There is yaoi everywhere for those with eyes to see...

[autumninpluto]

I'm playing Persona 5 right now, and like... not to be yaoipilled as fuck, but–

I'm on Rank 4 of Akechi's confidant (I hate saying that honestly; I'm more used to saying "social link", so I'll call it that) and I'm already sold.

This is really dumb of me, by the way, but I can't stop thinking about a thread my mutual made on Bluesky a few days ago about how some people have been saying ShuAke can't be a thing because it makes no canonical sense.

Hence the journal entry title, "There is yaoi everywhere for those with eyes to see..."

First of all, I think people who say "xyz ship can't be a thing because it's not supported in canon" are kind of insufferable.

"It's my opinion—" I don't care. Opinions can still be horseshit. And it's not about saying, "Everyone should ship [insert ship of choice]", but I don't like the "canon" argument being used to discredit ships as a whole because that's very narrow-minded.

Canonical interactions aren't the only basis for what makes a good ship—there's also things like, shared backstories, character dynamics whether explored or not, contrasting beliefs... characters, at least in decently written stories, are more than just pieces on the plot chess board. They have little facts about them that don't really serve the overall plot but make for a good springboard for the imagination.

And this is coming from me, whose ships are most likely the most popular ones in fandom, ergo the ones with the most "canonical evidence."

It's okay to not have a preference for something or to think it's unlikely, but I promise you, treating canon as the Bible is very restrictive. Trampling on other people's fun because you're a huge canon/ship snob is also just counterproductive, and frankly, miserable.

This is for a different fandom, but I saw someone who said, "I can't ship something unless it's canon." They were saying that for an M/F shounen anime ship that's already implied. But because there is no "Word of God", they feel as if their hands are tied and they can't fully appreciate it. That's just real sad, bro. Where's your whimsy.

In fact, I have great respect for rare pair shippers. These people are seeing things I'm not, and even if there is literally nothing there, they're still having fun and there's nothing better than that.

Now, to go back to the topic of ShuAke—I'm only past the 3rd castle at this point, so no spoilers please—but for ShuAke in particular, enemies-to-lovers is a famous trope, and so is the concept of "doomed yaoi".

The MC and Akechi are introduced as having opposing beliefs, and given how... strongly Akechi feels about the Phantom Thieves, and how tense some responses to his initial Social Link conversations can be, it doesn't take much to see that, if Akechi were to find out his trusted friend is the leader of the Phantom Thieves, there is going to be, at the very minimum, some dissonance. Instant angst material, right there.

I'm on Rank 4 but I say "trusted" because, well, I know how Persona games tend to go and of course deepening one's relationships is a given. At this point, I don't know how exactly their relationship unfolds. Persona 5 is a relatively old game by now, and while I've actually remained unspoiled for the most part, there is only so much I can infer from the ShuAke art/Akechi memes I've seen floating around cyberspace.

We also have Joker's troubled past and inherent distrust of authority figures due to being screwed over, feeling like he doesn't have a place in the world until he finds his "home" in the Phantom Thieves, versus Akechi's growing popularity and the respect he receives for his competence; he is well-liked, until you see that, deep down, he is actually lonely. He lives alone, has very few friends (makes a point to say Joker's the only one he's ever invited with him to his favorite jazz bar—though the truth of this statement is unverified at this point in my progress), and is only fawned over because of what he is, not who he is. A misfit with the power of friendship vs. a straight-laced loner—yet another compelling dynamic.

I'm not in the position to go all ship manifesto on here, but just this alone is already compelling for where I am in the story.

It honestly breaks my heart that Akechi is not a romance option. My opinion remains the same, regardless if his Social Link story or character arc goes down a path I don't like. I need Atlus to get with the damn program. If Intelligent Systems can do it, so can Atlus.

For all the progression Persona games have on social commentary, it's lacking in the gender department. (Do not get me started on Persona 4, by the way.)

Even in P5, we still have the flamboyant drag queen trope as a semi-recurring gag in Shinjuku. It's like Atlus only knows ONE flavor of gay men and that's it.

Putting so much gay subtext into two male characters and not having an option to romance them, to the point where a lot of people ask about it online which means there is a very visible gap, is... not the vibe.

I realize I'm self-censoring myself because I don't want to just start arbitrarily calling things "homophobic", but it does feel rather homophobic.

But if Atlus can just grow some balls and put a gay romance option where it makes the more sense to have it than not, we'd all be better for it, and then maybe canon ship purists can stop complaining about the legitimacy of their potential romantic relationship.

---

Final note: While writing this entry, I made the mistake of clicking into the "fujoshi" tag on Tumblr. The amount of misinformed vitriol people have is unreal, lol.

Comments

[autumninpluto simmy]

It's also a problem in 3 and 4, unfortunately! A Ryuji romance option would have made so much sense, too...

Just to correct you though, FE3H only has a limited number of same-sex romance options, with female!Byleth having more wlw options than male!Byleth. In fact, upon launch, male!Byleth only had one gay romance option which was Linhardt (who looks androgynous himself!) Two more male romance options were added in the DLC.

This is in contrast to female!Byleth who can S-rank all of the lords, including Edelgard. She can also romance some other female units like Mercedes and Dorothea. Some of the other playable units also have same-sex paired endings together, though the romance aspect is ambiguous even though they literally end up together...

But yeah, the inclusivity there when it comes to gender is far from what Persona has, which is a shame :')

[jajalala JajaLala]

Omg lol I almost always played as F!Byleth so I didn't realize that M!Byleth had so many more restrictions!! I do remember pairing same-sex units up often led to ambiguous/unexpected endings (I remember shipping Ignatz and Raphael, and being excited to get their special ending card... and then it turns out one of them married the other's sister!!), but a few were more explicit. Specifically I'm thinking of Catherine/Shamir's A+ support saying that same-sex marriage is a thing in Dagba, and Shamir suggesting they go there in a pretty proposal-esque way.

Even if the whole game doesn't give total sexuality flexibility for all characters, having that small acknowledgement (which also serves as worldbuilding suggesting Fodlan's homophobic culture is part of why there's not as much same-sex attraction freely expressed, but that other cultures in the world are more permissive of it) goes a long way towards making it feel more inclusive/acknowledging. Meanwhile Persona 5 just Does Not Touch any of that potential whatsoever :'(. Maybe I'd feel like Persona 5 was less rude if they didn't make it so literally every single woman (including absurd/unrealistic options) was romanceable... it makes the lack of any male options feel particularly stark.

[autumninpluto simmy]

Oh that Ignatz/Raphael one was CRIMINAL, thank you for reminding me about that because that was just the biggest wtf to me. The Catherine/Shamir one was good! I remember someone saying Shamir is canonically bi but she doesn't have an S-rank with fem!Byleth because she's simply not her type (very opposite from Catherine's personality lol).

What I had in mind was the Dimitri/Felix ending where it said:

Their lifelong bond grew so strong over time that, when Dimitri finally passed, it is said that Felix's grief was more potent even than the queen's.

What queen. Why are we bringing up queens here. Huhhh.

Strangely enough, those small reflections of "homophobia" feel more like the writers' own biases seeping through rather than the intention of the story/worldbuilding. For some reason you can also S-rank Rhea, and the tenets of the Church of Seiros never really explicitly say "don't be gay". I think a lot of people (me included) see bits and pieces of Catholicism in 3H's religion and think it's a mirror image when it's not.

For P5, I honestly didn't mind the abundance of female romance options. I realize that sounds problematic (and you're free to think it is), but part of the fun (for me) is seeing how characters react to something that is fundamentally "wrong" (e.g. Kawakami very clearly acknowledging their age gap/power imbalance, but doing it anyway; complications w/ Futaba's relationship as the game pushes the "we're basically siblings" connection + the fact that he's literally living under Sojiro's roof) and experiencing it through the lens of fiction. Also I'm just trying to get every single romance option in one save so I can get beat up on Valentine's lmao.

And as you said, the lack of male romance options becomes very telling of what the game's writers are willing to explore: a het teacher/student or adult/minor relationship (still baffles the mind that there are 4 adult choices) is somehow more preferrable than an mlm relationship between two students.

This is going to sound like a tinfoil hat moment, but I have to wonder though whether that was intentional: I think they very much intended to queerbait using ShuAke especially in Royal (AkiRyu is also another one), but a lot of thriving fandoms are built on the back of mlm fanfiction writers for ships that are not canon. The beauty is in the speculation. If there was a way ShuAke could be canon via a social link, I wonder if the interest for it would be as big as it is now, and whether P5 would still be as popular many years down the road than it is today.

[jajalala JajaLala]

Ahaha omg I forgot Felix/Dimitri's card, I vaguely recall getting it and my siblings next to me being like "??? So was Dmitri in a lavender/political marriage...?"

That's fair that the "canonical explanation" for homophobia IS a reflection of what's comfortable to the creators... I would love to say that they gave F!Byleth so many options bc they really loved and appreciated WLW, but really I can almost guarantee they crafted they game with Men in mind and assumed that if there were any men who wanted to play as F!Byleth they would want to still be able to romance several women options.

Lol for P5 I'll say the wider options are not my personal cup of tea (and fortunately, bc there are so many options I don't have to choose any of the ones I dislike) but like u said it's mostly annoying to see that the developers will accommodate all of those somewhat taboo female options and yet BLATANTLY exclude the "taboo" of homosexuality.

I wish I knew the culture/language better to get a sense of the queerbaiting angle, but I find it totally plausible. I don't know if the P5 developers would ever say it out loud, but I know other games have been deliberate in capitalizing on BL subcultures (I've heard Ace Attorney began pushing to appeal more to BL after they saw it grew popular with those communities, though they remain on the more subtle side as they're clearly not planning to canonize a relationship there). The idea of putting two men in such emotional proximity and yet having a tragic ending... it's definitely ripe for BL lovers to write/draw fix-its.

[autumninpluto simmy]

Seeing it as a lavender/political marriage is probably better for my mental health, let's go with that lmao xD

Definitely, I do remember some discussions of how wlw is more "palatable" in mainstream media, probably something to do with how women are seen as more pure? You're also right that it was probably done with the male gaze/male homophobia in mind.

Oh wow, I didn't know that about Ace Attorney. I've played a fair bit before, but I probably didn't get to the bit where they started pushing the envelope a bit more, so to say. Most non-explicitly BL works will always want to toe the line between non-canon and canon so they can pander to both audiences as much as possible, and (in my pessimistic opinion) have those audiences fight so they can continue to be relevant for years to come. (Can you tell I'm so tired of the BakuDeku / IzuOcha fighting? Lmao.)

[autumninpluto simmy]

I'm SO sorry for the long-ass response by the way!! I just have a lot of thoughts about this oof

[jajalala JajaLala]

Lol no need to apologize--I'm a yapper too, that's why I'm on DreamWidth which allows long responses XD