Toxic masculinity is largely a label created to demonize male traits.RobertBobert:
yeah generally that is how its used , i mention it more in terms of the fact that generally speaking an aspect also associated with in it alot of society is simply expecting men to supress their softer emotions , its a sad thing honestly cause i'm sure it results in alot of them not being able to show their true selves for fear of ridicule hence why i used my fiance as an example.
The problem isn't that male gaze is more overtly sexualized—you can find more subtle male-focused work, too. The problem is that modern media still treats male content as the default.
i don't doubt that a subtle male-focused work exists but i'm hard pressed to think of any off-hand myself, but yeah the fact that modern media treats male content as default is sorta exactly the issue , which sorta takes us back to the original topic i think in why some heterosexual women like myself find BL appealing is cause it tends to show things that lean more towards what we're looking for in a romance , sadly as someone early on mentioned that at times it can be a detriment to the over arching plot ,.. not to say that some don't have a solid plot but generally its secondary alot of times ,.. which is a separate sad problem and why even when i like something i tend to rate alot of them a bit lower than your standard straight romances.
i think you might have the wrong thread here for that discussion ,... that has nothing to do with this topic. that said i fully disagree about age gating a list site , theres no need for it even adults act dumb when it comes to rating things. that said i do think reviews shouldn't even be allowed to be posted before something has fully aired since you get alot of fans who just see a favorite/disliked actor n give something a 10 or a 1 which is stupid. peaking at your list tho i see you have Very little shows/movies falling below the 8.5-10 range idk if you've just had great luck picking stuff or you tend to highly rate things others just might not , while i've given my share of 10s i sure have Way less by comparison and nearly half my list is 7 or below so it could just be ppl have different standards as well.
ToddyD60:
When I see and realize, that some stupid teenage idiots eveluat dramas, because they don't understand politics or the world itself, or (main impact) no romance is in it, I have to vomit! When I look at "Tempest". This is genius. The best korean "drama" I watched. But is has only a 8.1 rating. Why? Because of the stupid teenagers around, witch dosen't understand anything and have also no patient to watch it full. You have only the right to write a comment when you watched a drama completly! Anything other disqualifies you to do so. My suggestion is a 18+ verifaction for beening member of MDL. If that would be possible, we'll have (nearly) correct reviews. Amen.
has anyone mentioned the fujoshi-to-transmasc pipeline in this thread yet?oatmilk:
i've only seen it offhandedly mentioned in a select few cases but i definately thing its a pretty fair thing to point out . i definitely have a few online friends who are trans ( both masc and fem) who are fujoshi so its a worthwhile angle to explore i think ,... that said the OP did specify the question was towards heterosexual females so its possible the topic's veiwpoint has been skewed toward that all things considered.
And even if we leave out those nuances, you still have to acknowledge that trans male audiences are still consuming content through the male gaze, otherwise it creates some very undesirable implications, you know.
thats a fair thing to point out as well which sorta aligns with my point above about the viewpoint on the topic being skewed
styx971:
i've only seen it offhandedly mentioned in a select few cases but i definately thing its a pretty fair thing to point out . i definitely have a few online friends who are trans ( both masc and fem) who are fujoshi so its a worthwhile angle to explore i think ,... that said the OP did specify the question was towards heterosexual females so its possible the topic's veiwpoint has been skewed toward that all things considered.
In my experience interacting with trans women who enjoy lesbian content, many genderqueer folks avoid discussing the topic because of cis slash shippers who like to pose as gay people on social media. Because of them, many people start to think that you are just another shipper whose hobby has gone too far.
oatmilk The main target audience is still straight women and, to a lesser extent, gay men, so this is a somewhat secondary issue. You may also recall that many lesbians were drawn to straight male shows with lots of attractive female characters, but it's a peripheral and much smaller audience with not only straight men, but even straight women watching it because of the overall theme of romance or sympathetic female characters.
And even if we leave out those nuances, you still have to acknowledge that trans male audiences are still consuming content through the male gaze, otherwise it creates some very undesirable implications, you know.
I kind of contest the point that because a particular demographic is a smaller percentage of viewership (by virtue, often, of being a smaller percentage of society) that their viewership is a less-valid part of the discussion - if that were the case, it would end any and all arguments for stronger representation of any demographic in media.
I especially contest it in this context, given that many users of this site (as pointed out elsewhere) are quite young, a lot of people who currently think they're straight women... may actually not be.
TBH, of my transmasc friends (myself included) the number of us who spent years as fujoshis before coming out as he/hims or he/theys or whatever else is... not quite 100% but it's close.
Transmasculinity is a reasonable part of the "why do women and girls like BL so much" equation.
I also don't think I "have" to acknowledge that transmascs (not all of whom are men) are viewing much of anything "through the male gaze" - firstly, the male gaze as a concept isn't something individual viewers look through, it's a commentary on how female characters (and on a broader scope, most media) are written primarily with a male audience in mind and to cater to stereotypically-masculine tastes. Iron Man is a character designed for the male gaze, as is Captain America, as is Wonder Woman (though she's getting a little better in recent years, as far as I understand.)
Secondarily, transmascs and cis men don't have the same life experiences and often have very different worldviews and approaches to media and how they relate to it. Even heterosexual transmascs have an understanding of womanhood and the female experience - having lived it - that the average cis man does not. To say that any transmasc interacting with media "has to" acknowledge that they're doing so "through the male gaze" is both erroneous at its core and also swinging dangerously close to just saying "man bad, man pov not important because man bad" which is a type of silencing transmascs have to deal with an unfortunate amount and it's not something I'm especially pleased to see in my first attempt to venture into the forums here.
i've only seen it offhandedly mentioned in a select few cases but i definately thing its a pretty fair thing to point out . i definitely have a few online friends who are trans ( both masc and fem) who are fujoshi so its a worthwhile angle to explore i think ,... that said the OP did specify the question was towards heterosexual females so its possible the topic's veiwpoint has been skewed toward that all things considered.
thats a fair thing to point out as well which sorta aligns with my point above about the viewpoint on the topic being skewed
Forgot to reply to this one initially but yeah, I definitely know a bunch of lesbian fujos as well. My point in bringing up transmascs is more that there's a nonzero percentage of the "hetero female" BL audience at any given time who, in about five years, will be Out transmascs (either gay or otherwise) but just haven't really explored their own identities yet. How does one meaningfully separate the genuinely-cisgender-heterosexual-women from the transmasc eggs and closet-dwellers, y'know?
Secondarily, transmascs and cis men don't have the same life experiences and often have very different worldviews and approaches to media and how they relate to it. Even heterosexual transmascs have an understanding of womanhood and the female experience - having lived it - that the average cis man does not. To say that any transmasc interacting with media "has to" acknowledge that they're doing so "through the male gaze" is both erroneous at its core and also swinging dangerously close to just saying "man bad, man pov not important because man bad" which is a type of silencing transmascs have to deal with an unfortunate amount and it's not something I'm especially pleased to see in my first attempt to venture into the forums here.
thats definitely a fair point ,just cause you might feel/view yourself as a man doesn't mean you don't have that experience , its something i don't always think about not being in that position myself so its good of you to mention this.
thats definitely a fair point ,just cause you might feel/view yourself as a man doesn't mean you don't have that experience , its something i don't always think about not being in that position myself so its good of you to mention this.
Well, that's a bit hypocritical, I think. Because even if trans men and cis men do have different experiences, that doesn't mean you can just choose the part of gender you like and cut out the part you don't.
Either way, it seems this thread is increasingly becoming a place for gender disputes and quasi-culture wars, so I'll refrain from further comments to avoid making this endless. Thanks for the dialogue, anyway.
