B has a Thought

I've got some thoughts on pop and nerd culture - let's talk about it. Sometimes and Unpopular Opinion Factory.

[bhasathought]

Yuri on Ice!!

It’s 2016. The hype is real for Yuri on Ice!! and initially people didn’t know what to expect. The show comes out. There are a lot of opinions about the show, which I will not discuss here, but one that stood out to me was this: “I usually don’t like yaoi, but I don’t mind YOI!!” Pause. Ok, I am a fan of smutty anime and manga, so I am very familiar with the concept of yaoi and yuri. They are gay porn for otaku. They specifically focus on erotic material that revolves around a same sex partnership. YOI!! has fan service, but it is hardly erotic.

Yagate Kimi ni Naru

A few things. There is another genre that covers less erotic same-sex romances - shonen and shoujo ai. This is where you find Loveless, Gravitation, Maria-sama, Junjo Romantica, Yagate Kimi ni Naru, and Strawberry Panic.The plot heavily revolves around the same sex couple, often highlighting the fact that they are gay and that’s divergent from the societal norm perceived in Japan. Sometimes, it occasionally brushes past intimacy and erotisiscm, since it is natural for people in a relationship to want to be intimate. Sometimes there is fanservice - that’s just something that comes with the medium. A variety of anime focus on the sex appeal of certain characters to entice viewers, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that Nami, Tsunade, and Lucy make their respective stories fall under the smut or hentai genre.

No. 6

That leads me to my next point - why are same sex couples automatically denoted as erotic? Some of the shows I think of when I discuss depictions of same sex couples (like No. 6, Revolutionary Girl Utena, or YOI!!) don’t actually fall under the shonen or shoujo ai banner. That’s because it is understood that the relationship is secondary to the rest of what is going on. YOI!! is primarily about ice skating, and Yuri and Victor’s relationship blossoms out of a mutual love for the art of the sport. No. 6 is considered to be sci-fi fantasy. My Anime List doesn’t mention the fact that the main duo are attracted to one another. But, the immediate reaction is to label these two shows as yaoi, simply because two boys fall in love. In reality, why does there need to be a separate category for shows that would otherwise be considered “normal,” except for the fact that is contains a same sex relationship? There isn’t a label for hetero specific romance (we just call it romance), while we specifically need to warn people, “Hey, two girls kiss in this manga, but it’s not in a smutty way, so beware.”

Revolutionary Girl Utena

I understand the delineation of porn - not everyone is gonna like certain things. The main goal of porn is to satisfy a very specific goal, but other media can vary greatly. In my view, it’s similar to disliking any other relationship in a story. It’s your prerogative if you dislike it because it’s two guys, but I really don’t like Asuna and Kirito together for my own reasons, so I don’t go out of my way to watch every iteration of Sword Art Online. As a woman who loves a woman, it is frustrating that characters that are like me are placed into a box as to not disturb viewers that are not normalized to the existence of same sex relationships. I don’t see my relationship as being different from my other friends in opposite sex relationships. That isn’t to say that Japan’s normalization of same sex couples is the same as the US, but I definitely think we can make changes in the Western fandom.  There have been other series that have had same sex couples as supporting characters, like Cardcaptor Sakura or Sailor Moon and I don't see these shows being labelled as yaoi or yuri, so why should we label other shows that have these couples as leads any differently?

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card-hen

Recently, Darling in the Franxx had post ending buzz about the fact that Ikuno, one of the main supporting characters, was shown to have strong feelings for her teammate Ichigo and the series ended with her finding a girlfriend - she maintained her orientation through to the end of the show, finding love like the rest of the main cast. Other Western shows have slowly begun to normalize the inclusion of same sex couples, like Steven Universe. We wouldn’t call any of these yaoi or yuri, nor are these shows aimed specifically at a LGBT+ audience. These are developed for a general audience, and so are a great deal of the shows that I have heard labelled as yuri or yaoi in discussions and reviews. If anything, we need to look at the language we use to describe these shows. At least if you say that YOI!! has elements of shonen-ai, I can get behind that; however, you really look silly if you call a show about boys ice skating a gay porn because of Victor and Yuri’s relationship. I think we need to check on our understanding of how people act and function: remember "ai" means love and there isn't anything inherently erotic in that.

Darling in the Franxx

Want to let me know what you though? Leave a comment on my blog. 

[bhasathought]

Let’s Talk About How Lolita Hurt Me

Note: This post details my struggle with my eating disorder. Please bear this in mind as you proceed - my experience is not the same as others. If you are in need of professional help, do not be afraid to reach out. There is always a time and a place to start your journey.

 In 2014, my partner and I went took our first solo trip as young adults to California. While we were staying in San Diego, we decided to take a detour in LA to go to Fairytale Boutique for their Automatic Honey event. We both had been interested in Lolita since 2009 and we were both in the Maine Lolita Comm. I had been saving over the last month or so for the trip and decided if I could manage it, I wanted to buy something at the event. And I did - my first brand dress (later known as “The Dress”). I fell in love with this dress, the details and the print. I was starstruck. At the time, I didn’t realize that this dress would come to symbolize everything I hated about myself and the loss of control I experienced in late 2013-2015.

I never got to wear The Dress. When I bought it, I knew it would be too small. Having a 122cm bust at the time, most brand dresses with partial shirring were about 30cm too small. I had been attempting to lose weight for years and as the time I was working my way down the scale. I felt better than I ever had and thought a bit more pushing would get me there. Safe to say, I never did. A little over a year after I bought The Dress, I was diagnosed with an eating disorder.

When I say Lolita hurt me, I don’t mean the community or the fashion itself. I felt so welcome in our comm and met many wonderful people. I still love Lolita to this day, though I no longer participate. For me, Lolita enabled my disorder to speak and act for me. In 2014, I was trying to edge myself down to 1,000 calories or less a day, compulsively exercising if I didn’t hit my daily goal. I kept The Dress hanging in my room where I could see it, so that I felt compelled to continue on my journey. I was obsessive about the foods I ate, but felt a deep sense of loss since I had begun to see all food as an enemy. Nothing I did seemed to work well enough, so I cycled into binging. I went through periods of severe restriction and overeating, more so than I ever had. It was like whiplash.

It was worse when our comm set up a resolutions group for New Years in 2015. It didn’t have to be a fitness goal, but that’s the kind of change most of us wanted to see. We all encouraged each other to do our best, but I was unable to think about these goals in a healthy manner. At the same time, my dad and I began a little weight loss contest: if I won, my parents would buy me my current dream dress. All I had to do was be able to fit into those dresses, I thought, then I could be happy. While I wouldn’t admit it, as 2015 edged on, I grew severely depressed.

I spent that summer away from home, away from my comm, at an internship. I was stressed, tired, lonely, and neck deep in self loathing. I walked 3 miles every day, but I felt like I was gaining weight. My eating habits were all over the place. About a month after I finished my internship, I felt overwhelmed and I finally admitted that I needed help.

When I started recovery, our comm began to dissolve. Everyone was busy with work and school, and a few of our girls moved abroad. For the time being I stopped thinking about The Dress - though it remained hung it my room, I bagged it with two other dresses. It was mostly out of my sight, until I began moving in March of 2018.

I had been wishy-washy when talking about The Dress with my mother and my partner: I didn’t want to sell it, even though four years had elapsed and I knew from working with my dietician that intentional weight loss was not in my future. The Dress didn’t fit and it was taking up space. We didn’t even wear Lolita anymore, aside from one small foray for a work event. It’s still sitting at my parent’s house, waiting for me to decide what I wanted from it. I was emotionally attached: my first brand dress from my first trip to California, the thing I invested so much time, money, and energy into. I couldn’t let it go.

Until this past month. My partner and I decided to sell all our Lolita in order to save money for our future. I felt ready to pass on The Dress to someone who would love it and actually wear it. It was like, I woke up one morning and decided it was time. I was ready. Over time, I realized The Dress had a lot of the old me attached to it. It represented the starvation, the struggle, the binging, the loathing, the disappointment, the guilt I felt over the four years I’ve owned it. I wanted to fit into a mold so badly, that I ended up harming myself and changing myself indefinitely.

I am still recovering. I have a lot to reteach myself, but I try everyday to find things that make me happy the way I am. It’s a hard thing to ask of myself, however it’s all I can do. I never want to wake up again feeling like I am enslaved by an article of clothing. I don’t want to obsess over things that no longer serve me.

Lolita was something I loved, but the best thing I ever did was let it go.

Want to let me know what you thought? Leave a comment over on my blog. 

[bhasathought]

Let’s Talk About Steven’s Mom

There are few characters that I have changed my opinion on more than Rose Quartz. She was one of my favorites from the start of Steven Universe, mostly because of her aesthetic more than anything else. The myth behind her was intriguing and offered depth to the early episodes as we learned about the Crystal Gems and Steven, how they relate to one another and how Rose Quartz acted as a connection between them. Then, We Need To Talk aired. I felt deeply conflicted about the sharp turn seen in Rose’s character, like her fundamental personality had been tarnished. It was only upon some deeper thinking that I realized how much this change meant to me. It allowed me to think about the show in a different and more personal light.

For me, Steven is meant to parse through the myth surrounding his mother and, just like many other myths, a lot of the story is skewed by the people telling it. The Crystal Gems loved Rose. She was so many different things to them: a leader, a friend, a comrade in arms, a lover (kind of). Rose inspired all of them to rise above their caste dictated by Homeworld doctrine. While we see Steven grapple with the fact he himself has never been able to know her, it wasn’t until we heard from Greg that the significance of Steven’s feelings were made apparent to me. Greg’s perspective allows us to see her playful nature in a painful light, both in the scene with Rainbow Quartz and the one where Greg tries to fuse with Rose. Her complete disregard for his feelings and his existence as a human allows us to see that she is deeply flawed. We don’t see any of this from the Gems’ perspectives.

This is when I realized that my own experience was reflected within Steven. Long story short, when I was six, I found out that my dad was not my “father.” My biological father did not want to present in my life, although his family was. I have always been close to my paternal grandparents and I always just assumed everyone had three sets of grandparents. I didn’t know how family worked, I just knew these people were present and special in my life. For a long time, I never thought this bothered me. My step-father had always been by dad and I never thought of my sisters as being different from me. I was loved and that’s what mattered. Then, in 2014, my biological father died in a motorcycle accident. This is when it all began to bubble up: the fear of abandonment, the sharp sense of loss, the guilt of not being able to share in the same type of grief as my grandparents. It was confusing. In the four days that followed, I spent every waking moment surrounded by the myth of my biological father. I never got to know this side of him, I didn’t know him aside from stories about him as a kid, told to me by my grandparents. My mom had always been open about her experience with him, but it wasn’t all bad. From my perspective, though, this man chose to leave me behind. He did cause me extreme pain and insecurity - things that began creeping to the surface about three years prior to his accident. I felt lost.

After I thought about it, Steven’s journey helped me begin to process some of these feelings. I wallowed in my strange, grief-stricken purgatory for a long time, not knowing what to do or how to feel. I didn’t know if I should feel anything. Steven’s inability to decide how he should feel about Rose spoke to me. Even after We Need To Talk, Steven began to learn more conflicting information about who his mother was. Others outside of the Crystal Gems began to give Steven more insight, including Jasper, Bismuth, and the Diamonds. I enjoyed the depiction of Steven’s growing confusion and resentment - Rose’s choices in life lead to real consequences for her son, mentally and physically. The main arc of Steven’s character revolves not just around saving the world, but also about how he learns to deal with who Rose really was and the ongoing damaged her actions caused. He matures through the series as he begins to understand his own feelings, creating his own convictions in the process.

And then I lost my mind - A Single Pink Rose solidified my bond with Steven. It is revealed that Rose’s secrets ran deeper than anyone could have expected: she didn’t shatter Pink Diamond, she is Pink Diamond. This reveal was both shocking and a little expected for me. I had somewhat subscribed to the Rose/Pink Diamond theory, but seeing it come to fruition made my heart stop. I was so excited that Rose’s character became more complex, her actions are revealed to be much more selfish in nature. The war, the formation of the Crystal Gems, her treatment of Pearl - while she wanted to protect Earth, she also used the guise of Rose Quartz as a way for her to escape her situation. She caused the deaths of many, manipulated her closest friends, caused a desperate amount of grief for her fellow Diamonds, caused the imprisonment of an entire run of Gems; however, she did allow for life on Earth to flourish. Rose falls much more into a grey area.

When I thought of my biological father, I felt torn by his selfish actions that took a piece of me away. When people tell me I have his eyes or I am like him in so many ways, I want desperately to be considered my own person. When everyone seems to know exactly how they feel about him, I feel jealous. It hurts when I hear about the good he did and the love he shared with the people in his life. But, that’s ok. People aren’t black and white, good or evil. People grow and learn - it seemed like Rose learned, too. I have learned as well and will continue to learn.

The way the Crewniverse builds this complex type of grief into Steven’s narrative makes me feel hopeful. Showing kids the idea that people change and can encompass different shades of grey. That that grief is valid. That you can use it to grow and mature. I hope that other children or young adults that have had similar experiences can find solace in Steven, like I have.

Want to let me know what you thought? Leave a comment over on my blog.