It's crazy to me that I still come across the "why can't two men just be bros?" discourse in the Naruto fandom in the year 2026........
Like, men are allowed to be bros. That's the problem; men are only allowed to be bros. They're not allowed to be gay. If we don't make it happen, nothing will.
Fujoshis will be blamed for shipping any two men with the tiniest amount of chemistry between them regardless of whether it makes sense or not. And yes, that's partly true; I ship Inuyasha and Miroku because it's more satisfying to me than Inuyasha and Kagome.
But let's be real, nobody is complaining about Inuyasha and Miroku being shipped together, because it's marginal and irrelevant anyway, and everybody knows it. It doesn't threaten anyone's understanding of the canon narrative, because it's obviously fanon.
And contrary to popular belief, fujoshis also know what makes sense and what doesn't; I would never assert that Inuyasha and Miroku together makes more sense than Inuyasha and Kagome, or that Inuyasha was actually in love with Miroku the whole time. And guess what, most fujoshis won't fight for ships that they know are complete headcanons. (That doesn't mean they're not allowed to explore such fanon ships publicly and be enthusiastic about it.)
So no one cares about Inuyasha and Miroku being shipped together. No, of course what people care about are Naruto and Sasuke being shipped together - Naruto and Sasuke not being "allowed to be bros." Because these two are not a marginal and irrelevant ship, they are a massive ship that actually threatens their straight reading of the narrative, since it's obvious to anyone not so hell-bent on living in a heteronormative fantasy that Naruto and Sasuke are in love, and that it's what the whole story is about.
In Naruto, the story starts by telling us two things: Sasuke is alive purely to enact revenge and won't let anything stop him, and Naruto's biggest aspiration in life is to become Hokage. Then the story proceeds to tell us two other things: Sasuke will willingly die for Naruto (land of the waves), and Naruto will also willingly die for Sasuke (lost count of examples). Naruto takes priority over revenge for Sasuke (that's literally the conclusion of the story), and Sasuke takes priority over becoming Hokage for Naruto (five kage summit).
This means that revenge, presented as Sasuke's sole reason for staying alive, becomes less important to him than Naruto, aka his ''one and only,'' aka his new reason for staying alive.
This also means that becoming Hokage, presented as Naruto's ultimate purpose in life, becomes less important to him than Sasuke, because essentially the world means nothing to him without Sasuke in it.
The story starts and ends with their bond, and only exists because of their bond. This is not a case of fujoshis not allowing two men to be bros, this is a case of society not allowing two men to be in love. Because guess what, how does Naruto end officially? That's right, with Naruto and Sasuke being bros. Because they are indeed very much allowed to be; that's in fact all they can ever officially be in a Japanese shonen manga of our time.
