on a more serious note, here’s why the whole lance is bi article left a bad taste in my mouth:
for starters, the first paragraph itself refers to the LGBT community as a whole using the q slur as an umbrella term. and while a lot of people have already reclaimed using it, that doesn’t necessarily mean everyone has, so using it repeatedly throughout the article was just….. it was pretty tough to read
the article talked about how some fans feel like lance wouldn’t really be bisexual if he ended up with a girl at the end of the series, and while it’s true that some people DO think that, majority of the fanbase is also trying to educate the people that that’s not how bisexuality works. there are a lot of kids in the fanbase who still haven’t been as exposed to what’s proper and improper when it comes to these things, but there are also a lot of people (sometimes even fellow kids) who try their best to guide them through that. it’s not really my main “the fuck…” moment with the article, but i just don’t think it gives enough credit to how hard people are working to make this fanbase a safe space
he brought up how rabid people become when he released the article about jeremy saying lance’s milkshakes bring EVERYONE to the yard, and how it was bad that we’re taking it as though it’s like the word of god from all the posts we make about it. like first of all my good bitch those are shitposts and we do it to cope, and second of all, we’re not idiots. we know proper representation of actual bisexual lance confirmation is supposed to come from nowhere but the show itself, but we’re just trying to have a good time with how lance’s own voice actor seems so openly supportive of it. that’s literally fucking all
he even mentioned the whole “fake fan demands canon klance or they’ll release studio screenshots” disaster….. as if it wasn’t already confirmed that it’s just some troll who didn’t even ship klance doing shit to give a bad name to everyone who ships it and didn’t really have any leverage but, you know, go off i fucking guess
he also said that the show isn’t q-baiting the fans, and that the fans are q-baiting themselves which is….. what lmao. literally how many times do we have to analyze frames and coloring techniques in particular scenes for people to get that we’re not pulling this shit from our asses? we are fucking getting all this information from what the show feeds us, and don’t even dare tell me that we’re looking at everything through rainbow-colored glasses ‘cause this is media. this is animation, even. everything the animators do is supposed to mean something. that’s the whole point of telling a story through visuals — words aren’t enough because you also have to show a story through the images you make
and another thing that really struck a nerve with me? the fact that he said that creators don’t owe us shit when it comes to their story. because listen, i studied media in college. we had multiple classes on producing media content and audience impact and reciprocation. a constant question we ask is “how can you give the audience what they want in the most satisfying way possible while also making them crave for more?” the minute you put your creative product out in the media, it’s not yours anymore. it becomes the audience’s. it’s something that’s been repeatedly drilled into our brains back in our classes, and it’s something we had to swallow painfully hard. because that’s the whole point of telling stories in the media; no one tells stories in public for themselves — they tell it for the people. whether it’s for a particular group or for the general public, storytelling for the media was and is all about pleasing the audience (while compromising and trying to make it pleasing to you too, but that’s a whole other topic) otherwise if you don’t want people to inject their own opinions on how your shit should be, don’t release it in that medium at all. so no, the whole “creators don’t owe you shit” idea? not a valid argument
one last thing that made my blood boil: how the article says that even if lance isn’t confirmed as bisexual, there are plenty of other canonically bisexual characters out there we can identify with and love. as if….. that’s what we want. it’s so degrading, having to be told that “hey you already got a niche of characters you can pick from! just choose from them!” that. is. not. why. we. want. bi. lance. you fucking idiots. having a canonically bisexual latinx character in a popular children’s show who’s complex and doesn’t fit the usual stereotypes is IMPORTANT. it’s not only important for a representation of sexuality, but of race as well. of how representation of race and sexuality is very important to overlap and intertwine with one another. it’s not just us wanting our “uwu sweet child” to be bi for the hell of it, it’s actually important to us to see that in a show as well received as voltron. because this isn’t something we saw when we were kids. this isn’t something we see often even now
and the article misses that point completely
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