How to Write a Good Fanfic

10.1.1 - Bury Your Gays

I'm going to discuss the topic of Bury Your Gays.

There was something which bothered me back in 2016 when Bury Your Gays was made such a big deal because a character in The 100 died. The impression I was left with was that people were arguing any death of an LGBT character was a bad thing and should thus be avoided which in turn is a continuation of LGBT characters being treated as magically special as nothing bad is allowed to happen to them and only good things can happen to them.

Except that's NOT what the trope is about, but I founnd myself questioning if Lexa actually counts as an example. We're talking a series I quickly stopped watching because some of my favorite characters died. To quote TV Tropes, "it is the presentation of deaths of LGBT characters where these characters are nominally able to be viewed as more expendable than their heteronormative counterparts." Something important was missing from the conversation.

And then came The Dragon Prince where second season has certain people claiming they pulled the Bury Your Gays trope, but did they? This is the Ask The Tropers page "Edit war on The Dragon Prince" which occurred on February 20th, 2019. Someone attempted editing The Dragon Prince page to claim that the trope happened, but that there was backlash, yet...

The user rjd1922 says, "Bury Your Gays has a whole Repair Shop thread to clear up that it's explicitly not about every instance of gay characters dying." They also said, "From a Google search, internet sources seem to be praising the queens, and "such how the Queens could have easily been a King and Queen in a heterosexual and heteronormative couple" seems ridiculous; people would rather have less LGBT representation than lesbians who died heroically?"

What is unfortunately left out of the conversation regarding The 100 and I think people need to start talking about is that – to quote TV Tropes – "it is widely agreed to be a straight example because of the circumstances of her death scene" where "Lexa is accidentally killed by a bullet meant for her love interest, Clarke, a short time after the reconciled and consummated their relationship." The issue had nothing to do with the fact she died, but because this isn't brought up it's gotten lost.

There are definitely people complaining that the show pulled a Bury Your Gays to the point some are complaining because articles don't bring up the fact the trope was used – namely because it wasn't. They're also complaining that two characters who showed up for only a small handful of episodes weren't fleshed out when in reality they were, and some are downplaying their role within the narrative.

Yet did they really pay attention?

Yes, their royal garb is very similar in style, but they have different hair and eye colors, wear their hair in different styles. One has a distinct scar on her face, but the color of their makeup they wear is different, and there are some differences to their royal garb, but the way they each carry their sword is different. There's a difference in the way their eyebrows are shaped.

It's gone over some people's heads that Neha was the one doing most of the talking or the fact Annika didn't really speak up – from what I can remember of my first time viewing the series – until she gave the ring to King Harrow. Aanya is likely related to her somehow, but it is Annika's blood line which is revered in her kingdom.

It's gone over some people's heads that Duren is most likely a matriarchal society instead of a patriarchal society, but for two strong female warrior queens who are also to approach a male ruler to help their people says a lot.

It's gone over some people's heads that one of the reasons they choose to sacrifice themselves when they did came down to regaining some of their honor – and by turn their people's honor - back in the same manner a male ruler would have done in said situation where they were the ruler in debt to another.

It's gone over some people's heads that we knew they would die before we knew they were LGBT characters, but would we really rather have had that death occur off screen?

It's gone over some people's heads that their daughter didn't let their deaths be used as a tool against her meaning she grew into the young queen they would be proud of.

It's gone over some people's heads that they are celebrated figures for being strong rulers, strong mothers and strong warriors, but there is a memorial built for them and their great deed.

It's gone over some people's heads that it wasn't just LGBT characters who died that day.

They died – well, how fans of The 100 wanted Lexa to go out.

Why is this important?

I'll start off by saying I am tired of people labeling something as Bury Your Gays simply because an LGBT character dies. I get the fact people are tired of seeing LGBT characters die in the series they watch or read, but I also think these people really need to spread their wings a bit more.

People are so focused on that list of dead LGBT characters they've not bothered looking at the ones which have lived. Instead, they place the blame squarely on the creators of the show for the fact they keep seeing LGBT characters die, yet the fix seems to be "don't let any die", yet this is unrealistic. LGBT characters shouldn't be given a pass simply just because they're LGBT, but there's also this idea that "it would have been better had they not died".

If we go back to Dragon Prince, the story wouldn't have worked had they not died. More importantly, it wouldn't have had the same impact. They didn't die because they weren't important, but instead they died because they were important. They didn't die because they were gay, or because they were some character where that was the only fate they could have.

But, Bury Your Gays is about "gay characters being disproportionately killed off..."

Except it's not. That's changing the definition, but the whole disproportionate – what is disproportionate? Nobody has quantified that, The reason people are calling it disproportionate is because someone came up with a long list, yet didn't compare said list to anything, but what I see people arguing is "no more LGBT deaths period" and that "all LGBT characters should have a happy ending".

That's bad writing, but what's going to end up happening is people are going to stop creating LGBT characters again because people are going to feel as if they can't do anything with them. More importantly, people need to separate being upset over character death – which is excepted – over being upset over the circumstances of said characters death.

More importantly, we have people saying "killing off an LGBT character is homophobic" and "not giving an LGBT character a happy ending is homophobic" when it's not. They're right in saying the trope is homophobic, but they're the same people who shove every LGBT death under the trope and expect everyone to be sympathetic towards them.

Seriously, stop acting like every single LGBT character gets killed off and absolutely no LGBT character gets a happy ending, but stop acting like LGBT characters should get special treatment.

What does this have to do with fandom?

Well, I've not seen the trope really in fanfiction. I'm not saying gay characters haven't been killed off in fanfiction, but most live. Yet, the influx of complaints regarding Bury Your Gay tropes is making people afraid to write such stories particularly since there is this major misconception that it means to kill any gay character.

The reason we should be cautious about killing off an LGBT character actually has nothing to do with the prevalence of the trope – which people are mislabeling anything as now – but has everything to do with the fact we should handle any character death with care. Which, is in itself another sensitive subject matter.