Anti-Oppression Linkspam Community

fairestcat

DID YOU SEE WHAT SHE DID THERE??? Because I sure as hell did. Let me break it down.
She suspects that "some female slash writers" who say they're bisexual are just doing it to "gain credibility". But of course, she'd never imply that any specific person were doing that, oh no, she'll just vaguely suggest that "some" of them are, thus casting the net of suspicion and doubt as wide as possible .

alixtii

It makes sense to me, in a more-or-less purely theoretical way... that may be totally wrong, that a predominately queer female body of writers writing for a predominately queer female audience about characters who are in some sense or another queer and femele doesn't require them focusing on how they are representing themselves (because the people to whom they are representing themselves are themselves), or at least not how they are representing themselves in any way which requires realism. Rather that which is being represented is a set of hopes and dreams, fears and fantasies. It's not a mirror that's intended to exist without distortion; indeed, given the grim reality of so many queer female lives, it'd be the source of much pain and anguish if it were. Femslash, no less than m/m slash, is frequently a genre of escapist literature (although, of course, it doesn't have to be, and it can be in ways other than the immediately obvious).

bodlon

On the whole, I find the position that slash (or mainstream m/m fiction written by or for women) is anti-gay hard to sustain.
I agree that it’s problematic in that there’s a tremendous amount of appropriation going on, and that there’s a significant amount of factual error and projection happening, but slash doesn’t arise out of some sort of hostile impulse.
Practically speaking, slash exists virtually independently of Actual Gay Men. The only necessary thing that Actual Gay men and slash have in common is the idea that men can be attracted to one another emotionally and/or sexually. If Actual Gay Men were a significant factor for slash to exist (or if slash were a significant factor for Actual Gay Men), there would be more of a connection there.

mistresscurvy

However. There is a huge difference between saying that there are instances of problematic characterizations or plot points or objectification that should be addressed and saying that women aren't allowed to write about gay men's experiences fullstop. The fact that there are examples of fail within a genre doesn't mean that the entirety of the genre is rotten. This is the exact opposite of the straw man argument from RaceFail09 that since it's so difficult for a white person to write characters of color without failing in some manner, they shouldn't even try. I do believe that writers have a greater responsibility to fully consider how they write characters of marginalized groups they're not members of, but there is a huge difference between that and saying you shouldn't write them at all because you don't belong.

avendya

avendya

This poll is simply trying prove or refute the statements that "fandom is mostly heterosexual females", or "most of fandom identifies as queer" (both of which are common statements at the moment).

calicokat

I've been watching this "Fandom's Responsibility to the LBGTQ Community" from a distance[...] And honestly I haven't read everybody's arguments, only picked up on things here and there, but as for fandom's responsibility to the LBGTQ community...
It doesn't have one.

mrsgiggles00

And it's really, really flying down the slippery slope to try to affix political meanings to MM stories. MM romance is not a form of political statement, it is not a means to spread GLBT awareness, and it really shouldn't be passed off as such. I don't think many GLBT folks are going to buying that.

clarelondon

Teapot tempests keep cropping up over straight women writing GLBT fiction -- and on such a regular basis, many female authors feel forced repeatedly to justify their involvement in the genre. Although I don't share the impulse (so keep in mind this is not a "why I write about gay guys" post), I understand it. Not too many folks want to be perceived as crass, opportunistic, sexist, ignorant, presumptuous, deceitful, and/or callous. But, when you think about it, all this belittlement is absurd. Wasting one’s time and energy trying to counter it is even more absurd.

sparkindarkness

“It’s just fiction” is a stance that a privileged person can take. But for the marginalised? That book with gay/lesbian/black/trans/asian/disabled etc characters is an oddity. It’s a rarity in a world where such portrayals are only remotely common within narrow genres and are nigh-non-existent in the mainstream.

To the privileged, that takes some grasping. I am currently sat surrounded by my library - hundreds of books and dvds. I can pick up any one of them and KNOW there will be a white person inside. I can pick up about 90% of them and know the main character will be white. I can pick up any of them and KNOW there will be a straight person inside - and, again, 90% of the characters within will be straight.

I would say at least half of them are lacking even a token appearance by a POC and up to 80% have no GBLT presence at all. Add in that of those token characters, I would say as many of half of them are strongly stereotypical or otherwise problematic.

sparkindarkness

I have to say this article annoyed me a lot. I didn’t see any sexism in it particularly as was suggested to me (but I’m not a woman so don’t have the awareness) but disrespectful to gay men? Oh yes. It annoyed me further that it contains so much that is problematic and it fails to acknowledge any of it - and sadly these are many of the things that so annoy me about the m/m genre.

The two sides in the m/m genre are squaring up again, and it’s getting really ugly. Again. Does it really have to be like this?

My thing is this and this is a word for my fellow “gay guys” out there in Gay Romance Land arguing away into the night… Maybe we should be getting “the log of bigotry” out of our own eye and our own arguments before pointing out “the splinter of possible exploitation” in another person’s. Just saying!

Here’s the thing: A self-appointed “expert” isn’t. Giving yourself an accolade for being an “expert” is basically telling us you are really good at being us. If you are straight, can you be good at representing us, portraying us, capturing some elemental essence of us in words or pictures (literature, film, the visual arts)—sure. Some of you can be very, very good. Is the best of you better than the best of us at those same activities (representing, portraying, capturing, etc)? Absolutely not. Get over yourselves.