Talk:Pets and the LGBTQ community/Archive 1

Archive 1

Source for otter

• https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/05/30/what-is-an-otter-the-gay-tribe-for-lean-guys-with-a-bit-of-scruff/

---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:20, 19 April 2022 (UTC)

Source for bear

• https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/05/18/what-is-a-bear-the-gay-tribe-for-big-hairy-hunky-men/

---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:21, 19 April 2022 (UTC)

Unicorn

This source is helpful re: unicorn, if we're to discuss more than just the slang term to describe some bisexual people:

• https://www.mic.com/life/how-did-unicorns-get-so-gay-investigation-23625803

---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:24, 19 April 2022 (UTC)

More sources:

• https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/oct/15/return-of-the-unicorn-the-magical-beast-of-our-times
• https://www.gaystarnews.com/article/evidence-unicorns-are-queer-icons/
• https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2017/10/176013/dirty-word-bisexual-slang-erasure

---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:26, 19 April 2022 (UTC)

Makes sense to have this section there because the LGBT symbols page only seems to have one line on it: "Unicorns have become a symbol of LGBT culture due to earlier associations between the animal and rainbows being extended to the rainbow flag created in 1978 by Gilbert Baker" (it then provides a source). Historyday01 (talk) 12:58, 21 April 2022 (UTC)

Merge revert

@Reywas92: I see you merged content to List of LGBT slang terms. I wish you would start discussions before taking such actions. I understand why you decided to merge, however, this page is not intended to only cover slang terms. If you look at the Unicorn sources above, you'll also see how animals are related to LGBT culture outside slang terms. I'd like time to expand this entry, but if you feel strongly that this content is an inappropriate content fork at this time, I'm open to moving the page to draft space. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:17, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Discussion is at Talk:List_of_LGBT_slang_terms#Proposed_merge_of_Animals_in_LGBT_culture_into_List_of_LGBT_slang_terms. Every item on this list is slang, including Unicorn, and this is not a topic that requires a separate page. I'm working on merging these two existing lists. And again, "gym rat" has literally nothing to do with LGBT culture, it's used by straight people for the same definition. Pride.com listicles are not a reliable source. Reywas92^Talk 14:27, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

I'm working to expand this entry beyond slang terms. See new Unicorns section. Please give this time to develop! ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:29, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Unicorn is also a slang term, no idea what you're talking about. Reywas92^Talk 14:31, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes, Unicorn is a slang term, but also unicorns appear in LGBT culture in other ways. See here. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:32, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

This isn't relevant. The fact that unicorns are a sort of gay icon has nothing to do with the fact that hairy men are called bears of otters. Moving to draft since this clearly isn't ready, and I will absolutely AFD if you want this page to synthesize a slang glossary and interest in animals often seen with rainbows. Reywas92^Talk 14:33, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

You literally said "I'm open to moving the page to draft space" so why tf are you reverting my move to draft space? The article is not ready. Reywas92^Talk 14:41, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Because you proposed a merge and added templates which direct readers to this page, but then moved the content into draft space. I don't think you're giving editors time to expand this entry or a reasonable opportunity to discuss merging content. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:43, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Exactly. They are assuming consensus before there is any discussion. Not sure why. Can't they just give time for the article to be developed? Historyday01 (talk) 17:26, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

"Gym rat"

User:Reywas92 removed "Gym rat" from the list. Pride.com defines a gym rat as "The gay man who spends every waking minute at the gym, talking about how he needs to go to the gym, or how he’s coming from the gym." Thoughts on inclusion? ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:28, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Removing gym bunny too. Also a generic term that has nothing to do with LGBT culture [1][2][3][4] etc etc. The fact that gay people go to the gym and can use it in addition to straight people does not make it gay slang or relevant to the rest of the list. Reywas92^Talk 14:52, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

I think that if there is another source apart from Pride.com, then it can be re-added... If Pride.com has it, I'd guess its also elsewhere too. Historyday01 (talk) 17:26, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

@Historyday01 @Reywas92 Does this help? See page 8 specifically. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 17:31, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Grouped with "Jock" too? Of course it's a subculture for some gays to be a jock or gym rat but that does NOT make this gay slang or an animal in LGBT culture – it's a subculture for straight people to be jock or gym rats too and I see no basis for inclusion here. Along with "geek" below, these are a broadly generic terms and it's ridiculous to specify this as being a gay thing. Reywas92^Talk 17:50, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting gym rats are gay. I'm suggesting we note how these terms are used in gay culture. You're right about the term also applying to straight people. Even the source says, "The reason these subcultures have been placed together is because they are terms that can also represent straight men, with the exception of the Bull." But the source also defines Bulls and says, "Gym Rats are gay men that strive to become Bulls... Their primary focus is to gain muscle and become physically larger." I'm not understanding why it would be inappropriate to add "Gym Rat" based on this. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 17:56, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

So what? Gays don't use this term in any differently from straight people either, we use it like any other English-speaking human being. This definition is wrong because it gives the false impression that a gym rat is specifically gay men, when it's not. A more accurate statement is "Gym rats are men that strive to become hunks" or "Gym rats are people that strive to be more macho." I'm not understanding why you'd need to specify that a common English term that is just part of culture at large is likewise used by LGBT people. This is just part of the absurdity of this article, because (perhaps unlike bull, bear, otter) it has nothing to do with the animal rat, rather that since 1864 rat has meant "person who frequents ___". Might as well import the rest of Category:Metaphors referring to animals into this. Reywas92^Talk 18:25, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

I dunno, sounds like you're saying "the source is wrong" and "I don't agree". I'm not going to fight for this further, just saying there are multiple sources using "gym rat" in the context of gay culture. I'll move on and let other editors decide. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 18:32, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Honestly, I think that the source is fine. Historyday01 (talk) 21:59, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Then I'll let you and others decide if this markup is worth restoring with or without this source. Thanks! ---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:59, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Sure! I don't know if the page will be around, but I'm already preparing for a possible merger of this page with other pages. Historyday01 (talk) 22:32, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Cartoon characters... shall any animals be included here?

• https://www.out.com/television/2019/5/20/25-cartoon-characters-who-should-just-come-out-already#media-gallery-media-1

Not sure if there's anything useful here. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 15:03, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Well, Spongebob has been confirmed as asexual, as noted on the History of LGBT characters in animation: 2000s#Other all-ages animations section, while Bugs Bunny and He-Man are described in on the History of LGBT characters in animation#Up to the 1990s section, while Li-Shang, 'Mulan' is also mentioned on History of LGBT characters in animation: 1990s#Animated films. I think the stuff about Elsa (a Mic article is noted) should probably be incorporated somewhere on the Disney and LGBT representation in animation page. Not sure about "Face, Nickelodeon", "Grandma Gertrude and Grandpa Phill, 'Hey Arnold!'", "Miss Grotke, 'Recess'", "Kronk, 'The Emperor's New Groove'", "Ren and Stimpy, 'Ren & Stimpy'", "Sebastian, 'The Little Mermaid'", "Splinter, 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles'", "Most characters, 'Spongebob Squarepants'" are headcanons. Additionally, Elizabeth “Betty” Deville did return in the reboot as a lesbian as noted in their entry in the List of animated series with LGBT characters: 2020–present#2021 section, while Ash and James are noted as cross-dressers on the List of cross-dressing characters in animated series page. Historyday01 (talk) 17:48, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Some of the characters you've mentioned are not animals (let's set aside humans are animals for now). I'm not opposed to adding more detail about any of these animal characters, but for now I've updated the article here based on the source shared initially in this section. Thanks! ---Another Believer _(Talk) 22:34, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Sure, its my pleasure. Historyday01 (talk) 02:06, 21 April 2022 (UTC)

Just FYI, Reywas92 removed this content. Not sure if any of these animal characters should be mentioned based on other sources. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 14:01, 21 April 2022 (UTC)

Right, right, they were the one who removed that content. The Out magazine article is ok, but other sources would probably be better because they would say more about those specific characters. And if Out is writing about it, there is no doubt that others have covered it too. Historyday01 (talk) 21:36, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Ursula, Iago, Rabbit, Scar

• https://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/news/a57833/disney-characters-who-could-be-gay/

---Another Believer _(Talk) 15:11, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Not sure about the last three, but I do remember that Ursula was based on a drag queen. A while back, I added a section in the History of LGBT characters in animation#Up to the 1990s about her, in fact, as she comes up a LOT when you look up Disney characters. Here's what I wrote:

Ursula the Sea Witch in the 1989 Disney film The Little Mermaid was inspired by Divine, a drag queen, with queer communities welcoming "her with open arms" despite that fact she was a villain. John Musker, a director of Moana, and co-director of The Little Mermaid, noted that Howard Ashman, a writer of the film, knew Devine and had one of the principal animators, Rob Menkoff, do drawings based on Devine. The other director of Moana (and a co-director of The Little Mermaid), Ron Clements, stated that it "just fit the character," while Musker called Ursula a "little mix of Divine and Joan Collins." Ashman was also, reportedly, a "big fan" of John Waters, and after the film, he got sick, as he was HIV positive, and he died from AIDS before he could accept the Academy Award for the music selection of Beauty and the Beast. Filmmaker Jeffrey Schwarz, who did a documentary on Divine, thought the film was pretty queer, while Sarah Ashman Gillespie, Ashman's sister, called the film "totally subversive." It was also revealed that earlier designs of Ursula were inspired by the singer Patti LaBelle, with Musker saying that in the early development art for the character, and Menkoff adding that they were "trying to get some of Divine's big, campy, overweight diva" into the design, which was incorporated into the final character. She was also described as "Mae West of the deep sea" and the first plus-size icon in a Disney film. Akash Nikolas, a former editor for Zap2It, wrote, in a piece for The Atlantic, pointed to queer subtext and themes in The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Pocahontas, Dumbo, Pinocchio, Aladdin, and Mulan, described Disney films as "both traditional and subversive," echoed by Hugh Ryan in Vice. A writer for The Mary Sue, Mandy Meyers, also argued that the movie's lesson changes if Ariel's journey is seen as a queer coming-of-age story and interpreted through the romantic life of Hans Christian Andersen. In April 2020, animator Mark Scarnander re-imagined and re-animated Ariel as a gay man.

References

Maybe that could help? Historyday01 (talk) 17:31, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

I am not opposed to adding additional information about Ursula, but based on the source initially shared above, I've updated the entry here. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 22:23, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Queer coding of Disney characters is well-covered, but is there anything discussing the animal characters in particular? Yes, Disney makes films with both human and animal characters but how are Ursula and Iago different from Gaston and Nakoma? Otherwise this is just more synthesis of lumping examples together without any actual unifying analysis. Ursula (The Little Mermaid) is a pretty good article that these sources may be good for, but how does her being an animal (Is she even one? Octopus-inspired but officially a sea witch) specifically relate to LGBT culture? And for the love of god use reliable sources appropriate for the encyclopedia, not these opinion-based listicles. Reywas92^Talk 03:39, 21 April 2022 (UTC)

I mean, there likely is something more (I haven't done a deep dive into it, yet, so I can't be sure), but I was simply responding to Another Believer here. I think we could mention Ursula as queer-coded and inspired by a drag queen. I'm not a big fan of listicles either, but they can sometimes be of limited value. I've used them from time to time, but I prefer other sources. As for Gaston, he is mentioned briefly on the History of LGBT characters in animation: 1990s#Animated films section. I don't know about Nakoma, the character in Pocahontas, so I can't speak on that. But, surely the "fictional animals" section could be expanded even further, but it appears to be progressing along well from the last time I looked at it, yesterday. Historyday01 (talk) 12:57, 21 April 2022 (UTC)

Here's another article that mentions Ursula, Jafar, and others, which I read today, which might be of interest:

Disney also relied on LGBTQ communities to revamp its animated films. Few creators were more central to Disney’s renewed vibrancy than Howard Ashman, an openly gay lyricist and director who the company recruited away from Broadway in 1986. Working with composer Alan Menken, Ashman provided the new musical template for Disney animation, crafting “The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast” and “Aladdin,” all of which went on to become Broadway musicals. With “I want” songs that expressed the princess protagonists’ desires, and with all-out showstoppers, Ashman brought theatrical know-how — and a good dose of camp — to Disney’s animated films. In “The Little Mermaid,” Ashman and the animators honored gay culture by taking inspiration from a range of gay icons, including Divine, Bea Arthur and Joan Collins, to bring to life the brassy and voluptuous sea witch, Ursula. Even today, Ursula’s “Poor Unfortunate Souls” solo — an Ashman and Menken original — is a staple for drag performers around the world...Animator Andreas Deja supervised animation for the characters of Gaston in “Beauty and the Beast,” Jafar in “Aladdin” and Scar in “The Lion King.” Scholars and fans alike have often noted the camp value in these characters. As Sean Griffin observes in his landmark study of Disney and the gay community, “Fantasy often walks hand in hand with camp, one of the cornerstones of gay culture.”...Indeed, queerness can be found throughout the Disney canon. While Disney promoted LeFou as its first “openly gay” character in the 2017 live-action remake of “Beauty and the Beast,” audiences have read a range of Disney characters as queer for decades either in their resistance to heterosexual romance, their gender nonconforming performances or their campiness.

Historyday01 (talk) 21:40, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

More on Ursula

• https://www.gaytimes.co.uk/culture/5-reasons-why-drag-race-star-ginger-minj-should-play-ursula-in-the-little-mermaid/
• https://www.out.com/popnography/2018/8/27/10-drag-queens-who-could-play-ursula-live-action-little-mermaid
• https://www.billboard.com/culture/pride/little-mermaid-casting-ursula-ginger-minj-disney-8472807/

---Another Believer _(Talk) 23:13, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Ursula bear

See Bear_(gay_culture)#Terminology ---Another Believer _(Talk) 21:45, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Doe/Stag/Tomcat

These are presentation terms used for butch and femme bisexuals, but I can't find reliable sources for them. Anyone could help? Tazuco (talk) 17:37, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Doing a quick search, I couldn't find anything either, just some people on Tumblr and Urban Dictionary talking about it, neither of which is reliable. Not sure about the reliability of this dictionary, but I did find a Bustle article saying:

..."doe" is used to describe a femme bisexual woman, Montell says. There's also "crow," used to describe a masculine nonbinary person, and "tomcat," which refers to androgynous bisexual women. The list of bi slang goes on from there

Amanda Montell is author of Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language so maybe there is something about Doe/Stag/Tomcat in that book? There's also an article in Dame which mentions the terms briefly, and a possible mention of Tomcat in a chapter on slash, bisexuality, and fan-writing. If I have time, I can look into this further. Historyday01 (talk) 21:54, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Koala bear

Not sure if this source is helpful, but mentions koala bear (Australian):

• https://southfloridagaynews.com/Guest-Columnists/op-ed-bears-otters-or-wolves-oh-my-but-what-am-i.html

---Another Believer _(Talk) 17:30, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

I think the source could be good to use in terms of views of those in the bear community, although I'm not sure it can be used to source those specific words. However, it can be used as a guide of further words to look up later. Historyday01 (talk) 21:40, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

More on bear, cub, otter, wolf

https://books.google.com/books?id=XflyDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA45&lpg=PA45&dq#v=onepage&q&f=false --Another Believer _(Talk) 17:33, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

That source looks fine to me and definitely reliable from what I can tell. Historyday01 (talk) 21:37, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

Thoughts on keeping animal slang terms grouped?

@Reywas92: You seem adamant about having this entry deleted/merged. I'm curious how you feel the animal slang terms should be moved to LGBT slang. Would the entries be kept together to demonstrate the "animal spectrum", or sorted alphabetically and mixed with all the rest? I ask because not all of these terms apply to one section of LGBT slang and separating and sorting the animals would (in my opinion) be less helpful to readers.

As currently presented here, the animal slang section help readers understand how these terms are related and how identity comes into play. I'm asked all the time (especially by straight people) about the "bear/cub/otter" spectrum. I think it'd be better to be able to point people to one section instead of a long list with terms scattered. What do you think? ---Another Believer _(Talk) 15:23, 12 May 2022 (UTC)

I would support a separate section for these sorts of identities, which I how I merged it originally. I agree with your points, though perhaps it should be based on slang terms that represent broader "tribes", not specifically animal names; the venn diagram of those doesn't fully overlap. Reywas92^Talk 15:30, 12 May 2022 (UTC)

Archive discussions?

A lot of the above discussions were for a previous iteration of this article (Animals in LGBT culture). Should we archive these now that the page has a different scope? ---Another Believer _(Talk) 23:57, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Sure. I think that would definitely be helpful. Historyday01 (talk) 13:28, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

@Reywas92: Are you okay with me archiving all of the above discussions, perhaps except the "merge discussion" section? ---Another Believer _(Talk) 13:53, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

Sure. Reywas92^Talk 15:15, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks! ---Another Believer _(Talk) 15:19, 26 August 2022 (UTC)