Loser
I tend to agree that "[s]ome characters just happen to be bisexual" does not itself seem to be grounds for a trope. I would like to see examples that just list characters names to be taken out or expanded if this is indeed a real trope. I also think that some of these examples are more about what fans think and thus should not really be included.
However, I do think that "character who never previously mentioned his or her bisexuality and randomly mentions it out of the blue" is a trope. If that is what this trope is suppose to be, I think it has gone through a bit of trope decay. I am definitely interested in hearing other opinions on this though.
edited 29th Apr '11 6:55:48 PM by LouieW
"irhgT nm0w tehre might b ea lotof th1nmgs i dont udarstannd, ubt oim ujst goinjg to keepfollowing this pazth i belieove iN !!!!!1 d
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
That is what this trope is supposed to be. A character that is assumed to be gay or straight suddenly comes out as bi. It's related to Suddenly Sexuality.
I thought it was "character who is bisexual without being depraved or just plain sex-crazy", which also isn't really a trope.
Which is why it's not this trope. It's suddenly being revealed as bi. The rest is trope decay.
Well I thought that Bi The Way is a good name cause it sounds like By The Way.
edited 29th Apr '11 7:00:29 PM by nuclearneo577
I think it's kind of like when a seemingly gay/straight character either casually says they're interested in the same/opposite sex or casually kisses someone of the opposite/same sex, acting like it's no big deal. That's what I think the trope SHOULD be, because yes, any random bi character is Not A Trope.
Wait, that inst a trope? That seems like a good idea for one. Also, I thought this was when someone says "oh, I'm bi" at random.
Loser
Actually, if that is allowed, then I imagine that it would probably be a better idea to work together to fix the examples or adjust the description to discourage misuse. Does anyone else think that the latter move might be necessary?
"irhgT nm0w tehre might b ea lotof th1nmgs i dont udarstannd, ubt oim ujst goinjg to keepfollowing this pazth i belieove iN !!!!!1 d
Who's doing the assuming? The audience or other character's in the story?
Either or both. The important bit is that the character is only shown intimate with one gender before the revelation.
Having it be either or both bothers me bit. It feels like it's working off the assumption that straight or gay is the default. Least, if it's just gonna be an audiences reaction.
That's the general assumption of 99.9% of people watching media. I know you don't understand the concept, but most people make assumptions about media. They do not need to be told every last little detail.
That would make this a YMMV trope, however, since it plays upon audience's perceptions. Whether this trope applies is entirely up to the individual.
However...the trope's description, Laconic, and Playing With are all saying that the trope is, in fact, when a character is simply bisexual without being crazy or depraved. Are we sure it's Trope Decay?
edited 30th Apr '11 10:03:30 AM by helterskelter
I understand the concept, but my problem is that it's unfounded. How do you actually know that most of the people watching a show automatic assume a character is straight or gay? Can you actually prove to me that is their assumptions?
My understanding of why Bi The Way is a trope is that while a character being revealed to be gay is usually treated as a big deal that necessitates a Coming-Out Story or a Very Special Episode or something, a character being bisexual is something that can just be mentioned in passing and then everyone can just get on with things as usual. There's a sense that as LGBT identities go, being bisexual is the least... I don't know, drastic?
Point is, all that isn't necessarily true in real life, which would make the trope not People Sit On Chairs. That being said, I'm not sure that's actually the right definition, as the page description is fairly vague. It's just the definition I always assumed that it had.
edited 1st May '11 8:40:22 PM by bluepenguin
Tell me if I'm wrong, but is the definition either, "I'm bisexual...so what?" or "A character happens to be bisexual"?
Reminds me of that "Gaynst What Gaynst" YKTTW.
Trope: a storytelling shorthand for a concept that the audience will recognize and understand instantly.
Audience perception is, by the most basic definition, is the fundament of all tropes. Tropes are, when writers exploit a shared audience perception in a specific way.
"Something happens to play on a certain audience reaction" is what makes something a trope, instead of just "Something happens", that would be PSOC.
For example, Killer Rabbit is based on the expectations that most people consider something cute and harmless, and then be shocked when it turns out to be a dangerous monster. No, we can't provide proof that most people will consider the same things cute, or that they will be equally surprised, but this is still what happens, as it is evident from how the trope is functioning.
Or in this case, we have a page about how suddenly being revealed as bi is surprising, and people list examples of all characters who were revealed as Bi, because they believe that authors used this as a trope to play on their inherent assumptions.
A Killer Rabbit is any monster that's far more dangerous than it looks, least that's what it says on the trope page. While they can be cute I don't think that's really a requirement.
My issue though is that most character in fiction don't scream out whatever sexual orientation they are, so if a character is shown beings intimate with either the opposite or the same sex, all that tells me is that they are either not gay or not straight. Unless they rebuff advances from the someone of the other gender I have no way of knowing they're not bisexual, so I can't really assume that.
Like I said if their bisexuality was a surprise to other characters in the cast I be fine with it, but if it's just a character that the audience assumed was straight or gay despite said character never revealing their sexual orientation, that's were I think things could get a bit murky.
It is surprising in the sense that a fact you did not know about the character is abruptly acquired. Is that a better way to phrase it? Something is not known about the character. It is brought up without any real angst on the part of the character.
A fact is revealed is objective.
edited 2nd May '11 6:58:35 AM by shimaspawn
Reality is that, which when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. -Philip K. Dick
Somebody took a hacksaw to the descriptions and examples. I'm not sure all the cuts are good (Jack Harkness was a pretty good example), but it is more clear now. A lot of them were just Ambiguously Bi.
I restored it. The cuts were vry arbitary, some of the removed examples were very obviously written about the trope.
The same editor also reduced the description to 10% of it's original content to make it sound less like "bisexuas exist", a move that I would support, but meanwhile he also redefined the trope's several elements, so I restored that too.
Ok, now that makes sense. Still, most of the examples in this trope are either pointing out a character is bisexual or don't make it clear that a character's bisexuality was abruptly revealed.
I was fine with most of the cuts as the description simply reads like any non-stereotypical bisexual character, without much emphasis on the reveal part.
I agree. The examples need cleaning and the description needs pruning, but we can work on that. The emphasis does need to be on the reveal.
edited 2nd May '11 10:13:59 AM by shimaspawn
Reality is that, which when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. -Philip K. Dick
I'm going to repeat a question asked earlier by someone else: are we sure that this is Trope Decay?
The definition of "Guy who just happens to be bisexual" is as much of a trope as Straight Gay. It would essentially be the same thing: character is X sexual orientation without any of the stereotypes normally associated with that orientation.
Well looking at the number of wicks, I can't say it really matters anymore but seriously is a character simply being bisexual grounds for a trope?
The examples pretty much sum up to a list of bisexual characters with little to no commonality between them, other than the fact (or the implication with some examples) that they're bisexual.