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Within the realm of fanfiction, an intriguing trend has emerged: most fanfiction is authored by queer women but centered around queer male relationships.
Some believe the prevalence of women writing men-loving-men (MLM) pairings is a testament to the fetishization of gay men. However, there are many possible motivations that speak to a larger issue of representation and the lack of complex female characters onscreen.
What draws women to MLM couples, canon or otherwise? At the most basic level, there are more men than women in typical stories.
Male protagonists are presented as frontrunners for the vast majority of network shows while female protagonists are usually only the main characters for programs that specifically depend on gender as a plot point.
The wide variety of male characters offers room to build off or subvert expectations for writers. For the hunky secret agent, fanfiction writers can either come up with new missions to expand his character, or they can go against the grain and make him run a coffee shop.
While men have more diverse opportunities for characterization, women are oftentimes cast into stereotypical roles that limit their character’s depth. She is never a full fledged person; she is a sister, a mother, a love interest, or a sidekick.
As a result, there always seems to be a power imbalance in heterosexual romance, at least implicitly. If the characters are given lopsided story arcs and one is much more nuanced than the other, logic would dictate that the same inequality would interfere with their relationship.
Romance between male characters, however, is seen as fundamentally more balanced. They may not necessarily be equals within the confines of the show’s plot, but they’re still powerful. Influential. In charge of their own destiny.
Apart from the characters themselves, the dynamics between male figures are more comprehensive and intimate.
The friendships or feuds between men are more complex than the romantic subplots they’re given. Since platonic relationships are given a good portion of the screen time, they have genuine chemistry that is drawn out and given more care than any female character.
The popular BBC series “Sherlock” is a prime example.
Both the titular detective and his partner John Watson are given character arcs involving women falling in love with them or vice versa. Some are there for a mere two or three episodes while others are key facets of an entire season.
Nonetheless, fans of the show overwhelmingly believed that Sherlock and John — known online by their portmanteau ship name “Johnlock” — were a better match than any of the intended female love interests.
In more recent years, “Stranger Things” has been a gold mine for fanfiction writers due to the various characters in the main cast. With so many possible ship combinations and a fairly even gender divide, one might assume that this phenomenon wouldn’t apply.
According to analytics from Archive of Our Own, the preeminent website for fanfiction readers and writers, the top three pairs from the show are “Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson,” “Will Byers/Mike Wheeler,” and “Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington.”
While it was confirmed in the fourth season that Will Byers has romantic feelings for Mike Wheeler, Steve Harrington has been written into an on-again, off-again relationship with Nancy Wheeler. Nevertheless, fans thought Steve was more compatible with two male side characters, one of whom only appears in a single season.
Any efforts made to make Nancy and Steve a couple to root for failed spectacularly. Nancy, a well-developed character in her own right, is most commonly paired with Robin, another female character.
If heterosexual relationships are imbalanced, then why don’t women just write lesbian romances?
It boils down to a simple issue: objectification.
In real life, queer women are constantly sexualized and commodified to the point that writing about fictional female queerness fails to offer the same creative agency and gratification.
Queerness is the key to true escapism in fanfic writing, but male queerness is still seen as a safer outlet to explore than sapphism.
In a world where queer women are ignored or invalidated, even queer writing is centered on men more often than not.
Until society’s prejudice against queer women is unpacked and a real effort is made to create complex female characters, fanfiction will remain a sphere for women to express themselves… but only to a certain degree.
*This article was edited on 2/24/2024 at 12:31 p.m. to insert correct format of the article*