How popular is the LGBTQ?

[Silver7]

Would you say that LGBTQ characters are very popular in anime and movies or would you say that LGBTQ characters are not popular enough, they need to promote those characters more?

[LunarScyphozoa]

do you mean popular as in amongst fans they’re well liked? Or as in creators write a lot of them? Because more queer characters of every kind in every type of fiction would be fantastic, and is happening more and more; but whether or not they’re popular with fans seems to have more to do with if they’re well written and likable as a character more than if they’re queer or not outside of situations where the fans are.. Not exactly normal about queer subjects.

[NickRowler]

LGBTQ encompasses several groups of people. There are definitely some groups that get more rep. Heck look at fandoms around BL or sapphic media.

There are definitely groups within the queer community that aren't often shown in media. And sometimes when they are shown, it is very clunky.

When it comes to if fans will like a character, there is always bias. Some gay people like Smithers from the Simpsons, some hate him. You can't just assume that everyone will like your character because they are queer. That is sort of like the same assumption of thinking everyone will like a character if you make them super sexy. Maybe there might be a few people who only care about that but most people would want more character depth than their sexuality or gender identity.

If you feel like having queer rep, I recommend writing a character that you are comfortable with writing. Don't try to find some group in the LGBTQ+ community that is under represented and use them just for the sake of "being the first". If you aren't part of that community and you don't know anything about it, it can come off a bit like your are just using them for clout.

[ButterflyEmpress]

I don't think so, at least not outside of queer spaces. It was hard to find a negative review of LightYear that wasn't blatant homophobia. If I didn't know any better, I would've thought it had a full on lesbian sex scene. And if you go to any anime forum and imply that a character may have been, gay, trans, etc, people will start frothing at the mouth.

[Lensing]

I say yes, LGBTQ characters got very popular in the last 5 years
I think that there is also a big wave of homophobia worldwide.
And I don´t know if they need to promote those characters more or
what other way there is to fight homophobia

[moontokkym]

If I'm honest I think on the whole most people don't care that much if a character is queer as long as they're written well.

There are some younger LGBTQ+ people (as in just realising that they are, not necessarily in age) who will love and need those characters because they are queer and help them feel less alone, especially if they aren't in an accepting environment. They are also usually the people who will say "watch this there's a gay person in it" and will watch things for that reason, because they need to not feel alone.

There are people who have made their whole identity hating what is different who will post homophobic slurs about even the smallest queer bit-part. They are just hateful people who have decided that queer people don't deserve to live, and I don't think their view should be taken into account for this reason.

But on the whole, people will just accept a queer character the same way they accept any other character. If it's the first person of that group they've seen, they might go "oh, different, I didn't know that was an option" but still enjoy the story. They won't promote the story because of the queer rep but they will promote the story for being good.

Like I recently watched The Sandman and I was surprised by how many queer characters are in it because I'm used to being a baby gay where people shout "LESBIAN CHARACTER IN MEDIA" at me. Some of the characters were also queer in the original comic from 30 years ago which was also surprising.

People told me to watch the show because they thought I would like it and it's good, so I got to go in and find out that people love this show where there's bi characters, and gay characters, and lesbian characters... My favorite character design on the show is Desire who's explicitly non-binary and played by a non-binary actor, and despite being a villain I really like them because of the chaos they bring to the story.

There are still a tonne of stories with no queer people, and a tonne of stories with a lot of queer people, and some in-between... That's kind of what I want us to move towards, where it's not "queer rep" it's "queer characters" because they're normal to have, like female characters, and characters of colour, characters with disabilities or neurodivergent characters. Get to the point where it's ok if one author gets it a bit wrong because there are millions of stories that get it right and that author isn't going to be someone's only impression of that group of people.

[choilyriel]

For me personally, I don't really care whether if they're queer or whatever but I want the characters to be written well.

But yes, LGBTQ characters has been popular these few years. I hardly see anyone hating on it in the anime community. And I'm not talking about yaoi, just anime in general.