think she should do. Also, she doesn’t owe us more representation, she’s doing quite a lot in that department. We can criticise the quality of it, but calling her out for not doing more, or more in the way we want her too, is not fair. I understand completely that we have our own needs of female wlw characters, I truly do (The only characters I can meekly identify with is Helen, which sucks for reasons I already explained), but we can’t pretend we’re owed that by every single author on earth, let alone an author who already is quite a pioneer in that department.

5) So what I'm saying: while she has good rep in her books, her main characters are still overwhelmingly straight and if they are not straight, they are more often than not mlm. And while I'm grateful for the world she has created and every single one of her lgbt characters, I don't think it's warranted to act as if her books treat male and female characters equally, as if there's a perfect balance between m/f, m/m and f/f ships, and insult her fans for working with what she gave them.

No, her male and female characters are not balanced. Not in so many ways… the more problematic thing to me is from a feminist point of view and not from a queer point of view, honestly. But this is not the subject at hand - so no, we can’t say theres a balance, but must we? The world is more straight than queer, that’s a fact. Not that I would’ve minded a completely queer cast of characters (it would be a dream come true) but why be angry about that? Yes, she writes far more mlm than wlw couples, that’s true. Obviously she likes (and frankly, succeeds) writing them more than the others. But should we be spiteful because of that?

Her comment on that post is insulting by all means, I said it loud and clear. Not sure if its relevant to how were “working with it” though.

[lena-in-a-red-dress]

You write a bit of OT3- do you have some advice for someone looking into writing it- or any resources to look into? TIA

Ummm... online queer community resources are good? I don’t have any specific ones to recc, unfortunately, bc I did most of my reading while I was figuring out all my ace stuff, and not for writing purposes (which only started with the OT3 stuff years later). You’ll want to look into polyamory as a keyword, sometimes referred to more simply as “poly”. 

In terms of execution, communication is key. So is honesty. If there’s lack of honesty, then it needs to result in conflict. And honestly having all of them be totally into each other is my favorite arrangement to work with, but there are some relationships where that’s not the case-- again, honest communication is an absolute must in establishing and maintaining boundaries. 

And at the risk of getting on my soapbox: Let them be happy. 

Poly ships do not have enough representation in media to justify the “everyone cheats and is unhappy” grimdark trope that the hets love to push on us. Sure, that stuff happens in real life, even to poly relationships. But showcasing it in a poly fic only perpetuates the already-existing assumption that poly is synonymous with sexual greed, promiscuity, and adultery. 

Poly ships in fiction are still in their infancy-- give them their hundred years of happily-ever-afters, and then we can start talking about gritty realism.

Create responsibly.

[flying-elliska]

sorry if this is like. the weirdest question ever but i thought you would be an ok person to ask. i've recently gotten into writing again and discovered that the hardest part of writing characters different from me isn't when they have a marginalized experience i don't know (ex. writing poc as a white person), bc there's research and guides available for that, but rather when i have an experience they don't (like writing straight or neurotypical ppl as a mentally ill queer person) 1/2

so i was wondering if you ever had the same problems or any advice on how to write characters with more “mainstream” lives when you can’t remember how to connect to that pov? it’s fine if you don’t, i just have a lot of respect for you as a writer and a person and i value your thoughts! sorry i wrote so much :/ 2/2

oh don't apologize, i love love love questions about writing, especially the weird ones ^^ and this is truly a fascinating question. it did puzzle me a bit at first because the thing about the mainstream perspective is that it's, well, everywhere. and it's absolutely an experience in itself too ! like as queer people we've grown up surrounded by straight love stories, and so on. so it made me wonder why exactly you have that difficulty, and whether i also sometimes encounter it (maybe a little at times).

- is it a problem of legitimacy ? as a person that has been 'otherized' in certain ways, do you maybe feel like your perspective on 'the norm' is less valid/adequate ? I especially have this when it comes to mental illness, I have these weird moments of anxiety about whether all the characters i write end up being mentally dysfunctional without me realizing it, etc - i don't think it's true, but the anxiety is there. and honestly i think the concept of 'mentally sane' in the society we live in remains somewhat nebulous and to be defined still. if you share these anxieties, it's good to remember that it's a proven phenomenon that marginalized people are forced, for reasons of survival and because they are socialized to the norm anyway, to quickly acquire insights into the experiences/minds/habits of privileged people ; and have been taught to see privileged people as human and complex in ways where the reverse is not necessarily true. This is why, for instance, women's writing perspective on men can have a depth and humanity that the reverse often lacks. in general i think as baseline that people can write really valuable things about experiences they don't share, the 'stranger's perspective' can be really interesting in itself because it forces you to ask more questions ; unless it has been blighted by privilege (which functions on a basis of seeing the other as inherently lesser and the atrophy of empathy). i really don't believe in the idea you should only write about experiences you know or have ; after all empathy + research + curiosity + imagination + questioning why things are the way they are, are a fundamental part of the writer's craft ; it's just crucial to be aware of how power can skew that. so i hope this reassures you a little if you struggle with this.

- is it a problem of interest ? ever since i realized i was queer, i have had this desire, more or less strong at times, to only consume and produce stories containing a majority of queer people. i was accused once of making too many characters queer in my fic (lmao i was so proud). and you know what ? i think that is abso-fucking-lutely fine. if people have an issue with that they can go back to the 99% of literature that caters to them. if you don't feel like writing about straight people but think like you 'have to' for some reason, please don't force yourself lol. and don't be ashamed to want to write about people who do share your experiences in that way, especially since we have been starved for representation for a long time. sometimes it's also just a detox phase you need to go through. i have had more m/f ships as of late and it almost feels fresh again to me lmao and focusing on queer pairings for a long time has given me a new way of looking at love and relationships and general which is great.

- is it a problem of connection ? ok so maybe you do want to write about those mainstream experiences but you just find it hard to be inspired for some reason. if you have checked that it isn't one of the problems above, i think the next step is to just look for the core reason of why you're writing these things in the first place. where's the issue, the spark, the zing, the problem, the crack, the fatal flaw, etc. Mental illness and queerness are interesting to write about, of course. but when you don't have that, you should still have other interesting things to write about. and you can go back to the universals. what is love ?how does sexuality impact people's experiences ? what does it mean to be mentally healthy ? what's the mind anyway ? how does our society affect those things ? how is the 'typical neurotype' qualified and why ? i have always believed anyway that true universals are made of an infinity of diversity, and not some sort of generic mold. so you can find a connection to an experience you don't have via an experience you do have. (again, as long as you're aware of power dynamics etc). will it always be perfect ? no, but it's still interesting to try. 'being straight' as an identity is not equivalent to 'being queer' because 'being straight' ties into heteronormativity as a tool of social control/oppression and therefore, heteronormativity deserves to be destabilized and written about in weird/new/original ways by queer people who don't entirely understand what it is to be straight ; this will always be more interesting and liberating than straight people writing about gays who 'are just like everyone else!!!!' uwu'. as a neuroatypical person i actually believe i have very interesting things to say about the nature of the mind and selfhood because i am constantly thinking about it in way neurotypicals don't ; i have experienced first hand how much of our selves are influenced by chemistry and how willpower is not everything in life and how the self can be a fluid thing. I choose to believe that i am not some sort of alien freak that cannot understand 'normal' people, but rather that i am a specific mode of the human species that just has a lower statistical recurrence, and therefore society is not adapted to me and i have to think about things that other people can ignore and that is thinking and writing material !!!!! the 'norm' is not more central, more human, more valid, more basic, more by-default, etc. and barriers between identities are often more porous than we think. even if you 'fuck it up' it's actually interesting !

anyway i think my point is, in general, this is not an area that you have to be super careful about ! experiment, go nuts ! write about straight couples as if they were gay ! imagine what it means for you to be mentally healthy/stable/thriving ! don't feel bad if you don't understand something, invent shit and it will still be interesting ! and like, you can still very much do research here. like there is a shit ton of love advice columns that mostly cater to straight people, stories full of straight people, books on love in general...you can study that just like queerness has been studied lmao. for the neurotypical thing in particular I have just started a book called "Explaining Humans" by Camilla Pang, a brilliant scientist who has autism/adhd/generalized anxiety disorder, and who basically created a manual of 'how do people work' through science and it's so interesting, there are a lot of things that are implicit and that they never really explain to you and you can kind of miss if you're neuroatypical and it's really fascinating.

good luck ! and please feel free to tell me more if this has made you think haha <3 thanks again for the question !