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

[extrapenguin]

If there were a significant level of homophobia, at least some people would have negative attitudes and use actual slurs.
This doesn't necessarily follow? After all, something must be enforcing that silence (see thread below that started as a reply to naye), and Zhao Yunlan outright says that the SID is a tolerant and all-inclusive workplace, so it's plausible that the only people who've been told are of the known to be non-homophobic sort, and the homophobes wouldn't necessarily have put together the clues, especially since Zhao Yunlan is by nature physically demonstrative. (But mostly my gutfeels come from the fact that it's something that everyone seems to find unnameable. If there were no homophobia, people could apply a term to the relationship. As is, it seems like so much playing of the pronoun game, except with the boyfriends next to each other.)

[(Anonymous)]

This is exactly the contradiction in canon that I'm talking about - on the one hand, homosexuality is never explicitly mentioned, but on the other, not even a hint of overt homophobia is ever shown. To me, the lack of visible homophobia is the more striking factor; to you, it's the lack of acknowledgment of homosexuality. There's no way to reconcile those two contradictory aspects without the help of extra-canonical speculation, so which interpretation you choose is up to you - they're supported/non-supported by canon to the same degree. Not entirely satisfactory, but, yeah. ;-)

[rheasilvia]

Oops, that was me! Sorry.