What is the appeal of BL?

[serenitysquirrel]

Correct. Especially if you're talking manga.

Though, not all of it. But most of what I've ever seen. There are a very few exceptions in anime/manga and a few novels, where in them, any relationship of flirting or orientation takes a way back seat to the actual story.

It's all about the market.

[infectedbloodcomics]

Yeah, market rules and money matters, all it takes is finding the right appeal to the highest number of people, I guess.

Personally, I don't like manga. I used to read them when I was younger, and have grown really bored with them. However, I did try reading BL and GL manga, because I wanted to see how gays and lesbians are portrayed outside the Western world. Too bad it's all really a huge disappointment.

[punkarsenic]

theres two kinds of bl fans afaik

type one: gay guys. so, this makes sense obviously.

type two: straight girls. usually weeaboos, 'yaoi fangirls' are honestly the spawn of satan, and it feels like theres more of them sometimes than actual gay guys reading bl. the worst ones are all nosebleed**nosebleed ahhhh! about yaoi, but disgusted by lesbians, and theyre usually into yaoi for some kind of fetish reason.
i mean, sure, maybe theres straight girls who have a thing for bl with absolutely no fetishization of sga boys whatsoever. but... uh, i doubt it.

[keii4ii]

Hey, let's not demonize people just for enjoying porn. There's nothing inherently wrong with "homosexual" entertainment that are blatantly catering to heterosexual audience. I don't think it's a problem except when people think that stuff is realistic or MOGAI-supportive. Unfortunately, there does seem to be a large number of people who do think that, particularly with BL... but that doesn't mean you can group all of them together like that.

Don't put down heterosexual men for enjoying 'lesbian' porn, or heterosexual women for enjoying yaoi. The type of porn they enjoy doesn't necessarily dictate how they view or treat real homosexual people.

[AnnaLandin]

i mean, sure, maybe theres straight girls who have a thing for bl with absolutely no fetishization of sga boys whatsoever. but... uh, i doubt it.

I might be a bit of an odd duck in this conversation, as I am a heteroromantic asexual, but I do read bl/yaoi comics, and believe there are several very good ones (Natsume Ono, as mentioned above, is one great creator). I'm very much okay with lesbian couples - not that they need my approval! - and don't usually go on loud nosebleed rants about the genre, so yes. I don't fit into either of your categories, and there are a lot of other people who don't either.

As for fetishes... well. Those exist everywhere, and there's no real shame in having them. What turns you on, turns you on, and there's enough shaming going around when it comes to sex without us mocking people for what kind of fiction they enjoy.

There are definite problems within the yaoi genre - not just among the fans, but within the actual stories themselves - but those are so heavily tied up in Japanese cultural expectations and gender norms that it's difficult for me, as a Westerner, to even begin to articulate them.

[tsukin]

Yeah I agree with that. It's part of the reasons why if you noticed one of my earlier posts I hadn't identified with a particular label, rather just said yeah I like dudes as well. I personally really hate labels for a whole host of reasons, two of the biggest being,1) they box you in to a specific set of stereotypes and biases I don't really want to be associated with and 2) I think it leads to a somewhat limiting and unrealistic view of what people actually are. Just cause I've personally had many friends come to me freaking out cause they think they're no longer straight or they've had their first man/woman crush. Society has put stigma on being something other than the norm, and I say it's all well and good to CHOOSE to only date men or women, but at the same time I think it'd help a lot of people if they realized and saw it was okay to still like both and that it doesn't change anything about who they are just cause they may have developed an attraction to someone of the same gender. I think I may have digressed slightly but yeah. Just a lil' more of my two cents on the subject of sexual orientation.

[infectedbloodcomics]

Disclaimer: I'm an atheist and I love sex. Big time.

To those who think porn is just a thing that straight guys enjoy and we shouldn't judge or something like that: I'm afraid you can't look at porn as something existing in a vacuum. Fantasy is one thing, actual treatment of people is another. Try have a look at the porn "actresses", see how much say they have in the "scripts" they get, find out the reality they often come from and where they end up when they reach the end of their career. It's a disgusting business. If it really was a simple representation of fantasies where nobody gets really hurt, sure, who cares, I'd probably still find it boring, but I would have nothing against it. But it's not, plain and simple. So I find it a real piece of crap.

[punkarsenic]

nah, see, what im taking about isnt girls who read yaoi among other things, but straight girls who have a thing for yaoi. yknow, like theyd be more interested in a manga if they knew it was yaoi, read mainly/exclusively yaoi.

and haha thats not the kinda fetish i mean. like.. fetishizing people, like say fetishizing black women or sga boys, isnt the same as liking leather play or biting or w/e, its creepy and racist/homophobic/dependsonthesfetish and baaad. straight girls who have a thing for yaoi are usually guilty of this to some extent, even if they dont realise it.

like idk im generally suspicious of any straight girl who shows any kind of prefererance for yaoi. although, that said, im generally suspicious of straight girls full stop.

[TAMAnnoying]

I feel like we all got way more serious about this then it ever needed to be :v

Putting it simply: some people have a foot fettish, some people don't. Some people like porn some people don't. Life is simple and pleasent like that

[PocketFloral]

I hope it's ok for me to chime in real quick and say that maybe the word fetish might not be the correct word to be using? Just because someone likes and gets off to certain kinds of media doesn't make it their fetish per say, a fetish meaning you have a fixation on something that affects how you sexually express yourself as a whole.
There are definitely straight girls out there who fetishize real life gay men because of yaoi but I don't think thats the sole driving force behind every BL webcomic popping up right now. I think for some it's just a comfort level thing? Especially concerning the ones created by young girls and women.
In a culture where women might feel shamed for expressing too much sexual interest, BL creates a nice alternative where women feel separated enough from the characters that they're comfortable but can still express themselves and find gratification. They also might turn to BL because it covers certain stuff that most other media don't, prostrate stimulation/male subs/ect.
Also I see a lot of people talking about yaoi like it's exclusively created for and by straight women but considering fanwork creators too, I've seen many many queer women who pretty exclusively draw MxM, along with a growing population of nb and other gender orientated people. There's an appeal there that touches a lot of different kinds of people and I don't know if it's possible to pinpoint exactly what that appeal is because there's no one reason.

[cheeznh]

Well it's a little more than a "fetish" when droves and droves of people draw and write it.

On the funny side, have you guys seen this Graham Norton episode where he shows the X-men actors their yaoi fanart? It's so cringey IT'S AMAZING.

[serenitysquirrel]

Ok, their reactions to the pics and the readout on the fanfic is pretty darn funny.

[GlanceReviver]

I think the reason so many people enjoy this genre specifically is because it creates a space that is open to the sexual expression of groups of people who don't normally have that. Most fan-servicey series and porn are created for the straight male consumer and features abundant sexy ladies, so having something different from the norm is important to a lot of people.

I write straight, gay, lesbian, and other queer stories, but I tend to enjoy gay romance the most just because men are the gender I'm attracted to, so I have to admit that it's a little more fun drawing those characters. Since I am aware of that factor, I try very hard not to objectify those characters, and make sure that they have their own personalities and complexities like in any other story.

[Sho_Shonojo]

I think the appeal for me was just, at the time I started reading BL in middle school, I was very firmly apposed to anything girly. There was a real lack of female characters who weren't ditsy, and boy crazed and all into dresses and the like. I think I also enjoyed it because there was an aspect, at the time anyway, of this being something forbidden. In a time where I was doing my best to be a model daughter and student it felt good to think, "Ha! I'm not as perfect as you think! I'm reading gay porn!"

Of course the reasons I like it have changed considerably. Now I look for stories with more depth and a slower progression toward the relationship. I want to know these characters before they do the dirty. I want to know their struggles and inspirations. And I tend to get turned off when I find the female stand-in characters. I'm hoping to challenge that trope in my comic.

[Vikiro_Hop]

@infectedbloodcomics I gotcha I was just pointing out that the appeal doesn't necessarily have to be of an erotic nature for people. I realize I was referring to homosexual relationships in comics and webcomics as a whole, but I figured it was relevant enough.

Again just my two cents.

[ikushina]

I'm generally open to most genres, but I guess that BL appeals more to me than 'shojo romance' because.. well, I've found lots of good stories among them. Sure there were some terrible ones too, but I felt like many of the shojos I've read were basically just the same. An uguu kawaii gurl that falls for a popular guy. I just think those kind of stories are really dry, like, give me something SPECIAL.
I don't fetishize or anything, and I don't think there HAS to be special roles ("you're seme, and you're uke"). I want stories with imperfect people, and I don't seem to find a lot of those in shojos, but then again I should've done some more research.. shrug /Not that they're imperfect because they're gay, but because they actually have some interesting characther development n stuff/
I wish there were more girlxgirl comics tho. I feel like they're pretty rare :0

Btw one of my best friends is gay, and I'm not all "OHMYGOD A REAL GAY PERSON HUE HUE YASS YOU MUST BE UKE" like wtf. I respect him, no matter what sexuality he has : )

[infectedbloodcomics]

I wish there were more girlxgirl comics tho. I feel like they're pretty rare :0

Ahem Mine is definitely girlxgirl (that's a weird way to call it, but you get the idea) with very imperfect characters who are NOT imperfect because they are lesbians, but because they are, hm, just making choices that raise a lot of moral questions cough cough

[ikushina]

oooh! sounds nice 8D will check it out some time!

[CelestialNavigator]

I generally don't like BL stories - I find them about as emotionally engaging as watching the paint getting dry. I can't relate to a male stand-in for female, you see :/

On the other hand, I admit that there are people who write m/m relationships and make them interesting. Like Robin Hobb books.
(Everyone who ever felt like throwing the last book of Tawny man trilogy in a wall - let's have a group hug and cry together).

I also I'm agree upon what Ikushina said - we need more GL, yuri and other femaleXfemale things.

[Caelestie]

I do know some few gl webcomics on tapastic:
http://tapastic.com/series/SUNDAZE
http://tapastic.com/series/Star-Avalanche
http://tapastic.com/series/MonsterPop (gl elements to it)
http://tapastic.com/series/BATAOB
I also do a gl comic:
http://tapastic.com/series/Diexemor
though it more atypical compared to most gl most people read.