As an older queer, allow me to say: the walls of the closet are load-bearing. It is our job as a community to stand in front of that door and tell everyone who wants to peek inside to fuck off.
There are so many reasons a person may choose not to come out and there is no reason a person would owe the public or a stranger that information. Certainly it's not owed simply because someone is famous.
We have fought for decades to make it safer for people to be open and authentic about themselves, but we are not yet there. And even if we were, the closet would still be something we need to maintain for those who are not ready to reveal that part of themselves.
I'm ranting about weird people in the byler, specifically lawless byler fandom, even more specifically the lawless byler fandom that is on twitter. Keep in mind that I mention things like homophobia towards the idea of Mike Wheeler possibly bottoming, specific kinks, etc
A lot of bylers (looking at you bylertwt) just don't know how to mind their own goddamn business when it comes to lawless headcanons about two fictional characters that have absolutely nothing sexual confirmed about them.
They act so immature and downright queerphobic at times about the sheer thought of Mike being bent over and fucked. Like buddy it's NOT that deep (I mean Will's cock is- what was that?!)
I'm not saying you HAVE to like the idea of Mike bottoming. Personally, I don't like piss kink byler, it just doesn't really do it for me because I do not have a kink for piss. That's not inherently wrong or harmful.
You know what I do when I see piss kink byler? I do this magical thing called scrolling and not interacting with the thing I personally do not take enjoyment from like a normal, mature and respectful human being with the knowledge that others who have different sexual preferences or believe that specific characters would have different sexual preferences are allowed to exist without harassment.
You know what I don't do? Mock the very idea of piss kink byler, make degrading and oppressive remarks against it, attack and harass anyone who even mentions piss kink byler in a manner that isn't negative, or act in any other hostile, immature way that only proves that I clearly have inherent biases towards people who experience that form of sexual attraction.
Additionally, bylers who only believe in t!Mike and b!Will and harasses anyone who disagrees feel extremely hetronormative and downright homophobic a lot of the time.
Because 90% of the time, the only reason that they believe Will is the only correct and valid interpretation of which person in this homosexual relationship would be a bottom, usually a submissive bottom also, is because of Will's canonical (and often overexaggerated by fanon) traits that could read as stereotypically feminine.
These traits being his personality, or Noah Schnapp's body, which are both extremely weird.
For starters, with his personality, he's not even THAT feminine (not that this behavior would be valid if he was) he's just not hypermasculine. He's soft spoken, he's quiet, etc. but that doesn't mean he's extremely feminine. HE HAS SOME TRADITIONALLY MASCULINE TRAITS TOO. It's just that he doesn't JUST have masculine traits and his feminine side oftentimes gets more attention by the narrative because of the scrutiny he faces given it.
Now on to the part that I think is even more weird. When they say that Will couldn't possibly be a top because "he has a fat ass" or whatever else. Now I don't completely agree with Noah Schnapp's behavior in the past, but they do realize that saying that a real person, a real actor's body dictates their place in bed and any other interpretation is laughable, that's odd... right? They do understand that it's odd?
They do understand that acting this way about discussions revolving a gay ship because of a real life person's body, specifically a real life gay person's body, is insane.. right? They HAVE to.
It just reads as insanely heteronormative. There are millions upon millions of more layers that I could dig up here, but I'm just going to leave it at that because I'm done ranting, I've gotten it out of my system.
Will bottoming because he wants to feel cared for and relaxed and Mike bottoming because he wants to be dismantled like a Lego set (they switch thank you very much)
Please keep interacting with this post because when I come to tumblr to procrastinate, this shows up again in my notifications and guilts me into writing again
people on bylertwt are now saying mike’s straight and denying his queercoding…why the hell would you even ship byler if you think that, like what’s the appeal??