I've been told I have *too many* gay characters!

My stance on this can be summed up thusly:
If you wouldn't mention it of a straight/white/male character, don't mention it UNLESS those differences are a source of conflict within the story.

If I wrote a white knuckle thriller about spaceships and aliens in which I wouldn't mention a straight character's wife, I also wouldn't mention his hypothetical husband.

What determines whether the author will mention that depends on them, obviously.

 

It appears that "aching need to create fictional diversity" is the ONLY reason that you can conceive of for permitting any diversity. That's an extraordinarily narrow view. And it feels like an elaborately constructed excuse to exclude certain character types from fiction.

 

Yes. I have a black female space captain in one story and a blind MC in another story because clearly the only thing that matters is that I'm pretending to be holding some moral ground and espousing how grand and wise I am for having these characters. I'm not doing it because they just happened to pop in my head as they appeared and it feels natural to me. No, clearly, I have some kind of agenda. I'm not doing it for any other reason than to showcase my wisdom.

 

Here's a great example of why arbitrarily gay characters should not be included for "diversity" (and is also one of the examples I mentioned yesterday):
http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-35786382
Headline: "Fans Revolt After Gay TV Character Killed Off"

You see, when you create a gay character for no reason other than "diversity", it affects what you can do with them. That character automatically becomes some imaginary figurehead and if anything bad happens to him/her, that gets twisted around back at you as if you're somehow persecuting gays. They take it personally as if it's an attack on the entire LGBT community. Apparently being gay is supposed to equal "plot armour".

The same kind of people who will bitch and whine about demanding diversity and representation are the same people who will bitch and whine when a token minority character actually IS treated equal to the rest of the cast. Kill them off, hurt them in any way? You're a bigot, shame on you! D:<

Now people are boycotting a hit TV show because of two lesbian make out scenes which had absolutely nothing to do with the actual plot. If those 2 scenes weren't included, if romance had been left out of this completely and not shoved in for diversity, the story would be exactly the same, and there would be no problem. A character died. Big freakin' deal. A quarter of the cast has died, what made you think anyone was safe?

Oh, the lesbian is supposed to be safe? Why? Because she's a lesbian? So all the straight characters can die but the lesbians can't? But wait a minute, that isn't equality! You don't want equality and representation, you want a shout-out and special treatment, that's what it is!

Absolutely ridiculous. But this is what you invite when you shove a gay character into your story for no reason - you better be REALLY careful what you do with them from then on.

 

Well, what they were talking about is a larger trend of LGBT romance having bad endings more often, but I agree, one example can't be blamed because sometimes it has to happen, the creators have the right to bad endings sometimes.

 

I get the feeling some of you here are treating your novels like they're tv shows, video games, or movies. We're not going to see that the character is gay unless you show/tell us that he/she is (movies unfortunately often depict gay characters by using stereotypes popular with women). We're not going to see how many characters are black, Asian, etc, unless you decide to bog down your story with relentless unnecessary physical discussions and character bios. If readers think the number of minorities in your story is "excessive," it's likely only because you're descriptions and explanations are excessive. If you were to write a story about a bunch of white, blondes, in the same way, your readers would probably criticize you for being white supremacist.

In short, it might not be your use of "minorities" that is gratuitous, but rather your descriptions.

 

If I wrote down every reason there is to permit diversity there wouldn't be any more space left on their servers, so I wrote down one I found prevalent to the discussion. How is that too out of the left field?

Neither of those examples have anything to do with what I said, so why are you lashing out at me?
You have a black female main character, and because it's a futuristic world set in space it makes sense that it wouldn't pose a problem for her. If humanity could captain spaceships of their own, instead of just self-destructing into a pile of rubble, moving past racism (perhaps moving unto xenophobia against other intelligent species instead?) isn't a huge accomplishment in comparison.
Your main character is blind? Extra-fucking-ordinary. If you pull it off that's a fantastic feat. Good on you.

This isn't the problem. I have never even mentioned anything related to what you're writing in a negative light. But if your main character is blind, yet completely unaffected by their blindness - if the diversity you chose doesn't have anything to do with the story nor pushes the narrative thematically - then I fail to see why you should diversify in the first place.

All I'm saying is that you shouldn't ignore the problems that minorities face, and that you should stick to your theme when writing.

 

I describe my character's appearances and employ their traits in the story. Otherwise they wouldn't exist, they'd be head-canon. DEAL WITH IT. The only gratuitous thing here is you people's paranoid fear of being labelled "too PC". That and you seem to be accusing the OP of including only gay characters, which is false.

 

Put up a writing sample and we'll see how we deal with it. Not erotica, obviously.

 

"Stick to your theme"? So you're making the same argument as JadeX? Do things relevant to the main concept only? Well, sorry, that perspective to me is highly unproductive and bullshit. And what even is the level of discrimination depiction you want? A small reference I will always do, but it's not always important or even secondary.

 

Not all blind people sit around going, “I'm oppressed by my disability!” True, they have to put up with a whole lot of bullshit (ie, like someone snatching their arm and dragging them across the road without their permission, then feeling like a hero for doing it), but what if my story wasn't about the blindness and how badly they've got it because they can't see? That kind of plot comes off as very insulting anyhow, so I don't write it. Yes, it's one aspect of their character, and they'll have to deal with all the bull that comes with it, but just because I have a blind character doesn't mean I must therefore make the plot be about the disability.

 

So your characters are unaware of the appearance of other characters? Are they all blind?


I assume that you would similarly advocate the removal of other sources of unnecessary and distracting information, such as character names and gendered pronouns.

(Edited to remove duplicated quote and typo.)

 

Even my blind characters are aware of the different appearances of other characters by the way they feel (please don't pervert this, 1234..., Amos doesn't go around groping his female companions unless he wants an assbeating of a lifetime) or the way they sound, or hell, what he's told and he figures it out. He's not gonna know what they look like visually, of course, but even he can get an idea.

 

In your past posts, you implied a few things that people found offensive, namely:

1. Being gay is a deviation. You meant that gays are not in the majority, and thus this detail will obviously stick out in any story. However, as a writer, you know that how words are taken culturally, symbolically, how words are typically used to mean something positively or negatively, all these things matter. The words "deviant" or "deviation" suggests that there's something abnormal about gay people or being gay - something that's wrong, or somehow disgusting. This, of course, makes it offensive.

2. Diversity shouldn't be included unless it serves the plot, and if you include it when it does not serve the plot, then you're just trying to be diverse for the sake of being diverse, to feel good, to be able to say, "Hey I got my token *insert minority* guy!" However, by saying this, or suggesting this, people could feel like you're judging their writing wrongly, because they have a diverse cast but not because they wanna check a box. It's just how they want to write, it's just how their characters came to them. Your suggestion places a negative value judgement in their writing decisions. It's like, for example, if you were American, and I said, albeit not to your personally, "All Americans are greedy sons of bitches." You may be offended by that, even though I never directly said you were a greedy son of a bitch. (You may not be offended, but you can see that people could and would take offense, and why that is) It's basically the suggestion that you refuse to see that there could be any reason whatsoever other than one that's plot-related to include a character who does not conform to the typical, "normative" character type. By suggesting there can't be any other reasons, others feel like you're judging them because you have, indirectly, dismissed their reasons and denied their existence, as well as implied something about the author's character.

At least, that is what I got from having read the last couple of pages on this thread. Essentially, it boils down to this: choice of words, and an insistence on seeing things only one way. I'm not saying you refuse to see any other perspective, but since you keep defending your perspective without acknowledging that there could be any validity in another person's different perspective, it seems like you refuse to see things any other way. This is really just a case of, well, bad communication. (at least so I hope)

Bear in mind I'm not attacking you, nor accusing you of anything. I'm just saying - I think this is why a few people on here have been offended and are now striking back.

The message I got from you, although a little mixed up in a few things, is basically this: Include what drives the story forward and don't distract the reader with meaningless details. It's not actually a bad point. It also seems to me that you were trying to say if a minority character is included, then make that minority trait affect the character and let it not be just another trait like his hair colour that is of no consequence.

The thing people take issue with is the suggestion that that means a character isn't even allowed to be gay, or otherwise different to what is considered to be the majority group, and if he is, then the fact shouldn't be hinted at or mentioned, unless it drives the plot. As I said, you implied that if it doesn't drive the plot, then the only other reason must be the author's self-righteousness, wanting to feel good about himself for having a diverse cast. This, obviously, offends.

The truth is, sometimes details can be mentioned without it being important to the plot - it's just about painting a fuller picture. It's the extent to which these details are given room and how many such details you drop in that matters. Descriptions are not plot driven - yet a book without descriptions would be very dull to read. A book with too much description would be equally dull. It's about balance.

Anyway, I hope this makes it a little clearer why there are a few ruffled feathers in the nest. Again, I think it was just mis- or bad - communication from start to finish between you and a few folks.

I would go back and streamline my post a little but I've written a lot and don't wish to edit I'm off to prep for my classes and do some online grocery shopping!

Folks on WF - please, be kind. Say something nice, or on-topic, or perhaps browse some other thread - plenty of cool stuff around to look at If something's offensive, report it and let a mod deal with it. But please, be kind to each other.

Tata

 

That's exactly what I've been saying. If it's something that's not important or even secondary, why even make a small reference? Why include something you yourself know won't matter? Not to the narrative, the atmosphere, the setting. Not to anything. What is the point?

I never said that you need to make the plot about the deviance, where did you get that from? What I have said is that having a disability or deviance without any impact, which isn't the case in your example of blindness, is an example of bad writing. For there to be purpose there also must be impact.

 

I mean that sometimes I will only have on scene which includes discrimination. And only becaus eof the reality that sooner or later, some dickhead pops up that has a problem. Sometimes it's a major issue, I have some stories set in the past or places like the past; where it is common for it to be discriminated against. But I prefer not to make every gay character have a significant thing about discrimination. You wanna talk about distractions? That's a bloody distraction. Heck, I'm considering reducing the amount in my WIP because although circumstances means there's likely to be a bunch, it's also in a setting that's pretty positive= modern Sydney.

 

Little details enrich the story and the world. They give the impression that there is more to the characters or world than what is shown.

 

The issue of blind, Asian, Black and other noticeable characteristics seems to stray off the issue in one important regard. If one character is introduced to any of those other characters they instantly know these things just from their appearance. Just like in real life certain minorities get judged by other people instantly by their own prejudices. The LGBT issue is different. I guarantee that every one of you has interacted with people that you were unaware belong to some hidden minority. If they don't happen to mention it you would never know. To me the same thing applies to fiction. If there's no reason to mention the issue then why bother? I have plenty of characters that have no physical description beyond male/female and maybe a vague sense of age. I may have an image in my own mind of the character but I don't add it to the story specifically so readers can fill in their own blanks to make the character more relatable to themselves if they choose.

 

You know, this reminds me of one time when there really was a blind guy crossing the road. He somehow got disoriented whilst crossing and ended up going around and round on the actual road. My inability to speak Czech stopped me from helping - I still feel bad (I was afraid he might not speak any English and then I wouldn't even be able to tell where he's trying to go and thus be utterly useless) Someone eventually did and got him across though. I stood there the whole time watching like a right idiot. The few cars that crossed his path stopped or slowed down to a snail's pace though, so nothing happened thankfully. (it was a dead end road so there wasn't much traffic)

 

Oh don't get me wrong, if the blind person is in clear distress, you should help him/her out if you can. I was just talking like someone spotting a blind person standing on the side of the road and -- without asking for permission -- snatching them by the arm and hauling them across the street. Just ask them first before you assist.

 

What is the point of most creative decisions? Quite often, the creator doesn't know. If you require a justification for every choice, you're likely to get bogged down and never finish, or write a really boring book.

 

You've got a couple different arguments going on there - the first is that LGBT characters aren't visibly different. I think that's a valid point - if this is someone the POV character is just meeting once, the POV character may not be aware of the minor character's orientation, and/or it may not be something the POV character is thinking about at that time. It certainly could be brought up, as a way to enhance the characterization, the relationship between the two, etc., but I can see how if there's minimal interaction there wouldn't be an opportunity for this.

But I think it's a bit muddy to say "if there's no reason to mention the issue then why bother" because "reason" is so hard to define. For me, characterization, depth of dialogue, relationship dynamics, etc. are all valid reasons to mention a character's orientation. For others... it seems not.

I don't think anyone's suggesting that we write anything like:

"Anita, who was gay, served them their lunch."

But we might say:

"As usual, Damien insisted on flirting with Anita even though he'd met her wife on several separate occasions, and as usual, she flirted back. Damien was a good tipper, after all."

It adds to characterization of both Damien and Anita, so why the hell not?

 

So you want to enable readers to make every character look a lot like them? To let them control your story for you? Why don't you just wank them while you're at it?
A story is about the story. If they don't like your story, they shouldn't read. If your story is good, somebody will read it. Pandering shouldn't be your focus.

 

There is no such thing as too many, if it works in the story it simply works.

 

EXACTLY! You summed it up perfectly. I write exactly the same way, I hardly ever give much character description. I only throw in age and random visual traits so the reader has some kind of picture in their mind to associate that name to; Kyle is 14 with mid-length blonde hair, Carl is a Scotsman in his mid-40s with a short grey scraggly beard - and sometimes I don't include descriptions. The descriptions I do give are typically for minor/supporting characters, but I tend to give my main characters minimal description because the reader will know who they are and I want to leave some room for imagination.

Because readers like to be a little creative themselves. It makes the story more engaging, and it can provide a different experience to different people depending on how they visualised it. If they did want to have every detail spelled out for them, they'd watch a movie.