Re-watching Game of Thrones for no reason and struck by the very 21st-century-Americanness of the "evidence" brought up in Loras Tyrell's trial to prove that he's gay:
- He was very emotional after Renly died
- His squire knows about a birthmark in an intimate location
And I'm just begging these writers to read, like, anything about the way men talked about and touched each other pre ~1960s! The Marlboro Man act where straight dudes can't hold hands or say "I love you" to their friends is so excruciatingly modern they might as well say "I know he's gay because I read it on his blog!"
Obviously a man would grieve passionately after a close friend dies! Obviously a squire helps his knight dress! The slice of history where "it's gay for one man to have seen another naked" makes any sense is so narrow you guys!
Heck, the slice where "being gay" is a question of identity and emotion, and not just "well, did he commit the Sin Of Sodom or not" isn't much wider. Being anxious that someone merely feels the wrong way about other men is the same kind of extremely modern insecurity that led to Jorah Mormont wearing trousers under his kilt.
(In-story Loras is being set up for political reasons and no one involved actually cares about his sexuality, but nonetheless. These still shouldn't be accusations that occur to them.)
(And yes, this isn't meant to be Earth history and they aren't Christians, but still. If you want a medieval-ish vibe and a sense of a fascinatingly foreign culture, don't give them the precise sexual mores of my ninth grade locker room.)
And I guess the reason this bothers me is that it's treating these concepts as natural. Like of course any place and time will recognize that two men bathing together are a bit [offensive hand gesture]. And that's not just factually wrong but annoyingly normalizing. The rules imposed on late-20th and early-21st century Western men to prove they're not even a little gay are such a weird little moment in history. It's, if not consciously homophobic, disappointing to see them thoughtlessly applied to fantasy.
