GL in Korea and few other things

*DISCLAIMER: what you are about to read is a personal view.*

I am not sure how many people are aware of gl.

Of course, it might be natural to think that if there is boyXboy then there must be one for girlXgirl, but it wasn’t the case for me. I learned about girlXgirl few years after I learned about bl’s existence. I was surfing through Youtube and, I don’t know how but, I was watching one of old gl anime. It was about a girl who transferred to a all girl boarding school and falling in love with a capable female lead. It was interesting but, at the same time, not very good.

Thinking back, I might have developed dislike for the genre because of what I saw in the Youtube video. It is very shallow of me to dismiss a genre after one try but I was younger at the time and was not curious enough to look up more materials from the genre. That being said, there were two things I saw in the anime that I did not like. First, the depiction of female body in the video was not very naturalistic. I am not pointing out the quality of the production. In fact, the quality was not bad. The movement of the characters were well depicted and I also liked the colors used in the anime. The problem was with the characters’ body proportion. All female students seemed to have huge breasts, and big butts.

Maybe males wouldn’t like bl for the same reason, but what I saw in the video was not real. They were not what I was used to and they were certainly far from the truth. It might depends on preference difference, but I did not think that a person with that big of a breast can carry out day to day task without difficulties.

Second, how the characters acts in the video was also very different from how I felt about myself and about my other female friends. The characters acted as if all they cared about was to be loved. It was as if the video was made up from someone else’s fantasy about woman in general. It was not at all pleasing to watch unlike some of my other romance anime. I blame this on the fact on lack of character development and establishment of setting.

Since my first encounter with gl, I’ve started to notice the pattern of anything boy related novels or mangas being more popular than girl’s. I already knew that female characters in stories tend to be used as a love interest that a main character ‘get’ at the end of their adventure. Most of the female characters are viewed in romantic way or sexual way. Of course, this happened long time ago and is slowly changing…or is it? I also noticed that when a female character have a superior power over a male character, the powers are either magical or spiritual and not necessarily physical. There are exceptions to this but what I am focusing on right now is speaking in general. Have you heard of Bechdel test? This test requires you to ask series of questions to determine if the film or movie that you are watching contains message of gender equality. People have came up with different set of questions to expend the test to determine racism as well. This test is not perfect and it is true that some good feminist films doesn’t match the category of the test.

What I would like to bring your attention to is not the identities of female characters in films, movies, or anime. What I would like to point out, however, is that there are lack of awareness for proper female representation relating to female identity.

Just like there is bl, there is gl. Just like there are drag queens, there are drag kings. And just like there is Jesus, there is … Oh, I don’t know this part. There are pagan goddesses but I can’t think of one woman messenger.

Anyway, back to explaining the lack of awareness for proper female representation. Because we do not care or know (maybe unpopular), gl and drag king markets (anything alike) are smaller compared to their male counter parts. When I wish to go through the list of gl books to read, there aren’t many wide range of books to choose from in Korea. This is not the case for US, however. There are many popular books out in the public and book communities are aware of such publications, so they are easier to buy and appreciate.

To bring in a few examples we have:

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11486.The_Color_Purple

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8913370-fingersmith?ac=1&from_search=true

Second Nature by Jae

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7431066-second-nature?ac=1&from_search=true

Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25164304-of-fire-and-stars?ac=1&from_search=true

Since I’ve mentioned a gl books in English, here are some Korean books that I would like to get my hands on (just for fun):

 그림자 공주 by 콩양 (shadow Princess by Kong-Yang)

Plot: So-Ye who is an actress is uncomfortable facing her fellow actress’s wishful eyes. As she works together with the other actress, So-Ye experiences confusion and fondness. What is the truth behind those wishful eyes?

카데바 소셜 클럽 by 윤차이 (Cadaver soCial Club by Yun Cha-ii)

Plot: “If you like corpses so much, why don’t you establish a cadaver social club?!” To this comment, Bing-Ben who lives in London agrees and creates her own social club. This novel is about examiner named Bing-Ben’s and a white bunny assistant’s adventurous detective story set in late nineteenth century.

호랑이의 변론 by 범 (Defense of a Tiger by Bum)

Plot: A new writer ‘Bum’ became famous for his beautiful writing style. Many writers, wishing to see him in person, invites the writer for a night entertainment. However, instead of spending time in the meeting with other writers, ‘Bum’ a.k.a Jung-Hwa spends her time with Young-Seon who works in the red light district as a gisaeng (Korean version of geisha).

Most of these books are written recently and none of them are popular among general public. There are long ways to go and not many company that are willing to print these books. I am willing to expose myself to other influences to find my female identity. Now that I think about it, the title of this post might need to change to ‘female identity in fictional media’.

If you do not have the set of idea about your female identity then it is likely that you might fantasize about being a male and have a bl romance of your own. There is nothing wrong with that, but what I worry about in that case is lack of solidarity in your resolve. People need experience not because it makes them superior to other people but because the experience allows people to make a informed decision. If we don’t even try to find out about different choices to our identities, how can we be sure the choices we make are the best one? I do know about a boy who transformed into a girl very early in her life, but there are always exceptions to general standards.

Uhm… I might have went off tangent and confused some people, but thank you for reading. I hope you can walk away with some urgency to find your own proper female representation in fictional or non fictional writings or media. We are what we eat and I think it is also true that we think like what we read, so let’s make our choices with some awareness.

I am terribly sorry, I sound like know it all. In truth, I just think a lot about useless things. I hope you forgive my unorganized thoughts above.