Honglou Meng

Lol. Yes, they might have as well outfitted everyone with bifocal lens and called it Four-eyed You.

Funny how some people use the term "soft porn" as if it were a crime, and stranger still that sexuality and sexual expression are not considered part of the storyline or acting, but a distraction from it.

It always amuses me that one of the most profound and pleasurable facets of human nature -- so fundamental, in fact, that natural selection actively shapes us for it -- is considered ancillary, if not antithetical, to storytelling. Yet, scatological humour is perfectly fine.

I, for one, celebrate Oat and Boat for being game, and going all the way for it. They are professionals, and seem aware that it would do wrong by us, and gay people especially, to be half-arsed or worse, look uncomfortable, in their portrayal of intimate scenes.

Haha. It helped that your username was John, and that you share the same concerns as a lot of gay men do about sexual dynamics about BL. Otherwise, I shouldn't have guessed so easily!

Yeah, it makes no sense. They just gave Pond a pair of old man's glasses and thought it would age him by 26 years. Lol.

I'm here for Pond, with whom I fell in love after 180 Degrees. I began to worry about him after Fourever You, because I couldn't tell if the script and direction let him down in it, or elevated him in 180 Degrees. To be fair, all he did in Fourever You was stare as intensely at Earth as a creepy stalker with proptosis. I'm not sure anyone else could have done better in that role.

But, after the first episode of Reset, I find myself nervous. I almost feel as if I shouldn't continue watching it to preserve my memories of Pond from 180 Degrees intact.

Lol. Bottoms make the dreams *come* true.

I'll show myself out.

Thank you! Exactly. The one thing good about this show is that Jun has always had agency. There is no reason to believe that Jun wouldn't have stopped and shoved Sorn aside if he wasn't enjoying it. It is disturbing to me that the one rare time where a bottom is given agency and control, and is shown to actively want sex, people want to undermine it as an instance of abuse.

I'm with you. It is hard not to notice that the ukes are predominantly patterned after passive heroines from Victorian novels and Mills & Boons romances, and the dynamics recreated are exactly those found in straight relationships. (In some ways, things are worse in Japan, the birthplace of BLs.) But many of the BL authors seem ignorant of the fact that, by virtue of both physical characteristics and societal norms, the dynamics of gay relationships, and its pleasures and problems, are very different.

I presume, from your comment, that you are a gay man? I am too, and I find this issue rather vexing. Quite a few others on this forum, gay and straight, do too. But there is also a fair few people here who are ready to berate and silence gay men for their views, and if that isn't the definition of homophobia, I don't know what is.

I don't take issue with any of what you have said. You are entirely in the right as far as the ethical question of consent itself goes -- which, in any event, isn't black and white, but a question of constant negotiation between the parties involved.

But my larger point isn't about the question of consent, or about the truism that our individual psychologies determine our views of the world -- though I'd place a higher premium on sociology than psychology -- but the differential application of these concerns, always, on the passive partner (or, and I don't want to speak out of turn here, women) alone. With the implication, always, that the bottom can't enjoy sex, and with the consequence that people confuse their own discomfort with that of the characters. It is also not a question about the validity of views -- that is another psychological truism thrown around commonly enough -- any view is valid within the chambers of your cortex, because there is no one else to invalidate it, unless the person in question evaluates it for his or her own self, and decides it otherwise. But insofar as we decide to throw around heavy, heavy accusations about someone, some objective standards become necessary. After all, perspectivism wouldn't hold up in a court of law. Which judge or jury would rule both perspectives are valid?

The question of context, as you say, is key. And this is where the issue of fiction, and the latitude you give to it, becomes important. My Stubborn hasn't really bothered with storylines, or a decent script, or continuities. Where does the GL story start? Why does it come where it does? It makes no sense. The whole show makes no sense. (Even within the nonsensical worlds of Yaoi/BL/bara/what have you.) Yet, we give it all the latitude to be absolutely nonsensical elsewhere, and on the one issue of rough sex, we don't. Even when every indication afterwards is that Jun enjoyed his time, we suddenly use the apparent inconsistencies of plot and writing -- of which there isn't much to begin with -- against the possibility of simple sexual passion. There is a great deal of hypocrisy at work here, and one that is particularly biased against gay sex. It comes up every time a BL show dares to show gay sex, and sooner or later, people find a way to be uncomfortable about it. (I don't mean you, of course, but in general.) I've been here long enough in these woods to know.

Lastly, before anyone comes to me citing personal experience as proof, here is another piece of context: I have been subject to more than one sexual assault in my life, and I find the fast-and-loose way in which people talk about consent very, very counterproductive.

"I feel like most depictions of lesbian sex in Thai BL/GL media have fallen into the trap of “girls only like delicate romantic sex”. "

Alas, all too true. And given that that is precisely how the passive men have been written in BLs since their inception, one must imagine that the leap was not too illogical.

By the way, have you seen Duke of Burgundy? If not, I wonder if you might like it. Check it out! It is written by a man, but I think it has something genuinely interesting to say about power dynamics in a BDSM relationship between two women.

Exactly! I'm here for good fun! After all, this is a work of fiction -- and a ridiculous one at that! And I'm so happy, as a gay man, to see actual gay sex in a BL, even if it is drawn more from the world of gay porn than a bathroom in Old Compton Street.

Can we just please enjoy that without clamouring for realism all the time, and po-faced lectures in morality? Nothing kills a work of entertainment like didacticism.

It says something about how many cultures around the world view sex as something "dirty." Sex is messy, to be sure, but dirty? I should like to believe that the prettiness of the scene has something to do with that, but then, we both know that that would be giving too much credit to the writers here. Lol.

At least they didn't go down the route of Blue is the Vilest Colour. I don't know about you, but my lesbian friends wanted to burn an effigy of that director.

Exactly. I wrote this above, but will paste it here, because I think it strengthens your argument:

The whole arc of the show has implied that if Jun wanted to stop it, he would have. There's no reason to believe otherwise. He is not a passive victim: I fear that's what a lot of bad BLs have taught us to expect, but Jun has agency. The show has always shown it. More importantly, he says he liked Sorn the more, not less, after the scene transpires, and there is nothing to indicate afterwards that his personhood was violated in anyway. Even the hickies are a badge of honour for him, not shame.

It's really self-defeating to want ukes to have more self-assurance and agency in BL, and then, when they do have it, and are shown enjoying sex, people still want to believe that he didn't consent to it.

As it was for me to hear yours! But then, despite my relative inexperience on the matter, I have seen enough Sapphic films with my lesbian friends to know that the writers had no idea how lesbian sex worked. :)

I see where you're coming from, and I see that your heart is in the just place. But I don't think Jun was demeaned or ignored at all. The whole arc of the show implied to me that if he wanted to stop it, he would have. There's no reason to believe otherwise. He is not a passive victim: I fear that's what a lot of bad BLs have taught us to expect, but Jun has agency. Besides, he says he liked Sorn the more, not less, after the scene transpires, and there is nothing to indicate afterwards that his personhood was violated in anyway. Even the hickies are a badge of honour, not shame.

Quite aside from the question of sexual kinks and fantasies (qua fantasies), it's a bit self-defeating to want ukes to have more self-assurance and agency, and then, when they do have it, and are shown enjoying sex, people still want to believe that he didn't consent to it. The point you raised about LGBT vs BL is pertinent here, because if there is one trope that underpins most BLs, it is that the bottoms or the ukes cannot enjoy sex. They must always resist, and the semes must always force themselves upon the innocent twinks. On the other hand, in LGBT shows, the gays do enjoy sex. For me, the shy Victorian maiden who runs away from the lustful top is more unrealistic, and more problematic a trope, than any fantasy from gay porn. Which is what makes this BL -- which I nevertheless ruthlessly lampoon in my review -- unusual.

Thank you so much! :) You've got to tell me what's your favourite review!

Well, I'm a real live gay man who hasn't (yet) appeared in porn, and yes, much as the whole series looks like it's straight out of gay porn -- not a bad thing -- I can tell you that a lot of us really love a dick deep down our throat. We can breathe through our noses after all, and, having slept with more than his fair share of men, I can attest that many of us -- by no means all -- love the domination that goes with it. I, for one, love being choked by a man I trust. It might well look uncomfortable to an onlooker, who might then mistake their own discomfort for mine. But what we don't care for is to make our sex lives palatable to others, least of all straight people. (I'm not making any assumptions about your gender or sexuality, by the way, and this comment is for the public at large.)

And lest it be forgotten, it was Jun who initiated the sex this time, and one of the few things that's good about the show is that (a) Jun is not a fey, helpless uke, but can and does stand up for himself, and (b) he does call out Sorn's bad behaviour, and often on his own. Yet the one time he expresses his own sexual desire, people try and make him out to be a victim, as if he had no agency at any point.

I see that the moral police are already out and about.

I must say, as a gay man, I find it really amusing -- and sometimes disturbing -- to see so many straight people pontificate about gay sex, about what is or isn't normal, what is or isn't acceptable, and what depictions of it they would or wouldn't put up with. It is also very revealing as to how straight people still think about gay sex, and how judgemental or censorious their gaze often is.

Heavens curse the gay man or woman who seek approval from straight people about their sexual expression.

My thoughts exactly.

My theory:

https://kisskh.at/profile/sasameyuki1950/review/450672