Da Bao:Not that they did anything terrible. They just treated me like a girl.Ryn:
It sounds like your choice to watch BL and GL is based on a dislike for heteronormative themes, and on personal negative experiences? Does that sound close to a simple way to look at it?
only the teensiest bit romantically attracted to men
And since you're not interested in the visuals of the male actors, then that counts out the physical basis of attraction for watching, but you mentioned having some attraction to men, so is that an emotional attraction? That's quite the opposite of many others here, who seem to like the actors visually, just sans their dicks and having to be close to real men (and their personalities and emotions in general), hence BL is favoured for some; because they portray gay sex in a very soft almost flowery way in BLs and they never show full frontal nudity and even backside nudity is rare.
people say that het women make up the majority of the BL fandom when that just doesn't seem to be true, and that does annoy me sometimes.
Male/male content (slash, yaoi, BL, LGBTQ, etc) whatever you might call it, was created by straight women, probably intended for whoever shared an interest in it, from there, it gained many different types of fans! I always remind people to remember the world population numbers when thinking about 'how many' because while the people who view gay content is varied nowadays, and that's awesome, statistically, it's definitely still predominantly viewed/read by het females. I don't think it's anything to be annoyed about, it's just a numbers game.
Sorry for late response,
It sounds like your choice to watch BL and GL is based on a dislike for heteronormative themes, and on personal negative experiences? Does that sound close to a simple way to look at it?Lyson:
Sure
but you mentioned having some attraction to men, so is that an emotional attraction?
'Emotional attraction' isn't a term that makes sense to me because I don't see how attraction would work without emotion. Isn't attraction entirely emotion? So then all types of attraction are emotional attraction, no?
So yeah no as I said, a very rare teeny bit of romantic attraction to men is possible for me, but tbh I think it's been about a decade since that last happened.
That's quite the opposite of many others here, who seem to like the actors visually, just sans their dicks and having to be close to real men
Honestly that really reminds me of this one sketch about what kind of fictional guys lesbians crush on before they realize they're lesbians. https://youtu.be/t1eEx7MFisI. I'm not saying that's definitely what's happening for everyone, but for some people it might be. 'I discovered/accepted I was a lesbian through BL' is practically a meme by now, isn't it? The sketch itself also strongly reminds me of The Untamed haha.
I always remind people to remember the world population numbers when thinking about 'how many' because while the people who view gay content is varied nowadays, and that's awesome, statistically, it's definitely still predominantly viewed/read by het females. I don't think it's anything to be annoyed about, it's just a numbers game.
I think that's an assumption you're making, and it's not based on actual statistics you've seen, because the statistics I've seen tell a very different story. https://archiveofourown.org/works/54011047/chapters/139049377#workskin I'll admit that those were from AO3, so mostly western, not Asian, but it's very clearly bisexuals and asexuals who are writing and consuming m/m content. I think the fact that you asked specifically for straight women to respond, and you mostly got bisexuals instead, should also tell you something.
If you have seen actual statistics that indicate this then I am very interested to see them though. Always happy to learn.
There was unfortunately a large effort on the part of terfs to spread the narrative that m/m content is mostly being made by and for straight girls who fetishize gay men. The terfs wanted to do a divide and conquer anti-LGBT strategy thing. Recently someone gave me this link https://www.fujoshi.info/bl-resources#misconception-2 to a website dedicated to documenting and debunking that crap. Whoever wrote that put more dedication into it than I would put into a thesis lol.
I keep seeing people like Alice Oseman and Casey McQuiston get called straight girls because they wrote BL. The pattern I see is that society largely villainizes amab queerness, while it largely erases afab queerness instead. Erasing the queerness of BL audiences seems to fit into that pattern, so yes, I am annoyed by it. I'm not annoyed at you personally, to be clear, but I am annoyed at the incorrect narrative itself.
Obviously it's true that in general there are more straight women than queer women, so your 'numbers game' assumption seems to make sense. But we all live in algorithm bubbles now, right? I think it's more about who's drawn to BL. In terms of sheer numbers, there are enough queer women on the planet for BL to enjoy gigantic popularity without ever needing to be seen by a single straight woman. I wouldn't assume equal percentages of straight women watch BL as queer women.
The straight women I've seen enjoy BL have all been pretty noncommittal, take it or leave it, 'sure yeah I watch BL but also straight romcoms, it's just a romance' kind of people, while I see bisexual, lesbian and ace audiences be ride or die shippers who strongly prefer m/m over straight media. Besides online, in my personal irl life I know a lot of bisexual women, enbies and aces who are VERY into gay shipping, and the few straight friends I have are just not that interested.
So yeah, 'it's got to be mainly straight women who are watching this' is an assumption that makes a lot of sense at first glance, but I think an assumption is all it is.
The straight women I've seen enjoy BL have all been pretty noncommittal, take it or leave it, 'sure yeah I watch BL but also straight romcoms, it's just a romance' kind of people, while I see bisexual, lesbian and ace audiences be ride or die shippers who strongly prefer m/m over straight media. Besides online, in my personal irl life I know a lot of bisexual women, enbies and aces who are VERY into gay shipping, and the few straight friends I have are just not that interested
Perhaps the discrepancy comes from your 'ride or die shippers' v 'just a romance' framework.
Elisheva:
Perhaps the discrepancy comes from your 'ride or die shippers' v 'just a romance' framework.
Yeah maybe, actually. I guess the way I was counting, someone who watches 300 BLs counts more than someone who watches 5, because they appear in the audience of more individual shows.
In a hypothetical scenario where 100 straight women each watch 1 BL, and 2 bisexual women each watch 50, then by my count that would be a 50/50 straight/bisexual ratio in BL audience. But I guess you could also say it's like 98% straight women. Depends on how you count it.
I guess in my imagination I was grabbing everyone watching one single BL at one snapshot in time, and putting them all in a room together, and then doing a headcount for who's straight and who isn't, and arriving at a significant percentage of queer people.
But I guess if we're doing a simple headcount for everyone who's ever watched a BL, then yeah straight women would probably win out in the numbers game. I don't think they'd win out in who writes BL though, because writing a whole novel or fanfic or webcomic is not a noncommittal thing to do.
Help me out, I've seen comments from LBGTQ/BL female watchers who don't seem to be attracted to 'real' men physically. So I'm curious, not including plot/entertainment/etc the one type of female viewer I know of is;
1) watching because they're attracted to men
and
2) ?
3) ?
...?
NB: there is no judgement here from me, I'm not the sort who takes issue with people who like fluff or smut, whatever you like you like, it's all good. I like what I like and idgaf who thinks what, I'm just curious about how het female BL viewers feel about real men sexually/physically because it's interesting to me.
I’m a straight woman, and I’m 100% attracted to men. That said, while it’s very nice to see good-looking men in the dramas I watch, attraction alone is not the only reason I enjoy BL dramas. I don’t watch them simply because I'm attracted to men. I mean.. I'm not always attracted to the men I see in BL dramas.
1. For me, BL dramas offer a strong sense of escapism that I don’t always get from heterosexual shows.When I watch hetero dramas, I often unconsciously place myself in the female lead’s position. That sometimes makes the experience less enjoyable, especially when I disagree with her choices or feel second-hand embarrassment. Instead of fully focusing on the story, I end up over-identifying with one perspective. With BL dramas, that pressure disappears. I don’t project myself onto the characters, so I can watch the story unfold more objectively. I’m able to appreciate all the characters’ perspectives equally.
2. It’s kind of refreshing to see male leads who have similar tropes to a female lead in a hetero drama. I don’t know if that sounds weird, but in a lot (NOT ALL!) of dramas, women are often written as the damsel in distress. The cute and fragile one who often needs protecting. In BL dramas, those same traits are SOMETIMES given to male characters instead, which feels refreshing. It challenges the usual expectations of masculinity and allows male leads to be soft, emotionally expressive, vulnerable, or in need of care without being judged for it. Idk, but seeing that is kind of cathartic for me. Like...I want to see men acting soft and cute for a change. Let them slip and get caught by someone else. Let them get caught in the rain and have someone else tower over them with an umbrella. Let them look UP to the other lead. Does that make sense?
3. I have specific type of men I like that I don't often get to see in real life or in hetero dramas lol. I mostly only get to see them in BL dramas, soo🤷♀️
So yeah, 'it's got to be mainly straight women who are watching this' is an assumption that makes a lot of sense at first glance, but I think an assumption is all it is.
Ultimately, I was asking for the people sexually attracted to men to answer because that's where my curiosity began, from a conversation between two heterosexual women saying they weren't interested in males sexually (specifically once their dicks got involved). It was interesting to read the perspective of others who weighed in though.
I'm not personally interested in the whole in depth debate about which group of sexual orientation watches BL more, tbr I don't even care and I don't think it matters who's watching it. I guess, over all, from what I know and who I've talked to, what I seen online and based on statistics of population sexual orientation surveys over the years, I'd say it's probably still mostly heterosexual women who consume slash media. I just think those fan groups (LGBTQ and Het) move in different circles so to speak, so there are different types of exposure to consider. But if it's becoming more and more diverse, awesome, for LGBTQ and het people, the more the merrier or something.
I don't think they'd win out in who writes BL though, because writing a whole novel or fanfic or webcomic is not a noncommittal thing to do.
I'm not sure where your pov of het people being noncommittal to writing/creating gay media/content comes from, because historically and to date, it's been and is still het people (not only women mind you) who created/creates most gay media/content, but yeah, it's changing, as it should with progressiveness gradually spreading worldwide.
