To quote my favorite red-haired witch, love makes you do the wacky. Love for another person. Love for our families. Love for our friends. Love for our favorite fictional characters. And love for what those fictional characters represent.
I know this; I feel it too. But sometimes I forget. Like when I joke about enjoying the hot so-called shipping wars between Doccubus and Copubus on “Lost Girl.” Wait, back up, let’s begin at the beginning. The wires and lights in a box currently only has one, yes one, TV show centered around a singular lesbian or bisexual female character. That show is “Lost Girl.” Sure, lesbian and bisexual female characters are parts of other leading ensembles – “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Pretty Little Liars,” “Glee.” But not centered around them, which makes Bo Dennis that much more important.
And also important is the relationship Bo has had with one Dr. Lauren Lewis since the very start of the show. From first touch, these two have had electric chemistry. And we’ve waited, through starts and stops and girlfriends in a coma, until these two were in an honest to goodness, lasts more than one episode real relationship. And this season, we finally have it. Doccubus is here and it is glorious.
But now, as happily ever afters make for very dull television, there is a wrench. Bo (a bisexual Succubus who must feeds off of the sexual energy – or chi – of victims to live) needs to do just that with people other than her human lover/girlfriend/hotpants Lauren. Welcome to TV’s interesting open same-sex relationship.
As such, last week Bo and former No. 1 frenemy Tamsin, the Valkyrie Dark Fae police detective with a mean right hook, made with the kissy face. Sure, it was a necessity so Bo could go on. But it was still a kiss and as such was, empirically speaking, kinda hot. I am just a red-blooded American gay gal and I call two hot ladies together hot when I see them being hot together.
That does not, however, invalidate my feelings for Doccubus. That does not invalidate how much I enjoy/support/respect Bo and Lauren’s relationship. Nor, do I think, it in any way undermines them. But, judging form the heated explosion of Doccubus v. Copubus comments to last week’s recap, everyone does not feel the same way.
Look, far be it from me to say who you can and can’t ship as a couple. Just was we all have an inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, so do we have the right to pursue all three through the semi-obsessive devotion to a fictional couplehood that may or may not exist in the aforementioned universes. Love your loves, ship your ships. And if you must start playing battleship, do so without denigrating the quality of someone else’s boat. At least that’s how I look at this big board game of life.
So, on this hiatus week for “Lost Girl,” let’s all take a breath and enjoy the show. More fans getting more excited about a real or wishful coupling means more people are invested in the show. And more, from a TV perspective, is always better. And shipping need not be a blood sport. Can’t we all just get along? Also, Doccubus4Lyfe.
UPDATE: Look, if you don’t like playful discussion of Copubus, that’s cool. I am solidly and forever Team Doccubus and have been since I started writing about the show in early May 2011, both on my site and on AfterEllen. I have recapped the show for AfterEllen since Sept. 2011 when I began weekly reviews of the second season and then wrote simultaneous retro recaps at of the first season to coincide with the U.S. airings. AfterEllen has been covering the show since November 2010 when we ran our first interview with Anna Silk. That’s less than two months after the show premiered in Canada. So to make bizarre claims of bandwagon jumping is beyond ridiculous. And to attack other talented AE writers who I respect and am friends with is not allowed on my site. And, once again, your facts are wrong – she interviewed them before the season but Showcase asked us to hold them for fear of spoilers, then she reinterviewed them entirely later in the season when the old information was obsolete. Those new Q&As ran within days of her interviewing them.
My post today was about getting along in fandom. About not attacking each other and enjoying the stories both put before and those we weave ourselves with passion and respect. If you want to yell at me about subtext, that’s your prerogative. But that’s not the discussion I am trying to have here. And to conflate the two brief comments I’ve made about Copubus with the homophobic rantings of some troll elsewhere is beyond insulting. This is my personal, non-commercial blog which I run because I love pop culture and lesbians and whenever and however the two intersect. If you bite all the open hands extended to you, all that will be left in the world are mangled stumps.
97 comments:
Beautifully put, as always Ms. Snarker. Let’s all play nicely together ;o)
Dorothy, the whole Tamsin/Lauren thing started with a guy called James, who will be familiar to most Lost Girl fans. James is a homophobic Christian fundamentalist weirdo who is absolutely outraged to see a lesbian maintext couple on television and has taken to spamming and trolling lesbian websites with fundie BS and implied threats of violence. When he's not using Twitter to make hateful comments about Zoie Palmer, wish lesbians were "killed in car crashes", or sending hundreds of tweets to his imaginary friend.
When this strategy started getting him banned from places, he changed tack and started spamming sites with Tamsin/Lauren stuff - anything to a)promote the idea that lesbians just want two hot chicks to make out, and b) to try and create the illusion of a "movement" in that direction. Have a look at the current e online fantasy couple poll for some examples of his obsessive handiwork. A bunch of Dyson fans cottoned on to the idea since and took it to Tumblr, but the idea is the same, to pair Lauren off with a secondary character with less screen time so the guy can get the girl as God intended.
We've already banned some of his many sockpuppets from our site a few times, and I can offer links to his giant crazy if you want them, but it's disappointing to watch you play into that deluded freakshow's idiotic "masterplan" and in doing so send a signal to showrunners that hey, they don't really need to put any thought into f/f ships, and hey, it's cool if there aren't any significant main characters involved. Just throw any two sets of boobs together and we're onboard.
Please tell me we did not push for real representation, with real depth, for this long, only to get it and then let a hateful troll lead us backwards to the land of subtext and crackships.
This is embarrassing as hell, to be honest. Of all on AE, I thought you knew better than do shill for cheap pageviews with so little thought about the message you send.
You're right, this couldn't possibly have any implications for Bo and Lauren.
I mean, it's not like the showrunner has been really active on the internet this year in order to guage public response to the enormous risk they took. It's not like she engages and responds to fans on twitter, or visits our chatrooms during episodes to check in now and then.
Oh wait! All of those things are true! So this is a dumb, contrived, and potentially profoundly ill judged shipwar that you yourself basically pulled out of thin air from about five comments you scrounged together with very little thought to the potential ripple effect!
Yeah this... this is silly.
Please. You cobbled this ridiculous shipper war out of thin air to get clicks for your Lost Girl recap, and now you're wagging your sanctimonious finger at the fandom.
You're a hypocrite and a tool.
Kudos to you, I'm team doccubus all the way as well. But who I am to complain about a hot as hell lady loving lady smooch? It was hot, no doubt about it. Sit back and enjoy I say, it's only season 3 so Lauren and Bo aren't going to last forever in a committed relationship, yet anyway. And personally I'd prefer another Lesbian couple than the Bo/Dyson fallback they keep around. Anyway those are my thoughts.
I'm writing to commend you on that lengthy 2nd sentence in the 2nd to last paragraph - woo hoo, girl! Take a breath because that is a winner!
Really? This is a made up war that YOU started. And it's been helped along by the homophobes in this fandom who at this point, will go for anything that's not Bo/Lauren.
Just yesterday we were fighting off the homophobe Anon above mentioned in the comment section at e!online's fantasy couple. This time, he was writing up nominations for Lauren/Tamsin, and upvoting each hundreds of times. You are getting trolled and you're playing along with it because... yay crackships and grrl on grrl. That's what it's all about these days.
Who cares about positive representation, who cares about visibility? Who cares about all the good things Lost Girl has done. Yeah, let's ignore that, let's write an article on imaginary shipper wars instead.
Don't call out the Doccubus fandom for standing up for those things. We're the only ones who actually give a damn. We're the ones who have been fighting to get this couple and this show some recognition. The same kind of recognition that shows like Glee get from you and AE effortlessly, even when they don't deserve it. That's what this "war" is about. Not about Bo/Tamsin, or Lauren/Tamsin, or any other ship you can come up with.
Are there people who genuinely want to see those happen? Sure, it's fandom. But it's one thing for the fringes of the fandom to ship them, and another thing for AE (and to be clear, I'm talking about the recaps, your personal blog is a different issue) to play along with it. It's something that I don't think the AE site I used to read years and years ago would have done.
At this point, I'm starting to think "Doccubus" would be better off getting no coverage from AE at all. You seem to be doing more harm than good. Plus, shouldn't you have your hands full with Rizzoli and Isles? They're off sleeping with men and being not gay so. Yay visibility.
Agree - this "ship" nonsense is harmful and a little pathetic. It seems to be born from the need that so many have to be "covert" - either to be members of a special "exclusive" club, or out of familiarity and comfort with being closeted. To hell with that.
Lost Girl kicks the crap out of subtext, shipping and all the other fan-fabricated patchwork and pitiful crumbs we are offered. The real thing. A lead on a mainstream show. My damned dream come true. May it be the first of many with no more furtive sneaking in shadows or cowering in closet. No more. Enough. Go real, or go home.
And please, watch the bloody show. It wasn't a "kiss" it was a feed. Just as it was only a "kiss" in 303 if you like your characters mentally compromised by a third party. Of course, it is meant to be a little light titillation, but don't make it more than it was, we deal with quite enough retcon.
The Bo/Tamsin kiss was NOT HOT. Both times they have kissed have been very chaste, lie back and think of England affairs. I mean, look at the screencaps posted. With Lauren, Bo is all lips parted and into it, while with Tamsin her face is all scrunched up like she's kissing her grandmother. If queer fans are going all gaga about THAT kiss, we need to have higher standards.
Are people so Stockholm Syndromed that the idea of a beautifully handled canon core lesbian romance is too much, is that it? "No, please, give me back my bullshit subtext and cheap sweeps stunts, I'm used to those!"
I want lesbian love, drama and angst not happily ever after. Totally doccubus4lyfe too yo but having Dyson switched out for Tamsin would be pretty grreat.
"Because representation doesn't matter all that much, really. We've got imaginations and Rizzoli & Isles and 2 Broke Girls, it's cool. Don't sweat it."
Wow, so much hatred and disrespect for Dorothy over this nonsense, really?
Tamsin is a great character, she has good chemistry with Bo, their story-arc is cool and more leaning towards bromance and Doccubus IS NOT in danger. No, the world isn't perfect and people will hate on lesbian maintext and other people will ship lesbian subtext, but that's just life. Don't be rude about it, hate only generates hate.
Please don't be so blase about the use of the word "hate", there is nothing of the sort taking place here and to claim otherwise diminishes the real thing.
If you actually don't think that media both shapes and is shaped by the cultural zeitgeist and that proper representation is not very much at the heart of full equality, dignity and fair treatment within society then you need to think again.
Those who would deny us our basic humanity do so because they cannot see us. The lies and slanders that they tell about us tend to vanish in the cold light of day (do you think someone like Cheney would be even a little LGBT friendly if not for out family?) This is why coming out is still an important political act, and our characters need to come out too.
I mean really? Hiding and resorting to secret handshakes isn't bad enough? How about perpetuating the despicable slander that all gay women are predatory and just waiting to pounce the moment a woman lets her guard down. That is *also* part of what subtext does to us. It casts us as predators, not safe around the unsuspecting, and it makes me sick.
We all stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before, those who were brave and took risks, those who accepted the burden to make life a better place. And this is *our* part in the struggle? The acceptance and collaboration in slanderous second-class citizen status? Is that to be our contribution to the next generation who come along and look at TV and ask - is this it? Because we have seen it quite long enough, been invisible or tokens or an exploitative sleight of hand quite long enough. Damn it, enough.
Visibility is part and parcel of acceptance and moving towards equality. Media and culture are intrinsically linked and it boggles my mind how little people seem to realise or respect that, including people who should know better.
Oh - and although posting Anonymous, since I don't seem to have a means of putting my name to it:
Valksy.
@MJNuts
No hate for Dorothy. Hate for the message AE is sending over this, because this is something that started on AE.
I agree. Tamsin is a great character. I love the frenemy thing she has going with Bo. I'm hoping for more of it. There's even some interesting spec going around the fandom about Tamsin/Odin and Bo's lineage.
I have no problem with people who genuinely ship Bo and Tamsin because they want some more girl on girl. Different strokes, etc, and of course they're not a threat to Doccubus.
But for AE to promote a crackship over a real, well written, canon relationship? Yeah, that's a problem. The tagline for the site used to be "Visibility Matters". I guess... not anymore?
@mmjnuts
Because while the rest of the Lost Girl internet community was getting sieged by a lively combination of incoherent homophobic ranting, hatespeech and Tamsin image spam, DS - in the process of completely fabricating a drama to write about and using a non-existent ship to undermine an actual one - was giving that jerk a signal boost.
It's bad enough AE was too busy covering shows without any actual lesbians in them to take Lost Girl seriously until this year, but... to compare the completely unprecedented, and hugely brave, thing the show pulled off this season to something that's literally imaginary, on a site with that kind of profile, is pretty hard to stomach.
Fuck subtext. It's done. After Lost Girl, it's done, and I won't and can't go back to accepting less; I won't go back to table scraps and apologeticism for the showrunners who treat us with contempt while parcelling them out. If AE's writers still had any kind of grip of actual lesbian pop culture anymore, they'd understand all that.
Either ignore Lost Girl like you used to - I know you're all playpals with Ryan Murphy again now that he's patted you on the head, so hey, maybe you could go back to to 24/7 Glee spam instead - or treat it with the pop cultural significance it deserves and do some actual journalism. There has never been anything like this show before, for God's sake, and in its make-or-break season, you cover it like it's something you've got to turn in out of obligation before you can get back to something more important like Rizzoli and freaking Isles.
For crying out loud, the best question Heather Hogan thought to ask Zoie Palmer was what Zoie Palmer thought of Heather Hogan's article.
Oh wow, there are some veeeeery intense feelings about this subject apparently. But maybe it's time to put down the computers, go outside, and relax a little. Or take your meds, whatever floats your boat.
Ms. Snarker, you are well loved, and a few people who have very intense opinions about this topic does not make you any less of the talented wonderful person we so enjoy each day.
Hit the nail on the head, Anon above, especially with that last line re: Heather Hogan.
Because yes, let's not forget about the way AE treated this show in general. It's no coincidence that the Anna Silk / Zoie Palmer interviews came out when they did.
Heather Hogan interviewed them how many months ago? And they never saw the light of day. But as soon as it became clear that we were winning the eonline poll, they rushed to re-do them. And rushed they were, with the extremely generic questions, and a clear lack of research/effort.
AE had no qualms about taking advantage of the publicity generated by the Doccubus fandom.
And yet, when we were running on fumes trying to hold off the powerhouse that is Glee/Brittana, and we needed a signal boost, and we needed help, it didn't come from AE, or DS, who made it a point not to pick a side. We got a shout-out from Sarah Warn, but not the current AE. The support came from our show.
What's happening now is more of the same. An excellent way for AE to score site hits with a made-up shipper war fueled by clueless people who have no idea what's happening in the fandom at large and by homophobic idiots in panic mode.
Preach, agree with all of the poster above points about AE
I know fandom loves a good conspiracy theory, but there's nothing nefarious about the timing of AE's Lost Girl interviews. I interviewed Anna and Zoie well before the season started, but found out after the interviews were complete that Showcase wanted us to hold off on publishing them until the new season started. Once the new season started, the information in the interviews was irrelevant. Neither Anna nor Zoie could tell me much of anything about season three because Lost Girl's production team is really tight lipped about spoilers. The first Lost Girl pre-season promo had more information than the pre-season interviews I did. So I interviewed them again. I know it's cool to think I can just call Anna and Zoie up at my leisure and ask every question fandom wants answered, but that's not the reality of how this stuff works. It has to go through a zillion channels and get a zillion approvals and there are a zillion questions they can't answer and I can't ask, and I have about 15 minutes to do a lightning-fast Q&A.
Entitled lesbian fandom outrage at AfterEllen (and at Dorothy Snarker) never ceases to blow my mind. We're giving you everything we've got to give you, with open hands and a full heart. To suggest otherwise is insane.
Run away! It's Doccu-gate and The Curse of the NonSense-Anons! Quick before their fun-draining keyboards get us all!
"Entitled lesbian fandom outrage." Oh boy... AE's completely lackluster and grudging coverage of "Lost Girl" is pretty clear. You'd rather endlessly promote subtext or Ryan Murphy instead of the real thing from a show that took a real risk. And then you have the nerve to turn around and declare us "entitled" when we call you out on it.
At this point, I'm with others: AE should just stop trying covering Lost Girl because you obviously don't get it.
So the net result is an interview that sounds quite distinctly like you've got barely any idea who Zoie Palmer is or why you're talking to her.
Pop culture journalism doesn't begin and end with recaps and interviews. Until this year, you gave Lost Girl about as much coverage per season as you gave R&I per episode.
And the thing is, it's not even really about this particular show. Am I unreasonable to expect a site which used to tout "visibility" as a core value to focus on actual lesbian characters - or God forbid even search them out - over shows which either don't have any, or feature them in derisory contexts, or in favour of simply rewording press releases?
You know what, I feel genuinely bad for hashing this out in DS's comments, because she's hands-down the best writer you've got, and I do respect her a lot, and this was probably just a combo of really poor timing and slightly poor judgement. She, least of all, deserves to be a lightning rod for all the ills of AfterEllen.
But that shitty little parting shot from Heather is just the icing on the cake. Absolutely tone deaf to what we're telling you, automatic retreat to rabid defensiveness, insulting dismissals of all comers who don't suit you. Entitled Lesbian Fandom Outrage... I swear to God, in text, you're absolutely indistinguishable from Ryan Murphy at this point and I can't even tell if it's intentional.
Stay classy HH.
"Entitled lesbian fandom outrage at AfterEllen (and at Dorothy Snarker) never ceases to blow my mind. We're giving you everything we've got to give you, with open hands and a full heart. To suggest otherwise is insane."
Just calling it like we see it. AE has a large audience and I think a certain responsibility to promote positive representation. That's all we want for LG. It's not doing that.
AE is the ONLY site that mentioned Bo/Tamsin at all. This shipper war only exists on AE. Everyone talks about how awesome Bo and Kenzi were, about Tamsin as a character, about "the Dawning", about Bo/Lauren and what that little bump in the road will mean for them. But, nope, on AE, people are busy arguing about subtext. It's a show that deserves a bit more than the "yay, girl on girl, hot! go shipper wars!" promotion it's getting there.
I'm not saying it was intentional. But the recap has 108 comments at the moment, that's what happens when you come up with Copbus, knowing that the Doccubus fandom is out in full force, and when you further promote that shipper war on Twitter.
As for the interviews, thank you for doing them. I don't think anyone wanted any spoilers. I enjoyed AS and ZP's responses regardless. But I think a lot of people were hoping for something a bit more in-depth about their characters or about them as actresses.
I don't want AE to stop covering Lost Girl. I just want them to be better at it. There is so much to be said about where it fits into our media ecosystem and you guys don't even try.
We're not asking for on set interviews or exclusives, just something done with a little more thought than we've seen so far. There is no substantial alternative to AE. You are the single biggest platform for these subjects and discussions, and nowadays it feels like you're just going through the motions on autopilot.
Wow, what? Did we all miss the point of the great phrase: "Love your loves. Ship your ships"?
I love the honesty of this show, which in turn has allowed us, the viewer, to invest in these fictional relationships and really feel something while we watch. I think Dorothy loves this show because of such honest writing and acting. Why can't she have an opinion, or as seen in this post, can't she simply put forward an observation on the fandoms in question? Those who have read Dorothy's post and/or her writing on AE know she too is an honest writer and that's why so many people read her. To suggest there is some kind of nefarious agenda or self-promotional stunt happening here is ridiculous and idiotic. Those unconvinced can simply watch the damn show and write their own blog/re-caps. Or, even better, move to Canada and write their own lesbian sci-fi. I mean, really. What the what?
Amanda
You know what, I'd like to reel in some of my upset at Dorothy Snarker in particular, because she doesn't deserve it. But trying to find useful, thoughtful coverage of this show is so incredibly frustrating. I used to be able to go to AV Club for some actual analysis and journalistic context for this stuff, but even then the reviewer clearly didn't get the show, and eventually just gave up.
Almost all other sites are watching at American speeds and through SyFy's promotional channels, and focus solely on Dyson or dismiss the show as something made for teenage boys.
We come to AE, because we want a lesbian perspective on a (perhaps uniquely) lesbian show, and you guys just aren't offering that as well as you could be. I enjoy the recaps just because of who's writing them, but some more real and thoughtful content on a show that's done what this show has done - something I did not expect to see this decade - is surely at least as warranted as Harry Potter sorting hat graphic.
Entitled fandom outrage... that's just blowing my mind that you didn't see the irony in that before you hit "post".
Woah! There are some harsh mean folk out there. For the record I loved the latest recap - just read it and laughed my ass off. Can't believe this play nicely post was needed by DS in the first place but totally get why she wrote it.
Here's the thing if you can't post something without being harsh, insulting, or assuming the worst of someone - don't post it.
Lena UK
"You know what, I'd like to reel in some of my upset at Dorothy Snarker in particular, because she doesn't deserve it."
Seconded. It blows my mind, given the twitter responses and the comments here, how badly the complaints are misunderstood.
Asking for better treatment on AE = entitled lesbian fandom outrage. Wow. That sounds eerily familiar.
"Entitled lesbian fandom outrage"
"As irresponsible and enraging it is that a so-called champion of all things LGBT thinks its lesbian fans are a bunch of unstable goons... I’m simply not going to let you make my blood pressure spike."
So. I saw the tweet, and I'm glad you revisited the subject, Dorothy, even though you are probably gonna get a pile of paragraphs on it.
It is hard to make a complex feeling turn succinctly enough with 140 characters on twitter, so I thought I'd offload here.
I find it juvenile to harbor irritation over any one individual concerning a comment made as a joke on twitter. Women are lovely and f/f kisses on TV? I'll take them ALL!
But, it was a perfect storm. Coming off the really hard fought e!poll win, where I know alot of dedicated people, including myself (crazy I know) took a day off work to help making it happen.
You have 4 things in play here with this. And the frustration isn't about "shipping" and "fun" or even you... so much as it is an internal LGBT rage at how TV continues to treat gay fictional relationships (or the lack thereof).
1) We are tired of subtext. We are tired of representation on our screen to be in the shadows or just in a 2second look.
2) We are tired of big LGBT media giving precedence to shows that really don't do a great job depicting LGBT lives, or relationships, and they give lots of promo attention to $$$ instead of substance.
3)It wasn't until this year that Lost Girl really got much of anything from this site (beyond your love for it Snarker. And thanks for loving it.) But when it starts hitting mainstream, suddenly the influx of new folks are on a new shipping crusade... and it's kinda nuts.
You have a feast (Doccubus) and a subtext bit (the Valkyrie). Why do we give any airtime to shipping the crumbs? It feels (as a community) ..kinda crazy.
4)I don't think any of this is honestly about you or Ms Hogan...but it is somewhat about the online site you are a part of.
This is probably way too heavy for such a thing that began in light hearted jest. But it brings out all of the passion in the fans that have really screamed at the top of their lungs about this show..that's gotten nothing in the way of recognition...for the AMAZING work it's doing in changing culture.
TV shows are fiction..but it's power is in reaching many with a message. Of hope of change, or equality. And I don't want to ever spend another second of my day..concerning myself with anything less than. Ever again. Even in jest.
I first discovered Lost Girl because of a post on this blog. I am thankful for that and that this blog exists. Thank you Dorothy.
Goodness gracious, it's a fun TV show with pretty people who have sex with each other, I adore seeing Docubus together but I'll be kind of sad if Bo doesn't get it on with some other cute girls too.... Dorothy has said she loves Docubus and yay for that. I think it goes without saying that as a lesbian I'm not obligated to embrace a lesbian TV relationship just because...I'm a lesbian. I do happen to enjoy Bo and Lauren but it took up to season 3 for me to say that. I found Lauren the character and ZP the actress just not compelling at first...
I think any references to shipping Copubus are a combination of irreverence in the context of a rather irreverent show, a desire for as much girl on girl as possible on a show that has sex as main plot device, and there may actually be folks, lesbian folks, who don't passionately ship Docubus. And that is OK. We've signed no blood pledges that say we must all ship the same couples....I'm actually more Team Bo than anything else. I would like to see her with Lauren but not necessarily in a monogamous relationship for the entirety of what is left of the series....
For better or worse, these ship wars are created/fostered/valued by shows themselves and writers who write about those shows. We all, straight, gay and otherwise can be part of the ride or opt out and just watch the show while not partaking of the social media sideshow. What we can't do, it would seem to me, is think that we can bludgeon others with our outrage and get others to capitulate to our beliefs. We can all just state our thoughts and get on with life and hopefully a few more seasons of Lost Girl.....
Hold up. We ask you for... not so much more, but better coverage, with some depth... and rather than really hearing that, your response is to punish us/Lost Girl by threatening to cover it less?
I don't know how to respond to that. AE's coverage of Lost Girl beyond DS has been fairly cursory until now, but it's still a big platform for a show that needs even that little bit of support. Please don't punish that show to try and teach us some lesson, it's too important.
A final thought - Please don't invoke the "angry lesbian" meme. It is a tool for silencing, it takes voices, it invokes the concept that women are far too reactionary and emotional to offer a reasonable argument. It is exactly the tool that has oppressed women for a very long time and should not be invoked.
In terms of the ZP/AS interviews - I understand the point and yes Prodigy play their cards so close to their chest I'm not even sure that they know what is actually in their hand. If you had explained that the material was obsolete, people would have understood. If kept in the dark, are you surprised that people come to their own conclusions, especially given coverage of the show since 2010?
Valksy
"Entitled lesbian fandom outrage at AfterEllen (and at Dorothy Snarker) never ceases to blow my mind. We're giving you everything we've got to give you, with open hands and a full heart. To suggest otherwise is insane."
Ryan Murphy couldn't have said it better. Seriously, were you so blown away by the shout out on Glee that you now feel beholden to recycle his bitchfest?
Oh my god. Lesbians went full nerd. Guess it had to happen.
First thing I notice is- a lot of these more long-winded anonimi write exactly the same as each other and say the same thing, so I dare say that a fair few are the work of one fast fingered fury.
Second thing I notice is, that our online community has started using words like "silencing" and "privilege" to staunch any sensible criticism of their behaviour. That constitutes the beginning of the end for a large swathe of the "progressive" online community. (And I vehemently contest that label. To be progressive you must show a desire for progression; if you fail to engage people in a language they understand they will never listen to your point of view and if you "silence" them by screaming about privilege to shut them up they'll quite rightly say "fuck you" and who gains what from that, exactly? and then they have a good long whinge about how it's so terrible being a progessive and having to explain your views all the damn time and how really they're the monster, when you're really just a self righteous, self absorbed windbag with no desire to actually contribute any meaningful discussion.)
The above threads are filled with entitlement, and deeply cringe-worthy shrieking nerd dom. I honestly don't know how writers cope in an environment like this when any old lunatic can access and verbally assault them any time they dare to gently suggest that hey, maybe we shouldn't be screaming blue murder at each other over a tv show, hmm?
Haters gonna hate. You don't have an obligation to please anyone. Your opinions are yours and should be respected.
Privilege and silencing are elementary concepts related to general theory as it applies to women in general and LGBT women in particular.
Is it not unexpected to think that a site created by women, for women, would understand the social/political/etc issues? AE crosses boundaries into mainstream sometimes, it is seen by some as our unified "voice" and I do think that the writers do know better. If AE is to just be a site to talk about how gooey the actors make people, by all means say so and surrender that air of mainstream credibility.
If not, and it means more, as it always has been for many years, then let's talk about these bloody issues which have perhaps been left unspoken for far too long. Let's have this damned dialogue or give up, walk away, and cease acting like any of this means anything at all.
Oh - And Anonymous?
I post as Valksy here, on AE, on Twitter and other places. I missed attributing a post (starting "Agree - this "ship" nonsense is harmful and a little pathetic") and will do so now.
I don't have a damned bit of fear about standing up for what I believe and what I very much hope for the future of credible, legitimate LGBT visibility and WHY that matters.
And since you mention it - YOUR comment is also text book silencing - an attempt to diminish and remove debate by largely resorting to ad hominem attacks. Round of applause to you. How about you give the posters a little bit more credit?
If Dorothy Snarker wishes to remove me from her blog, so be it. I don't know that she would ever do such a thing, I doubt it to be honest. But then I also respect her enough to be pretty sure she doesn't need white knighting by another "anonymous" poster.
We're entitled hysterical crazies for wondering if maybe a primarily lesbian entertainment site should give a show about a queer superhero and her girlfriend a little more attention than it gives straight shows. And AE is only doing us a favor in the first place by bothering to cover it at all, which it will withdraw if we start misbehaving.
I'm sorry Dorothy Snarker's getting the full brunt of a lot of frustration that's clearly about the direction of AE itself, but the fact that the two points up there are our take home messages for the day makes me pretty sad.
Anyone who knows Lost Girl's fandom knows there are many of us disappointed with AE's coverage of Lost Girl. Especially when compared to shows like Glee or like Rizzoli and Isles.
This is nothing new. The latest recap and "shipper war" it generated was the last drop and like someone said above, a perfect storm. It coincided with some rabid homophobic attacks in the fandom, and everyone is still on a high from the e!poll win.
It's unfortunate that all this is happening on Dorothy Snarker's personal blog, because really, the problem is with AE at large. What we want is better coverage, better treatment for a show that deserves it. Equal representation for the lesbian relationship compared to the subtext ones.
The irony of being called "entitled" and "lunatics" over this is... really, it can't be lost on you.
Ms. Snarker and AfterEllen have done nothing but show support for this show from the start. They are the reason why me, my friends and pretty much everyone I know even started watching in the first place. You guys should just smoke an effin' joint and stop being so angry all the time. You're wasting too much time hating when you should be grateful for the great coverage, interviews and love for this show that we've been given instead.
I respectfully say that if you are unhappy with AE, start your own website. I totally understand the concern over not overplaying the angry, unironic, humorousless lesbian motif. It sucks and it has been around forever. But unfortunately, so have angry, unironic, humourless lesbians been around forever. As well as straight people of the same stripe..... We may all have differing degrees of passion for how important it is to us to see lesbian/bisexual girls depicted on our TVs. I happen to love the heck out of Lost Girl and Docubus is the main reason, but I would actually watch it happily without that added bonus...
Bottom line for me is that Lost Girl owes us nothing in terms of how they portray sexuality and gender and AE owes us nothing in terms of how they choose to comment upon the pop culture landscape. Lost Girl is an unexpected gem of a show from Canada that just happens to be sex and sexual orientation positive and not judgemental and AE is a website that celebrates all things lesbian related that no one need visit unless they choose to do so. AE isn't the problem. This website doesn't exist to serve, it exists to express the thoughts, whims, obsessions of its creators. Be your own creator if you desire....stop blaming a website for something websites are designed to do-generate discussion and buzz and engagement.
PMSing much?
Well said Dorothy. I hope you don't let this discourage you, most of us really enjoy your recaps :) I think its nice to have a balanced perspective!
"The irony of being called "entitled" and "lunatics" over this is... really, it can't be lost on you."
Yeah, it's not what you want that makes you an entitled lunatic, it's how you think it's acceptable to go about getting it. The sheer bile flung at what was a very reasonably put article, is *embarrassing*. I can only hope the average age of the contributors is about 14: I've been as angry/crazy about shows as you are now, but not since that age, and even then the memory makes me cringe.
And even say You, anonymous in particular, are not one of the most strident contributors to this debate, if you say can read the other posts here and not see a problem I say you are deeply disingenuous. The tone here (and shut up, tone is important and certainly no TV SHOW is worth sacrificing basic civility) is appalling. Make your arguments but make them proportional, measured, and proof read for insanity. It can slip in unnoticed when you're mashing the keyboard with a carven effigy of a popculture blog contributor.
And Valksys or whatever, you using the word "silencing" to silence me for accusing the global "you" of misusing the word "silencing" makes me sad. You additional (erroneous) use of famed internet silencing catchphrases such as "ad hominem attack" and "white knighting", plus the pointless, irrelevant grandstanding ("I don't have a damned bit of fear about standing up for what I believe and what I very much hope for the future of credible, legitimate LGBT visibility and WHY that matters."- are you for real? Like, really for real? That sounds like something a cornered beauty queen would churn out when asked her opinion on Ru Paul's Drag race) mark you out for a great career in the talking head industry along side the likes of Glen Beck. What you say *doesn't mean anything*.
Honestly, I'm half buying into this (convoluted, ludicrous) conspiracy theory with the added twist that you are yet another sock puppet for this "James" hoping to instigate some sort of lesbian blogging schism. I hope I'm right cause I'd hate to think you were actually one of us.
I didn't even know this issue was taking place as I only watch Lost Girl, but don't get involved in the fandom. I don't know if their complaints are justified or not but judging by the amount it would seem that maybe they are.
However the heather Hogan comment about "Entitled lesbian fandom outrage" was a little too Ryan Murphy for my liking. You girls did promise us not to start kissing that guy's ass (again) after Glee's random shout out, what we didn't expect was for you to merge and become "them".
You can't claim to be trying to represent a community (the lesbian/bi community) and, EXACTLY like Glee does, get upset when you get it wrong, or when your audience thinks you got it wrong.
But i see you lapping up all the praise on Twitter so you will probably ignore this comment.
Man, these shipping wars are something else. Fedex and UPS get along better.
There was never any shipping war to speak of. It basically begins and ends with this article cautioning people about falling into the dichotomy she tried to create and promote in the first place.
Dorothy, I've been following you for a while now. I never comment on anything. I think your recaps are wonderful and your writing is fabulous. Keep up the good work. As for the rest of you, if you want something "better" ask for it, POLITELY. Offer constructive criticism rather than attacking DS and each other. What do you want to see from AE and DS regarding Lost Girl? Did you ask AE for it ? Or are you all just complaining, hoping someone will figure out what you want.
"Trying to find useful, thoughtful coverage of this show is so incredibly frustrating. I used to be able to go to AV Club for some actual analysis and journalistic context for this stuff..."
"Actual analysis"? "Journalistic context"?
Darling, it's a cheesy little show about a bi-sexual energy sucking demon, what more do you want that Snarks and/or AE hasn't already given?
Unless... Is it the case you'd like more discussion regarding the NWO's possible motivations for green lighting the thing? Analysis of the occult themes and how they relate to Western society's many occult driven secret societies etc.?
Thought not.
Sure, it's nice to have a non-straight female lead and the sex scenes are gorgeous, but does the piece really warrant a painstaking deconstruction???
PD (science not humanities "major")
5:43 - it's the first show that I am aware of in the world featuring a female superhero involved in a canon, maintext, OTP romance with another woman.
Don't you think that's of a little more relevance, and of a little more worth, and deserving of a little more effort, than 2 Broke Girls or something?
We laid out what we'd like. And, to be fair, it's very much more AE than DS at fault here, because she has supported the show. And it's not really about Lost Girl as it is a trend we see forming.
We would like to see this show and this couple treated at least as seriously as a show and a couple with this many lgbt firsts deserves. Particularly in comparison to the many shows featuring 0 LGBT characters or "subtext" couples that AE has wallpapered in the past. There have been gestures in that direction this year, at last, but so far it's all shallow, there's no insight, and there's no real effort made to ground it in anything other than "OMG hot girlz!" and that problem is compounded when a canon couple is treated as no more important than an invented one. "Visibility" either matters, or it doesn't. AE is capable of way better so it's frustrating to watch them phone it in.
I seriously feel like I owe Emily Andras more than I owe AE this year, and she's not even on our team, never mind playing for it. You tell us to expect more from our media, well here we are, we asked more of you.
You responded by insulting us in exactly the same language as one of the most celebrated misogynists working in TV today, and later holding us to ransom by implying you'll actually cut down on coverage if we don't learn our place. All the rest aside, people would have gotten over this by morning if Heather Hogan hadn't made that incredible gaff. I still can't believe she really posted that.
The biggest irony is, I'd expect Ryan Murphy to eventually pay lip service to an apology. Probably partly due to attention from AE. I can't say I expect as much here.
So, you fuelled a shipping war, and when you got hit by the friendly fire you get all "stop this madness angry lesbians!"? Really?
@Anonymous@556pm Describe what you want. No one is saying what they want.
@anonymous@547pm. Agree!! this is a cheesy little show. I didn't even think the last episode was that great. So, the big reveal is Fae Puberty?
@DorothySnarker can we have a contest, where the winner gets Zoie Palmer to model the Lab Coat in person.
Miss Snarker, you are awesome.
And seriously, this one *anonymous* troll needs to get a life. You are an embarrassment. Take some Midol, pack up your hate-filled nonsense, and reevaluate your reason for being.
"What do you want to see from AE and DS regarding Lost Girl?"
Up the coverage and reward the show for the risk they took this season. Take the relationship as seriously as the show-runner and actors do, and don't diminish its importance by latching on to the first hint of subtext or just the girl-on-girl aspect.
More in-depth recaps. The Dyson/Bo side puts out War&Peace size novels for every episode. I love DS's recaps, don't get me wrong, but I could also do with more substance and analysis about the mythology, relationships and so forth.
Check out the difference:
http://www.afterellen.com/tags/glee
and
http://www.afterellen.com/taxonomy/term/7432
Glee even gets a "favorite tweets" column. Use the power of the fandom. We're basically starved for content. This isn't a mainstream show. Very few places cover LostGirl. For crying out loud, we get excited over user-created polls at spoilerTV.
For that matter, you can even do a spoiler article once in a while. We don't have sites like e! covering the show and doing spoiler chats. And before the "but the show is tight-lipped" comments, they might be, but the fandom certainly can find spoilers, so could AE.
And as for the comments that this is a "Cheesy little show" and therefore it doesn't deserve the coverage... wow. And Buffy wasn't cheesy? South of Nowhere anyone? Glee? Rizzoli and Isles?
" Make your arguments but make them proportional, measured, and proof read for insanity. It can slip in unnoticed when you're mashing the keyboard with a carven effigy of a popculture blog contributor. "
Bahahaha, oh thank god there are some sane people commenting today. So many of these comments seem unnecessarily harsh. Love your stuff Ms. Snarker, try to block out the crazy!!
Dear "entitled lesbian fandom": either get a life or do the work yourself, write your own damn blog, create your own damn website. But don't ever just sit on your fat ass attacking and complaining about these women with the intelligence, talent, and work ethic to create something for our pleasure.
If you don't like it, then stop reading it. If you don't like it, then create your own. If you don't like it, then find something else to do. Take up knitting. Read a fucking book. Anything.
Your hate-filled comments are irrelevant and serve only to reveal your ignorance and talent-less existence.
Those who can, do. Either put up or shut up.
And identify yourself for godsake. You're a fucking adult.
That's my problem with AE now, thank you. It rarely goes any deeper than looking at this stuff as "girl on girl". I like light humor sometimes sure, but is that the best we can hope for?
Elizabeth, if any body - ANYBODY - other than AE dismissed a little criticism as "Entitled lesbian fandom outrage" they'd be crucified for it and rightly so.
Elizabeth, if any body - ANYBODY - other than AE dismissed a little criticism as "Entitled lesbian fandom outrage" they'd be crucified for it and rightly so.
Dear Snarker: I love you.
Dear Anonymous: For there not being a shipping war, you bit pretty hard on this one. Joke's on you.
I want to thank you Ms. Snarker; Heather Hogan and AE - you guys write from the heart, with humor and enthusiasm of real fans. I'm sorry you have to deal with some of the consumers of your efforts who have their own personal agendas and who can't seem to understand that sometimes it's OK to have a difference of opinion without being hostile about it. I hope you know that your fans by far outweigh your critics and we appreciate you and your hard work and passion.
Dear Ms. Snarker - I found LG because of your blog also and I hope the trolling and over reaction and folks that post as twenty different people don't ruin it for the rest of us, as that would be most unfair.
For those of us who love the show and how you write and think this is all quite silly, thank you and keep doing what you are doing.
But...it's Lost Girl this show is the type that 'ooh I kinda sorta ship it' and then in a couple of episode they're kissing. Like, Bo kissed her mum, Kenzi and Lauren kissed in a hallucination. This show is, to be honest, a fangirl's dream and yes sometimes some people don't like other ships but attacking people for what they have fun shipping is just weird. It doesn't impact on your at all, so can we just...accept and move on that not everyone ships the same things, or that some people can ship more than one pairing (Honestly I love Bo/Tamsin, Lauren/Tamsin, Bo/Lauren and even BLT)
" Anonymous said...
Elizabeth, if any body - ANYBODY - other than AE dismissed a little criticism as "Entitled lesbian fandom outrage" they'd be crucified for it and rightly so."
Oh, please. There's more petulant whining in these comments than I hear from my 4 year old nephew when he doesn't want to go to bed.
Like I said, if you don't like or appreciate what Snarker and HH and AE do THEN WRITE IT YOURSELF!
Stop acting like they owe you anything or that you deserve something else.
And if you think the comments in this post are a "little criticism" then let me buy you a dictionary because that word doesn't mean what you think it means.
Perfectly put anon @ 6:48! I agree completely, and the fans really do outweigh the critics.
@Elizabeth.
We have done our part. As evidenced by the e!poll and everything that followed: Syfy, CNN... And we will continue to do more. Asking for better treatment from AE is part of it.
It's not as easy as "write your own" because AE is more than just another site. An anon explained it above. It has crossed into mainstream, PTB pay attention to it and it is, in a way, the "voice" of the lesbian fandom. With great power comes great responsibility and all that.
"It's not as easy as "write your own" "
Yes, it is. Funny, but the internet is kinda perfect for that very thing. It's exactly what AE did. Create a website. Set up an blog account. Invest the time. Do the research. Put in the work. Build a following. There are a million examples on the internet of this very thing. Dorothy Surrenders and AE are shining examples.
AE didn't just appear a decade ago fully formed as it is now. Sarah Warn and others invested the time. They did the work. And it grew. They weren't seeing what they wanted and so they CREATED it. THEY DID THE WORK. Isn't that where fanfic comes from? Creating something you wanted to see b/c you weren't getting it otherwise?
Arrogantly demanding these writers do something exactly the *WAY* you want it and *WHEN* you want it is insane and is the very definition of entitled. Nothing in life is like that. Nothing. To think otherwise is delusional.
I'm not a good writer so I read their posts. I appreciate their effort and what they offer. I don't agree with everything they say, but you know what, so what. Satisfying my every whim is not their job. I take my pleasure where I can find it and disregard the rest. As with everything else in life.
And BTW, we are all getting what they offer FOR FREE. No money has changed hands. No terms of service have been offered. No contract violated.
(Sorry for the deleted comment above, my wife left herself signed in on Google.)
Anon @ 6:08pm hit the nail on the head. This is no longer about a ship war, or even just about Lost Girl. (For the record, I didn't think there was anything wrong with the recap, or the teasing about "Copubus." If any of you happen to follow me on tumblr, which is not likely, you would know that I ship all the things.) It's unfortunate that this discussion ended up on Dorothy Snarker's personal blog, because this isn't really the place for it, but so be it.
I've been reading AE for a lot of years (as I'm sure many of you have) but lately I've been disappointed in too much of what I've seen from them. I'm not going to pretend I know anything about their editorial policy, how much control they have vs how much is directed by Logo, etc. But the site is not what it used to be. They're no longer as critical of the media they cover, and it's (in my opinion) way too closely entwined with online fandoms. I've also seen one too many filler articles seemingly created just to generate page views, not to mention things that have absolutely nothing to do with lesbian/queer women or media. (Mila Kunis rumored to star in 50 Shades of Grey movie, with an "um yes please" comment by the AE writer - really!? Gross.)
@Elizabeth - It may be "easy" to just start your own blog and write your own articles if you don't like what AE is doing. However, AE is the most well-known lesbian pop culture site, and has become the "face" of the lesbian community online as far as a lot of mainstream media is concerned. I don't think it's out of line for us, the readers, to criticize what AE is doing and ask for better representation from them.
Just to be clear about a few things from the top:
I've never read anything written by Ms Snarker except the tweet that led me to this discussion.
It took me awhile to figure out that "AE" referred to "After Ellen," and then to realize (although I'm an AE follower), it has nothing to do with Ellen Degeneres. Not directly, anyway.
I think I know what "shipping" means, (though the meaning seems to change depending on the context) but I have no idea what "OTP" means.
Get it? I'm a total noob to AE, to Twitter, and even to LG. I suspect this will be of little interest to anyone else, but here's the story of how I got here:
I was surfing channels on a Monday night in January, here in New York, and was just about to blast through SyFy hoping to miss some random gross-out scene from "The Hills Have Eyes," or another Star Trek re-run, or one of the many asteroid-threatening-humanity fliks, when I saw a woman with an unmistakable -- if anxious -- look of love in her eyes, tell another woman, "It's time." And the other woman, eyes welling up with tears, asked in a achingly vulnerable, hoping-beyond-hope sort of way, "Really?" And then they kissed.
But the kiss was almost besides the point. "Lost Girl" had me at Lauren's "Really?" In all my nearly 60 years of television watching, I'd never seen a moment quite like it - two women declaring their love for each other with all the tenderness, hope, anxiety, excitement, and vulnerability such declarations often bring. Two women...
Years ago, I saw a movie - Desert Hearts - that sort of tried to approximate such a scene but, let's face it, that movie was more about infatuation, loneliness, bicuriosity rather than a mature love. And of course that relationship ended when the bicurious woman got back on the train for whatever town she'd come from for her quickie Nevada divorce. They were never in each other's lives in any meaningful way.
But "Lost Girl" was different and I knew it the moment I heard that exchange. Even more startling, two other characters then came running up and stumbled upon the two women embracing -- and they did none of the usual, "OMG, will you look at that!" voyeuristic, titillated sort of crap I half-expected. The guy -- I had no idea in that moment who he was or that he'd once loved, still loved, the brunette -- he stood quietly, almost respectfully, taking it in, and just said, "Bo looks happy." I was really hooked.
I'm giving you my personal "recap" by way of saying that for me, this show has never been about the girl-on-girl sex (though I definitely enjoy those moments, too) . It's about a genuine love story that happens to involve two women -- two very different and complicated women -- which made for some interesting conflicts in subsequent episodes. But it is a real love story nonetheless, each person willing to make sacrifices for the sake and for the love of the other. The fact that both were women seemed of no consequence either to them or to anybody else in their world for that matter. It simply didn't come up.
Frankly, I never imagined I'd see something like this on American television in my lifetime (just as in 2008, I resigned myself to the fact that Anericans probably wouldn't elect a woman President in my lifetime...but stay tuned!). So, I gave a big shout out to those wonderful Canadians for being their liberal, creative, down-to-earth selves.
I have no idea what's in store for Bo and Lauren. I like Tamsin and have imagined she may become Bo's main go-to Fae for feeding when Lauren's wiped out -- with Lauren's blessing. But like some of the other posters here (and it isn't just one PMS'ing angry entitled dyke, for God's sake - - PMS'ing?! really?!), I hope that having taken the bold, ground-breaking step of showcasing this realistic love relationship -- albeit between Fae and human (gender irrelevant) -- the writers and producers don't fuck it up by multiplying Bo's suck-buddies. Yawn. If I'm looking for soft porn, I know where to find it. Not that I ever look fot it. Much.
Having not read your posts, Ns Sbarker, I can't comment on the objections raised by others here. But I can certainly relate to their sense of protectiveness about preserving what is special about Lost Girl. What I heard was a plea for you to use your bully pulpit to do the same.
Mahlers5th
Dorothy caught a lot of shit that's really about AE, and not really about Lost Girl. There's a widely held sense that AE devotes far too much time and energy to subtext, even at the expense of actual text, and pitting a crackship against a canon one like she did just struck that nerve.
We expect Dybots to prepare a table for the corpse of Bo & Lauren. We expect homophobes to belittle and dismiss Doccubus. We expect Lauren haters to applaud and cheer over anything that pushes her one inch closer to the show's trap door. BUT! We do not expect a lesbian blogger who has been recapping the show and knows more about it than anyone else at AE to suddenly pull a Bo & Tamsin rabbit out of a hat and throw Bo & Lauren onto the tracks of an incoming train. Here we have the most compelling lesbian couple in TV history (no hangups, no closet issues, no dependencies, no role playing, no family angst, none of the typical crap and downers hung on lesbian couples on American television) and you, of all people, are already diddling with an imaginary alternative. How does that saw about an antagonist go? Oh yeah...with friends like you who needs enemas?
Wow, the shit's really hit the fan....
Is AE
A) Going to take any of this onboard, stop undermining important milestone canon lesbian relationships, and start convincingly supporting them instead.
or
B) Stick their fingers in their ears and Ryan Murphy us out while they phone in another article about two straight women who look at each other sometimes and try to figure out why their traffic has been consistently sliding in the wrong direction for the past few years?
In light of HH's post, I think I know which way to bet.
I want Tamsin and Bo to have sex, it would be awesome. MAKE IT HAPPEN LG WRITERS!!!!
My reaction to scrolling through the comments....*face palm* *shakes head* calm your tits!! This is why we can't have nice things. My two cents.... I would like to start by saying that everybody has the right to their own opinion and here is mine. I am fairly new to engaging in any covervesation of debate that exist in the Internet, fandoms, and shipping. Social media and the Internet were not as prominent back in my day of hoarse and buggy. With that said, I had a hard time understanding why people get so upset at what I perceive as innocuous things such as shipping two characters together. I was informed that how the Internet is. It just is what is it is. Well I am getting a little tired of every place I go in my various fandoms there seems to be a war of words over the meaning of the ships Mines better than yours and you fail as a human,or how the ships or shows fail to represent the LGBT community and set the cause back. Positive visibility is very important to help the community to progress forward towards equality. But in the fight to move us closer to our cause we can't lose sight that sometimes entertainment is just entertainment and not everything need to be made into some large federal case. It just shipping people. It's the desire to see certain characters together. Wish fulfillment And there is nothing wrong with that. One thing that I found puzzling in the comments was the statement that if Bo/tamsin were to happen that it would be homophobic (somehow???) cause Bo would be paired with a secondary character and its negative visibility cause it messes with Bo/dr hotpant,I don't think this is the case. I think lost girl is fairly progressive show. The show treats Bo's two main love interest as equals. If Bo were to leave Lauren for dyson it wouldn't be because Lauren is not a man and Bo feel that since she is not a man their relationship is lacking in someway and she seeks out dyson to fulfill her desire. No! Bo loves dyson because he is dyson. The same works in reverse... Bo loves Lauren because she is Lauren. Equal. To me that seem progressive. Our visibility has inceased a lot in a short amount of time. I was 18 when Ellen degeners came out on her tv show and I am 34 now and we have shows like lost girl. Another thing I found troubling was the comments aimed at AE, Dorothy snarker, and heather hogan. AE doesn't know pop culture, snarker induced a shipping war as a fluff piece and blog hits and heather hogan not a good journalist. What the actual fuck!?!?! First of all, with out AE I would have never been exposed to shows like south of nowhere, girltrash, bad girls, capadocia, pretty little liars and rizzoli and isles, ect. I would have never know about the communities of fans for these shows let alone the various blogs that are entertaining and at times very informative. I was intrigued by this little cop show rizzoli and isles and that intrigue quickly gave way to confusion about depth of their friendship, so I turn to all things lesbian AE and I discoved two things one, I was not alone in my perception and two,Dorothy snarker's subtex recaps. Snarker became one of my favorite people on AE which led me to seek out her personal blog site. Of which I enjoy greatly. I have nothing but respect for this woman who take time out of her life to post stuff for our enjoyment and I value her option greatly. I think she is very articulate, funny and intelligent. Her blog is a shiny spot in my day. As for heather hogan. My god that woman is a wordsmith. For example, heather hogan is the reason why i love page Mcullars on pll. in her recaps she gave me insight to her character that changed my mind form and extream dislike to love. I have never once thought that she handle and interview or story without the utmost of intergrity. Heather is an amazing and talented writer. So these are my big lesbian feelings. So I plead to the Internet... Can we please dial it down a bit, chill out and enjoy our entertainment.
Snarker... I feel as if you deserve a hug so here is one....*HUG* *squeeze*!!! Keep calm and carry on! You are awesome!!!! p.s if you can pass along the hug to heather that would be cool bean:-)
With all due respect, saying that the relationship between Bo and Lauren is "just entertainment" and that those who think otherwise should just "cool your tits" not only misses the point entirely -- it's patronizing and offensive. Maybe it's cool these days for women to put down other women using the worst of sexist tropes (PMS'ing? Angry, crazy bitches? Humorless, entitled lesbian fandom? Take some Midol? Wow), but as a second-wave feminist from the paleolithic era, I am really appalled at the level of discourse.
That "whine" aside, I think the debate here had nothing to do with dictating which LG couple the fandom should be shipping - each to her (or his) own. I think Valksy and others here were expressing their disappointment that someone like Ms Snarker, with the bully pulpit influence she enjoys (and deserves, I gather) seemed so primed to jump on the bandwagon of "I want Tamsin and Bo to have sex, it would be awesome. MAKE IT HAPPEN LG WRITERS!!!!" (as suggested by Anon 6:08am) . I guess it would be "entertaining," in a sense, to see Bo fuck practically ANYBODY on the show -- I do enjoy her unabashed sexual energy. But that isn't what sets this show apart - it's the real love relationship that has been developing between Bo and Lauren. Some of us have been waiting 15 years since Ellen's wonderfully comic coming out scene to see American television grow up and catch up, but (unlike Anon 6:29am) I haven't seen much evidence of that. Glee? Teenagers. Rizzoli and Isles? Puh-leeze. So we need a writer with the influence of Ms. Snarker to defend the importance of showcasing this real love story -- set as it is in an otherwordly place -- and letting it unfold for more than an episode or two before reverting to "just entertainment." I hopethe writers and producers had the good sense to know what they have created.
i agree with the above.. sending you and HH a big hug.
This is more like it, AE
http://www.afterellen.com/2013/02/heather-peace-fight-for-video?xrs=synd_twitter_ellen
I wanted to say thank you Dorothy Snarker for all you do. I have been a faithful reader of your site for years, and I have loved every post. It is always nice to be reminded I am not alone in the world. As a lesbian from rural East Texas, that fact can sometimes be hard to remember. From simply talking about loving the ladies to having slightly obsessive feelings about possibly fictitious characters, you have helped me make peace with myself and about coming out.
I do not remember how I first heard of Lost Girl, but there is a good chance it was through you and/or AE. I have been watching it since the first season, and I have loved reading your posts about it. You have helped add another dimension to my love for the show, and I appreciate the interviews with Anna Silk and Zoe Palmer on AE.
I have always appreciated what you (and HH) do in giving us a place to shelter and share our fandoms and our stories, and I am sorry to see how virulent some of the comments on this post have gotten. I hope some of the responses on this post do not dampen your enthusiasm for what you do, because it does matter. You do make a difference in people's lives. Again, I want to say thank you for the years of support and entertainment I have found through this site and through you.
I like what you are doing for AE. I support you. And what I want to read is an interview with Rachel Skarsten. Interview done by you. I like your respectful but precise questions :)
I honestly don't understand the vitriol that has popped up here. I personally dig Doccubus but don't get all upset when other people have other opinions. Anger at Heather Hogan, AE and Ryan Murphey is inappropriate on Snarker's personal blog. Also, for those of you being so hateful and doing so anonymously, get some gumption and sign your posts. You lose all credibility (imo) when you don't even put a name on your comment. Everybody seems fine with shipping non-cannon couples until there's a cannon couple that everyone is expected to like simply because we're lesbians. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. If you don't like the ones being presented, start your own blog rather than attacking other peoples.
One episode. ONE. With a deliberate chi-suck scene that happened because Bo was depleted and weak -- and DS is turning it into a possible Bo/Tamsin hookup that can pull the rug out from under Bo/Lauren? WTF?
DS is turning Tamsin into a possible threat to Doccubus... all she did was say that while she was a Doccubus fan, the idea of Tamsin/Bo was hot.
THAT'S ALL.
989Ms. Snarker, I appreciate your recaps of Lost Girl. They are witty and comparatively much more representative of what happens in each episode. However, there must be a better way to generate web hits and pay the rent than with an undermining of a lesbian couple that has become a cult favorite and is, to me, the best representation of two women in love that I’ve seen on teevee North of the border. Unfortunately, your blog appears in a website that encourages mountains to be made out of lesbian couples that upon close inspection are simply molehills, or imaginary couples that only exist in the fantasy world of wishful thinkers (e.g. R&I). I simply don’t know what to make of a harebrained idea about what the writers have planned for Bo and Lauren and Tamsin. At this point in the story of Bo, it just feels like a desperately foolish and typical AfterEllen concoction.
Ms. Snarker, I appreciate your recaps of Lost Girl. They are witty and comparatively much more representative of what happens in each episode. However, there must be a better way to generate web hits and pay the rent than with an undermining of a lesbian couple that has become a cult favorite and is, to me, the best representation of two women in love that I’ve seen on teevee North of the border. Unfortunately, your blog appears in a website that encourages mountains to be made out of lesbian couples that upon close inspection are simply molehills, or imaginary couples that only exist in the fantasy world of wishful thinkers (e.g. R&I). I simply don’t know what to make of a harebrained idea about what the writers have planned for Bo and Lauren and Tamsin. At this point in the story of Bo, it just feels like a desperately foolish and typical AfterEllen concoction.
In addition to liking TV shows with authentic, hot same-sex women couples, I also like TV shows with authentic drama and conflict. Bo's a succubus, which doesn't make an easy road for a long-term solely monogamous relationship on its face (heh). Add to that her involvement in things that tend to get her hurt, and sexual energy speeding up her healing, well, there you have it. And it adds some wonderfully spicy conflict that will surely cause continued drama on the show. Hopefully the good kind. But I'll tell ya, that's why I loved shows like Xena and Buffy that handled the conflict between X/G and W/T authentically (for the most part). It added to the story and made for some great makeup segments too. Hopefully Doccubus lives happily ever after but if it's smooth sailing the whole way, with kissyface, long nights at home with pinot and movies, and domestic bliss, that makes for a great real life...but boring TV.
Yeah and you enjoy obsessing your beloved Lauren and denigrating BO at times in your recaps, you don't play nice either..lol
BO becomes a "ass" to you when she's drunk and stated the fact that she always deals with life and death situations and Doc is more staring into petri dishes....
BO life is also endangered when she saves the Fae & Human~
So you feel that your beloved Lauren is hurt by this fact??
So isn't Lauren a "ass" either when she just flared up and insulted BO about her not finishing high school and not qualified to a Doctor all because BO acts as therapist to help solve a case?
So BO is not hurt and your beloved Lauren is not a "ass"??
There's always double standard and bias by Lesbians including you LOL
GOODBYE~~
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