A weird thing that happened to me on discord once

[JoshRaed]

I told this story before but I did it very wrong.

Basically it all started with this person posting something on a writing server about letting a character have minor problems, and I gave an anecdote about my own story, but told it badly so I ended up getting a lot of follow up questions. But once I finally explained it, that this character had struggles with being thought of as a one dimensional stereotype of a gay dude by those around him, I was given advice to stop making this character one-dimensional.

For context, I’d already thought of quite a bit for this character:

He is consistently bullied for being an out gay teen in a place that is not accepting. The people who are nicest to him are a group of people who see him as their pet gay friend, and he accepts this because he’s unused to people who genuinely respect or like him. This is because parents are immature and uncaring, treating him similarly to how the bullies at his school treat him. A big factor in this is that he had a lisp, and everyone assumes it’s an effeminate gay lisp when it’s just a regular lisp. He is embarrassed to speak most of the time and will do so awkwardly and slowly most of the time so he can avoid lisping. Because of the way he’s mistreated, he has developed an affinity for 2000’s scene fashion and culture, and regularly dresses like a 2000’s goth.

I didn’t say any of this, but I didn’t need to because I wasn’t asking for writing advice and hadn’t even written a story yet, and was just answering questions about a thing I had said in a non advice channel. And yet people genuinely assumed I had written. No other details for this character based on the single fact that this character had sexuality based struggles, specifically struggles with being pigeonholed as one dimensional, and everyone assumed that made him one dimensional.

In fact this character isn’t even gay anymore, he’s bisexual now (specifically crushing on a girl even), because it was genuinely that unimportant that he be gay, just that he be perceived as such by those around him.

The rest of this conversation was kinda boring. I explained that the character wasn’t flat, elaborated on his character to them, I think got holes poked in the character writing of the description I gave, and then remembered I didn’t even ask for advice. I don’t remember it that well.

I don’t really have a point to this story. Just that this happened and I wanted to talk about it.

PLEASE DO NOT TRY TO GIVE ME WRITING ADVICE UNDER THIS POST. If I want writing advice i’ll ask for it.

[NickRowler]

If you just want to vent it might be better just to post on a personal social media like Tumblr or something. Posting to a public forum or Discord on servers dedicated to writing, it makes people think you want to have a conversation about your work.

I don’t know about your personal drama with said person, tho I can see maybe someone being concerned because lisps are a gay stereotype and your description frames your character as being a “punching bag” due to the fact he is gay.

[JoshRaed]

This is unrelated but on multiple occasions I have been told I need to understand depth and subtext in fiction, specifically when discussing chosen wads. I felt tempted to defensively write a 20 page book report on chosen wads just to disprove that, but I decided that wouldn’t help with the problem.

What is it about the way I describe my plot that makes it appear shallow or like I don’t understand what goes under the hood of a story?

[NickRowler]

You don’t really need to write a report…this isn’t school. Honestly I learned the most about writing from just listening podcasts and YouTube videos of people talking about movies and media.

As for your character, my concern is that you describe him in a very negative way. He’s bullied, friends mistreat him, bad parents, avoids talking due to speech impairment. What are his positive traits? Where are the people in his life who support him? What is his emotional drive as a character? Does he want positive change in his life? Is this his villain origin story?

You don’t really need to give me an answer, it’s just something you can just think about.

[JoshRaed]

Looking back on this in honestly super mad that me venting about homophobes in a toxic writing server got turned into this discourse about what a bad writer I am because I was slight vague on the details. Like do people here just never talk about their characters without having fully written them? Like they never have a moment where they mention a less than developed OC in a comment thread? Because that’s literally what I did and any indication of what they thought I did was pure speculation.

Then I said “a gay character CAN be done” was a bad thing to say (Imagine someone saying that a black character could potentially be a good character) and people just did not understand.

And my two sentences of venting got turned into me being obsessed with this story somehow and was treated like I was not allowed to be upset about the misunderstanding of my very simply words because I hadn’t written the story in question. Like by the time I had made that post this characters main thing was basically being a rockstar, I just hadn’t committed to that yet.

Why does no one on the internet ever hear me speak slightly ambiguously and assume the less terrible option? Why is everyone else seemingly given the benefit of the doubt all the time about actual homophobia or blatant misunderstandings, or pulling up my comic release history as a way of attacking me for venting for two seconds because being upset at homophobia was suddenly a distraction from my writing once I do it on the forums.

Like if it wasn’t me making this post in the context of other posts no one would have reacted like they did. I understand the difference, but come on, can’t something just be a thing and not a secret piece in the puzzle that is my failures as a writer?

[JoshRaed]

This was a mistake I only made because i’m up at midnight hate reading posts. @joannekwan can you close this thread now?

[kyupol]

I'd just write. Who cares. Haters gotta hate lovers gotta love.

Even Chad gets rejected

[NickRowler]

I was the only one who commented on the original post. Honey if you have beef with me, then just talk directly to me.

I just don’t think these vent posts are mentally healthy for you or productive.

[DiegoPalacios]

Why does no one on the internet ever hear me speak slightly ambiguously and assume the less terrible option?

It's hard to convey tone on written form. That plus random strangers that doesn't know you and negativity bias based on previous experiences clouds people's judgement.

Why is everyone else seemingly given the benefit of the doubt all the time about actual homophobia or blatant misunderstandings

sadly that's not always the case.....misunderstandings happen often online, but i agree that jumping into conclusions without the full information leads to unnecessary drama.

[DiegoPalacios]

Like do people here just never talk about their characters without having fully written them? Like they never have a moment where they mention a less than developed OC in a comment thread?

It's rare. People often prefer to talk about things that are more polished about their work. Not necessarily complete, but clear enough.

And the folks that come with something incomplete often come asking for feedback.

People can't read minds, so ambiguity leads to a guessing game that they will often get wrong.

[SleepingPoppy]

There was a topic about the same situation before this one. I think Josh is more so talking about responses to that, not you.

[JoshRaed]

I meant the other one that this was about. Sorry if this sounded like it was about you.

[joannekwan]

[joannekwan]