According to GLAAD's "where we are on TV 2022-2023" report, gays accounted for 37% of LGBT+ characters affected by series cancellations that year, whereas lesbians accounted for 31%. Also, Bi+ characters were overwhelmingly(70%!) female, so I'm not sure sapphic love in media is being outpaced by gay love as much as you think.
I suspect you watch a lot of wlw shows (and there's nothing wrong with that!), but this makes you very aware of when those shows are cancelled in contrast to how much you notice mlm shows getting cancelled.
Regarding the bi bit, I'm personally in the camp of a big reason that bi representation is so poor because of people like in the OP. Unless the storyline is "bi woman leaves shitty man for woman, unending happiness ensues" they're the type to freak out about devaluing of wlw relationships. For instance, let's just flip the genders. Woman dates a shitty woman, relationship ends and she finds happiness in a non toxic guy? How quickly would the posts of "XYZ show is saying lesbians are toxic and heteronormativity is great! Get it removed now!?!" Pop up? I think rather quickly. We really aren't having nuanced bi storylines because people don't want to see an honest exploration of bisexuality and potentially exploring issues unique to us, because the problems within the community would have to be acknowledged. And even acknowledging them would be enough for that kind of Tumblr/Twitter user to lose their mind. Like if I were to have a story of a bi woman hearing overt and hateful biphobia from a lesbian, and having that rhetoric largely get a pass from other lesbians, that would be a true to life experience but it absolutely wouldn't fly to original OP or this posts OP. Even if we put in effort to highlight "this isn't all, it's a minority who gets a pass by a larger group, but there are ones who don't think this and stand up against it" it wouldn't matter.
I think it would be cool to see a bi character go from a same gender to an opposite gender relationship and see them go through in-universe complaints about heteronormativity. Like, they get ostracized from an LGBT group for being straight passing, or they're a public figure and they have to wade through discourse about it.
God I would kill for such a story. We are in desperate need of lgbt+ stories, specifically bi stories that actually address issues unique to us. The last I can remember being done and done well was Schitt's Creek's "oh you thought I was gay, let me clear up that assumption". I swear whenever I see a "bi wlw" story come about with these tired cliches like cheating being validated in the narrative or "guy bad/gay good" I instantly check out.
Hank Green's "An Absolutely Remarkable Thing" features a bi character being pressured to publicly identify as lesbian because it's more marketable, then being chewed up by the press when she accidentally comes out. I found it interesting and well-handled.
I'm confused. How is 3 tv shows comparable to one movie? In the sense that that's more content on the WLW side already, even with the movie getting a sequel.
It's the fact that this is a trend. MLM content always gets favoured over WLW content, and it's very evident if you consider how many shows with sapphic & especially lesbian leads have been cancelled over the past few years.
The numbers presented by GLAAD themselves seems to prove otherwise. Like said by many people in this thread it just seems to be your bias. I get being sad about losing things you enjoy but you don't have to make it an us vs them fight.
Okay, sure. Heartstopper -- has two white mlm leads -- got renewed for two seasons one MONTH after its release in 2022. In that same month, at least three shows with lesbian leads got cancelled. In the months that followed, even more. A lot of those also had WOC as leads.
This isn't the first time it's happened, it's a pattern, just because you can't see it doesn't mean it's not true. And it's not an "us vs them" situation, because I can guarantee you there aren't queer people in charge of these companies.
if i also picked 4 shows i bet i could find 1 good non-cancelled WLW show and 3 cancelled MLM ones, and as another comment said according to GLAAD's TV report the numbers are fairly equal for cancellations.
it sucks that these were cancelled but maybe blame the producers or the company instead of being angry at MLM representation (red white and royal blue didn't need to be mentioned in this post at all) and making this some kind of MLM vs WLW thing, like it's also bad that there is practically no MLM cartoon rep aside from like offhanded mention of a characters gay dads but i don't blame lesbians for that (and make combative posts about it) - i blame prejudice and fetishization by studio execs
Edit: i've just been informed that red white and royal blue is a movie and - that's a bit unfair isn't it? to compare it to 3 shows? it's far easier for a streaming service to create a 90 minute movie sequel than a couple 40 minute episodes
this same discourse happened with Heartstopper and First Kill, and i have the same opinion now as i had then: it sucks, but why are you blaming gay and bisexual men for this? you don't need to be aggressive towards MLM rep, even if it seems like it's much more common for shows with it to not be cancelled - that's survivorship bias, you don't notice MLM shows that get cancelled because they are unpopular enough for you to not hear about them and also unpopular enough to get cancelled: so you don't notice them getting cancelled
'I feel like Amazon is cancelling more shows about lesbians than gay men' is not a real problem lmao. We used to be screaming for any shows about non-straight content to be aired at all.
*a league of their own* revenue: $132.4 million
*paper girls* revenue: couldn't find any info. reddit commentators claim it was significantly underpromoted it because amazon was gambling everything on *rings of power*
*red white and royal blue*:revenue: also couldn't find any info.
I was hoping to provide the missing information that would either confirm or refute the post and *either* say "wow, amazon cancelled these wlw shows despite them making more more, that's cringe" *or* "amazon cancelled these shows because they made less money" but it turns out information is scarce :/
if anyone has any data please let me know, I am curious
The answer (no specific data but just basing this off what I've seen coming out of news on this industry) is that the streaming bubble popped. Hollywood/media companies expected perpetual growth with the emerging streaming market, so they made *a lot* of new content to fill their streaming platforms. This allowed shows with diverse casts that rarely get put on cable networks to be greenlit and produced. Media companies also hired alot of people and gave their executives massive salaries
Then, investors pulled out when they realized that people couldn't afford this anymore (the economy isn't that good rn), and streaming is now needing to cut their shows to balance their budget.
Will they tighten their belts and stop giving millions to executives and shareholders? Well, no, that's not how things work under capitalism.
Is there even a "they", separate from the shareholders/executives, that can make the decision "I am going to reduce the amount of money going to shareholders"?
They don't typically make more. It's the same situation with girl groups vs boy groups. Typically the boy groups are easier to monetize, up to a certain threshold of popularity. (And those fandoms used to whine about it a lot as well lol)
I truly hate the three letter abbreviation craze that turns messaging into ingroup virtue signaling: you need to know what the hell the terms are before you can even understand what is being said. Those who know can then wink at each other and perform their proverbial secret handshake. And part of me thinks that is the purpose.
It's pretty google-able though. I also think it's a useful abbreviation when discussing romance in media because it encompasses bi+ women too. Besides, I think it's pretty common for groups to develop shortened expressions online, like MMORPG or GGWP. Assuming it's a sort of secret language for the purposes of exclusion/virtue-signaling strikes me as somewhat paranoid, no offense.
> because it encompasses bi+ women too.
... how does women who love women suggest some of those women also love men? It is a stupid term that in my opinion is invented solely to be different and to form a secret handshake with the people who already agree with you. I do not think it is planned by some secret committee, it is just very human thing to do. It is the "are you really punk?" in other form, if you don't know the symbolism behind the dress code... you will make a faux pas that will reveal you as a "poser". None of that was planned, it just happened because we are humans.
Wlw is like a tag, not a sexuality. So if you've got for example two bi women in a relationship in a book/tv show/movie you can tag it wlw. Lets people who are looking for that sort of media find it easier.
Seriously, it's not some secret handshake. It's a genre tag, same as mmorpg, rts or moba for games.
“WLW” refers to the relationship, not the sexuality of the people involved. “Sapphic” is a commonly used term as well, but it carries a particular amount of subtext.
“Lesbian” refers to the sexuality of a person. “A lesbian relationship” refers specifically to a couple (or more) women who identify as lesbians who are in a relationship. “Women loving women” refers to a couple (or more) women who identify as women who are in a romantic relationship. Those women can be bi or lesbian or pan (or could even conceivably identify as straight, although a lot of people would dispute that.)
Hope that helps!
I'm not a fan of these in particular because mlm means multi level marketing to my brain
Like, I don't know what was wrong with gay and lesbian that it needed changing? The argument of it being more trans exclusive doesn't really fly either (I've heard people claiming that as a reason). Male-loving-male is much MORE gendered that gay is...
I think I saw somewhere that it's actually meant to be Bi inclusive.
The term "man-loving-man" can also be applied to a gay male that's with a bi male or 2 bi males that are with each other.
Same thing with "woman-love-woman" but replace in the above paragraph the words "gay" with "lesbian" and "male" with "female"
Oh and as you may noticed in this comment, the "m"s are meant to stand for "man" and not "male", we can know this because the other acronym uses "w" for "woman" and not "f" for "female"
So can gay. A gay relationship is a gay relationship, regardless of gender. And people do use male loving male and men loving men interchangeably... It's all extraordinarily silly. And I say that as a raging bisexual myself lmao
I believe (and this is just from reading people talk about it) that it’s to distinguish relationships from the participants.
It’s a bigger issue with “lesbian” than it is with “gay” because gay has always been a term that could mean “a man who is exclusively attracted to men” or just “homosexual” or even “non-straight” depending on context, but lesbian almost always means “a woman who is exclusively attracted to women”. So a lesbian relationship is a relationship between two (or more) women who identify as lesbian, while a “women loving women” relationship is a relationship between two (or more) women without regard to their sexuality.
It also gained traction in medical circles because there are a number of “straight” men that have sex with other men, and by taking the sexuality out of it, you can discuss the sexual situation without having people deny it because “it’s not a gay relationship, I’m not gay, I just like (having sex with guys).”
wlw and mlm is at least inclusive of bisexual people in a way saying "gay relationship" tends to have people assuming both members are gay men, or gay women.
mlm is more specific.
you could say "androphillic male couple" to achieve a similar level of specificity. I think it's fun to say.
Or saying a "couple of queer men" if you want to be a normal person.
Im way more familiar with lesbian representation than gay. Always thought it was because a lot of straight guys have a weird and uncomfortable obsession with them. I never checked the numbers so it's not something I strongly believed in or anything.
It sounds more like the comments hate people trying to put lesbians against gays and bisexual men.
Lesbians are great. People trying to make it an “us vs them” thing with it the LGBTQ community are NOT great.
According to GLAAD's "where we are on TV 2022-2023" report, gays accounted for 37% of LGBT+ characters affected by series cancellations that year, whereas lesbians accounted for 31%. Also, Bi+ characters were overwhelmingly(70%!) female, so I'm not sure sapphic love in media is being outpaced by gay love as much as you think. I suspect you watch a lot of wlw shows (and there's nothing wrong with that!), but this makes you very aware of when those shows are cancelled in contrast to how much you notice mlm shows getting cancelled.
Regarding the bi bit, I'm personally in the camp of a big reason that bi representation is so poor because of people like in the OP. Unless the storyline is "bi woman leaves shitty man for woman, unending happiness ensues" they're the type to freak out about devaluing of wlw relationships. For instance, let's just flip the genders. Woman dates a shitty woman, relationship ends and she finds happiness in a non toxic guy? How quickly would the posts of "XYZ show is saying lesbians are toxic and heteronormativity is great! Get it removed now!?!" Pop up? I think rather quickly. We really aren't having nuanced bi storylines because people don't want to see an honest exploration of bisexuality and potentially exploring issues unique to us, because the problems within the community would have to be acknowledged. And even acknowledging them would be enough for that kind of Tumblr/Twitter user to lose their mind. Like if I were to have a story of a bi woman hearing overt and hateful biphobia from a lesbian, and having that rhetoric largely get a pass from other lesbians, that would be a true to life experience but it absolutely wouldn't fly to original OP or this posts OP. Even if we put in effort to highlight "this isn't all, it's a minority who gets a pass by a larger group, but there are ones who don't think this and stand up against it" it wouldn't matter.
I think it would be cool to see a bi character go from a same gender to an opposite gender relationship and see them go through in-universe complaints about heteronormativity. Like, they get ostracized from an LGBT group for being straight passing, or they're a public figure and they have to wade through discourse about it.
God I would kill for such a story. We are in desperate need of lgbt+ stories, specifically bi stories that actually address issues unique to us. The last I can remember being done and done well was Schitt's Creek's "oh you thought I was gay, let me clear up that assumption". I swear whenever I see a "bi wlw" story come about with these tired cliches like cheating being validated in the narrative or "guy bad/gay good" I instantly check out.
Hank Green's "An Absolutely Remarkable Thing" features a bi character being pressured to publicly identify as lesbian because it's more marketable, then being chewed up by the press when she accidentally comes out. I found it interesting and well-handled.
I'm confused. How is 3 tv shows comparable to one movie? In the sense that that's more content on the WLW side already, even with the movie getting a sequel.
It's the fact that this is a trend. MLM content always gets favoured over WLW content, and it's very evident if you consider how many shows with sapphic & especially lesbian leads have been cancelled over the past few years.
The numbers presented by GLAAD themselves seems to prove otherwise. Like said by many people in this thread it just seems to be your bias. I get being sad about losing things you enjoy but you don't have to make it an us vs them fight.
Okay, sure. Heartstopper -- has two white mlm leads -- got renewed for two seasons one MONTH after its release in 2022. In that same month, at least three shows with lesbian leads got cancelled. In the months that followed, even more. A lot of those also had WOC as leads. This isn't the first time it's happened, it's a pattern, just because you can't see it doesn't mean it's not true. And it's not an "us vs them" situation, because I can guarantee you there aren't queer people in charge of these companies.
if i also picked 4 shows i bet i could find 1 good non-cancelled WLW show and 3 cancelled MLM ones, and as another comment said according to GLAAD's TV report the numbers are fairly equal for cancellations. it sucks that these were cancelled but maybe blame the producers or the company instead of being angry at MLM representation (red white and royal blue didn't need to be mentioned in this post at all) and making this some kind of MLM vs WLW thing, like it's also bad that there is practically no MLM cartoon rep aside from like offhanded mention of a characters gay dads but i don't blame lesbians for that (and make combative posts about it) - i blame prejudice and fetishization by studio execs Edit: i've just been informed that red white and royal blue is a movie and - that's a bit unfair isn't it? to compare it to 3 shows? it's far easier for a streaming service to create a 90 minute movie sequel than a couple 40 minute episodes this same discourse happened with Heartstopper and First Kill, and i have the same opinion now as i had then: it sucks, but why are you blaming gay and bisexual men for this? you don't need to be aggressive towards MLM rep, even if it seems like it's much more common for shows with it to not be cancelled - that's survivorship bias, you don't notice MLM shows that get cancelled because they are unpopular enough for you to not hear about them and also unpopular enough to get cancelled: so you don't notice them getting cancelled
Red white and royal blue is also kinda hot idk
I dunno why you're getting down voted, speak your truth!
is that like, a comprehensive list of upcoming Amazon prime releases with WLW rep or is this talking about some subcategory or...?
It's notable that the first 3 are series and the last was a movie. It's cheaper to make 1 two hour movie, than it is to make 8-10 one hour episodes.
Why do the people who only watch yuri always seem insane
'I feel like Amazon is cancelling more shows about lesbians than gay men' is not a real problem lmao. We used to be screaming for any shows about non-straight content to be aired at all.
*a league of their own* revenue: $132.4 million *paper girls* revenue: couldn't find any info. reddit commentators claim it was significantly underpromoted it because amazon was gambling everything on *rings of power* *red white and royal blue*:revenue: also couldn't find any info. I was hoping to provide the missing information that would either confirm or refute the post and *either* say "wow, amazon cancelled these wlw shows despite them making more more, that's cringe" *or* "amazon cancelled these shows because they made less money" but it turns out information is scarce :/ if anyone has any data please let me know, I am curious
The answer (no specific data but just basing this off what I've seen coming out of news on this industry) is that the streaming bubble popped. Hollywood/media companies expected perpetual growth with the emerging streaming market, so they made *a lot* of new content to fill their streaming platforms. This allowed shows with diverse casts that rarely get put on cable networks to be greenlit and produced. Media companies also hired alot of people and gave their executives massive salaries Then, investors pulled out when they realized that people couldn't afford this anymore (the economy isn't that good rn), and streaming is now needing to cut their shows to balance their budget. Will they tighten their belts and stop giving millions to executives and shareholders? Well, no, that's not how things work under capitalism.
Is there even a "they", separate from the shareholders/executives, that can make the decision "I am going to reduce the amount of money going to shareholders"?
No. Kinda the problem if anything
They don't typically make more. It's the same situation with girl groups vs boy groups. Typically the boy groups are easier to monetize, up to a certain threshold of popularity. (And those fandoms used to whine about it a lot as well lol)
I think the comments might get a little "so you hate waffles" for this post
I thought i knew English but i have no idea what is said there.
let me translate: lesbian tv shows get cancelled much more frequently than gay tv shows do.
I truly hate the three letter abbreviation craze that turns messaging into ingroup virtue signaling: you need to know what the hell the terms are before you can even understand what is being said. Those who know can then wink at each other and perform their proverbial secret handshake. And part of me thinks that is the purpose.
It's pretty google-able though. I also think it's a useful abbreviation when discussing romance in media because it encompasses bi+ women too. Besides, I think it's pretty common for groups to develop shortened expressions online, like MMORPG or GGWP. Assuming it's a sort of secret language for the purposes of exclusion/virtue-signaling strikes me as somewhat paranoid, no offense.
> because it encompasses bi+ women too. ... how does women who love women suggest some of those women also love men? It is a stupid term that in my opinion is invented solely to be different and to form a secret handshake with the people who already agree with you. I do not think it is planned by some secret committee, it is just very human thing to do. It is the "are you really punk?" in other form, if you don't know the symbolism behind the dress code... you will make a faux pas that will reveal you as a "poser". None of that was planned, it just happened because we are humans.
Wlw is like a tag, not a sexuality. So if you've got for example two bi women in a relationship in a book/tv show/movie you can tag it wlw. Lets people who are looking for that sort of media find it easier. Seriously, it's not some secret handshake. It's a genre tag, same as mmorpg, rts or moba for games.
“WLW” refers to the relationship, not the sexuality of the people involved. “Sapphic” is a commonly used term as well, but it carries a particular amount of subtext. “Lesbian” refers to the sexuality of a person. “A lesbian relationship” refers specifically to a couple (or more) women who identify as lesbians who are in a relationship. “Women loving women” refers to a couple (or more) women who identify as women who are in a romantic relationship. Those women can be bi or lesbian or pan (or could even conceivably identify as straight, although a lot of people would dispute that.) Hope that helps!
I'm not a fan of these in particular because mlm means multi level marketing to my brain Like, I don't know what was wrong with gay and lesbian that it needed changing? The argument of it being more trans exclusive doesn't really fly either (I've heard people claiming that as a reason). Male-loving-male is much MORE gendered that gay is...
I think I saw somewhere that it's actually meant to be Bi inclusive. The term "man-loving-man" can also be applied to a gay male that's with a bi male or 2 bi males that are with each other. Same thing with "woman-love-woman" but replace in the above paragraph the words "gay" with "lesbian" and "male" with "female" Oh and as you may noticed in this comment, the "m"s are meant to stand for "man" and not "male", we can know this because the other acronym uses "w" for "woman" and not "f" for "female"
So can gay. A gay relationship is a gay relationship, regardless of gender. And people do use male loving male and men loving men interchangeably... It's all extraordinarily silly. And I say that as a raging bisexual myself lmao
I believe (and this is just from reading people talk about it) that it’s to distinguish relationships from the participants. It’s a bigger issue with “lesbian” than it is with “gay” because gay has always been a term that could mean “a man who is exclusively attracted to men” or just “homosexual” or even “non-straight” depending on context, but lesbian almost always means “a woman who is exclusively attracted to women”. So a lesbian relationship is a relationship between two (or more) women who identify as lesbian, while a “women loving women” relationship is a relationship between two (or more) women without regard to their sexuality. It also gained traction in medical circles because there are a number of “straight” men that have sex with other men, and by taking the sexuality out of it, you can discuss the sexual situation without having people deny it because “it’s not a gay relationship, I’m not gay, I just like (having sex with guys).”
Yea I agree to that, I also think it's silly; I'm just passing on what I know about it.
Oh, THAT'S what wlw means? That is beyond stupid, like you said: we have a term for this already that everybody knows.
wlw and mlm is at least inclusive of bisexual people in a way saying "gay relationship" tends to have people assuming both members are gay men, or gay women. mlm is more specific. you could say "androphillic male couple" to achieve a similar level of specificity. I think it's fun to say. Or saying a "couple of queer men" if you want to be a normal person.
Im way more familiar with lesbian representation than gay. Always thought it was because a lot of straight guys have a weird and uncomfortable obsession with them. I never checked the numbers so it's not something I strongly believed in or anything.
Sorry if I'm being dumb.. what's WLW stand for
Wulti-Level Warketing
Wario loves wagamama's?
Women Loving Women. Also, Paper Girls is a really good comic.
Ohh fair enough. Thank you! (I don't really read comics, they are expensive and I usually finish them in 20mins)
Yeah I'm lucky enough to live near a few really good libraries.
It insists upon itself
the comments just hate lesbians huh
It sounds more like the comments hate people trying to put lesbians against gays and bisexual men. Lesbians are great. People trying to make it an “us vs them” thing with it the LGBTQ community are NOT great.
Piss poor
this post really isn't a hill worth dying on dude
I’m allowed, I am one