#straight representation

The problems straight couples and individuals face in mainstream texts are nearly limitless: physical illness or death, mental illness, domestic abuse, unrequited love, infertility, a child's illness or death, infidelity, divorce, sexism, internalized sexism, racist reactions to interracial couples, financial problems, and on and on and on.  What's not recognized often enough in these texts is that gay couples and individuals are susceptible to almost all of the same issues.  Really, the only exception I can think of is that gay couples rarely have to deal with unexpected pregnancies. Obviously, homophobia is a real problem, but it's something non-straight people have to contend with on top of everything else. Yet, what we see over and over again is gay people being objects of homophobia.  Part of the reason for this is the lack of diversity in these portrayals.  Most gay characters are white, able-bodied, mentally healthy, middle to leisure-class men, so they escape a lot of these issues merely through privilege.  Homophobia is the only problem they face because they are only marginalized by their sexuality. In terms of fidelity, it's a rare show or film that has more than two gay men or lesbians (even rarer to have bi, trans, or ace characters).  If they're the only two gay men in the universe (looking at you, Game of Thrones), who are they going to cheat on each other with? Concerning children, in most of the episodes and films I've seen involve cases of gay men's or lesbians' fitness as parents being called into question because of their sexuality.

I would argue that this omission of other problems--problems that any person who chooses to share their life with another can have--works in two different, and somewhat contradictory, ways.  The first is othering gay people by focusing on what makes them different.  In some homophobic discourse, this difference gets twisted into a kind of privilege.  The idea is that gay people don't have to deal with marriage problems, childrearing, and the financial burdens that accompany these; they only have to deal with homophobia, which is often underestimated, if not dismissed, in these conversations  On the other hand, making homophobia the only problem gay people face has the effect of unnecessarily involving straight people in their lives and relationships, either as heroes or oppressors.  Homophobia is often either a problem from which allies can rescue their gay friends (since they certainly aren't subjected to it themselves) or a problem created by straight people.  In either case, gays' lives are being defined by external forces, and both make straight people pretty damn important, don't they?  In their own relationships, most straight characters' problems are, at least in some ways, internal..