Anonymous Coward · 18d
It took me days to be able to summarize this as much as possible, sorry man.
Ok, so I'm the same anon from some months ago that asked about the mangago yaoi topic section, so this is like the sequel to that lmao.
After that I started reading them every time. If I start a new yaoi, I get anxious and can't stop thinking about what type of comment is in the topic section, so until I read them, I can't enjoy my manga in peace, and now thanks to that I'm really unable to enjoy anything. I'm someone who doesn't shy away from any type of story, not only with yaoi; I don't care about the art style, writing, plot, problematic plot, etc. If I enjoy the story, then it's good enough for me, and I get that not everyone is like this, but as someone who also read a lot of straight and yuri, I have never seen this amount of complaints before; like, it's crazy (https://www.mangago.me/thing/about/774727/ https://www.mangago.me/thing/about/782580/) I get that yaoi being about (gay) men, plus written by and for women, makes people more judgmental compared to yuri and straight, plus there is geicomi to compare it to, and also because there is not a "sexual dimorphism" between how men and lesbians (or any women) draw women. I started to avoid three types of yaoi first ones like LITC, Cherry Magic, and Nakamura-kun, you know, the ones that get praised for not being Like That. If you read the topic section of Samejima-kun and Saihara-kun, you will get what I mean, also started avoiding series that are not BL but get praised with "crazy how this is better than BL," like TSHD, Let's Go Karaoke! and finally anything with muscular bottoms, short tops or when both top and bottoms are not "heteronormative" again because the comment are all "omg finally men and not a whiny hairless twink with no personality who is basically a self insert for women" There is a manga list on mangago called Uke that are not whiny,weak willed crybaby and dependent of other, like, I get that people can have tastes but the way they do it just rub me the wrong way.
the other day I comited the mistake to search for Haiki's work on mangago (god do i love how he draws hair and steam) and god, all anime and manga directed at women has bishonen or ikemen, is not that yaoi goes out of its way to make men hairless or have "female" personalities, so idk why men feel the need to being that annoying about it, specially because gay guys will make fun of women for their tastes and then you see and they are into the hairless hourglass bishojo or even into moeloli, ironically a lot of these girls are from series written by and for straight men using a minority(women) to express themselves. I used to be the type to say, “Hey, not all yaoi is a 6’0 muscled seme with a 5’0 uke with big eyes; here are some examples,” but now I’m just like, What’s so wrong with enjoying that kind of BL? I don’t know; I’m not straight, but straight women are on an unequal footing with men from the start. What’s so wrong with having a genre that’s both about men but also about them navigating a more equal footing? Sometimes I see people say that BL authors put the uke in a misogynistic position because they think they deserve it for being the "woman," and I’ve always felt like that’s a very mean-spirited way to read it. I think it’s because they want the female reader to relate and be able to navigate fantasies without feeling attacked, so part of me understands when gay men are like, “Yeah, but why do they have to use us, another minority, to feel empowered?” But as I said before, gay men themselves enjoy content that is also "degrading" to women or that degrade women (Alot of gay artists I follow love Jimmy from Moutwashing and I don't think they hate women, neither the guys that want to fuck Endeavor. that Otomeprotag guy for example likes Gilgamesh from Fate LOL), or how they have also used women to express themselves like the Little Mermaid or Menhera-chan. In any case, it is interesting how gay men have much, much stricter tastes compared to lesbians.
I know it is stupid to feel this anxious over this or even care this much, but I don't know; I started to feel humiliated for enjoying any type of yaoi thanks to this. It's the way in which people express their dislike and like for a story. When I read a yuri manga that is explicit with sexualities or gender, the comments tend to praise it without insulting the genre for rarely doing it. Same when a girl is more masc; the comments analyze the story, and sometimes too much, omeone was talking about communist theory on my gf's not here today the other day lol, but i think it is awesome. People in yaoi comment section will complain about the body size, unrealistic sex, heteronormativity, how gross women are for writing the problematic yaoi, how there is not hair, etc., and when they praise a manga, it is always, "This genre is pure trash, but finally something good," and when someone doesn't like the "objectively" good BL, people start bringing up rape and how women can't handle anything that is not a bishonen like in the topic section of "Until We Are Together" doujinshi I just thought it was boring. I get that for a lot of queers, the more relatable a story is for them, the better it is, but for me its like too much relativity can feel a little performative. Also, her art style feels like it's trying too hard to be like, "I want to be queer friendly," like trying too hard with the common geicomi art style. For example, Honpo's art style is awesome and doesn't feel like that, or maybe I'm being a jerk to her; her yuri was just so much better i think. To be honest, I don't know if this happens to you, but when a manga or artist I like gets the "not like others" praise, I start avoiding the author/series. I love Nishida Higashi, but after seeing the way people praised her I just 🫠
Also, I know some women are weird when they comment on geicomi, but a part of me can't help to think that at the end of the day, hairy fat/muscular men are the default in our society, and that geicomi don't really get that level of scrutiny— https://www.mangago.me/thing/about/755336/. I am not crazy if I think Theore's comment is misogynistic, right?/gen
You don't see people saying Geicomi authors are normalizing rape or etc. I mean, if Itai Itai Itai by Mentaiko was written by a woman with two bishonen, people would be saying how it's normalizing the "I rape you because I love you." The plot of Tabun Sore ga Love Nanjanakarou ka is similar to YBC, but no one has ever complained the same way about them; sometimes I see the same MRM users complain that the yaoi manga has rape just to find them commenting in the goblin ganrape manga about how hot it is, like a part of me thinks it is awesome that Geicomi is not well known in the public because I don't want to read people calling gay men groomers or that they are rapists for writing what they write, but some of these guys are so annoying. Some of them believe that geicomi having problematic tropes is not the same because it is not mainstream like BL, but that doesn't make sense either.
I don't know, dude. I just want you to tell me what you think; I'm crazy? also Have you read the mangas I named? I hope I don't sound rude or that I'm minimizing some things.
You know, for me, a lesbo who is really questioning the possibility of being a straight trans man, BL is awesome; it makes me feel like I don't need to man up to be a real man.
Geicomi purists often have an extremely sanitized image of gay male sexuality that's often predicated on this notion that gay rights were achieved through desexualizing the community, which I think can be just as, if not more harmful than BL's preference for femininity and androgyny.
They will recommend My Brother's Husband but don't know or ignore how Gengoroh Tagame made a career out of hardcore SM and I think that is entirely disrespectful to him. they will pretend to favor geicomi for it's own-voice convention (don't let them know women write geicomi too tho lol) and portrayal of 'realistic' gay men (why is a feminine or androgynous gay man unrealistic?), but they are devaluing these mens' work all the same; they refuse entirely to engage with the 'problematic' sexuality of geicomi.
Aside from the usual self-insert jargon, I just think a lot of people find masculinity scary and intimidating regardless of gender. for a woman in particular, they're subject to patriarchal abuse through these performances of masculinity. The ideal man, or the image of a man, often deviates from that Alpha-male archetype. Queer men are similarly victimized by hegemonic masculinity and often emasculated or even refused their social class of "man" in some societies, and so masculinity is not appealing, in the sense that it may not be something they want to embody even if they are attracted to the aesthetics of it in others. Like, even JP gay men's' praise of BL involves it's approach to masculinity, providing a softer alternative and helping them not internalize any negative feelings for their sexuality.
And, regarding the degrading thing. it's not that I'm not sympathetic, I just don't understand what makes these people think there aren't gay men who want to be degraded. your point about gay men often using the likeness of women to express themselves and navigate their identities through their own are, but there's also this like, for me at least, sadomasochistic thrill to seeing that violence in a controlled environment. gay people have always been brutalized, for reasons not unrelated to women's' mistreatment in society. plenty of gay men have fantasies of being brutalized, of being raped, stalked. none of these are literal wishes, but fantasies born from marginalization and a desire to have control over what is typically forced upon you.
it's one thing for something to be presented in a way that is just disrespectful, or attempting to be socially conscious and failing miserably at it. i do think it is good to call out genuinely problematic depictions of queer people. like, i remember it used to be a really popular trope for the femme gay bar owner to be a sex pest that everyone treats like a housefly, which was obviously a product of gay stereotypes of the time.
but, you know, it's just not really like that anymore. not to do apologia for straight women because they are just as complicit in homophobia as anyone else, but i just think women in general have always been a bit more sympathetic to gay men than anyone else
i wont say what gay men and women experience are the same, but misogyny and homophobia both manifest in similar ways and there is a reason both groups have historically been comfortable amongst one another. we might also be ignoring that all sorts of people just love to see men kiss and there doesn't have to be any expressed motive behind the decision to write BL as opposed to Yuri or het
the one thing i am really sympathetic to is just the idea that more male and non-binary stories should be amplified within the genre. i don't think straight women writing BL/GL is wrong regardless of if it's problematic or vanilla, but the fact of the matter is that minorities do not have total control over their public image. that has always been largely in the hands of their oppressors and i don't think there's a straight person who doesn't benefit from some semblance of straight privilege. BL is already becoming more diverse in authorship, i would just love to see more rec accounts amplify the works of male and gender-ambiguous/non-binary authors
I admit i cant stop myself checking the comments a lot, even though I know it'll just piss me off and half of these people will grow out of their anti-fujo phase in a few years. but it is genuinely upsetting that one of the largest catalogues of BL also refuses to engage with it on any intellectual level, to dumb it down to being just porn, to degrade and mischaracterize it's authors, to completely shut out defenses of the genre from gay and bisexual men, and to detest femineity so deeply as to call it 'unrealistic' in the men of BL. I don't stray away from things that get the "not like other yaoi" treatment but i tend to only get into it after the storm has passed. i didn't read cherry magic until i stopped seeing it on my timeline.
It does kind of stifle the experience though i try not to let it affect my feelings for a manga itself or make me distance myself from it if i genuinely like it. its just more annoying than anything i wish both fujodans and anti's weren't rampant with communities of like, 15 year olds who have opinions on gay sex for some reason
