[ SECRET POST #5775 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5775 ⌋

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


01.



__________________________________________________



02.
[The Murderbot Chronicles]


__________________________________________________



03.
[Witchfinder General]


__________________________________________________



04.



__________________________________________________



05.
[The Mermaid Princess's Guilty Meal]


__________________________________________________



06.



__________________________________________________



07.
[Arknights]


__________________________________________________



08.



__________________________________________________



09.



__________________________________________________



10.



__________________________________________________



































11. [SPOILERS for The Rings of Power]




__________________________________________________



12. [SPOILERS for Person of Interest]




__________________________________________________



13. [SPOILERS for Mary Skelter 2]




__________________________________________________



14. [WARNING for discussion of abuse]




__________________________________________________



15. [WARNING for discussion of rape(-revenge films? this is here just in case)]































Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #826.
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

[fscom]

10. https://i.imgur.com/MMLBqVd.png

[(Anonymous)]

I have two problems with this theory.

One, it takes it for granted that people will be massive fans of properties where casual misogyny permeates every title. The logic is basically: "Given that all of these people are inevitably going to be fans of shows where there are no compelling women characters, and the women characters who do exist are poorly developed and ill-used, it naturally follows that the resulting fandom will focus heavily on male characters and be really slash-y." And that's a terrible explanation! Because, in fact, people could simply watch other shows if that was what they wanted.

Second, I think it explains something that doesn't need to be explained. It seems to me that it's really easy to explain why shonen fandoms have such gay fandoms - it is because there are fans who like the show, and think the boys are pretty, and want them to kiss. I don't think you really need to come up with any more elaborate explanation. Sometimes the simplest answer is the right one.

[feotakahari]

People have different breaking points. “I won’t watch this show because the female characters suck,” “I won’t watch this show because the plot makes no sense,” “I won’t watch this show because the villain keeps pulling a win out of his ass at the last second.” So someone can go “sure, the female characters suck, but that’s not my breaking point.”

[(Anonymous)]

I mean back in the day you didn't have many options?? yeah I watched a LOAD of casually misogynistic shows, where even without hating women outright, they weren't given depth/interiority. Otherwise I would not have had shows to watch! THERE WEREN'T OTHER SHOWS IN THE GENRES I WAS WATCHING THAT CENTERED WELL-WRITTEN WOMEN.

What was I supposed to watch when I was ten, Murphy Brown? I had Sailor Moon for a while, and that was IT, honey.

[(Anonymous)]

There's countless anime with amazing female characters in them but the majority of slash shippers wouldn't be caught dead watching them anyway let alone write fic about them. AFAB queers find boys easiest to identify with and we should make peace with that rather than blame anime for not having "good enough" girls. The girls will never be good enough

[(Anonymous)]

That depends entirely on the individual fan. There are plenty of m/m slash fans who also watch and like lots of other things, but those things aren't what we're in fandom for.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm AFAB queer and find this a really weird take (not to mention plenty of m/m slashers are straight AFAB people). Sure, slash is super popular, but there's plenty of femslash out there (and, in most places other than AO3, the het outnumbers everything). Anime can have many shitty female characters (ugh waifu bait) AND people can like m/m AND people can like f/f AND some anime has great female characters, none of these are contradictory.

[(Anonymous)]

"AFAB queers find boys easiest to identify with"
quick question. what the fuck

[(Anonymous)]

There's countless anime with amazing female characters in them but the majority of slash shippers wouldn't be caught dead watching them anyway let alone write fic about them.

And there's nothing wrong with that. Well, personally I think there's something wrong with watching shonen anime in the first place, but that's just me.

AFAB queers find boys easiest to identify with

Don't even know what's going on here

[(Anonymous)]

If I agree that some canons are weak in female characters will you listen to the next part?

Because. Fuck no. Given how many female characters who *are* well-written in canon are routinely bashed or just erased or side-lined in fanfic, I think a lot of this is firmly in the realm of fan-writers. Not all, definitely. But it's there.

For example... The Old Guard has multiple fascinating female characters dominating the screen. A quick look at the categories of created fic shows... M/M 7,325 to F/F 1,513.

So - since I'm not in the fandom - let's assume for the sake of argument that everyone is happy bunnies, female characters when they appear in fic are treated positively, and the skewed numbers are a case of 'everything is good, I just have my favourites'.

The shipping numbers are not the fault of the canon material. That's fanficcers' preferences showing themselves. Yes, Nicky and Yusuf are interesting characters, but they're not the leads. They dominate the shipping there because the people writing the fanfic really, really, really-really-really like guyslash.

Own your own tastes, OP!

[(Anonymous)]

this is such a weird example

TOG is one of very few mainstream SFF-y properties that has a super romantic canon m/m relationship front and center

like. slash fandom predominance is hugely multifactorial but I absolutely don't disagree that generally m/m is still overrepresented even when there are great female characters, but the old guard is so OBVIOUSLY an outlier for completely unrelated reasons that it actively undermines your point & credibility

Homestuck would have been a much better example, since it has an almost perfect parity of m and f characters, strong characterization for all the main ones, largely equal screentime with john maybe having just a BIT more, and a canon f/f ship that while very popular is still playing second fiddle to several slash slash ships

[(Anonymous)]

This is a fair enough opinion to have, but it does not account for a) the not insignificant number of people in majority f/f shows who aggressively ship only the sole available m/m thing (see Simoun fandom) and b) the number of fans who go head-over-heels for male characters who are poorly developed, ill-used and not compelling characters (see Matt from Death Note).

The long and short of it is there's pretty much no point in trying to decide why most people ship what they ship as a blanket statement, imo. There's no one answer and trying to find one just makes you look over-invested in everyone else's fun. No one needs to justify why they ship what they do. It's just shipping.

[(Anonymous)]

I agree. I don't care if people only ship m/m or why and I don't expect or want people to "defend" it.

Sometimes it puzzles me that I like female characters and find plenty to write about and so many people don't, but I don't need to "understand" it. I just do my own thing.

[(Anonymous)]

This excuse stopped working about 10 years ago OP and tbh it never held much water. A lot of M/M fans predominately write about men because they’re interested in men and it does not matter how good or well-written/developed the female characters are they’ll never ever be ‘good’ enough.

And honestly I really don’t care if all someone wants to do is engage with M/M, have at it and enjoy yourself, but making up ‘if only they were good enough!!’ arguments just makes you look foolish and causes people to argue with you because it’s not true. Own your preferences without shame.

[(Anonymous)]

I realize you probably just picked a random anime image but it does amuse me to see Inuyasha in there, seeing as it is one of the few anime fandoms where het vastly outnumbers slash.

[(Anonymous)]

Nah my dude, it's absolutely the fans. I can't tell you how many times I've seen "the women in this series suck and are one-dimensional" used as an excuse to totally ignore the female characters so they can focus entirely on two dudes fucking. Bonus points when the dudes are just as shallow and one-dimensional as they're claiming the female characters are.

[(Anonymous)]

I thought the female characters in Fullmetal Alchemist, Blue Exorcist, and Inuyasha were well done. The ones in Bleach and Naruto definitely had untapped potential though. Orihime's power is so freaking cool and she had the perfect opportunity to unleash it when Ichigo looked like he'd been killed by Ulquiorra, but Kubo made her cry instead. That was some bullshit right there.

While I agree with some parts of your secret, there are fans out there who just love to bash female characters to justify their slash ships. Not saying that they're the majority, but they're there and they can be pretty damn loud. I love Yusuke/Keiko, but I remember Keiko getting a lot of hate because she didn't really do much (although what exactly was she supposed to do as an ordinary human?). Anna in Shaman King is a really cool character who actually does stuff and she and Yoh have history together, but I personally prefer Yoh/Ren. Why? I just think they're cute together.

[(Anonymous)]

Buddy, I've seen someone who *only* wrote gangbang AU's of the leads de-aged into teenagers having pseudo-incestuous parties with their father-figure... complain - apparently sincerely - that they just can't write the female characters because canon makes them so 'flat and oversexualised'.

I mean, a lucky escape for the ladies, but.

For all the truly excellent M/M writing out there; the wonderful, thoughtful people writing it... it's best just to acknowledge there's a streak of assholery in there, too.

[(Anonymous)]

I agree with you and the replies are proving your point. Women are well aware that misogyny is all around and seeps into good writing too, but only up until the point where they want to discredit fans who don't like their fave fictional girls. Even well-written female characters get sexist treatment by the writing, that usually affects their characterization more and more the longer a series runs. If semicanon het ships had actual chemistry and the female characters in them weren't reduced of everything I love about them every time they start to have feelings for the male protag (looking at you especially, Magi) I'd be a lot more interested in them.

[meadowphoenix]

idk, i think this is weird to say when there's no quality level of writing for male-characters that change who gets shipped. if everyone is written with equal quality, we all know who is getting shipped in mixed gender media lmao. hell, if the female characters are written quality we all know who is getting shipped!

But I'm going to present a different answer than mere desire, which is definitely a reason. the grand majority of people grow up with more male perspectives and interiority than female interiority, and not just in media. so that's what they primarily reproduce at first, even in sub-social spaces.

[(Anonymous)]

Why is who gets lots of fic written about them the be all and end all?

[(Anonymous)]

God, I've written out two huge responses to this and deleted them both, then rewritten them.

2 things on this topic (which has been debated to death for literally decades):

1. Male slash fans (who are mostly but not all straight, white, cis women) like to ship men not only because they are attracted to men, but also because for many a male romantic avatar makes engaging with the fantasy easier. One of the reasons behind this is that women aren't taught to compare their physical attractiveness (and thus their self worth) against men, only other women. So thought some women like mainstream romance instead, which often has an idealized heroine they can pretend to be, others don't like to be made to feel inadequate in comparison to a female lead in their romantic fantasies. I suspect many in this camp are drawn towards m/m writing.

2. There are exceptions to this rule - a character like Hermione is very popular across many ships, and is popular with fans who otherwise primarily write slash. And I think that actually is an example that supports your point - Hermione is a well-rounded character who has distinct relationships with various name characters who is also very relatable to young, nerdy (white) women. So of course, Hermione, as both a relatable to fans + well-rounded + well romantically positioned character, is very popular. Very few female characters reach that trifecta of factors, so don't get a following.

Note: many people, including some in this thread, really don't like number 1. I didn't like it myself when I was younger, because I saw it used derogatively, saying slash fans were insecure/ self-hating/ had internalised sexism and that's why they couldn't stand to read a romantic story about another woman.

But this conveniently ignores that most straight men don't like romances with incredibly attractive male leads (hence, and I say this even though I have a thing for him, Seth Rogen's career). It also ignores the fact that slash fandom is women having agency and writing what they want in romance/erotica. Sometimes women want Pride and Prejudice. Sometimes they want 50 Shades. And sometimes they want two or more dudes fucking each other's self lubricating bussy's in the town square A/B/O style. And that's okay. It's all gravy baby.

[(Anonymous)]

Both men and women like men more than women, so it's no surprise that there is a lack of well-written female characters and their stories. But slash fans won't stop shipping slash pairings even if there were better female characters in a show, because that has nothing to do with why they ship male characters with each other in the first place.

(Also, that image you used contains FMA, which has well-written female characters.)

[(Anonymous)]

I mean as a gay man I'm just... what else am I supposed to want to write here? I like canons that have well-rounded female characters, I'm glad that I see more of them than I used to and I've liked plenty of ships involving them... but I don't write many m/f or f/f ships, especially not in sexual situations, because no matter how good a lady is and how much chemistry she has with someone else, I'm not invested in her sex life. There are a couple rare ships I like enough to write about lady-lovin' for (one m/f ship where both characters feel chaotic bi and suit each other insanely well, one m/m/f triad that has a place in my heart and quite frankly just doesn't work without her, though I'm always down for two-guys-get-it-on-while-their-wife-is-at-a-work-thing scenarios, where the sex is concerned... but they very much both also love her. There's a cute f/f ship I wish was more popular, but I just can't get into writing about them as more than a support pairing)

[(Anonymous)]

I know that there are good female represented media in anime. But there is a lot of truth in that the most mainstream animes tend to be male created/centered/focused. And you know, generally speaking, local culture from the creators tend to be casually misogynist. And society in general still upholds the patriarchy so casual misogyny can still go on without much pushback for a variety of reasons. I've made my peace with that.

My personal thing is, I'll call it out when I see it, sus out the fandom to see what the general vibe is, deduce if it's worth really doing much about outside of giving up the thing or continue consuming but not participating in the fandom.

But at the same time, I will find media that aligns more with what I want and like and participate in the fandom there. Because the only way to get more of what I want is to let people know that this is what I want!!