[ SECRET POST #5494 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5494 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.



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02.
[The Untamed]


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03.
[Justice League Unlimited]


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04.
[Encanto, She-Ra, Korra, Arcane]


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05.
[Barry (HBO)]


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06.
[Chorus]















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 07 secrets from Secret Submission Post #786.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

This, so very much. It's not bi erasure if someone else sees her a as lesbian.

[(Anonymous)]

Uh, yes it is when the character has canonically expressed sexual interest in men. Korra likes men and women, full stop.

What's the obsession with people insisting characters are lesbians anyway? A character in a lesbian relationship is a character in a lesbian relationship and is therefore WLW rep. A bi character dating a woman is just as much WLW rep as a lesbian character is.

[(Anonymous)]

Nope. That's bullshit. The character might be bi, gay and in the closet, or gay and still figuring that out. Lots of gay people date, and even marry people of the opposite sex; that's what being in the closet means. And not gay person knows it early in their life; sometimes it can take years or decades for someone to figure out that they aren't as attracted to the opposite gender as they thought they were. Korra hasn't defined herself in any particular way, so things are still open to interpretation.

Also, Korra's not real. Even if she were canonically bi (which she isn't), other fans aren't doing anything wrong by headcanoning or writing her as lesbian. This whole argument is just another way to police what other fans can and cannot do.

*old slash fan who has many, many memories of homophobes using the "but this character is canonically straight, how dare you write them as attracted to people of their own gender!!!!" And more recently, that whole obnoxious "well, it's okay to write this character being attracted to their own gender, as long as you keep them sexually available to the opposite gender!"

[(Anonymous)]

Even if she were canonically bi (which she isn't), other fans aren't doing anything wrong by headcanoning or writing her as lesbian.

Yes, they are when they are erasing one form of rep in favor of another. Korra is bi rep. Korra is also WLW rep. If you try to erase the former in favor of the latter, you are being shitty. Korra is canonically dating a woman. You don't have to erase her being bi to write her in a relationship with another woman! It's already canon.

It's shitty when people try to erase bisexuality in either direction.

NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

Bleh.

I do not agree with AYRT. *If she were canonically bi*, writing her as a lesbian would be an example of bi erasure.

But - she is not canonically bi. She is not canonically bi. Nothing that is depicted in the series allows us to conclude that she is canonically bi. So the hypothetical doesn't arise.

Re: NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

Word of God is that she IS canonically bi.

Re: NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

so the only way characters can be bisexual in your head is when they say "by the way i am a bisexual", dating men and women means they're just figuring themselves out. so i guess let's just claim korra is actually straight and asami was just a one off? what an ugly way of engaging with bisexuality

Re: NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

No, it's also totally legitimate to describe Korra as bi. She is a fictional character who can be described as either bi or lesbian.

Re: NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

+10000000

Re: NAYRT

[(Anonymous)]

But what even is the point of writing her as a lesbian as opposed to bi? You want to write her in a sapphic relationship, great, you've got one right there in canon. And if you don't want to pair her with Asami, you've got canon proof that she's into girls so it'd be easy to justify writing her with another female character. You want to write about her figuring out she's attracted to women? You can do that too. You want to write about what she'd face from the rest of the world if she were in a relationship with another woman? Again, it's all there.

Also, if being attracted to members of both sexes in canon doesn't make a character canonically bi, then what DOES? Do they have to say "For the record, I am bisexual" for it to count? That's ridiculous. People don't hold gay characters to that standard, if a female character is shown dating multiple girls then it's just assumed that she's a canon lesbian even if she never comes out and says so. There shouldn't be a need to jump through hoops to prove that a character who demonstrates interest in both sexes in their canon is ACTUALLY bi, it should be safe to assume that unless either the character themselves or the narrative states otherwise, the character is meant to be read as bi.

[(Anonymous)]

Anon, she's not real. And fanfiction and headcanons are not erasure. Canon still exists.

[(Anonymous)]

ayrt

It is very possible for a woman to express interest in and even be in relationships with men for a while in her life, and still be lesbian. You are shitting on the experiences of real people in defense of an imaginary person and coming across as assholes who act like they own the fandom in the process.

[(Anonymous)]

Representation in fiction for particular groups of people is not the be all and end all of social justice, as much as certain parts of fandom might like to think so.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, you're right. Korra's not real... which means that she can't grow and change her mind about what label best suits her like a real person can. She's bi because on the show she is interested in a guy and a girl and the writers have said this means she is bi. If you write her as deciding she's actually a lesbian, that's a future what-if AU.

It's the same idea as deciding to write about your OTP (genders irrelevant) getting married after canon ends, even though they have no plans to marry in canon. It makes it your headcanon, but it's disingenuous false advertising to say around the fandom that they're a married couple as if it's true in canon. That's the equivalent of what the OP is doing by calling Korra a lesbian in the context of this secret.

[(Anonymous)]

This!

[(Anonymous)]

That's a ... very uncharitable interpretation of the secret, to put it mildly.

[(Anonymous)]

DA. Then is it okay for people to headcanon lesbians as bi?

[(Anonymous)]

NAYRT but yes, it is, as long as you don't act like it's a fact of canon by labeling her bi in a secret that people not in the fandom will read and assume is canon about her.