Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-13022928-20180109024620/@comment-108.31.158.50-20180302032606

Hey I'm the fandom user you were talking to for most of this (I didn't send in the last two messages geez) sorry I've been so busy.

I definitely agree with both of you that the issues are entirely different, and I apologize for comparing them.

And has Lexa's death scared them from not killing off another lgbt character? It could've, but that's difficult to prove, we can't really get inside their head. The question is: should it?

My answer is yes. If they don't have multiple points of representation (like if they just have one main couple the majority of the lgbt fandom watches it for, and then a couple side characters they mention for bonus points) and then they kill them off that's bad representation. If they wanted to kill of lexa and break off the pairing they should've already had another main lesbian couple or built one up soon after (but that would've been hard to do and not seem like some desperate bid for attention) so that queer people wouldn't lose representation.

And to the other user- Janus100, I entirely agree with you that bi representation is important and that bi people face discrimination for it. I understand your feeling that bisexual people should be represented as dating men and women as Clarke has been. My worry is that when shows make their endgame a straight pairing it potrays the other relationships they had with people of the same gender as a phase, or people will view it that way. It's a huge issue on the other side too, where when a bi character ends up with a woman she's seen as a lesbian even if she's fallen for men. I don't know what the answer is, I really don't. Maybe it's visibility? Characters actually saying their sexuality? Brooklyn 99 just did that with a bi character but I can't watch that show so I can't so one way or the other if it helped.

You are also very right about the black guy dies first trope, I hadn't thought about it until recently and then I did some research. Sorry for leaving it out, but you're very very right about that being an issue. Right now there's not a much representation on the show for people of color, and not positive at least. All we got is Raven Reyes (hispanic? I think? I might be wrong?) and Indra...

So yes, creators should be worried next time they kill off a qqueer character. They need to think "is this going to improve the storyline signifigantly if we do it by a stray bullet or is there a better way we can do it?" "should we bring her back at the end of the season just to kill her again or would that rub salt in the wound?" "should we make it seem like she'll be safe that season so it's more traumatizing for our viewers?" "should we give her an entire 'love is weakness' storyline just so she can die from it and prove it right?" "should we have her be killed by her father figure directly after consumating her love with her girlfriend reinforcing the idea that lesbian sex is wrong and dangerous?" "should we have more than one couple as representation so we aren't leaving our viewers with nothing?" These are the questions they needed to ask themselves before they wrote that scene, these were the questions they didn't.

Creators need to think long and hard before they kill off another LGBT chracter but don't worry about them becoming indestructible my friend. That's never going to happen. I promise there will never be a time where plot armour protects gay characters for being gay in the same way it protects straight characters. For example: Murphy getting literally hung and pretty much every scene with him, Bellamy Blake killing 300 people in cold blood and a bunch of other things, Jasper getting impaled by a giant stick and an inexperienced 17 year old glorified med student saving him, Raven be tortured, being given life threatening surgery, stopping her own heart??, like to be fair straight characters are very indestructible in this show... And what they did to Miller's boyfriend they also did to Wick who just kinda faded off so that's not just a gay problem that's a bad writer program.

Does all this make sense? Is it legible? I haven't slept in 746 years so I might be a little tired haha... s kgj;dshdg

Anyway, I hope the backlash does make them think twice before killing off another lgbt character because the showrunners didn't even think once.

Thanks again for reading this long ass rambling reply

Anyway here's a cute video about lions

here's a site with a lot of stats and specific info about lgbt representation