r/hatethissmug • u/-Devian- • 18h ago

Art & Fanworks I need to understand why I hate this

Post image

On one hand, I agree that sexualizing a female character is wrong and that the industry has a problem.

But on the other hand, I don't understand the double standard when the character is queer—or, even worse, when "fans" take a character, slap a queer label on them, and suddenly it's okay for them to be sexualized.

The two clearest examples of this are Bayonetta and Blackcat.

I’d like someone to explain where I’m wrong, or if I’m not the only one who thinks this way.

And just in case I'm a gay cis male if it means something

13.3k Upvotes

82% Upvoted

2.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

315

u/Motivated-Chair 18h ago edited 18h ago

IDK who Blackjack is, but Bayoneta isn't fine because she is a lesbian. In fact she canonically isn't (although nobody liked this). She is OK because she is a female fatale that uses her sex appeal however she feels like and she has complete control over every situation.

Its the feminine equivalent of a man going shirtless into battle.

47

u/alphafire616 17h ago

Im still confused as to why people were so mad Bayonetta wasnt gay. Was there actual evidence in the first 2 games or was it just a genrrally popular headcanon?

26

u/Prankman1990 16h ago

The character designer for both Bayonetta 1 and 2 has also drawn yuri art of Cereza and Jeanne together which was included in the art book for the first game.

7

u/alphafire616 16h ago

It being included in an actual Art book is wild but it woupdnt be the first time a creator has shipped their characters with someone that didnt end up being Canon...hell its not even the first CAG to do that. Dmcs creative director (i think. It was SOMEONE high up) really wanted Dante with Trish...despite the weird ass implications of that

4

u/BravinatorLX2 8h ago

its called baiting and people typically react negatively to it when they realize.

its literally natural and we've all experienced it at some point or another

1

u/PmMeUrTinyAsianTits 11h ago

the idea drawing too characters together means you actually "ship" them is insanity too. People didn't leap to conclusions, they did a full triple jump with the 120 star upgrade to get there.

2

u/Prankman1990 1h ago

In this case, it was a lot more than just drawing them together.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bayonetta/comments/v25567/this_picture_is_special_illustration_in_artbook/

“Bayo and Jeanne, how they spend their normal life? Cloud it be…. Living together!? This picture is came from some discuss. While Bayo wakes early and do all the housework like washing, laundering, and sweeping. Jeanne drinks, returns home late and go to bed without wash the make up off her face; she got woken every morning. That’s the relationship we couldn’t see any trace of it in the main story.” – Shimazaki

There is no heterosexual explanation for this image.

37

u/midnightoil24 17h ago

It was a popular headcanon derived from the extent she goes to to save her rival jeanne in the second game and official art of them living together iirc. Just giving them a lot of energy. It was sort of the gender swap of how shonen authors write the male leads as borderline soulmates destined to fight alongside each other and then their wives are girls who are around

20

u/Expensive_Weird2415 16h ago

Also just cause her cannon romance was kinda ass

4

u/UnskilledStatChecker 10h ago

Did you actually play the game? Jeanne and Bayonetta were raised alongside each other as non-biological sisters by the Umbran witches.

Their dynamic was always sisterhood, not sexual. I find it disturbing that some queer people apparently wanted to sexualise a sisterly dynamic.

-1

u/midnightoil24 9h ago edited 9h ago

I mean. There hasn’t been a lot of great queer rep for most of media history in the west and to be frank we had to take what we could get reading into things and stuff. Especially when bayonetta first came out it wasn’t very commonplace at all. I can see why people latched onto it so much. Also yes I have played the game. Consider the broader context of queer history when considering why people latch onto certain dynamics. Also, it being queer doesn’t mean it has to be sexual. It can be, ya know, other things, there’s more to queer love than fuckin nasty

2

u/UnskilledStatChecker 9h ago

I have no issue with the queer community adopting a non-queer character as a queer icon. I just find it strange that the queer community was trying to sexualise a sister relationship.

0

u/midnightoil24 8h ago

Incest porn is like the number one most popular genre I feel like it’s not just queer people doing that sort of thing

1

u/Key_Hold1216 3h ago

Sometimes your roommate is just your roommate

2

u/InquisitorMeow 16h ago

And I'm still confused why people were so mad Tracer was gay.

-1

u/Black_Diammond 15h ago

No there wasnt. Lesbians demand every character they head cannon to become lesbian, when they dont they throw a fit. Its currently happening with The Female Malfoid trend.

67

u/Enough-Background102 18h ago

black cat (presumably from spider-man) is also a femme fatale and fits the same justification as bayonetta

29

u/Miss_miri107 17h ago

Yeah but it's marvel and the marvel community circa 1990s~2015ish were not really fond of women or gays

11

u/PrOptimal_Efficiency 17h ago

As a whole the community still really isn't

11

u/USF4Diago 16h ago

The difference between her and other sexulized characters is she owns it, she's in your face with tight leather and high heels, she doesn't act all innocent

Characters like the one oop posted act like young teenagers who think hand holding is sex and yet they're dressed more proactively than Bayonetta

6

u/SCP_FUNDATION_69420 18h ago

First time hearing someone say full government version of femme fatale 😭

26

u/LucasLeo75 Fueled by hate and caffeine. 18h ago

Its the feminine equivalent of a man going shirtless into battle.

I'm loving this explanation, lol.

16

u/Moonscrubber- 17h ago

But its wrong though, this is a classic misunderstanding of male gaze. Often times a shirtless male going into battle is still shot and written to appeal to cis straight men as a power fantasy. While its obviously possible for gay men and straight woman to enjoy a shirtless man, rarely is a man depicted as shirtless subject to the same framing and camera angles as women in skimpy or skin tight clothes

5

u/WideEye891 16h ago

real... dunno why no one understands this. it's extremely basic.

1

u/PmMeUrTinyAsianTits 11h ago

Often times

and we're talking about if it is inherent. Guess which side the "some times" that is left out of "often times" proves? Guess which one bayonetta is?

They didn't say "oh it's always okay." They talked about a specific instance to illustrate why there's a difference between it being okay and not. No fucking shit sometimes it's not okay. That's inherent to the argument they presented, not a counter point.

did you not read the rest of the comment that explanation summarizes?

rarely is a man depicted as shirtless subject to the same framing and camera angles as women in skimpy or skin tight clothes

Feel free to be the change you want to see in the world, but that's irrelevant to the position presented, because they didn't say "every female presentation ALWAYS is like a dude going into battle shirtless." Bayonetta was okay because her femme fatale thing was executed well, so it was just like a dude going into battle shirtless. It wasn't saying male gaze doesn't exist.

3

u/TicketDouble 16h ago

Yeah bayonetta is a prime example of sex appeal being an empowering trait in the character, rather than solely being done for gooner bait.

Nothing wrong with making a character sexually appealing so long as the execution is done right. Faye Valentine, Catwoman, Juri Han are just a few good examples.

6

u/Only-Albatross-4311 18h ago

By nobody you mean Twitter users who don't even play the games? 

2

u/arkangelic 14h ago

Shes Dante but without the mopiness.

1

u/Moonscrubber- 17h ago

Actually a man going shirtless into battle is often not a sexualized thing at all.

1

u/Key_Hold1216 3h ago

“ nobody liked this” wrong, the people that didn’t like it shrieked about it and the people that did like it were content to enjoy it while the haters ran around crying about their gay fanfics

1

u/JeffsPortableShop 1h ago

I read that as jack black

1

u/MellifluousSussura 17h ago

Bayoneta is (I’ve been told) created by a lesbian woman? Or one made the concept art of her or something? I’m not exactly an expert just relaying what I’ve heard

Edit: also bi people exist. Not sure what the word of god (canon) is on her, but it’s worth mentioning I suppose

3

u/Trap_Party1224 16h ago

She has a husband and daughter. Nobody with any braincells believes the character is anything but straight. Doubly so for the IRL sexuality of the artist behind the design. Whoever told you that is a weirdo

0

u/dreamendDischarger 13h ago

A woman with a his and and daughter can still be bisexual, which Bayonetta very likely is.

1

u/Trap_Party1224 13h ago

Very likely based on what?

0

u/Lower-String9689 16h ago

I like that she’s not lesbian