A Single Unified LGBT Character Thread

Ah, yeah, that's another concern for sure. Thank you so much for the feedback/tips!

I've been wondering for a long time, what is a good way to hint at a character's sexuality without shoving it in the reader's face?

For example, if I'm writing a noble anti-villain, who climbed the ranks in the army of an extremely homophobic country. He is a tough guy who speaks little about his emotions, as anyone finding out about his sexual preference would be a catastrophe for his career. Because of this, I find that it's hard to portray this side of him without it looking shoehorned in some way. The fact that he's neither the protagonist nor one of the main characters makes it even harder.

I don't want it to feel like a character is gay just to appease an audience. I want his personality to feel natural, not forced. I put an example, but any advice is appreciated, even if it doesn't apply to this exact character.

Well at most you can show him dispassionate about female attraction, but if that doesn't figure much in his surrounding characters then that's about it. He's in the closet and you really can't drag him out to parade.

I thought of making one of my main characters bisexual, but given that all his romantic relationships involve girls, I dunno. Just like my main heroine who is also bisexual but she had romantic relationships only with men (and a crush towards her best friends, both male and female).

It just comes more as fanservice and fetish Pandering, and shallow fetish Pandering.

Dunno if go for it or not? I sometimes think on going for a Everyone Is Bi world, but again, I have my doubts.

Alll members of the main trio are heterosexual or I go for a Everyone Is Bi world, What I should do?

You shouldn't feel required to have your bisexual characters have same-sex relationships. They could have crushes on different people or an identity crisis of some sort and that should still work. Bisexuality is not defined by who you sleep with but who you are attracted to, and that's the same with fictional portrayals of bisexual characters.

I guess, but I am still a bit akward about it. When all the crushes of the bisexual characters are towards people of their opossite sex.

There really are no rules on sexuality. Saying it's weird for a bisexual character to only have heterosexual partners is saying that it's weird for them not to be attracted to everyone; it's not, like it isn't weird for heterosexual characters to not be attracted to everyone of the opposite sex.

Some people may try to stink up like "you're just SAYING they're bi, but really you're writing same cishet as everybody!" But you should ignore them.

If they're bi/pan, then they're that. Whatever attractions happen to be shown is up to what other characters happen to have chemistry with them. There is no pressing need to have active or past relations with full array of genders and sexes. There is no need for the character to horndoggily "check out" across that array to establish them (unless doing that is in character otherwise)

edited 11th Mar '18 11:18:35 PM by Adannor

I'd consider comparing "who's hot" notes with an also-bi significant other a fun bonding activity, but that probably requires a low-jealousy relationship.

Honestly But Not Too Bi intimidates me a lot because it seems to imply a litmus test for what qualifies as an "actual bisexual character" vs. one that isn't. It also has the Unfortunate Implications that a bisexual character has to constantly switching around who they're dating and can't be in committed relationships or else they're not really bisexual. It makes me nervous to tackle that particular character trait in my story.

For example, there's one bisexual character in my story who's one of the secondary protagonist's love interests (and later his wife), but I have no idea how to even bring it up without invoking that trope considering that she's in a committed relationship with him, and it's not very much in her personality to casually mention the attractiveness of other people (not to mention acting like a total horndog is a pretty negative stereotype of bi people anyways). Part of my worry is that either I won't be able to include that detail naturally, meaning my story loses out on some diversity, or if I do mention it people will say that I'm not really being inclusive because the character I'm claiming to be bisexual never shows any homosexual attraction.

Actually, if I could get advice from you guys on how to mention her sexuality in a respectable way that doesn't seem like a tract, I'd really appreciate it. Since I'm a straight dude, I feel like this is an area where I need to tread lightly as to be as respectful as possible.

edited 14th Mar '18 8:07:13 PM by randomdude4

Hmm. Are there any opportunities for the character or someone around her to mention when she came out? Perhaps childhood friends and a certain marker for other events is that they were “around the time X came out”; or do you know if her husband knew she was bi before they dated, could there be a natural way to bring that up? Or does she interact with other LGBTQ+ people?

On the point of family and friends: not really. He meets her after saving her cousin's life during a bandit attack, though said cousin loses his arm in the process and returns to his hometown to live with his aunt/uncle (her parents, who raised him) while he recovers. It should also be mentioned that she isn't from the town where she meets the protagonist, and that she'd only recently moved there with her cousin. My original thought was having her talk about her cousin since they grew up together, and mentions to the protagonist that he acted super protective whenever one of her boyfriends or girlfriends was around, but I'm not sure how much I like that idea. Doubly so since this would, in a way, be her coming out to this protagonist, and I have no idea how he'd react.

This is something that he's going to learn before their marriage, but again I have little idea how to have him learn it in a natural way. I imagine that he'll be at least a little surprised by it, but wouldn't have a negative reaction. He might have questions considering that he's from a rural town in the middle of nowhere, but that would be the extent of it.

As far as other LGBT characters go, I hadn't actually considered including any more in this town since it's a small fishing town, but it might not be a bad idea. Maybe a woman she briefly dated? Dunno. All things considered, her sexuality isn't a big part of the story, and I wouldn't want to distract from the actual narrative by dwelling too much on it.

edited 14th Mar '18 9:12:17 PM by randomdude4

Those are all good points, you’re good on the story and I imagine you’ll find a way for it to come up naturally

Recently I've run into some concern over the lack of LGBT characters in my works, with particular emphasis on non-binary genders. I've never really included any such characters in my works simply because I was not too interested in exploring the concept in my works, treating the intricacies of gender and sexuality as superficial details (just like race, height, clothing style, etc.) that don't really add anything to the story. Especially since I don't really have any LGBT friends and identify as a cis heterosexual female, so while I have nothing against the LGBT community, it's not really a concept I have much familiarity with or interest in.

Then there's the matter of pronouns - one big reason why I don't include non-binary characters in my works is just for simplicity/convenience's sake, due to the lack of any commonplace gender-neutral pronouns that refer exclusively to a single person in the English language. So as a result, referring to a random character as a "they" (which typically refers to more than one person) or an "it" (which sounds like it has negative connotations due to classically referring to a non-human creature or object) in writing seems to add on an extra layer of confusion with regards to who or what the pronouns refer to. So for the sake of convenience, unless I really want to explore gender with a character, or their gender is a notable part of how their characterization relates to the story, I just default to he or she.

So I've been told lately that this approach I am taking is a tad offensive to non-binary people, and am a bit confused on how to handle this in my works. Is the problem that I am failing to regard gender as a crucial part of a character's existence? Is the problem that I am being too rigid with regards to gender identities and seem to "forget" about the presence of non-binary/genderfluid people in the setting? Is there even a problem at all? My inclination is to focus on the aspects of a character that actually matter to the plot and their actions and tendencies, and I'm wondering whether I am missing something that a character needs to concern themselves with.

I also just yesterday finally came up with my first ever character of non-binary gender, and am really nervous about describing that as part of their character without sounding derogatory. My inclination is to focus on the parts of the character that really matter to the story, such as that the character is an inventor who wants to develop new electrical gadgets that depend less on magic, in a heavily magic and magitek focused world. They do not see gender as an important part of their identity at all and outwardly takes on a rather androgynous appearance. So I'm a bit unsure how to address this complete disregard of a gender in the character, besides just having them kind of shrug off any assumptions people make about their gender (they just let people call them whatever as long as they aren't jerks about it). It's also important to note that they are in a society that also doesn't consider gender distinction that important, so trans people would be quite rare; that story might be a good opportunity to talk about how gender is viewed in that world in general, in a way that doesn't detract from the story itself.

edited 26th Mar '18 8:50:18 PM by ladytanuki

I think what they would have to be offended about is the idea that unless the story is about someone's exploration of gender, that gender or lack thereof doesn't need to exist in your fiction. Like unless a story is explicitly about someone exploring their hand function, characters don't need to have hands. It makes their existence seem non-normal because the only time it is being represented is when it is shone a light on.

Kudos on being the kind of person who does not take that completely wrong and gets upset or angry, and someone who wants to learn why their approach is unsettling others — and on the non-binary character!

In regards to sexualities (a bit easier topic than identities): do your work ever at all touch on the sexual attraction? Even in faint passing mentions? Would any actions or feelings expressed by your characters change if you were to redefine them all as asexual?
If you do have some expressions of attractions and it is all strictly hetero then that may ruffle some feathers, yes.

On the overall thing: it doesn't have to be the work's focus. It is just a trait that can get mentioned once or twice to make people feel nice about being represented in your world. It is also not balanced with the non-queer representation, so if you don't mention any there is still a prevailing impression that the default is straight. If fiction was sufficiently saturated, it wouldn't be a problem and any character with unmentioned status could be presumed to be anything with equal ease, but it isn't.

edited 26th Mar '18 9:53:55 PM by Adannor

I can't speak for anyone else, but this is a pretty accurate description of how I handle things.

is it cool for a gay guy to date a gay anthropomorphic corgi?it's that the person who's writing the story i'm basing my current project on did that....he's a furry.

Would the objection be that it might be seen to lump gayness and furriness as the same thing, and both bad? I'm not sure I understand the question.

i'm just worried it might be seen as problematic.

Wouldn't that depend on your target audience?

Is it an adult anthrocorgi?

It's a story with furries already, people that flip at that will flip regardless.

Isn't there a furry thread you can ask that in, and not bring it here?

Edited by canarycodfish on Jul 31st 2023 at 4:52:48 PM

It is definitely a thing that has happened. Your best bet is to just google for coming out stories from transgender folk, and going through those. At least, that's what I would do.