Your New Favourite Youtubers Part 3

[sqbr]

Even more queer youtube essays! I gave up on a lot of these, which is definitely more a function of having seen so many and wanting to be Done than a sign of the quality actually dropping.

BUT NOW I AM DONE. Watching (parts of) all these videos was a worthwhile experience, and I did actually find some new youtubers I like, but I am still glad to be finished.

Part 1

Part 2

 

"SHE'S THE MAN" is More Homophobic and Sexist Than I Realized… Nick DiRamio: Fine, I guess. Made some valid points but I just didn’t find it very interesting.

I Was Wrong About Queerbaiting Sarah Z: I quite liked a lot of what she had to say but overall it was typical SarahZ: her takes are mixture of good, adequate but shallow, and bad. Specifically, she lumps Kids Today With Their MicroIdentity Flags with people who think you have to be exactly one of L, G, B, or T, and I’m not saying there’s no crossover, but overall those are diametrically opposed approaches to queerness and I suspect that the most relevant thing they have in common is that SarahZ doesn’t jive with them. Like she shows a screenshot of a unique flag and terms for “black men and masculine non binary people who love men” and then follows it up with one saying non binary people don’t exist: those are clearly not the same philosophy!

Liberation vs Assimilation in Queer Cinema Rowan Ellis: This seems to have been removed from the list since I cut and pasted the links.

Vampires as a Trans Allegory Maven of the Eventide: Afaict a discussion of how vampirism is used as a flawed metaphor for being trans in the book Let The Right One In and it’s adaptations. The analysis seemed basically ok, but it’s not a topic I find inherently interesting, and the creator has an affected “vampire” persona I found grating so I didn’t get far.

Race-baiting, queer-baiting, colorism, featurism, and performative diversity | Khadija Mbowe A good discussion of season 1 of Bridgerton by a dark-skinned black queer person who liked it but thought it had a lot of flaws. I kept being recommended this video in the context of attitudes towards romance and representation I dislike, but turns out the video itself is fine. I was worried the term “race-baiting” implied a lens similar to “queer-baiting” (which I dislike for all the reasons SarahZ so eloquently just described lol) but the creator defines “race-baiting” as “claiming to address racial issues, but not following through.” which… yeah, that’s Bridgerton.

Drake & The Rise of ‘Sassy’ Black Men Herby Revolus: A really interesting general discussion of the expectations around being, or being forced to be, a “Black man”, from the perspective of a Black amab non-binary person. There were some things that rubbed me the wrong way, but I have heard so little from this kind of perspective that like… I was plausibly missing something, and regardless it’s just good to hear from unfamiliar perspectives.

Hunger Hurts: Cannibals and Why We're Obsessed with Them Lola Sebastian: Starts with a mostly good discussion of the cultural significance of Twilight. She read them as a child and I think over-states their influence since I remember many of those trends existing before Twilight. But then, much worse from my perspective, she moves onto ZOMBIES and NOPE. Also I got the impression that she doesn’t like zombies so is inclined to discount the genre more but I didn’t get far enough in to really judge.

Is Alien a Queer Text? | Lambert’s Gender max teeth: Gender in Alien and Aliens, specifically in the context of recently a released background image which reveals that the character Lambert was changed from male to female as a baby. I have never seen any Alien movies but have this instinctive sense I might not actually agree with this person’s interpretation, but it was still interesting.

The indulging gayness of Danmei Kameno -o: Well intentioned and enthusiastic but flawed celebration of Chinese m/m romance by an American gay man. As someone who is already a fan of the genre, it was a mix of things I already know and things I disagree with (eg this guy clearly has no idea about the ethnic tensions within China), and eventually the “queer people and women are two separate groups” attitude I was already annoyed about from his last video got too much for me and I stopped. Still, if you’re curious about Chinese m/m and want an enthusiastic sales pitch full of illustrative clips you could do worse.

CATS & The Weird Mind of TS Eliot | An Analysis Maggie Mae Fish: Digs into T.S. Elliot’s fascist politics and how they show up even in the children’s poems that formed the basis for CATS, as well as the historical context and how the musical and movie differ and do their own different thing. Well made for what it is, and I learned some things even from the bit I watched, but has a bit of a Buckle Up Twitter smug snarky didactic tone I found annoying, and my patience is wearing thin at this point so I stopped.

Anne Heche: When Community Doesn't Show Up Princess Weekes: About the extreme biphobic (and ableist, though that’s less of a focus) backlash Anne Heche experienced, and about biphobia in general. Pretty good, but a depressing topic.

Asexual Manga and their powerful visbility Kameno -o: A general celebration of asexuality and aromanticism, and recs for manga and a J-drama which handle them well. Like all of his other videos, this is very well intentioned and enthusiastic but inadvertently binarist. But since gender isn’t as relevant to discussions of asexuality and this is a less commonly discussed topic I still overall really enjoyed it.

alt-right aesthetics & the origins of art history drapetomania: The introduction to the other drapetomania art history video earlier in the list. Fine for what it is, but doesn’t really make sense as a stand-alone and would have been better to watch before the other one.

Are They Gay? - Merlin and Arthur (Merthur) Alexander Avila: Light hearted look at the relationship between Merlin and Arthur, apparently made when the creator was a teen. I was 99% sure this wouldn’t be my sort of thing, so only gave it like a minute to win me over and it did not.

Are They Gay? - Sherlock Holmes and John Watson (Johnlock) Alexander Avila: See above.

Comments

[anghraine]

I really enjoyed reading these write-ups!

[sqbr]

I'm glad to hear it!