I just know that when Romeo and Juliet premiered two ye olde girlies in the pit at intermission were like didst thou see the sparks betwixt Tybalt and mercutio… aye and not from their swords alone!
So, just curious how many writers and creators will have to be forcibly outed by relentless harassment before we acknowledge that “This queer characters was written by a cishet person and that’s why they’re bad” is not good criticism.
Also I cannot overstate how much “We should scrutinize out queer authors MORE” was not the point of this post, or my tags on it. Queer creators already cannot fucking win. If they’re not out loud and clear, they get ripped to pieces. If they’re out and proud and make art that doesn’t rise to the impossible standard of perfectly representing all queer people everywhere they get ripped to pieces.
There isn’t a way forward from this without being willing to admit that what is good representation is subjective. There isn’t a way forward from this without admitting that we aren’t all looking for the same thing in queer media and queer characters, that something not being for me doesn’t make it necessarily bad and harmful, and that what we need is more and a greater variety of queer characters, not to force them all into one arbitrary formula.
Less than a day after I posted this, the notes were already filling up with testimonials from creators afraid to represent themselves in their own work because they are aware of the unforgiving scrutiny applied to all marginalized characters and they know their characters will be seen as imperfect representation.
You have to realize that the rigid view of what constitutes “good representation” is not just hurting the privileged creators you deem acceptable targets. It is hurting marginalized creators who want to represent themselves and share their stories in their voices.
