Homophobia in Haixing

[extrapenguin]

If I were to write a Guardian fic the point of which was something completely unrelated to homophobia, but which ended with Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan getting a happily ever after, what level of societal homophobia would not throw you out of the story? Would you find it jarring if they dared hold hands in public? If they dared kiss? If they introduced each other as romantic partners in casual-ish conversation without too much euphemism? Their nearest and dearest would know, and marriage wouldn't be on the table anyway, but ... what is the range of attitudes that wouldn't have the readership's suspension of disbelief come crashing down?

On the one hand, I want this to be happily-ever-after dancing on roses without a cloud in sight; on the other, a lot of the relationship developments of canon make more sense if Haixing is at least somewhat homophobic. So: advice?

Comments

[qikiqtarjuaq]

I personally feel like Shen Wei being a Dixingren is likely to cause more of an adverse reaction than the fact that they are men.

However, since there is nothing in drama canon about the attitudes on Haixing, you can reasonably go with either option. I think if you want a happy/fluffy ending, it's not necessarily worth including.

I'm happy to imagine them in a world where holding hands just means people are jealous of them rather than discriminatory.

On the other hand, I have to be in the right mood to read a fic with RL political/social parallels depending on whatever shitshow is happening in the news, so I at least would be less likely to click on fic tagged that way.

[extrapenguin]

Shen Wei being from Dixing will be addressed.

However, since there is nothing in drama canon about the attitudes on Haixing, you can reasonably go with either option. I think if you want a happy/fluffy ending, it's not necessarily worth including.
IDK, I don't actually think the drama canon is neutral on the existence of homophobia! It does seem that it exists, at least in some quantities, even if the SID crew/younger generations/a large chunk of people just go shrug and get on with their lives. Like, it seems there would be at minimum staring.

That said, it would definitely not have any outright incidents of homophobia; this is just me trying to figure out what sort of world they would calibrate their PDA and relationship privacy for. I doubt homophobia would even be explicitly brought up in the fic.

[qikiqtarjuaq]

I feel like Shen Wei's prim and proper repressed restraint will have more of an impact on PDA than anything else here, really. Would it not make more sense to consider Shen Wei's sensibilities vs Zhao Yunlan's shameless wheedling instead?

I've genuinely not seen anything in drama that indicates homophobia is a thing, though obviously they couldn't be explicit about it. Like ChuGuo had their awkward family dinner and his creepy puppet/angry attitude were the focus. We see a few implied f/f relationships on the cases. It's only if you look to the novel set in actual China that there is canonical homophobia, and even that is a lot milder than reality.

What scenes are you thinking about that makes you think otherwise?

[extrapenguin]

Would it not make more sense to consider Shen Wei's sensibilities vs Zhao Yunlan's shameless wheedling instead?
Due to a thing called "the rest of the fic", Shen Wei has been subjected to a few dozen happiness overloads and currently would be skipping along with a silly grin on his face if not for his self-control. :P He's willing to relax his sensibilities a bit now that he doesn't need to compulsively keep everyone away.

As for the homophobia ... the fact that Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei treat each other as their primary social dates, but don't ever name the relationship (to e.g. Vice-Minister Guo when he's inviting Zhao Yunlan for dinner), and neither does anyone else (see: the entire Zhu Hong arc where she's treated narratively as a love triangle loser but no-one says Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan are together) just reads as society not being super homophobic, but gay relationships still being taboo enough that people don't want to speak about it and leave it at the level of plausible deniability in case an escape hatch is needed. Then there's also that early-episodes joke where Da Qing complains about the flirting and Lin Jing says "Comrades!" (=slang for "Gays!") and that whole exchange is only funny if it's hilarious to insinuate that your boss is gay. I know it's the censorship, but it doesn't feel like a homophobia-free society to me as a result.

(I also didn't see ChuGuo as romantic, since the first instance of Chu Shuzhi having a positive feeling about Guo Changcheng was basically "ah, he's just like my brother!" and I don't have an incest kink. I also didn't pick up on any even vaguely romantic subtext until the very final episode, where Chu Shuzhi dragging Guo Changcheng off from that blind date had some hints of jealousy, but it was much, much less blatant than Zhao Yunlan and Shen Wei.)

[jo_lasalle]

Then there's also that early-episodes joke where Da Qing complains about the flirting and Lin Jing says "Comrades!" (=slang for "Gays!") and that whole exchange is only funny if it's hilarious to insinuate that your boss is gay.

In a similar vein, the episode with the personality changes had some stuff around Chu, with Shen Wei very seriously saying "he'd rather die than be like this" (effeminate), that gave me a serious cringe on the homophobia front. I really do want to roll with the hilarity of that episode, but I have to engage in some mental gymnastics to take that as not the Occam's Razor reading. (Made worse by the fact that Shen Wei is saying it.)

(It is a little different because it's more part of slapstick than the other one, but it still seems topical.)

[extrapenguin]

In a similar vein, the episode with the personality changes had some stuff around Chu, with Shen Wei very seriously saying "he'd rather die than be like this" (effeminate), that gave me a serious cringe on the homophobia front.
Urgh, yeah, that one! It's a little more forgiving of alternate interpretations (e.g. Dixing having more rigid gender roles?), but it does fit with the rest of the homophobia-must-exist stuff. I guess Dixing isn't a homophobia-free paradise, either.

[bonibaru]

I agree with this. I think that canonically you have to overcome Shen Wei's reluctance to show affection or emotion without significant public restraint, much more than anything they showed about the society at large.

The canon is open to do whatever you want. If you write homophobia into the story, as long as you tag/warn for it, it's author choice I think (but give sensitive readers the option to tap out via tags, if it's a subject they find untenable even in what you might consider a mild form).

[extrapenguin]

But Shen Wei's reluctance and restraint would obviously be heavily tied up with societal opinions?

If you write homophobia into the story, as long as you tag/warn for it, it's author choice I think (but give sensitive readers the option to tap out via tags, if it's a subject they find untenable even in what you might consider a mild form).
See, my view is that canon-typical levels of $THING (whatever $THING may be) are the price of entry for fic/should be expected to exist in fic without being warned for*. Before this thread, it would not have crossed my mind that someone could watch the same show as I did and somehow interpret its setting as completely free of homophobia.

* Exceptions for the AO3 archive warnings, but even so, if a fic is Choose Not to Warn, one should go in with a baseline assumption of canon-typical.

[bonibaru]

See, my view is that canon-typical levels of $THING (whatever $THING may be) are the price of entry for fic/should be expected to exist in fic without being warned for*. Before this thread, it would not have crossed my mind that someone could watch the same show as I did and somehow interpret its setting as completely free of homophobia.

No one makes overt homophobic comments, insults, or threats at anyone in the series. If you did that in a fic and didn't warn for it I would expect that it could be upsetting to some people who were not expecting to see homophobia beyond canon, if canon levels are "don't ask, don't tell" and in your fic it went farther than that - someone asked, or told, and the consequence in the fic was unpleasant/negative/hurtful. Agree that "choose not to warn" is, in itself, a clear choice.

[extrapenguin]

No one makes overt homophobic comments, insults, or threats at anyone in the series. If you did that in a fic
I wouldn't; that's not what this discussion is about. This is about me asking what range of homophobia people would consider canon-typical. No-one has answered "insults and threats". The characters plausibly having concerns about other people's homophobia, OTOH, would be canon-compliant to me, since Haixing society is (mildly) homophobic.

Also, homophobia is not a mandatory archive warning, so homophobia can be found even in fics marked as No Archive Warnings Apply.