Leaving the Party

I just unsubscribed from that creator’s patreon.
Not naming them – I’m sure they have no idea who I am and that works.

I love the series they write because I think it’s time that western gay teens and preteens have a series like theirs that shelves the horny for a rosy-colored view of young romance. I’ve seen these idealized non-sexual stories before, in BL from Japan.

Contrary to their comments on the BL genre (based on their limited exposure to the raunchy stuff licensed in the west?), Japan was and still is loaded with these types of BL stories; there are whole magazines dedicated to chaste teen MM love and romance with no sex at all in them at all. They’re aimed at younger teen readers – but only recently has the western market licensed a scant few…

I’m drawn to those stories because my teenage years (the 80s) were highly sexualized in media and in real life, so it’s nice to see something a little chaste. I left the author’s Patreon though, and I intend to purchase the book when it releases – as I have the others.

So why did I go?

One thing I disliked in my very short time there was their readers’ knee-jerk reactions when older gays commented with thoughts and terms that we, as queer people, use tongue-in-cheek and reflect our experiences.

The first drama I caught my second day as a patron came from an older gay reader who had the audacity to suggest the series didn’t reflect his reality, but he loved it anyway. He jokingly said that at his age, he would’ve been… He got a finger-wagging dog pile from various readers informing him that young gays didn’t focus on sex at that age and thinking such things was gross and unnecessary. He ended up deleting what I thought was a benign comment but at the same time, I slowly got it: We’re in a room with younger people, and the eight of us that HEARTED that comment are clearly the minority in the fandom demographic.

Then, I offended some patrons by calling Charlie a top. Apparently, my age and pro-nouns made me an old fetishizing CIS woman (lol) with no business talking about TEENAGERS in such stereotypical ways. They didn’t dog pile me, tough, they got themselves worked up at Discord, and then vague commented about my comments. BTW – thanks for the blog traffic, and the three book sales. ♥

Yesterday, someone commented (forgetting the eggshells on the floor) their thoughts about the lack of explicitness in the current plot point – it was general navel-gazing that got completely drama-bombed by readers taking their sentiments personally because clearly the work is also about them as readers. The original commenter thought that the author being ace impacted the decision not to depict explicit sex – at least, that’s how I read it. Readers took it as ‘the author is ace and therefore cannot write sex;’ and I was shocked when the author also chimed in with that impression.

Shocked when they expressed surprise that ‘one of their readers’ would think this way of them. 0__0 Have they met the online fandom around their series? In all fairness, the minute the author painted ‘BL’ with an ill-perceived stroke based on a fraction of the genre they were exposed to, they became a hero for the ‘you’re not gay enough to enjoy queer content’ crowd, not to mention the ‘kink doesn’t belong at pride,’ types that demand all queer lit be like THIS series.

All that crap aside, yesterday’s patreon comments is why I bailed.

Clearly, my gray goggles are too gray because I saw nothing black and white in this original comment, yet the author took offense, so clearly my orientation-cocoon blinds me to what is and isn’t offensive to other orientations– or as the readers there would say: my values as an old oversexed queer aren’t allowing me to see when someone’s making insulting assumptions about ace people.

Wiseass-ness aside, the problem is me, and so I tapped out. I’m not being sarcastic in any way here – my worldview isn’t aligning with the room and when that happens, it’s time to leave the party. I don’t stay where I’m not comfortable, and I won’t make others uncomfortable with my perceived immorality.