I agree. And I also wanna stop reading too but for some reason I’m waiting for something bad to happen to the omega
Imma keep complaining, I’m still complaining about the wholly unnecessary incest plot that Vampire Knight took, and I’ll keep complaining about how the author looked at their comic, had the choice to not have a character be a r@pist, and decided that not only would they commit no less than 6 sexual felonies, that they would also be the endgame for the MC who they assaulted. Like the side quest fever dream of kidnapping the beta, chaining him to a bed, forcing him to have sex despite clearly being told he did not want to and to ‘stop’ while forcing the sex to last for days, only to not give him proper medical treatment and be in your feels bc the person you just assaulted doesn’t want to see you or eat after the trauma you just inflicted on them is wholly unnecessary and also ruins ANY prior character growth (of which the alpha had very little, so it basically puts him in the negatives for ‘redeemable qualities’ outside of being a hot troubled chaebol). I hope the beta, omega, and alpha end up single, in therapy, in a psych ward, and in jail in that order for each respectively.
It makes me wonder, how hard can it be to make a ML who isn’t a rapist?
NOT VERY it’s just that the majority of authors of BL and yaoi aren’t actually trying to write authentic and interesting gay stories, they’re writing fetish smut for straight women and it always turns into weird torture p0rn because they are incapable of writing a M|M relationship where one isn’t insanely bad boy jacked and the other isn’t a small petit weak femboy.
They over exaggerate agro male behavior to over compensate for the fact that it’s a gay relationship since the writers are often straight and apply their heteronormative ‘there must be a male and female presenting person’ to the relationship, so the ‘tops’ end up as brooding agro douche lords and the ‘bottoms’ end up as overly submissive feminine doormats, and this is also translated into overly aggressive top in bed and overly submissive bottom, since they’re both men I think the authors subconsciously make it clear that one is overly masculine and one is overly feminine so it fits straight gender expectations of sex.
Like nearly no yaoi or BL is authentic to a real gay relationship, it’s giving straight women a self insert story where the overly feminine male bottom represents them or fetish content from a straight gaze for women. This is general, but as someone in the queer community this is generally what I hear about why this happens.
This is also why BL and Yaoi are accepted and widely read in Korea and Japan but publically members of the LGBTQIA+ are still not very accepted. The comics are fetish content for straight girls.
I personally think that majority of the BLs are just fetish, I find very few stories where it’s actually done well with the plot, logic/rationality, little to no unnecessary love triangles that are an overused trope in many BLs, no stereotypical characters and cliche plots (falling in love quickly etc).
So many stories are overused, I don’t expect 100% originality but at least not make it too cliche or add sexual assault and rape every story. I am sure that at least half the stories I’ve read has those shit.
I’d love it if there were more buff men as bottoms, it’s mostly slim men that don’t even look their age and looks like a teen. It’s insane how they sexualize gay relationships but it isn’t how the majority of gay relationships are in reality, especially the individual gay men themselves.
It’s as if the bottoms always have to be these slim men with doormat-personality or just weak. I know that there are many men that are physically weak, but cmon, it happens in almost every BL. There are readers who fetishize these content and says things like:
“I think the cuter looking one is the bottom.” —like not every cute faced men are bottoms, what is this bs?
“I hope they switch”—I see comments like these mainly when the bottom is buff/muscular compared to the top, and wants them to switch because for them the top looks like a bottom.
What even?!
Gay men in real life do switch, at least far more than the BL stories make it out.
There’s also a bunch of unnecessary rape and sexual assault, like it happens in almost every BL. I go reading to expect at least one sexual assault or rape to the bottom. It’s like tops can’t be sexually assaulted, I know many gay men that like to be on top that are raped or assaulted.
The stereotypes in BLs make me feel icky. And people are so used to this that they think a lot of real life gay relationships are like this.
You’re right about the fetish content being consumed by straight women mainly. A lot of LGBTQ+ in Asian countries especially Japan and S.Korea are looked down upon, yet there are many bookstores with the BL genre. It’s sickening.
And unfortunately this is the norm in BL that many have just come to redeem the MLs regardless of their actions and many are even desentisizdd to rape and sexual assault.
God forbid re reading the old school Yaoi too
Something that is weird to me is that straight girls read yaoi and BL more than they do Yuri and GL, like they fetishize gay male relationships that they can’t be in irl as cis straight women, and not the lesbian relationships that they could be in hypothetically. Like I don’t get why they need a feminine male bottom as a self insert when literal gay women exist in yuri lmfaoo like I’m not asking for lesbians to get fetishized but it’s a funny double standard
That’s true. Straight girls definitely fetishize Yaoi, and there’s also straight men that read Yuri cause fetishizers. Goes both ways and it’s just strange.
I know many people that enjoy reading such stuff and find it embarrassing or disgusting to watch BL dramas lmao it’s the contrast in their reactions..
I wonder why they fetishize gay men.
Maybe in the live action dramas they’re confronted with real men who aren’t charicatures of a strong too and a femme bottom, so it makes them uncomfortable seeing what appears to be two regular gay men in a romantic drama even thought the insane plot is still the same.
I’ve seen far less straight men read yuri, I assumed they just straight up read straight hentai bc idk what other demographic is funding that aside from them
Strong top*
If the alpha's the end game this just makes me think that there's no use to complaining. How can one control their heart just like how can one control their blindness to colors. Jihyuk fell for the alpha knowing he'll get hurt right? He could have avoided the bet but he chose to stay with the alpha. He has himself to blame just like how I can only blame myself for staying and not dropping to his.