They are. Temporal context. Periphery demographic. Queerbaiting. Collateral damage. Three of which a lot of people use incorrectly to their advantage. And another that I’m 90% sure they’re ignorant about the actual meaning of. So for the purposes of this post I’ll be listing them along with the meanings and some examples. Like so:
Temporal context. Understanding that when a show, film or book is made and/or set more often than not influences its contents. For example. Stranger things. Friends. Harry Potter. Original star trek. Classic doctor who. You cannot and should not approach these with a 2022 mindset because things made and set twenty or a hundred or hell even five years ago are never going to match the current morality system you’ve cultivated through social media. Either continue being mad that a show set in Reagan’s America hasn’t said the words gay or lesbian to describe its two lgbt characters yet or acknowledge they’re doing a helluva lot more than an actual show from the eighties would’ve done, move on and enjoy what they’ve done so far. Trust me. You’ll be so much better off if you do
Periphery demographic. Why we aren’t getting actual canonical lgbt characters in mainstream Disney movies while the current old guard are still around. It’s all very well and good to go on about how “don’t they know what I would’ve done for representation as a kid?” But they don’t. Because they don’t care about the Tumblr demographic. They care about entertaining the five year olds and the parents with the money to spend on the film who might not want to take the kids to see it if there’s anything they might find objectionable in it. And sadly. Quite a few believe that lgbt content kids films is poisonous to their precious offspring. It’s a truly, truly, horribly shitty belief system. But still. It’s the ugly truth.
Queerbaiting. I’ve heard of it. I’ve never seen it. And all the pairings I’ve seen labelled as it. Ain’t it. Destiel. Supercorp. Swan queen. Byler. Johnlock. That’s not queerbaiting. That’s fans latching on to something that isn’t there and going ballistic and quite frankly terrifyingly entitled when it doesn’t happen. Just because you think a character that’s only ever been interested in the opposite gender is secretly gay and in love with your obsession doesn’t make them gay or make you right. No matter how much meta, fanfic or gifsets you make and consume. Clothes, eating habits, hair and way of speaking doesn’t make someone gay. Do you know what does? Actually being homosexual. Which Dean, Kara, Emma, Mike and John are not. Headcanons are fine. But if you have to change every single little thing about a character to enjoy the show. Then you shouldn’t be watching said show.
Collateral damage. Audrey Rose in descendants. Lindsey Lister in Gilmore Girls. Side characters (Lindsey) or antagonists (Audrey) that exist to be a background character in the main characters story. Unfortunately. Many fans latch onto these characters are bleat about how they deserved better. When they didn’t. Especially in Audrey’s case. Lindsey existed purely to show that Dean Forester, that poor poor mistreated boy, wasn’t over Rory. Audrey existed as the stereotypical bitch that the boy leaves for the better option. And when they tried to give her depth. Her still didn’t get wet. I hate Audrey. Always have. Always will. And I don’t care about Lindsey. But they served their purpose. And fans should leave it at that.
So there you go. Four phrases that [tumblr] should learn. If you do. Then you might wind up being ever so slightly calmer than you were before.
