Agreed! Again, Aqualad has been queer longer than he's been assumed straight, if people don't like Kaldur being queer you just don't like the character at this point man. I'm tired that whenever a non-"normative" character is used there is always this jump to hyper-rationalization that it's "pandering", we see it all the time with the inclusion and introduction of characters of color and LGBT characters. Also, didn't Weisman already say he always had plans to reveal Kaldur was queer?
@dkrook you seem very sensitive to being called homophobic but it really feels like your biggest issue isn't how his sexuality is handled but more about his sexuality itself and him not being straight, which is like textbook homophobia or at least just a weak complaint simply because of how little his sexuality affects his story on Young Justice.
Last edited by lemonpeace; 08-02-2019 at 12:09 PM.
THE SIGNAL (Duke Thomas) is DC's secret shonen protagonist so I made him a fandom wiki
also, check out "The Signal Tape" a Duke Thomas fan project.
currently following:
- DC: Red Hood: The Hill
- Marvel: TBD
- Manga (Shonen/Seinen): One Piece, My Hero, Dandadan, Jujutsu Kaisen, Kaiju No. 8, Reincarnation of The Veteran Soldier, Oblivion Rouge, ORDEAL, The Breaker: Eternal Force
"power does not corrupt, power always reveals."
I think dkrook is just processing the revelation of Aqualads sexuality from a certain viewpoint that most people wouldn’t understand. Historically when it comes to black male non heterosexual depictions in media its was always meant as a form of negativity or emasculation and not inclusion. It was also meant to keep the black male character from the women especially white women should he not get killed off. For example in Revenge Of The Nerds the only black male nerd is homosexual. If not a homosexual than an asexual. So I think he’s assuming that Aqualads pansexuality is a form of keeping him away from other female characters similar to how Cyborgs castration keeps him from Wonder Woman or women in general. Those types of tropes are always viewed as establishing a limitation with a black male character. It’s a very large debate that’s been happening for years and it’ll continue happening in the future. I will say this, I’m not up upset about Aqualad’s sexuality but I do think it’ll cause the character to lose steam in fanbases especially black male fanbases. Because, like dkrook, theres going to be people who process it differently than others and they’re going to associate it with the asexualization and homosexualization of a black male character trope. I don’t think it’s necessarily homophobia but it’s viewed as some kind of negative catch when it comes to black male character depictions in media and some people are going to be rejective of it, just my two cents.
Last edited by Mr HardKnocks; 08-02-2019 at 12:55 PM.
What I had said was not circular logic, but rather simple truth. Back in Brightest Day, nothing precluded Jackson as heterosexual, or any-sexual, really. The stories told with him didn't even focus on romance and sexuality, and the one bit that could be presumed as ship-tease (posted in this thread some pages back) never actually showed Jackson to be receptive or harbor any romantic feelings on his end. And that's only if one even precludes it as ship-tease. And for Kaldur in the show, his infatuation/love for Tula does not, nor should not, be taken as evidence of heterosexuality-with-no-exceptions. Anything else regarding these two characters' sexualities were assumptions on the parts of the readers and viewers.
This is the truth because not enough information, especially unambiguous, conclusively straightforward information, was given at the time to make any statements anything more than personal assumptions.
But beyond that, I would personally appreciate you not going down the path of that tone. Even if we disagree with one another, going down that path is not warranted. It does nothing but muddle our respective points and opinions.
I appreciate this. I know we don't agree 100% with everything, but I can always appreciate civility in differences over otherwise.
Beautiful...YES! Thank you for this statement, and moreover how you worded it in straightforward way that evaded me. DC can have the character now it's cool. I start off a fervent fan of his, now I know that I still have characters that I can roll with in Miles, Blade and T'challa. Everyone is happy there's nothing wrong with not preferring his sexuality that know was not how he was started. I have no expectations on everyone loving the characters I do for the reasons I do, nor can anyone do that me. The sillness of tagging homophobia on someone who has no hate for LGBTQ is what is wrong with society.
Reading List (Super behind but reading them nonetheless):
DC: Currently figuring that out
Marvel: Read above
Image: Killadelphia, Nightmare Blog
Other: The Antagonist, Something is Killing the Children, Avatar: TLAB
Manga: My Hero Academia, MHA: Vigilanties, Soul Eater: the Perfect Edition, Berserk, Hunter X Hunter, Witch Hat Atelier, Kaiju No. 8
I truly mean this in the most respectful way, miss me with that. that old b.s hotep talking point, I always HATE that myth of the "homosexualization of the black man trope" and as a black man, with queer family members and considers himself an ally, who's had other black men try to justify their homophobia with that nonsense, I can't let it slide here. The use of homosexuality being used as a way to negatively depict and/or emasculate a character is not exclusive to black males. That's a problem of proper LGBT+ representation, not an issue of the depiction of black males, because in the lexicon of black characters and queers characters, if you look at the number of depictions of this stereotype being used as a slight against black male characters, it'd be a reach to say it's a black specific trope. Plus, it's not as if there are zero depictions of characters who are queer and are compelling and are iconic and well-received (Constantine, Batwoman, Midnighter & Apollo, Wonder Woman, Deadpool, etc.), so if you are basing your idea of a character being LGBT+ solely on negative stereotypes of what a queer character is, then at a minimum you're willfully ignorant and at worst you have a problem with LGBT+ characters fundamentally; and that is what's homophobic. Equating a character being queer with a character being castrated is disrespectful. Imagine if every time the characters of color got together people automatically jumped to the conclusion that's it's a corporate slight against the characters of color to keep them away from the good normal white characters, is that not problematic my guy?
Here's the thing, I'm not even saying DC's done a great job with the handling of Jackson Hyde as a gay man, he sometimes teeters on "the gay sidekick" territory and the lack of compelling personal story arcs often leaves coverage of the character being focused almost solely on him being gay. But again that's not a problem of him being a black man, it's a problem with how he's being handled as a character and how queer characters are discussed. If DC was keeping the characterization of Kaldur'ahm across the board consistently as compelling as he's been on Young Justice, he'd still lose steam with those same fan bases from being gay or pansexual, homophobic fan bases. However, the biggest issue facing Jackson Hyde losing steam isn't him being gay it's him not being as well-received as his Young Justice counterpart. His issue is character consistency and his being pansexual is a step in the right direction on that front.
THE SIGNAL (Duke Thomas) is DC's secret shonen protagonist so I made him a fandom wiki
also, check out "The Signal Tape" a Duke Thomas fan project.
currently following:
- DC: Red Hood: The Hill
- Marvel: TBD
- Manga (Shonen/Seinen): One Piece, My Hero, Dandadan, Jujutsu Kaisen, Kaiju No. 8, Reincarnation of The Veteran Soldier, Oblivion Rouge, ORDEAL, The Breaker: Eternal Force
"power does not corrupt, power always reveals."
Im not seeing any circular logic here man. You made an assumption about Kaldur that isn't really supported by the stuff that's actually on the screen/panel. Sure, it's the default and everyone probably assumed he was straight at first (I did too). But there's literally nothing that shows Kaldur is straight, beyond the fact that he had a brief relationship with Tula when he was a kid....which doesn't really amount to much considering the number of non-straight people who have a straight relationship somewhere in their past.
If Kaldur had been shown to date multiple women, or even one woman for a prolonged length of time, or even if he were dating women as a full grown adult who knows who and what he is, then sure there'd be a precedent establishing Kaldur as straight. But there's nothing like that. There's just one high school relationship that didn't last. That's pretty thin ice to base an argument on. Dont get pissed just because you made an assumption and it turned out to be wrong. Kaldur's sexuality has pretty much always been a largely blank slate....or he's been established as gay. Hell I think in comics he's been established as gay longer than anything else.
It's also not an agenda. Some people are gay/bi/whatever, bro. That's not a PC/leftist conspiracy, that's a fact of life. And Kaldur's one of them.
"Trendy narratives." Sh*t, that's funny.
"We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe."
~ Black Panther.
You do realize that right now you are the one coming off sounding very "I" am going to set everybody straight "Hotep" ish. Yes, you have an opinion as does everyone else. That simple. That fact of the matter is these tropes have been...and still are being used. Its foolishness to pretend that Hollywood and the media industry have somehow removed this element from their DNA, naw son! The difference now is that there was a prominent black community that understood and now there is a LGBTQ community that is more vocal about their relevant portrayals in different mediums.
Whoa, I think you need to relax a bit your coming at this with way too much heat. I have no idea what a hotep is nor do I speak as one, my comments were simply based on history, patterns and factual conclusions. When I spoke on the depictions of black male characters I never specified that homosexuality was an exclusive negative depiction to black males. What I said was that it’s depiction, based on history, has always had some kind of negative undertones and intentions behind it. Whether it was to keep the black male from the white women in terms of potential lover or below white men in terms in terms of status. A lot of black men have caught on to these patterns throughout the years and pointing it out or objecting it is not homophobia. If someone wants to see a character like someone of the same sex then they have every right to but same goes for someone who wants to see a character with someone of the opposite sex. For example the character of Mister Terrific in the show arrow was changed to homosexual and his character was completely altered. In the comics he was the 3rd smartest man and master martial artist in Arrow he is nothing like that. I believe that the depiction severely hurt the character because it made character look completely useless and foolish. Now if someone was to question as to why his character and sexuality was changed they could say it was for inclusion or they could say so he wouldn’t outshine Green Arrow on his show. If Mister Terrific would’ve have kept his normal characteristics than he probably could've been elevated as character by the show but the depiction was poorly received and rightfully so. There’s is nothing wrong with wanting to see a male character get with a woman whether it’s a black man or any other man. Like I said people catch on to the patterns eventually, Blade in his entire trilogy never had a true love interest, Cyborg has never truly had a stable love interest and John Stewart hasn’t been used in a positive light in years. If you want to go to other franchises look at Finns portrayal in Star Wars or Lando Calrissians recent sexuality revelation. When people point this out it’s not homophobic or meant to invoke negative thoughts, but it’s simply questioning why the same thing happens to black men and it’s easily noticeable because there aren’t that many depictions of them.
Last edited by Mr HardKnocks; 08-02-2019 at 02:50 PM.
I don't think Kaldur loved Tula any less than he loved his new flame. From what I've read of Jackson in the Teen Titans it did leave me wanting for him to be more personality similar to Kaldur from Young Justice. The cool thiong I think about Kaldur being pan is that he has more options to love interests instead of just he doesn't like women no more and is strictly only into men. The guy's a lover and a fighter. I'm happy at least Kaldur gets a love life unlike what they did Cyborg in the original Teen Titans cartoon.
I'll have to read the current Aquaman run too see how he's portrayed there.
Yeah, making Kaldur pan is interesting. I dont think anyone saw that coming, even those of us who thought he might not be straight.
Never saw the original TT cartoon. What did they do to Cyborg there?
"We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe."
~ Black Panther.
He never had a long term love interest in the show. Robin had a long development relationship with Starfire while Beast Boy had a relationship with Terra and a budding one with Raven. Cyborg had some tension with Jinx but she eventually got with Kid Flash. He also had another girl he liked but she was from another time period. So he’s the only member of the main cast that didn’t have a long developed relationship with a female character.