#fudanshi was the masculine version for the same

[disaster-j]

So I came across a clip from an interview OffGun did a couple years ago and the interviewer's question and the way she asked it really hit home for me why so many people in BL/GL fandom spaces and asian audiences in particular are often so adamant that actors who work in same sex ships must be dating.

Like, my brain usually jumps to the the whole capitalist factors of exploiting people's interest in same sex couples irrespective of whether that interest is out of genuine love for queer representation or just finding same sex ships hot. The companies all push the agendas and particularly target teenagers who are more likely to build unhealthy parasocial relationships with these actors and their ships so of course they are to be blamed for some of the madness around it. I also think it's worth acknowledging that these kinds of invasive questions about dating and sexuality are also thrown at m/f pairs, though it's not usually as bad in comparison.

This interviewer asked OffGun if they were dating and of course they did their usual routine. The interviewer said something along the lines of "aren't you embarrassed (uncomfortable?)... if i had to film with another woman..." and it just made me think about how people just cannot fathom two people being comfortable with performing fake intimacy with same sex partners. When they see genuine chemistry between same sex duos like we see with pairs like OffGun, MaxTul, OhmNanon their brains can't comprehend that this level of closeness could exist without the presence of sexual and/or romantic attraction.

Too many people look at on-screen chemistry or even off-screen (platonic) intimacy between actors and cannot comprehend how it could exist without the presence of physical attraction. It is easier for people to comprehend this with opposite sex pairs because cishet audiences in particular assume that whether these actors ever act upon it or not they are physically attracted to each other. Because physical attraction between opposite sexes is seen as something of a default setting.

Now add homophobia to this preexisting thought process and you get huge groups of people who couldn't comprehend ever being close or intimate with people of the same sex without the presence of physical and/or romantic attraction. Not even when the intimacy is clearly faked for the screen. And of course if the actors are genuinely close in real life like the pairs mentioned above then there must be something sexual and/or romantic going on behind the scenes. Which then leads to these groups being enraged when said actors end up dating other people. It shatters this little bubble of ignorance they live in and seeps doubt into their messed up belief system and they lash out in retaliation because they don't like being proven wrong.

The point I'm trying to make is that while fetishism and the capitalist exploitation of the BL/GL genre play a big role in the toxicity of these fandom spaces, if allo and amatonormativity weren't such pervasive concepts in our society these problems likely wouldn't exist at such a large scale to begin with.

[phoenixkaptain]

Nonody cares, but I just can’t get over my intense bitterness towards a comic I started reading, only to realize midway through that I couldn’t stand it. I put down this comic and walked away, I didn’t leave any comment because the author made it very clear that they read all of them and didn’t want to be corrected. I realize that they strongly believe that they were in the right, but they were false.

It is all over the term “fujoshi.”

I cannot believe I’m going to make this debate on Tumblr right now, but I would just like to get it off of my chest.

Fujoshi started as a derogatory term towards women in Japan who enjoyed mlm media in works that weren’t intended to be mlm. The male equivalent is fudanshi. It’s a hard to translate word, but the underlining meaning of the term was used to call women “unsuitable for marriage.” It was used as an insult, a misogynistic insult.

The term has been reclaimed by women in Japan, some of whom embraced it openly and some of whom just still use it self-deprecatingly. It simply means that the woman enjoys mlm romance. That’s all. That’s what it means. I can assure you of this, one hundred percent, by going back to the prior mentioned male term.

Since fujoshi and fudanshi are the exact same thing, only different genders, I am inclined to believe that the terms aren’t inherently negative. I mean to say, I don’t believe that fujoshi describes a crazy woman who obsesses over hot men having sex while being homophobic and/or sexualizing real gay men. I don’t believe it refers to this, because the male equivalent is not described as crazy, obssessive, homophobic, and/or sexualizing of gay men. If the masculine form of the word and the feminine form of the word mean different things to you, you are wrong.

An example: waiter/waitress. It’s the same job. Actor/actress. The exact same thing. Fujoshi/fudanshi is just feminine and masculine versions of a term used to describe people who like to see romance between men.

Is it weird to enjoy that? Fuck no. Look, I don’t know how to tell you that lesbians and gay men are sexualized by the media, not by some twenty-something who jokingly calls herself a fujoshi. Even if she didn’t use the term, the rampant sexualisation of homosexuality would still exist. Therefore, since she doesn’t worsen or lessen this crisis with her usage of fujoshi, logic dictates that she can use it as she pleases.

And yeah, it is fucked up to view real life human beings as nothing more than sex objects. But, unfortunately, the term fujoshi doesn’t refer to this.

The comic mentioned at the beginning went on a whole long rant about how fujoshi are disgusting and fetishizing. Fujoshi was a kind of empowering term in Japan. Women embracing their “unsuitability to be married.” And why shouldn’t women embrace that? If their interest in seeing two people kiss makes them unsuitable for marriage, maybe marriage is just sucky. Why do we have to belittle these women who reclaimed a derogatory term? The most efficient way to deal with bullied and naysayers, I’ve found, is through taking their words and using them to lift yourself up instead of letting them break you down.

Words like fujoshi and queer are similar, in my opinion, because they were reclaimed by people. People who took these words, meant to be attacks against them, and decided they liked them. Who am I or you to tell the strong people who built the foundations for feminism and gay rights that they can’t use a term? If they decide dthat it isn’t an insult, then we should band together with them to further push the negative opinions down.

Someone calling a fujoshi disgusting is just regressive. You’re simply reverting to a 2000’s mindset of “this women in unsuitable for marriage and disgusting.” Why are you using the words of misogynists at the time? Why are you siding with them while claiming to fight for gay men? Feminism and homosexuality are not mutually exclusive. It’s because of these women, these “disgusting” women, that gay media has become much more pronounced. That male friendships have become so much closer in stories. Because, these women consume the media that they can ship characters from. Teasing a gay relationship in a show that is completely straight is just fanservice. Fanservice is not inherently bad, nor should it be viewed as such.

The way English-speaking countries (I’m looking at you U.S.) decide that a word means something different from what it actually means is disgusting. You are the ones twisting words and deciding that thing sare harmful. We can’t spend our whole lives consuming foreign media and not accept that they have some different idealogies from us. If you wish to consume the media, then you should be prepared to accept a new point of view. You don’t have to agree, but you can’t twist their words and act like they’re evil for being different. Have all those children’s stories taught you nothing? “Being different isn’t bad” is the moral of countless books. Did you miss that, somehow?