Homophobia in a Lesbian Romance?

Posted by Merry in Merry's Blog      3 comments

May
4

Finished chapter twelve tonight. A little alarmed, because halfway through this chapter the book suddenly veered into a very coming-out/self-acceptance/okay-to-be-gay direction that I was not expecting at all. I’ve reread the sections several times, and in the context of the story it all fits smoothly. But I worry how these scenes will be recieved by readers.

I’m writing for a queer readership, primarily. And the story is a little too adult in nature to be YA, wherein a little coming out is generally more well-recieved. The self discovery that takes place for Kade is completely organic and true to the setting, but I don’t want to be “preaching to the choir,” so to speak, when it comes to the book’s readers.

In essence, Kade comes from a conservative religious background in which queerness is never discussed. It’s not even mentioned as an existing “problem” in their society, so she’s made to feel like something of a unicorn — a one-of-a-kind freak. Not only that, but she’s accused of possibly also ‘corrupting’ her best friend along with her, as if her natural inclinations are symptoms of some dreadful contagious disease. (Raise your hand, anyone, if you’ve ever encountered homophobia of this type? That’s what I thought.)

So there has to be a point at which she discovers that she’s not alone, which would, of course, rock her world for a while as she tries to digest what that means about everything she’s ever believed up to this point and the choices she’s made in her life thus far.

With all the applause out there for books wherein homophobia does not exist, and one’s sexual identity brokers no need for explanation, the irony is that I’m actually worried about offending my gay audience in describing a gay character’s struggle to overcome her own homophobic world view in the context of what she knows to be true about herself. Am I perpetuating homophobia by writing about it this way? Or is it just a realistic depiction of the struggles a sheltered young person might go through as they figure out who they are? I’m hoping for the latter, but a bit concerned that it’s going to raise the hackles of some readers.

As I explained in a previous entry, when it comes to romance I personally prefer the fantasy happy ending to too much ‘realism.’ I wonder if queer readers feel the same way about homophobia, preferring the fantasy of worldwide acceptance (which will hopefully one day no longer be a fantasy at all) to the more realistic depiction of its impact and the barriers it creates for people who love one another. I’ve read many complaints from readers who say they’re tired of the coming out story, tired of writers who are constantly depicting queerness as a struggle. They want to read about the worlds they would much rather live in — worlds in which their lives are no more remarkable than anyone else’s. I don’t disagree, and yet somehow these books I’m writing for Ithyria are consistently revisiting issues of homophobia. In SotG these issues were sort of flirted with, but not in any serious sense. Now it looks like in PotH the gloves are coming off and it’s being tackled head-on. Once upon a time, none of this would have even mattered, because I’ve always just written stories more for myself than for any particular audience. Writing for a publisher, though, and having my work revised in order to be more suited to its audience, has made me a lot more sensitive to the POV of the reader.

I still feel, in re-reading the chapter, that it just fits. That the scenes belong. So I suppose I’ll wait and see what an editor has to say in revisions. But if anyone out there in the blogosphere feels like chiming in with their opinion, I’m all ears… I’m genuinely interested in finding out what kinds of stories you prefer to read.

3 Comments to “Homophobia in a Lesbian Romance?”

• June 14, 2011 at 8:33 pm
  Aurora Moon says:

  hello there. not one of your readers but I stumbled across this and felt that I had to comment.

  I don’t think you would be perpetuating the homophobia that sometimes runs rampant in real life. the only way you might do that was if it was done in an over the top way (with mob lynchings, killings, and beatings) and or if it was one of those stories where one of the gay people dies at the end. which sometimes happens in movies with gay characters. I really hate that sort of ending… it’s as if they’re saying: “See? this is what happens to gay people… they always die even in a world lacking bigotry! God always gets them in the end!”

  of course, my viewpoint might not even be valid, considering that I’m mostly straight. I’m 98% “straight”, 2% “gay” you might say. :P

  however I’ve read gay romances before and also watched movies that had themes of homosexuality (of all kinds) in them. and I’m one of those people who doesn’t think it should even matter when it comes to gender of the person that one loves. after all, if it’s not out of pure lust and the two people genuinely love and care for each other then why should it matter if they’re the opposite genders or the same genders?

  I honestly think that too many people focus too much on the sexual aspects of a relationship. Yes, sex is a part of relationships but that’s not all there is to them.

  I don’t know about other people but when I see a straight couple holding hands I don’t think about them having sex, and I don’t do that for gay couples neither. I just see two people completely comfortable with each other.

  Yet, another straight person seeing gay couples promptly visualizes them having sex or something, and so they react as if the gay couple holding hands just had sex in public. and they say all gay people are perverts? it would seem that the ones who keeps on visualizing gay couples having sex is the ones who are really the perverts instead. after all, they’re usually the ones who keeps on trying to regulate what goes on in the bedroom of ALL couples everywhere, both straight and gay for the sake of “morality”. and sometimes they can get really obsessed about it too.

  and I’m not even talking about religious people nether, even though they do play a large role in that sort of thing. I’m talking about the sort of person who lack the creativity to do anything expect the missionary position ever since they started having sex and they think it’s supposed to the one single position that EVERYONE should do. they think anything even different than that position is “freakish” no matter who does it. so they outlaw everything expect the missionary position, in the hopes that everyone around him/her will adhere to his/her overly idealized ideas of what is “normal”.

  I think this is the reason why some people, get so hung up over things that they’re not used to, such as gay people. they just have the inability to look past the sex part to see the relationships that people in general have. Just like how some people have the inability to look past skin color, religion, etc to see the person for who she/he really is. they’re just SO used to their way of life and thinking that it’s the norm for everyone, that the very idea that somebody else doesn’t follow their way of life AT ALL is basically a huge shock to them.

  sorry for rambling… and all the awful run on sentences. but I just wanted to point out that instead of perpetuating homophobia, your story could be used to highlight how silly it can get at times, even if it can be highly hurtful. hey, real life can be very silly in that respect, even with awful things like homophobia.

  Reply
  • June 17, 2011 at 10:21 am
    Merry says:

    Hi Aurora — thank you so much for the comment! <3 You make such an excellent point, too. I wish that queer literature would be more widely read by heterosexual audiences for that very reason — to help drive home the point that homophobia really is pretty silly and often indicates more of a dirty mind on the part of the disser than it does the diss-ee. *grins*

    Reply
• July 21, 2011 at 12:34 pm
  EK says:

  Hi, I was directed to your books based on some positive reviews on Amazon; I look forward to reading them.

  I am sort of torn on this issue, both as a queer reader of queer women’s fiction (both romance novels and “literary”-marketed works) and as a writer who hopes to one day do as you’ve done and publish a piece of fiction about two women who fall in love. (Well done, by the way).

  Part of my view is colored by someone who is from a very repressive cultural background. My whole life course, not just my sexual and romantic orientations, has been steered by this cultural background, and there is no escaping it–both its many blessings, and its many curses–in real life. That is why I am somewhat of a literary coward, a stick-my-head-in-the-sand type reader when it comes to the fiction I choose. Any time I see a novel in the bookstore, any genre, with the author’s name indicating a heritage similar to my own, I get a funny feeling in my stomach and doggedly move right past it on the shelf, seeking the soothing detachment of European names and experiences. I don’t like this about myself, that I consciously run from fictionalized depictions of lives and experiences that hit way too close to home.

  It’s just that I have to deal with the bigotry, misogyny /patriarchy, racism/colorism, homophobia, internalized colonialism, and other ills of my background every day. When I turn to fiction, I am more than happy to read about other people’s struggles—just not the ones that sting the most, the ones that I live day to day. When it comes to the homophobia, coming out struggles, and other issues that touch the lives of all LGBTQ people, no matter their cultural background, I have a higher tolerance for literary depictions of it, but I suppose it all comes down to genre and marketing.

  If the book is marketed as a romance novel, I want it to indeed be a romance novel in the sense of the genre: it focuses on the development of a love relationship between two leads, who end up together with their “happily ever after.” Under the “development” umbrella falls obstacles to their love, and under obstacles, I am willing to accept homophobia-related or coming out-related obstacles, as long as they don’t dominate the other aspects of relationship development, to the point that it’s one long book of obstacles. (And my personal caveat, which it probably unique to me: I don’t like to see obstacles of a specifically cultural nature, as described above).

  An example of a romance novel with homophobia- and coming out-related obstacles that I consider very successful *as* a romance novel is Karin Kallmaker’s SUBSTITUTE FOR LOVE. In that novel, not only does one protagonist realize her own latent lesbiansim after years with men and go through the whole coming out process, but the central obstacle to her happiness with the *other* protagonist is the latter’s intention to remain closeted due to the homophobic atmosphere of her career and family. Yet, it’s not an angst-ridden read by any means, and the romance is not given short shrift. It is a proper romance novel that is enjoyable as such.

  I guess my answer is that I am cautiously okay with such themes and obstacles being explored in romance novels, as long as they do not dominate the novel to the point of eclipsing the protagonists’ interactions with each other and the enjoyable development and denoument of their love. And it doesn’t sound like the book you’re writing is going anywhere near the possibility of such an eclipse.

  A few years ago, I decided to face the unsavory elements of my cultural background and write my first piece of fiction featuring a protagonist from my own heritage. It was a really big step for me, as all of my characters in all of my work up until that point in my life had been of a cultural background from which I could emotionally detach. This novel I’m writing now evolved out of that personal breakthrough.

  The novel I have been undertaking is problematic for me (and potential publishers) precisely because even though it has the basic requirements of a Romance novel , a lot of the themes I explore are not the sort of things Romance readers expect or want in a romance. That’s because the central obstacle to the women’s relationship is one of the women’s repressive culture and family (it’s heavy, angsty stuff to explore), and also because the book isn’t dialogue- and plot-centric the way a lot of genre fiction needs to be (it’s more like a general/literary-marketed novel that happens to have a bare bones Romance structure).

  Anyway, I’m running into a lot of the same issues you bring up in this post, so it will be interesting to see whether I end up deciding to tone things down and take out a lot of the culturally driven homophobia and coming out angst with which the main character struggles. But that would kind of defeat the purpose of this particular novel.

  Thank you for a thought-provoking post. Good luck and continued success with your work.

  Reply

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