certainthings

This first time I read yaoi, it freaked me out. The dominant gender roles (despite being a same-sex couple), the explicit threats/jokes of rape, the romaticized victimization, and the plot cliches, to name a few. My western, educated feminist self was having the critical theory equivalent of "zomg, wtf?" But the more I read, the more I understood the conventions and the culture of yaoi. It's like a became a different person when I read yaoi. Probably not unlike how my standards for fanfic are different from my standards when I read literature of my choice, or the literature I was exposed to in school. It just demands a different kind of audience.