I'd like to request a tag for a protagonist who is gay. There's currently no real way of signalling that your story has gay characters unless you write [BL] in the title, and when your story isn't actually about BL, that doesn't really work. So, yeah. Tag please.
Tag Request: Gay protagonist.
- Thread starter Rhythm
- Start date
Well, leaving aside the fact that it's there for Bisexual and Pansexual protagonists already, my story in particular is a psychological piece. A large part of the plot deals with how his childhood experience of rape complicates his relationship with his developing sexuality.
Leaving my specific story aside, however, there are still any number of gay narrative points that can be explored without explicit romance. Or hell, maybe someone's just writing a regular adventure story with gay romance that isn't a main focus, the tag would be relevant there because it's an adventure story rather than a BL story.
Leaving my specific story aside, however, there are still any number of gay narrative points that can be explored without explicit romance. Or hell, maybe someone's just writing a regular adventure story with gay romance that isn't a main focus, the tag would be relevant there because it's an adventure story rather than a BL story.
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On top of that, there's the fact that the whole point of tags is to help people either find or avoid particular topics when they want to. I can see readers wanting to find a story with gay themes. I also know for a fact that there are readers out there who'd like to avoid reading about gay themes, so a tag seems pretty justified on those grounds. I mean, heck, if we have a tag for futanari, having a tag for baseline homosexuality doesn't exactly seem too far.
From experience, people are probably putting it in the title just to avoid having people wandering in, reading three chapters, realizing it's a gay story, and getting angry, which happens surprisingly often. Still, tho, good to know it's a listed genre.
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YuriDoggo
Angery Doggo >ᴗ<
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A lot of people that would be uncomfortable with gay protagonists will filter out Boy's Love, while those that aren't won't. Those that are looking for it will select Boy's Love as a genre they want to read. If it explores developing sexuality in a homosexual direction, it does seem that Boy's Love fits to some extent.
Sure, to some extent, but that kinda just means that the entire homosexual experience is boiled down to a single tag. Sure, there are some people, like you say, who wouldn't use it. There are some that would, though. So, if it is of zero cost to some, and a potential positive to others, then it's still a good idea.
Leaving all that aside, though, there's also the fact that boy's love really doesn't fit as a descriptor for the specific story you're talking about. This is a story about how an adolescent boy reacts to the trauma of being raped. That's not exactly a scenario covered by boys' love, which is specifically about romantic homosexual relationships. Frankly, if I tagged that story as BL, it'd probably just lure some people in looking for a gay romance and getting, well, molestation.
Leaving all that aside, though, there's also the fact that boy's love really doesn't fit as a descriptor for the specific story you're talking about. This is a story about how an adolescent boy reacts to the trauma of being raped. That's not exactly a scenario covered by boys' love, which is specifically about romantic homosexual relationships. Frankly, if I tagged that story as BL, it'd probably just lure some people in looking for a gay romance and getting, well, molestation.
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The problem is if there are too many tags, it'll make it harder for readers to find what they want to read. It'll just be one huge mess. I'm limiting tags at the moment so I'll have to reject this request for now. Sorry.
Moonpearl
The Yuri Empress
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You could try using the "shounen-ai subplot" tag, which is for when the gay romance isn't focused on enough to be counted as BL.
I feel like the "psychological" and "rape" tags will probably matter a lot more on your story, though. It's much more make-or-break.
The tags were imported from Novel Updates and are originally for categorising translated Asian novels. There probably isn't any novel there with a gay protagonist that isn't BL, or at least not enough to warrant a tag for it.
But there are a lot of different types of smut, so the porn tags are helpful. Plus there's lots of erotica here too.