Often times in media the only queer representation is a villain.
It’s actually difficult to find characters that are gender non-conforming and good or at least neutral in any media before like 2006. Only having queer people show up as villains subtly hints at your brain that something is wrong with queer people, that you should be wary, that they are bad. This is held out in scientific studies and also applies to bipoc representation in media too.
I’m all for queer and bipoc villains but we also deserve to be heroes.
You make a good point I hadn’t taken the time to think about before. There’s not really too many heroes like that. Everyone deserves their chance to see themselves as the hero
It’s hard for me to decide blame on those problems when it’s cast across so much media, and isn’t the fault of one particular author.
These days, gay representation is common, so if someone made a queer villain, I’d think “Ooh, that’s a cool new idea!” Back then, of course, it would’ve been the hundredth one turning them into villains.
I agree it was a bad pattern, but the blame is so shared I’d almost rather focus on praising media that bucks the trend than specifically demonizing media that followed it, especially because it becomes difficult to trace back to the “beginning” of the trend (before it was even a trend!)
Same thought goes towards the old “princess in a castle” trope, which was at one point a regal fantasy before it became a repressive routine story element.
![Powerpuff Girls fans in the modern day reassessing how the show portrays non-heteronormativity [Day 56]](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/58801ce4-791a-4f12-8b14-1e2200b82164.png){kind=link}
Nah the take is:
Often times in media the only queer representation is a villain.
It’s actually difficult to find characters that are gender non-conforming and good or at least neutral in any media before like 2006. Only having queer people show up as villains subtly hints at your brain that something is wrong with queer people, that you should be wary, that they are bad. This is held out in scientific studies and also applies to bipoc representation in media too.
I’m all for queer and bipoc villains but we also deserve to be heroes.
You make a good point I hadn’t taken the time to think about before. There’s not really too many heroes like that. Everyone deserves their chance to see themselves as the hero
It’s hard for me to decide blame on those problems when it’s cast across so much media, and isn’t the fault of one particular author.
These days, gay representation is common, so if someone made a queer villain, I’d think “Ooh, that’s a cool new idea!” Back then, of course, it would’ve been the hundredth one turning them into villains.
I agree it was a bad pattern, but the blame is so shared I’d almost rather focus on praising media that bucks the trend than specifically demonizing media that followed it, especially because it becomes difficult to trace back to the “beginning” of the trend (before it was even a trend!)
Same thought goes towards the old “princess in a castle” trope, which was at one point a regal fantasy before it became a repressive routine story element.