I normally don't break my blog's character in asks but I'm gonna make an exception here. How can you continue to support and advertise, in good conscience, for a company that has repeatedly baited and insulted its LGBT+ fanbase? Especially after they had Robyn basically lie about Clover's supposed flaws to berate Qrow - and on a meta level the audience that were mourning the representation they were explicitly promised - for feeling sad about his death?
So I appreciate the fact that you felt strongly enough about this to break your blog’s character in asks to bring this to my attention by answering this as openly and honestly as I can.
Firstly, Clover was never written as gay. Never. Not for a single second in his conception was Clover ever intended to be a love interest for Qrow nor was Clover ever written as a gay man. Period.
Secondly, Clover was never ever stated to be “explicitly promised” representation for the mlm community. That is an entirely untrue statement with no actual basis for truth behind it. There’s no documentation of this anywhere, there’s no draft where he was, none of that is true at all in any way, shape, or form.
Third, I have also stated many times that I do understand how a misunderstanding in how the audience perceives a character vs what the actual written intent was can hurt, saying that I’ve felt that burn before, and very much understanding how a fandom can feel a bit upset by it. But the fact that various creators, for many shows, have come forward to say “hey, not the intention” - such as the case with many folks feeling Jenny was tran-coded in My Life As A Teenage Robot, which actually took the creator 21 YEARS to actually acknowledge that fact despite it being spoken of many times - and expressed their concerns and understanding toward those communities affected by it... shows a sign of actually caring. Of which many folks working on this show did the same thing and did so immediately after the first sign of the misunderstanding.
Fourth, as the voice of a character that is a blatantly stated and explicitly promised bit of representation for an entirely underrepresented community of people it’s extremely frustrating to see a character that was never intended to be seen as and surely was never ACTUALLY written as a representation for a marginalized group of people being held up as an example of representation while my own character, who actually is a real example of representation, being constantly demonized and overlooked.
Fifth, the cast and crew of the show (including myself) have received more death threats about this than I think most of you care to actually acknowledge. Am I saying that you, specifically, issued any of those threats? No. But the fact that a lot of folks just forget that that happened is pretty telling to me.
So you asked “How can you continue to support and advertise, in good conscience, for a company that has repeatedly baited and insulted its LGBT+ fanbase” ... the answer is because the actual representation for the LGBTQIA+ community that was explicitly stated and promised was actually handled incredibly well, had time and care put into it, was thought about from concept, to design, to casting, to written dialogue. And that representation was not hidden, not coded, but bluntly stated both by creators outside of and inside of canon, and proudly on display in the show.
The final big reason that I can firmly state all of these things? Is because this isn’t just a fictional situation. The people behind the scenes making this show possible actually stood up, stood by, and have put more effort into actually supporting the LGBTIQA+ community than most folks will ever even know or see. In a very real and tangible way these people have physically fought for the rights of people like me to be able to do what I do and, more importantly, to actually be able to live my actual real life with less fear of being actually harmed.
To top it all off, I’m deeply hurt by how things are said by the fandom some days.
I see all the comments saying May isn’t good rep because she doesn’t look or sound manly enough to be a trans woman and that Joanna or Robyn looks more trans than May does and worse being said about her.
Clover being mlm was always just a head canon that the fandom leaned into, it was never ever stated to be canon at any point during the production of the show or creation of the character.
I do understand the hurt that some folks feel about it, trust me I do, but I’ve received death threats over this head canon while actually having put time, effort, and part of myself into actual on-screen representation ... having had that real work ignored with me and my co-workers continuously being harassed despite not a single shred of tangible evidence to back up the reason for the harassment.
Clover was never intended to be seen as gay, ever, and the fact that the fandom latched onto this head canon and has pushed it that it was always actually canon, in a very negative way, has only harmed both the fandom and staff.
Having a head canon is great, I love them, but seeing a creator (or group of creators) explicitly come out and debunk that head canon as to not spread a toxic and hurtful message that could easily spiral out of control and blatantly ignoring it because it doesn’t fit in with your own narrative does not make that head canon into canon and will only make getting actual intended representation for that group much harder in the future.
It is desperately hurtful to have poured so much work into having a character that is actually a representative (and a promised one at that) of a marginalized group entirely ignored by the community because of a head canon for another character, and in doing so has only made that (very rare) bit of representation feel ironically invisible.
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