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If you truly believe that Byler was queerbaited for literally five seasons, then I'm begging people to go to media literacy classes. I will literally get on my KNEES and beg, because did we watch the same thing? As a bisexual woman who watched the show with my fiancé's queer sibling who experienced a love/infatuation similar to Will's infatuation with Mike, there was zero mutual romantic interest and feelings between Will and Mike. The only person who even felt those feelings was Will himself. Mike was NEVER romantically attracted to Will.
In order for queerbaiting to be a thing, it has to be a marketing tactic where creators hint at or suggest LGBTQ+ romance or themes to attract a queer audience for profit or publicity, without ever delivering actual queer representation. For example, queerbaiting involves them actually showing mutual romantic feelings and attraction in the show and then the creators fully denying the audience of the relationship that they had been hinting at for years. One of the two main examples being Johnlock (Sherlock Holmes and John Watson) and Destiel (Dean Winchester and Castiel).
Destiel is really the only pairing that I know enough about. For example, Castiel confesses to being in love with Dean. This was a romantic confession that is still denied by the creators of the show, even though they have WRITTEN the actually romantic relationship within to the show.
So, if you truly believe that the Duffer Brothers queerbaited us for five seasons without showing ANY romantic relationship between Will and Mike, I'm begging you to do more research on what queerbaiting is and learning about media literacy. We lost the plot, people!!!
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. I love y'all, truly, but y'all genuinely are hurting my head with this.
