What was your "TOP 3" LGBT highlight of 2015 at Marvel?

[ZNOP]

Where is your proof that he was "forced" gay? You're acting as if the editors at Marvel were being held at gunpoint when in fact it was their conscious decision to give Bobby this story narrative. And no, there doesn't need to be "proof" for someone to be gay or closeted, anyone can come out as gay at any point in their lives, sexuality isn't black and white and there are thousands of reasons to repress your sexuality. If a 60 year old man can come out as gay after being in a happy marriage with kids, I don't see why Bobby can't.

In all fairness JediMindTrick did clarify that comment by saying "because it feels (felt) forced in order to satisfy some sort of agenda".

And comparing coming out to "race swapping" is ludicrous. Sexuality develops overtime and can be repressed, race can't.


Glad to see Bobby's coming out story is winning the poll.

But, isn't that exactly what (ex-NAACP leader) Rachel Dolezal was doing for several decades before her own parents outed her as being white?!?

[Stormcrow]

Other than Bobby's coming out, I'd say the rest of it barely qualifies as a highlight... Marvel needs to step it up ASAP.

[Holt]

Not too much to get excited over. I did like Iceman coming out and America getting a girlfriend in Ultimates (especially since I was dreading them hooking her up with one of the guys on the team beforehand).

Hopefully 2016 is much better on this front.

[t hedge coke]

But, isn't that exactly what (ex-NAACP leader) Rachel Dolezal was doing for several decades before her own parents outed her as being white?!?

Race can be repressed. Passing is a thing. But it doesn't "develop over time." Not on an individual's idiosyncratic trajectory.

(Mainly because race/ethnicity are social constructs through and through. And, thereby require societal definition.)

[Reality]

She was as much "male" as anyone is, in a biological sense. Maybe it's just me, but I don't see why her not experiencing dysphoria about it, but changing immediately because she had the power to change it would disqualify her in any way.

Morrison has a good laugh at the otherwise beloved-by-him Camelot 3000s big melodrama over transitioning, since it came out way after transitioning was a medically sound and relatively easy procedure, but no, in the far far far "realistic" future, it needs magic and sacrifice.

I'm not going to get into my medical history, but some of you here know enough. I know that I'm looking at it from a different angle than many, and bringing in baggage or emphasis, but I don't think we can afford to be essentialist with gender particularly when we're talking about aliens and magic and fantasy tech.

We have children who are openly trans and adjusting to the lifestyle of their preferred/true gender right now. No long fretting. No big existential crisis.

Disphoria isn't an existential crisis, it's the literal feeling of the body being wrong. Rather like someone who has limb disphoria and desperately feels the need to remove it. The only known cure for it is transition of some sort. The lessened trauma is simply because this process is allowed to begin with puberty in many cases now. They still have the condition of body disphoria, which is awful.

The Beyonder also became a woman when they "matured." Kosmos.



And, that did take effort (and a "surgeon").

I wasn't saying it wasn't trans because it took no effort, I was saying it isn't trans because Kismet (and also Kosmos) were both stated to be physically immature. It's more.like a very boyish girl going through puberty than a man becoming a woman.

As I said- they sort of work as metaphors, but they aren't even remotely close to the experiences of real trans people at all. I wouldn't count them any more than I would say mutants are any specific ethnicity.

That was a bad analogy being that Banner and his alter-ego Hulk were not two different beings rolled into one along with a cosmic entity unlike Aleta and Stakar Ogord.

Not technically true, as each Hulk personality is a distinct person from Banner and this has been a lot point in many runs of his comic. They are essentially different people, just as Banner essentially has two sets of genetics that he switches between. He's a chimera with multiple personalities.

I think I prefer that mourning issue, on further reflection, to most of the listed options because it wasn't a status quo shift, but a funny, sweet, sad, romantic elegy. Also, it had characters I care about.

It was by far my favorite issue of KSD's run for those same reasons!

[ZNOP]

Disphoria isn't an existential crisis, it's the literal feeling of the body being wrong. Rather like someone who has limb disphoria and desperately feels the need to remove it. The only known cure for it is transition of some sort. The lessened trauma is simply because this process is allowed to begin with puberty in many cases now. They still have the condition of body disphoria, which is awful.



I wasn't saying it wasn't trans because it took no effort, I was saying it isn't trans because Kismet (and also Kosmos) were both stated to be physically immature. It's more.like a very boyish girl going through puberty than a man becoming a woman.

As I said- they sort of work as metaphors, but they aren't even remotely close to the experiences of real trans people at all. I wouldn't count them any more than I would say mutants are any specific ethnicity.



Not technically true, as each Hulk personality is a distinct person from Banner and this has been a lot point in many runs of his comic. They are essentially different people, just as Banner essentially has two sets of genetics that he switches between. He's a chimera with multiple personalities.



It was by far my favorite issue of KSD's run for those same reasons!

I can't run with idea of Banner having a completely different set of genetics when in his Hulk form because Banner was still gamma irradiated when he reverted to his normal form.

[NexusTenebrare]

Voted Wiccan and Hulkling being Avengers.

Second choice was Mystique and Destiny though it seems like this was common knowledge for decades.

Absolute last choice was Iceman being force diversified in Uncanny #600 because it feels forced in order to satisfy some sort of agenda. New gay characters like Wiccan and Hulkling are awesome. Not a 2015 thing but having characters like Rictor who for a long time had hints of being gay come out is also awesome. Having a character like Iceman being force diversified is lame. And no there were no real hints. A series of failed relationships doesn't make you gay else Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Peter Parker, Scott Summers, and pretty much every marvel hero except Reed Richards is gay. Having Northstar crush on you doesn't make you gay unless being gay is contagious. Having your mom in the movies make a gay analogy doesn't make you gay especially since the movies have nothing to do with 616 continuity. To me having Iceman being forced gay would be the equivalent of if in 1975 Marvel wanted a black X-person and instead of creating Storm they race swapped Polaris.

Bashing on the Iceman outing is all the more hilarious in that you're praising the Rictor outing. There were far more hints and public perceptions of Iceman being gay then there ever were of Rictor. Shatterstar, yes. But Rictor was just his friend and got outed by association.
Nothing about the Iceman outing was forced. It was a long time coming and thankfully Bendis finally got us there.

Race can be repressed. Passing is a thing. But it doesn't "develop over time." Not on an individual's idiosyncratic trajectory.

(Mainly because race/ethnicity are social constructs through and through. And, thereby require societal definition.)

Wouldn't race being a social construct make it more likely to be able to 'develop over time'? If it's not a hard and set thing, then it stands to reason that it is more fluid and thus can change.
Anyway, I'm not expert on the Dolezal case, but from what little I gathered it seemed like she identified as another race. I don't see why being transracial couldn't be an actual thing.

[Wiccan615]

In all fairness JediMindTrick did clarify that comment by saying "because it feels (felt) forced in order to satisfy some sort of agenda".



But, isn't that exactly what (ex-NAACP leader) Rachel Dolezal was doing for several decades before her own parents outed her as being white?!?

"Having characters be force diversified is lame." That's what he said and that was the tone of his argument, it was worded in an almost objective manner. I don't agree with that at all, claiming a character was "forced" to be something is ridiculous, it was a conscious story decision. If you don't like it, fine, but using the whole "forced" argument isn't realistic at all. Nobody forced this story, it's what was chosen. It may feel forced, but guess what? Coming out isn't always a cakewalk, sometimes it actually is forced.

Comparing someone coming out of the closet after years of being repressed and hiding their sexuality to someone swapping their race is false equivalence. Race is mostly an exterior part of you that you can't hide, and i wouldn't say it's something fluid like sexuality. You can identify with whatever race you want and you can look like a different race than what you are but it's not comparable to the social mechanisms that keep someone in the closet. Also, Rachel Dolzeol is the exception, not the rule and her situation borders on cultural appropriation, again not the same thing as someone realizing that they aren't straight. Also, Rachel chose to identify as another race, sexuality isn't a choice.

[Reality]

Bashing on the Iceman outing is all the more hilarious in that you're praising the Rictor outing. There were far more hints and public perceptions of Iceman being gay then there ever were of Rictor. Shatterstar, yes. But Rictor was just his friend and got outed by association.
Nothing about the Iceman outing was forced. It was a long time coming and thankfully Bendis finally got us there.



Wouldn't race being a social construct make it more likely to be able to 'develop over time'? If it's not a hard and set thing, then it stands to reason that it is more fluid and thus can change.
Anyway, I'm not expert on the Dolezal case, but from what little I gathered it seemed like she identified as another race. I don't see why being transracial couldn't be an actual thing.

Because, unlik being transexual it has no basis in biology. All the evidence suggests that transexuals have the wrong body for their brain, which causes disphoria. It's also been recorded in history since history has been recorded.

Whereas for transracial, you either have people passing as a majority for personal gain or people such as Rachael Dolezal who are passing as a minority for personal gain. For whatever reason, it is a choice made for personal gain, not a medical condition that requires surgery to alleviate the symptoms.

This is because race is not biologically determined, unlike sex. It's just the intersection of phenotype, lineage and culture. It's essentially all behavior, and there is almost no genetic difference between races. Moreover there is no neurological basis for race.

You can't be stuck in the wrong color skin because our brains simply aren't wired differently based on skin color. That's just culture. But you can be stuck in the wrong sex, because men and women have different biologies.

Very different things.

[Reality]

"Having characters be force diversified is lame." That's what he said and that was the tone of his argument, it was worded in an almost objective manner. I don't agree with that at all, claiming a character was "forced" to be something is ridiculous, it was a conscious story decision. If you don't like it, fine, but using the whole "forced" argument isn't realistic at all. Nobody forced this story, it's what was chosen. It may feel forced, but guess what? Coming out isn't always a cakewalk, sometimes it actually is forced.

Comparing someone coming out of the closet after years of being repressed and hiding their sexuality to someone swapping their race is false equivalence. Race is mostly an exterior part of you that you can't hide, and i wouldn't say it's something fluid like sexuality. You can identify with whatever race you want and you can look like a different race than what you are but it's not comparable to the social mechanisms that keep someone in the closet. Also, Rachel Dolzeol is the exception, not the rule and her situation borders on cultural appropriation, again not the same thing as someone realizing that they aren't straight. Also, Rachel chose to identify as another race, sexuality isn't a choice.

More simply, she was a con artist. She pretended to be black to get a career out of it. She faked hate crimes against her family many times to profit from her victimization. It was all for the attention and money.

[Reality]

I can't run with idea of Banner having a completely different set of genetics when in his Hulk form because Banner was still gamma irradiated when he reverted to his normal form.

I mean he has two at all times, one takes dominance when the other doesn't. There's always Banner lurking in Hulk and vice versa. That's what a chimera is- someone with two concurrent sets of DNA.

[ZNOP]

Bashing on the Iceman outing is all the more hilarious in that you're praising the Rictor outing. There were far more hints and public perceptions of Iceman being gay then there ever were of Rictor. Shatterstar, yes. But Rictor was just his friend and got outed by association.
Nothing about the Iceman outing was forced. It was a long time coming and thankfully Bendis finally got us there.



Wouldn't race being a social construct make it more likely to be able to 'develop over time'? If it's not a hard and set thing, then it stands to reason that it is more fluid and thus can change.
Anyway, I'm not expert on the Dolezal case, but from what little I gathered it seemed like she identified as another race. I don't see why being transracial couldn't be an actual thing.

'Ya know Essence Magazine covered the very concept back in June?

[Tiamatty]

While telling people on the side that he's Lance, Hank's boyfriend.

Oh, well, he made a joke so he must be gay!

You know, I have no problem with Iceman being gay. I'm happy for all the people that it meant a lot to. So I'm not coming at this from a negative "ruined forever!" standpoint.

But using that "Lance" panel as "evidence" of anything is one of the most ridiculous things ever. It was a joke. An obvious joke made to annoy Beast. It's not proof. People make jokes like that all the time. I joke around about being gay, that I'll probably end up coming out of the closet. But I am quite comfortably and contentedly straight. I make jokes about being attracted to specific guys, but I'm really not. It's just jokes, because people like making jokes. That was what the "Lance" panel was. A joke. Just a joke. It was a joke and no more than a joke and it was not intended as more than a joke. In-universe it was a joke, and out-of-universe it was a joke. Every single element of that line was a joke. It. Is. Not. Proof. He's. Gay.

Honestly, most of the stuff people use as "proof" is not proof. It's proof if you squint really hard to find something you're already completely convinced is there. It's going in with a preconceived conclusion and then cherry-picking out-of-context panels in order to try to rationalize it.



There was no evidence of Iceman being gay. That's fine; plenty of people come out despite never having had providing any hints of that beforehand. That happens. But let's be honest about this: There was no prior evidence of Iceman being gay, and at least half of the post-hoc rationalizations are complete bullshit.

[ZNOP]

I mean he has two at all times, one takes dominance when the other doesn't. There's always Banner lurking in Hulk and vice versa. That's what a chimera is- someone with two concurrent sets of DNA.

Let me see if I understand what your saying here correctly... So, if someone had a vile of puny Banner's blood and a vile of Hulk's blood and sent both to a genetics testing lab both samples wouldn't be genetically identical because he/they are a Chimera?

[ZNOP]

I mean he has two at all times, one takes dominance when the other doesn't. There's always Banner lurking in Hulk and vice versa. That's what a chimera is- someone with two concurrent sets of DNA.

Let me see if I understand what your saying here correctly... So, if someone had a vile of puny Banner's blood and a vile of Hulk's blood and sent both to a genetics testing lab both samples wouldn't be genetically identical because he is a Chimera?