Tapas and LGBT Sensitivity Failures

[HGohwell]

In that case, you are very lucky, I hear it constantly especially at conventions. I have never "bitch wtf"ed harder than hearing some people asking a pair cosplaying to do "yaoi poses" because they're their favorite character.

I haven't noticed the shift happening around the Japanese people I interact with (and also my experience is Japan a pretty decent labelling, age rating system when Tapas?), but that is interesting. Although I think the point still stands about BL genre having a bit of an identity crisis at the moment which will hopefully figure itself out somehow.

[nostalgicroxas]

BL will only figure itself out if people decide to define it as an all encompassing term of both (bishounenai) and (yaoi) - as a thing that includes both sexual and non-sexual stories. Right now so far as I've seen, especially at conventions in the US, it's been leaning toward the sexual side far more than the non-sexual side. Which is odd since it was started as a translation to bishounenai / shounenai. But then that means that we need to stop arguing about it's definition of "omg it's only sexual" or "it's everything that involves boys loving boys". And frankly, people love to argue or want to be some twisted form of "purist" :: BL can only be shounenai since that's its history as a term that was translated, and since shounenai was the non-sexual stuff, then BL must and can only be the non-sexual stuff.

In regards to Tapas and LBGT stuff though, it'd be them as a company trying to determine if "BL" and "LBGT" should be seperated into two seperate genres. It seems clear that right now as a business standpoint, they're doing better if BL remains seperate from LBGT as a whole. Same if they were to make GL it's own thing. It's less about "genre" I think, and more about "categorizing".
[I want to read a story that's just about two homosexual boys. Look in the BL category. I want to read a story that's got homosexual girls as the focus. Go the GL category.] <- In this sense, Tapas should be adopting both Genres and Categories. That depends heavily on how much they want to shake the foundations of how the site has progressed to this point, and forcing how many works to move into Categories and Genre.

[Bree_Mana]

well thanks, glad you thought so

[GesuGesu]

Personally, I don't actually read specifically labelled LGBT anything, because as @Cavechan has mentioned, highlighting it feels like pandering to me. Sometimes I feel like SOME creators who create LGBT content are trying too hard to highlight why their story is LGBT and is genred under LGBT, which overshadows other purposes their story has to tell. Plus, having to shift through the admittedly large pile of same-template coming out stories.

I actually prefer it if queer characters or characters of varying genders and sexualities simply just appeared nonchalantly in whatever fantasy, adventure, or drama series and it's not supposed to be a big thing. I think the term is to "normalize" them? Shove the stories in those genres, and place a warning or note for whatever happens in case you fear losing readers of having an ace character appear. Some of the shoujo of old would feature gay characters, but that didn't make it BL, did it? Many modern dramas and shows nowadays have a few nonbinary or gay characters in it, but Game of Thrones isn't gonna be labelled BL for featuring a gay character, right? The overarching genre should define a series, not the existence of gayness or gender nonconforming characters.

As for the OP being uncomfortable with the seme/uke labeling, I'm not sure if that's any different from categorizing people as top/bottom, or dom/sub. It just feels like a relationship label to me.

[darthmongoose]

As for the OP being uncomfortable with the seme/uke labeling, I'm not sure if that's any different from categorizing people as top/bottom, or dom/sub. It just feels like a relationship label to me.

I think the difference here is that the terms "top/bottom" or "dom/sub" would only be used in the context of a very specific kink-based relationship if the characters were heterosexual. While meanwhile in some BL, it seems to be standard not only to strongly flag who is the seme and uke even in a story that won't contain any sex, or certainly won't depict the sex, but to attach personality and physical characteristics to these preferences in sexual position.

You would only ask of a heterosexual couple "so who's the dom and who's the sub?" if you were invited to ask questions about their sex life as a couple involved in S&M. But as a lesbian, I have literally been asked in casual conversation several times, "who's the butch one?" Which het people expect to be rewarded with by an answer of "oh, it's Shaz" because Shaz is NB and has short hair and wears more androgynous clothes. They get very frustrated and confused when I say jokingly, "oh, that's me. I build all the DIY furniture and play all the shooty games, Shaz loves shopping and makeup and things." because I look "girly"; I have long hair, I'm soft-spoken and I like pretty dresses and bright colours. Then of course I have to explain to them that there isn't really always a "butch one" and a "femme one" in a lesbian relationship. But there's this assumption that there must be a masculine, dominant one who "penetrates" and a submissive, feminine one who "gets penetrated" that's frankly pretty tiresome and invasive. Can you imagine going up to a het couple and asking "So who wears the pants?" or "Sooo... she seems pretty bossy and tough, does she peg you?"

This fictional trope that queer relationships need to be forced into having the weird, uneven power dynamics of patriarchal heterosexual relationships, and that it must not only apply to the sex lives of these fictional characters, but their entire presentation and personality.
"Tops" are big, dark (and by the way while we're on this subject, it's also pretty racist that the darker skinned dude is always the scary, barbaric "top", also makes me wonder if my partner is seen as the "butch" due to being south asian while I'm white), financially powerful, controlling and assertive. (traditionally seen as masculine traits).
"Bottoms" are small, light, meek, passive and need looking after. (traditionally seen as feminine traits).

It's clearly not just treated as a relationship label by the people creating and consuming these kinds of works. The BL meme posted by Tapas also encourages this idea. If it was purely a "relationship label" that applied only in the bedroom, like being a dom or a sub, why would that be the top thing on the meme? Like the first thing you're encouraged to decide is, "am I making a top or a bottom?" which clearly suggests this is a big decision that will impact all the rest of the character creation process. ie. if the character likes penetrating best, he will be active, strong, masculine, controlling, but if he likes to be penetrated best, he will be gentle, passive, vacillating and feminine.
I think it'd be pretty disingenuous if fujoshi types said seriously that the first thing they think about when creating heterosexual characters is whether they're a dom or a sub, and that they base the entire character's personality and appearance around being a dom or a sub, especially in the context of non-sexual Romance stories. Of course, this is partially because in het romance, it's assumed that the man is the top and the woman is the bottom by default... but that's the issue here, why does a queer couple NEED to be labelled with a masculine and feminine role that covers not just our bedroom antics but our entire relationship dynamic and our personalities and physical presentation? Why is that trope so pervasive in BL specifically? Why is this "relationship label" only being applied to queer couples? I don't think it's asking too much for the BL fans and creators of the world to do a little self-examination of their fetishisation of certain types of queer people.

[AWFrasier]

Not to mention, the whole thing about "uke" and "seme" assumes all gay men enjoy anal sex. And like... No.

This is also an issue because it has become so normal to ask gay men "Are you a top or bottom?"

Like @darthmongoose is saying, asking invasive questions about our sexual lives as queer people seems to be totally cool with the cis/hets. Hell, gay singers have been asked in official interviews as well, whether they were a top or a bottom.

We're constantly sexualised. When I come out as queer, I can't even count the times people have asked if I'm "goldstar" - as if whether or not me having had sex with someone who has a penis is any of anyone's damn business.

A lot of people's weird fixation with what we do in the bedroom is downright creepy and bringing that out on official social media accounts by a business that claims to support LGBTQ+ is one helluva weird move.

[Junohugger]

I think the opinions expressed here by a couple of people really sums up the general issue. as long as gayness is a fantasy its all fine and good, just something to play with, gay men are toys. Fantasy creatures. But when they're stories from gay people, tagged as LGBTQ and being about real experiences such as GASP coming out, well, say it ain't so, how uncomfortable, such pandering.

We're real people. Shocker, I know.

[domisotto]

You would only ask of a heterosexual couple "so who's the dom and who's the sub?" if you were invited to ask questions about their sex life as a couple involved in S&M. But as a lesbian, I have literally been asked in casual conversation several times, "who's the butch one?

Straight people would be asked, ‘who wears pants in this relationship’ the moment there is some divergence from parochial ruleset.

The invasive questions are a trademark of Western psyche.

[KRWright]

Straight people would be asked, ‘who wears pants in this relationship’ the moment there is some divergence from parochial ruleset

Yeah but not like straight away as small talk, which is the point here. The sexist "who wears the pants" is shitty, but it's not really the same level or as often as queer people have to go into detail on the intimate details of the dynamics of their relationships during small talk. You aren't going to get a straight cis couple walking down the street and get "who's the man and who's the woman then eh?" yelled at them.

Like your example is still an example of shitty behaviour surrounding sexist norms, but the actual level of sustained harrassment is no where near the same level.

[domisotto]

Fair enough, but the entire culture of small talk going into places that are either private or offensive is a Western norm, and it always bugged me. That superficial, gossipy curiosity about you from complete strangers instead of holding a conversation about general topics of mutual interest and switching to private discussions only with close friends or people you are courting is one thing I had never been able to get used to.

[KRWright]

the entire culture of small talk going into places that are either private or offensive is a Western norm

True, but ultimately off-topic for this thread.

[domisotto]

True. I hope Tapas removes the labels that people find invasive into their privacy and rude so it doesn’t propagate it on the stories they promote.

[scribesunlimited]

Thank you, @ratique, for applying a level of understanding in this, and we appreciate you very much. I'll do my part too. If I notice a post that doesn't seem quite right in the way BL, GL, or other LGBTQ comics or characters are addressed here, I'll certainly bring it to your attention. We should all be setting an example so that sensitive issues like this are resolved right away. We're certainly not going to be able to please everyone, or to resolve every issue on a person-to-person basis. This place will never be 100% harmonious no matter what we try, and that's just a sad fact..

But it doesn't mean we stop trying.

[snailienz]

That's all well and good for you, but ultimately, the LGBT genre on tapas was made specifically so that LGBT artists and writers could reach LGBT readers more easily with stories made by them, for them. I think it says something that people assume that someone embracing its use is "pandering" without reading the work at all.

If a queer person headcanons a person from a work of major fiction, they're "reading too much into it" and "there is no evidence​ that they're gay". They're yelled at for " ruining" the experience for people. They are told to "go make your own story".

So we do, and we decide to ensure we don't get the wrong audience by labeling it. We're excited, so we gush about our characters. We try to be inclusive, because that's what we want. Suddenly, we are "pandering" because we put it "in their face" too much. Like somehow being excited and enthusiatic about lgbt inclusiveness is a crime.

Not to mention, October had several lgbt focused days. I made art for like a whopping two of them because a big focus of my work is the varied identities of my characters and how it effects their life on top of it being a fantasy. One of those I drew as vent art for my own dysphoria after being triggered. That wasn't "pandering" it was me being a loud queer person with queer characters. That shouldn't be making people "uncomfortable".

[domisotto]

If the LGBTQ genre is intended to showcase and feature works by the LBGTQ community creators vs the books with the LGBTQ leads, Tapas also needs to state that very clearly in the genre description, vs this being something people have to just intuitively know, because nobody wants to break such a very important and specific rule.

[Junohugger]

I don't think that's the point being made here, it's not about policing what goes into the LGBTQ+ genre, its about statements that have been made here that the LGBTQ+ genre is to be avoided as it's "pandering" and "uncomfortable" to read about queer people and their lives and stories, which is, of course, a terrifically hurtful thing to say. That people are happy to just let all us queer folks know that they avoid us because they just find us a bit icky... well, its worth a response, don't you think?

[snailienz]

I never said it was a "rule". But if you look at the tag, you can see it's usually that sort of thing. It was made when LGBT creators were uncomfortable labeling their stuff "GL or BL" because either the content of the work wasn't inherently romantic or they felt unwelcome in those spaces because of the tropes. It's not ideal, since we shouldn't NEED to be separate, but I'd rather have a label on my work so that I don't attract bigots than not have one and have people calling Dee or Bani trope words that are considered slurs.

[azzy-m]

You know, I could be misinterpreting this, but: just because a creator and their story likes to put their LGBT content front and center doesn't automatically mean it is pandering, ESPECIALLY if that creator is LGBT+ themselves. I love stories that just let the LGBT+ characters appear casually, but it's not bad if the characters talk about their sexualities/gender/gender identity on screen. Actually, it can be a good thing!

Am I pandering by having a character talk about polyamory on screen? Am I pandering by having a character talk about his life before he transitioned? No. Things are, unsurprisingly, more complicated than "slapping LGBT genre on story + creator talking about the LGBT aspects of the story = pandering". It's a WILD generalization, and a dangerous one at that.

Can we LGBT creators create stories with gay and trans characters and promoting them without people bombarding us with "pandering!! PANDERING!!" because legit I like celebrating my, and others, characters, i like talking about those characters, please

[domisotto]

Well, on the inverse, there are people who actively seek out LBGTQ work that is written by the creators from the community that introduce the new themes and new outlook and represent the LGBTQ characters the way they live that truth and see it.

They specifically do not want to read stories written by the straight authors, because they don't like their way of portraying their leads.

So, the clearer the rules, the less potential to do something wrong, because nobody wants to intentionally do something wrong or be offensive or take the exposure away from the marginalized creators.

It's on Tapas to decide on those rules and prevent conflict and hurt as much as possible in their genre definition and advertising.

[KRWright]

I don't think the answer is outing everyone who writes in the LGBTQ genre. That's a massive safety issue.