For a while now, the general 'straightness' of everything has been getting on my nerves. In every book I read, it always seems like the main character is conveniently single or with a lousy boyfriend/girlfriend, and someone of the opposite gender around their age pops up who is conveniently single or with a lousy girlfriend/boyfriend. That's an immediate turn-off and no matter how awesome the book is, I feel a twinge of disgust and become very tempted to just put it down and never come back to it. In movies, I have the same problem as well. I can't connect to the emotional romantic scenes at all. In fact, the Witches of Eastwood disgusted me to the point of me being almost physically sick. My parents tell me to be more open-minded, but heck, I've been open-minded in that area my whole life! How do I stop being grossed-out and frustrated by straightness? Any advice on the matter would be much appreciated.
One solution: become a scriptwriter, and write some lgbt films. I write love songs sometimes, and I make a point of using the masculine pronoun when I do, or use 'boy' instead of 'girl' in them, and I intend to perform them as such, too. And if 'straight society' finds that challenging, well they had better get used to it.
Unfortunately, I can't do that quite yet. And my issue really irritates me because I can't read about 90% of the fiction books in the world because of it. Is there some way around it right now?
I'm not a fan of the over abundance of heterosexuality either. I don't relate to it. These days the only hetero pairings I like are extremely non-heteronormative ones.
I wish they did both gay and straight;I joined a lesbian book club recently ,so I can read stories that relate to me and get away from this hetro normative stuff.
forced romances make me fuckin gag, probably of any orientation but yeah i always see it hetero part of what made pacific rim cool was the buddy friendship without forced romance then giant robots fighting giant monsters, that was the main cool
In mainstream entertainment it likely will never change. Being straight is the most common so having the characters relate to the most people possible will likely make the most money. I too would like to see more gay or lesbian couples in movies and books. Sadly in the interest of money it is seems better for characters to just be straight. If this did change however, it would be a good way to perhaps make the LGBT community more accepted and recognized.
I loved Pacific Rim and I was so glad they didn't try to force any romance... Yeah I get sick of it too, I don't have anything against hetero couples I just wish there were more that I could relate to
Well, let's see here... In terms of film, Netflix actually has a fair amount of LGBT content, although it seems to vary in quantity over time. Most of it is gay male, but I have seen a few lesbian and poly oriented films in their library as well. They run about $9 month in the U.S. and that's all inclusive of content. Amazon Prime includes a cross-section of their movies as well as other stuff for about $100 per year. However, the majority of their LGBT content seems to NOT be included in their Prime program so you have to rent it separately. Both services can be set up to stream over a computer, or even your TV with a bit of hardware. There are probably also other rental services available online that you might find with a bit of searching. All of them are going to have a cost of course, but at least for NetFlix and Amazon, the cost is fairly low. Perhaps your parents might spring for one or more of them (or let you spend your own money on them) - there are all kinds of other movies on these services as well usually, or they might just want to do something nice for you. Neighborhood video stores might also be a place to look. These aren't the big chains, but individual or family owned places, possibly found in the more alternative or artistic neighborhoods (assuming you have anything like that in your area). We have one here in Norfolk that has a wide selection of films, both mainstream (incl. Pacific Rim, which so many have mentioned), and more 'art house' stuff, as well as foreign films, and a great big LGBT section. In terms of literature, you may have more options than are available for films. In no particular order: a) Amazon - do a search for bisexual fiction (or romance, or whatever your preferred genre is). So the same for LGBT, or lesbian. A fair bit of stuff will come up. Of course, you then have to read the descriptions and reviews and try to determine if anything in particular appeals to you, and is age appropriate, but that would be the case with any type of literature no matter your orientation. b) LGBT community centers - some centers have libraries of one sort or another. Our local center is small (but fierce!), and has a sort of lending/take it if you want library that is built from donated books. Recently, my partner and I helped organize the library and build new shelving for it as part of a larger renovation. In the process, I discovered that there is a massive amount of lesbian fiction out there, apparently mostly consisting of romances and mysteries. There are authors who have multiple books, sometimes all built around the same character (the mysteries mainly). c) Smashwords.com - The Smashwords website allows people to self-publish e-books across multiple platforms (Kindle, Kubo, iPad, PDF, etc.). They include an LGBT section and prices are generally quite low or even free. Its self-publishing, so quality will probably be all over the map, but they include a feature (that some authors may choose to use and others not) that lets you read a percentage of a book before you buy so hopefully you can decide whether you want to read the whole thing or not. As with Amazon or much else, I can't make any promises about what content may not be age appropriate, although they do separate out erotica from the rest. d) Do an internet search on LGBT fiction, like what I recommended above for Amazon, but using Google (or whatever your preferred search engine is) - odds are you'll get some amount of porn, but you may also find some sites that do either movies or books that might turn out to be interesting to you. My thinking is that if you have some sources of entertainment that cater more to your demographic, it might dilute the 'straight overload' feelings you're having now to at least some degree. Hope this helps, Todd
