#especially in contrast to the classic 'predatory-camp-gay-disney-villain' style zemo

[amarriageoftrueminds]

maybe it's bc I grew up seeing (and can still see from the outside) how cis men play/joke/fake gayness as a display of domination but yet all somehow knew to avoid actual gayness like the plague (bc the it's so real how cishets manage to know what we are b4 we ourselves do) but I see that exact same "locker room" idea of playing gayness for laughs (usually by violating of sexual boundaries) + treating actual gay love like an unmentionable replicated by the cishets making media

like, look at marvel's iron man thor and gotg movies littered with writing that might nominally be considered "gay" jokes abt men being placed in sexual situations each other (again, often by laughing at the idea of sexual assault/nonconsensual sexualization) but cishet norms don't consider this gay in any real sense. it's the "accepted" way of portraying "gayness" in a way that signals to the audience that it's there to poke fun at the characters and knock 'em down a peg for comedy

This is part of why I rolled my eyes at ppl claiming queerbait at tfatws (completely not knowing what the bait part of the word means). Those "gay" moments in that show were the most classical homophobic dudebro locker room comedy that I've grown to recognize as an extension of the homophobic rough housing culture growing up among cishet boys. Every "moment" was just a Gunn-esque laugh at the male characters being degraded by being put in a position that seems gay against their consent, either by literally falling/rolling into it, by purposeful taunting by a malicious (and shoehorned) character, or literally by the force of the state(state as in governing body). it's meant to be funny in that the cishet culture the comedy comes from dictates that violating men's boundaries with a superficially "homo" act is a way to enforce hierarchy within the group. the jokes come from homophobia (which is why the creators were baffled at the idea of shipping in that show, they recognize the difference between real gayness and their homophobic lockerroom-culture jokes)

This is also why we never see anything even remotely like that between Bucky and Steve, they have genuine love for one another, the same cishet "gay" rough housing culture recognizes that between them it wouldn't be a joke, it'd be actually gay, so they avoided it like the plague. That's why we hardly ever see Bucky and Steve's canon platonic friendship portrayed, it holds actual love for one another that can't be played off by stoicism or homophobic lockerroom-style comedy. They can't do Gunnisms to make it a haha hehe, so the marvel franchise opts to not show the best friends inseparable from playground to battlefield as actual friends. Actual factual, sincere, earnest friendship between men is considered to approximate to gayness by comic book dudebro culture, so they don't show it and then blame gay ppl for "ruining" the platonic make friendships that they were too scared to show because anything more than hooking up with a bunch of interchanging women and meeting up one a year at a bar to talk about the women they've hooked up with is considered to gay by cishet men who still haven't grown out of that homophobic (& misogynistic) locker room culture.

Anon you're so right, and this is also how Tony can be cracking jokes about holding Rhodey's dick in the Avengers movie and no one in the execs room has a gay panic about needing to separate them!

Given that it also had Sharon mocking Bucky for being 'Mr America' tfatws especially seemed to revel in these nasty little homophobic digs. 😥

#long post #tfawts critical #stucky meta #mcu critical #mcu meta #steve meta #bucky meta #toAyourQ #dat's me #hey nonny #stucky #bucky barnes #written like a supernatural episode #it's like they tried to head off shipping sam/bucky at the pass... #...by making them do the thinly-veiled homophobia dudebro cliches #especially in contrast to the classic 'predatory-camp-gay-disney-villain' style zemo #who's all about the deep emotional talks and this is framed as intrusive and creepy and hannibal lectery #also there was that weird mackie quote... #where it seemed like he was being jockeyed into saying sth critical of gay shipping and then had to back-pedal.. #and sth similar from sebstan more recently?? 🤔 #ftatws onward really seems like a cack-handed attempt to de-gay bucky in particular... #just in time to shove him up against a bunch of women in thunderbolts presumably?? 😞 #meta #steve rogers #tl;dr: they're so concerned with avoiding seeming gay they accidentally make everything seem hella gay #like it comes full circle back around to gay... #where steve and bucky's very avoidance of everything connoting typical male friendship shown everywhere else... #ends up just emphasising how very much NOT JUST FRIENDS they are #is it just me?? #anon is SO SO fucking right