#lanque discourse

[velvetvexations]

Yo, if you wanna talk about stupid Homestuck discourse between trfs, you should see how the fandom reacted to Lanque, the canon transmasc troll. I saw so many bad takes like saying he can’t actually be a trans guy cause he doesn’t have top surgery scars and he’s too much of a guy, they called him predatory and shit cause he did party drugs and wanted to fuck the player character even tho he respected boundaries and consent the entire time and never forced anything on you, only offered. And don’t get me started on how he got leaked and everyone thought he was a butch lesbian and it was somehow the devs’ fault they all misgendered him initially. Personally, he’s officially my favorite canon trans guy character as a trans man. He defies all stereotypes while also just being a cool as fuck character. Also his whole thing about wanting to escape his fate predestined by his blood caste is very fitting for a trans character. All trans guy characters now must meet the higher bar that’s been set.

he sounds rad tbh

[beforus-for-real-justice]

< you guys just make up discourse at this point. do a poll on which mod should be voted off >

Yknow what. Fuck it.

[autisticsupervillain]

Lanque discourse is gross across the board tbh. At least Charun and Cirava are broadly spared from it.

Imma be real with y’all but personally I find the trans Vriska head canon a bit offensive? Not super offensive but just, yikes y’all

(I’m a trans woman btw in case you didn’t know, just throwing that out there before peeps accuse me of anything)

Vriska being trans suddenly has her doing a lot of offensive seriotype stuff (“the compitent gal powerhouse must obviously be trans no other way”, being super impulsive, literally being a fairy!!! etc) AND like all of her trans coding was only from Pesterquest. Which while fun is non canon as frick yo.

That’s a big part of it to like being trans is a BIG part of a person’s character. You can’t just make them trans on a whim that shits gotta be in there from day one. The whole “and then I transitioned and that was that!” thing never happens shit bro this is a big part of a person!! And Vriska just don’t act like that. Not saying a trans character wears it on their sleeve per say but like it’s quite the life influencer.

(Tho admittedly this is me applying human society norms to troll society but then again since when do the writers take that into consideration)

But ye

Don’t retcon in trans just cause you thirst for trans characters, like fuckin make trans characters !!! I don’t want your “haha she was trans the whole time I swear!” JK Rowling fuckery I get being thirsty for trans reps, I am to, but this ain’t it chief. Vriska is cis boo hoo. Hell these peeps are writing homestuck2 just like??? Have trans peeps in that??? Trans peeps playing Sburb has so many ramifications like legit stop dwelling on characters that we already know all about and give me some actual trans characters !!!

If y’all want a trans icon like,,, Lanque is standing RIGHT over there, tho his route mocked y’all who be wanting to reduce trans peeps to “uwu pressoous bab who did no wrong uwu” so ye continue to sleep on him I guess !! He was a lot more popular before he route came out and it sickens me to the bone

[autisticrena]

it saddens me so much that Lanque's whole existence as a character in the Homestuck universe is tainted by discourse.

you're telling me that Hiveswap finally gave us a trans character who is an asshole™️ and whenever i try to find stuff related to him instead of finding awesome fanart and essays of people exploring transness in Alternia i find... *opens Tumblr*... discourse?? transphobia?? shame on you. shame on all of you.

[real-homestucks]

REAL HIVESWAPS???

[trandom]

Here me out:

[nemowom]

I forgot that his eyes are yellow im sorry

[bramblepatch]

/steps up to the Discourse Podium and taps the mic

Lanque isn't remotely the first Alternian teen we've seen leverage sexual precociousness and emotional manipulation to control their peers, he's just slightly older and much better socialized than most of the others and therefore better at it. His behavior is destructive and predatory but also a predictable possible outcome of a society with no adult oversight of any kind and a strong awareness of looming inevitable mandatory sexual activity for the vast majority of the population.

In other words Lanque's behavior is a successful example of what Vriska was trying to do throughout much of Homestuck Act 5.

[homestuckisautistic]

@lanquee-bombyxx he was said to be trans by Cohen, yeah. My point is there is absolutly nothing in hos writing to back that up. Yes, its possible to have very minimal scarring disguised by nipples depending on how your surgery is done, but thats honestly besides the point.

When you write a character from any marginalised background, you have a responsibility to...y'know. Actually write them that way, not just say "oh yeah! [Character] is totally this thing!!" its why i used the phrase "pulling a Dumbledore" in refference to JK Rowling retroactively insisting Dumbledore was gay despite having zero textual evidense to back it up. Lanque is somehow the reverse of that, being claimed as trans before he was even written and then just...sort of ignoring that fact.

Also worth noting, this isn't me saying that fans need to have proof before they can headcanon characters! That is an entirely seperate issue and i think my stance on that is p clear considering i have autistic headcanons for literally every Homestuck character. But a writer does have to back things they say up in their source material! There should he something at least suggesting Lanque isn't cis. Im not saying he should have waltzed in with the pride flag iver his shoulders saying hey its me the only tran on alternia but well thats what i do on a daily basis so its definitely on the table

Tldr; yes, Lanque was confirmed trans by word of god and if you want to see him thay way thats A-OK. But there is nothing in his writing to back it up and as a trans man, i read him 100% as a cis dude.

[vripei]

I know the Lanquecourse train has slowed a lot, 8ut I still have some Words.

Screenshot from someone I follow on twitter, 8ut he deleted it so I’m posting this for him.

[screaming-goblin]

hello tumblr, i have some hot takes™ on the Lanque discourse i’d like to point out! I think Lanque’s entire character is a satirical callout of the fandom and how it treats popular characters, Think about it, the character is either treated like a ‘uwu sweet prince with a flower crown’ or ‘sinful slut who doesn’t know when to stop’. like??? how have y’all not noticed this??? as soon as i read both of Lanques routed it was like “holy shit hiveswap really did that” and I love it tbh!! Also, y’all losing your goddamn minds over Lanque having candy red nails and a handkerchief to match???? y’all remember that bright red is a symbol of rebellion and worn to “Look cool”. So, I don’t think the red nails signify a moirail/mateslrite that Lanque has/had.

[prophetparadox]

Lanque’s Friendsim Route Opinions

Yeah, I guess I’m throwing my hat into this discourse. After playing through his route fully and looking at various opinions that are in his tag, I figured I should give myself a bit of time to let everything sink in and gather my thoughts.

Gonna make something clear though before I jump into this: my opinion on this subject does not have to do with him being trans. I’d feel the same way regardless if he were portrayed as cis or non-binary as his gender is not a personality trait. Him being trans is not relevant aside from one point that I’ll mention when I get to it. I also don’t want to speak too much about his portrayal in tandem with his status as a trans male, as I’m not trans myself and I don’t believe I have the right to talk about that subject. I’ve seen different opinions presented by those who are trans as well, so there’s clearly no consensus on this. I will say though: if his portrayal bothers you there’s still at least two (three? I haven’t finished the Soleil twins route yet but I’ve heard mentions that one of them uses male pronouns so yeah) trolls that are non-binary and I don’t like the idea that people seem to be forgetting Charun and Cirava’s existence. Now then, let’s get started.

I’ll admit, I’m someone who jumped on the Lanque train after his design was revealed. And I had worried that when his Friendsim came out that his personality would turn out to be one I didn’t like. However, I hadn’t expected, well, that. I won’t lie, playing through the adult route made me feel uncomfortable at many points. I’m not a fan of Lynera at all, but the things he said to her went too far in my opinion. The bad ending left a sour taste in my mouth for reasons I doubt I need to explain. And what Bronya said about his treatment of his matespirits leaves little to be desired. I had a feeling that his final portrayal was not going to be the best, but the final result was worse than I could have imagined.

Now I’m not someone who expected or wanted Lanque to be a soft pure uwu trans boy or anything like that. And while I will admit that the SFW route was the one I preferred, it’s because he was just more pleasant to interact with in that route. If I’m being honest, I had pictured him as being a melodramatic wannabe vampire type if anything else. The fact that there’s two different versions of Lanque depending on if you take the adult route or not and both of them give you good endings just makes things harder. Because even though it seems to be implied that the adult route is the “canon” version of him, there really isn’t a surefire way to tell. And I think that’s what bothers me the most.

Granted, I do think that his route was intended to break expectations. He certainly wouldn’t be the first Friendsim route to do that. Marvus, Mallek, and Karako come to mind specifically. Just because I don’t like the way his route was written doesn’t mean he’s a bad character. There are people who are upset because he isn’t the way they wanted him to act, there are people upset because he isn’t trans in the way they wanted him to be (it is pretty creepy that people wanted to see visible proof he was trans with his chest), there are people upset because of a lot of other reasons, but it does feel like a lot of it boils down to not meeting certain expectations that the fanbase had for him. And I think that was a mistake we all made. A number of characters didn’t turn out the way we expected, but Lanque in particular is raising a lot of ire. So many people wanted him to be a specific vision they had, and the route shot it all down because we had these ideas for months. The route pretty much told us we shouldn’t do that, so hopefully this won’t happen again with any future characters we see in Hiveswap. I may not like what Lanque’s personality ended up as or how his route played out, but I too judged him before I knew what he was like. I can’t just say it’s bad though because my expectations were shattered. I don’t like Lanque basically being Part 1 Dio Brando from JJBA, but that’s what he is and I guess I’m just not meant to like him.

I don’t really know where I’m going with this anymore, so I’m gonna stop here before I ramble too much. If you have any thoughts on this, feel free to discuss with me.

[batvenom-art]

I love how everyone is complaining about Lanque being the "first" trans character in homestuck/hiveswap and he's not even good rep but like? Everyone just forgot that Cirava and Charun exist? I know they're nb and not directly trans from one end of the binary to the other but they are trans nonetheless and I think they're pretty good rep.

[rightcat-wrongcat]

Ok but like

The one(1) thing I will say about Lanque’s route from here on out(probably) is 

He’s VALID for yelling at Bronya.

Maybe not in the way he did.

But yelling at her? A b s o l u t e l y.

May I remind you.

Bronya calls. all. the jades of the cloister. Her girls. Her GIRLS.

I’m trans and I would yell at Bronya for calling me a girl, sweet as she is. 

[degagedatary-blog]

[[I think the stuff done with Lanque is pretty cool when you really take a moment to dig into it

I just wish they could have figured out a way to tell it in a different context, or with a bit better explanation of things. Some people literally don’t care about ‘Homestuck Thematics’ and if that doesn’t interest them, a lot of these nuances are just going to be read toxically. 

Because that is sort of how it was presented, in a vacuum.]]

[homestuckisautistic]

Lanquecourse 2: Electric Boogaloo

I finally got round to watching an LP and sure enough, I have some opinions on it but i dont feel as strongly as Jess did. I do recommend you go read her post on Lanque first though, it should just be a little below this one and she goes into a lot more detail than i will.

That being said, i have three observations to make; two about Lanque himself and one about his chapter as a whole.

First of all, Lanque is not transgender. He's not. This is echoing what other, noteably Tipsy have said but there is absolutly nothing in the volume to imply he is anything other than cis male. He is said to have a "masculine" voice and when shirtless, he is bare chested and without scarring or any evidense of boobs. You can play the Ambiguous Troll Titties card if you want but it doesnt change that other trolls either do or do not have noticable breasts in their art and that if they were actually comitted to making him trans, they could have included details such as scars or a binder anyway. He is not a trans man, he is a cis man they decided to pull a Dumbledore on.

Secondly, he is abusive. This is also not up for debate, he intentionally pressures Lynera into a confrontation, she is visably uncomfortable around him throughout both routes and he is also very manipulative towards the player character. I've seen people trying to argue that because Alternia is the way it is and he's using sexuality as an escape that excuses his behaviour and...honestly, go away. I dont have personal experience with sexual abuse but i know enough people who have to know how damaging seeing this kind or behaviour replicated is for them. Furthermore, having a justification does not excuse abusive behaviour. He's still actively hurting and manipulating people for his own pleasure. Cool motive still murder next question.

Before i make my final point, ill say i dont think this makes it wrong to enjoy the character. Im out here stanning Vriska man, im here wishing Eridan and Gamzee had a chance at redemption because when it comes down to it, theyre still children. Lanque's a bit older sure and more distasteful since hes not doing what he does to survive, but my point is. Its totally cool to like flawed characters. So long as you acknowledge they're flawed. Also I'm irritated by the whole trans thing but at this point, I'm not surprised. He's just another cis dude.

My final point is his chapter as a whole felt...weird? I haven't played much of the others but the narrator felt much more like classic Homestuck than what friendsim has had, shit it felt like I was reading Caliborn at certain points. The fact that Lanque straight up has a different personality in the sfw and nsfw routes also stands out. The conclusion im forced to is...this episode is a joke. It is mocking fans and fan culture. Using the word "problematic" more than once and just...the whole tone, even the fact that the focus was the character already labeled as trans and therefore with more controversy around him than most. It seems like it's trying to say something about how fandom reacts to it's source but the way it does it left a bad taste in my mouth. It feels like they wanted to make a shitshow so they can laugh at all the fans being offended. Which is...not okay. Its a little disgusting, actually. There's something here that i can't quite find the words to express but i felt contempt from some of the words, the 4th wall breaking to take a dig at fans. Fuck man, i can understand being frustrated by your fanbase but this isnt a good way to address it.

~Jason