Is Blackfish (Brynden Tully) a homosexual?

[Anythingatall]

Well you can have no problem whatsoever with gay people or gay characters, but still dislike it if you feel an author gratuitously includes them out of political correctness or similar - particularly if it is revealed late and with little or no reason behind it. Personally I never really picked up on the Dumbledore thing, and as such I don't care in the slightest. I mean if the author says he's gay that's fine, I guess he is, but it makes no difference whatsoever to the books.

I struggle to see how this is the case. IIRC she as asked about a possible Dumbledore/McGonigal (Spelling) relationship and answered that she always thought of him as gay. It then got blown into a media circus (and yes it is possible that she cashed in on this to score liberal points, but I dunno).

Still though why does somebody need a reason to be gay? Are we to assume that the default is straight unless plot demands it and anything else is pandering?

Can you give me another example of this trope? I would like to mull it over a bit more.

[Mikkel]

I struggle to see how this is the case. IIRC she as asked about a possible Dumbledore/McGonigal (Spelling) relationship and answered that she always thought of him as gay. It then got blown into a media circus (and yes it is possible that she cashed in on this to score liberal points, but I dunno).

Still though why does somebody need a reason to be gay? Are we to assume that the default is straight unless plot demands it and anything else is pandering?

Can you give me another example of this trope? I would like to mull it over a bit more.

Well no it's not that a character "defaults to straight" (though most people still are, so I suppose you could say that statistically most probably are), it's rather that unless there's reasons to explain either way, the sexuality of a character doesn't really matter, whether gay, straight, bi, asexual or any of the other possibilities.

Of course somebody doesn't need a "reason to be gay", I mean they either are or they aren't, it's not really a choice is it?

I don't know if it's a trope per se, though I'm sure it's been done on occasion. I'm not really into the whole political correctness circus (I'm sure this is where some people would tell me to "check my privilege" or similar, hah!).

Anyway, I didn't say I felt that about this particular case, just that IMO if you do feel it was silly or gratuitous it's not inherently discriminating.

[Anythingatall]

Well no it's not that a character "defaults to straight" (though most people still are, so I suppose you could say that statistically most probably are), it's rather that unless there's reasons to explain either way, the sexuality of a character doesn't really matter, whether gay, straight, bi, asexual or any of the other possibilities.

Of course somebody doesn't need a "reason to be gay", I mean they either are or they aren't, it's not really a choice is it?

I don't know if it's a trope per se, though I'm sure it's been done on occasion. I'm not really into the whole political correctness circus (I'm sure this is where some people would tell me to "check my privilege" or similar, hah!).

Anyway, I didn't say I felt that about this particular case, just that IMO if you do feel it was silly or gratuitous it's not inherently discriminating.

This idea (that people shoehorn gay characters into things to be trendy) seems like one of those urban legends used to make bigotry more acceptable. I cannot think of a single example of this.

[Mikkel]

This idea (that people shoehorn gay characters into things to be trendy) seems like one of those urban legends used to make bigotry more acceptable. I cannot think of a single example of this.

It may be, in which case I stand corrected. Though I fail to see how that connects to bigotry?

[Anythingatall]

It may be, in which case I stand corrected. Though I fail to see how that connects to bigotry?

Because peoples real problem is they don't like the gays.

[~~~~~~~~~~~~~]

Wait, you "have nothing against gays" but if you had known that JKR had one of her characters as head cannon gay it would have impacted you so much you wouldn't read an entire series? I struggle to follow the logic here. Why is being gay and issue (that

[mormont]

[mod] How about we go back to discussing ASOIAF? The Dumbledore discussion can be taken to Literature, by all means. [/mod]

[MyLittleFinger]

[mod] How about we go back to discussing ASOIAF? The Dumbledore discussion can be taken to Literature, by all means. [/mod]

Agreed

[Anythingatall]

EDIT- Deleted after I read the mod.

Really gutted as it's the first time I have been able to format multi-quotes correctly =(

[Veltigar]

There is a book from Vargas Llosa in which the protagonist, who is very Staniss-like, has to set up a special force of prostitutes in the jungle because the men placed there were so isolated and getting frustrated by not having sex that it became a problem for the whole community (also, the jungle makes you extra horny, it seems) and he somehow found two guys who were completely uninterested on women at all to help them with the logistics of the operation... so, it's not like those men does not exist.

Didn't they make a movie about that with Angie Cepeda?

[Veltigar]

I think I said it before in this thread, but I blame Ser Bonnifer Hasty. We had a perfectly adequate solution for the BF conundrum, one which could have a very interesting effect on the outcome of the series, but with Bonnifer in place it no longer goes. If the knight Rhaella Targaryen loved had been the Blackfish, we could expect all sort of cool developments with Daenerys coming over from Essos to play.

[DeathYon]

Brynden Tully is a free spirit. He wouldn't have wanted to be tied down by a woman he barely knew.

Stannis tried to outlaw brothels, but that doesn't mean that he's gay or asexual.

[MyLittleFinger]

Brynden Tully is a free spirit. He wouldn't have wanted to be tied down by a woman he barely knew.

Stannis tried to outlaw brothels, but that doesn't mean that he's gay or asexual.

He's also married and has a daughter...and bangs a smoking hot fire priestess.

Whereas Brynden is married to his sword and silence at Areo Hotah levels.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Didn't they make a movie about that with Angie Cepeda?

A movie AND a miniseries.

[Taenqyrhae]

Re-reading the series, it's clear that GRRM intended to make the reason for Brynden's refusal to ever marry a mystery, so it seems clear he also intended for some people to wonder if he is homosexual. Maybe he wrote the character to have a gay character whose sexuality is not relevant to the story at all, for fairness sake - all other gay characters in the story have some story related to their gayness or relationships entangled because of it. If this is his intention, I'd find it refreshing for him to write a character who is not "hetero by default" but whose sexuality is not referred to except in the most subtle of ways.

Or he may have some other explanation for why he never married. It will be interesting to find out if this is ever revealed.

[Alia of the knife]

Re-reading the series, it's clear that GRRM intended to make the reason for Brynden's refusal to ever marry a mystery, so it seems clear he also intended for some people to wonder if he is homosexual. Maybe he wrote the character to have a gay character whose sexuality is not relevant to the story at all, for fairness sake - all other gay characters in the story have some story related to their gayness or relationships entangled because of it. If this is his intention, I'd find it refreshing for him to write a character who is not "hetero by default" but whose sexuality is not referred to except in the most subtle of ways.

Or he may have some other explanation for why he never married. It will be interesting to find out if this is ever revealed.

Agreed.

[Jaime4Brienne]

Who cares hes too old to reproduce anyway.

Men can father children their entire lives.

[Oafkeeper]

Robb was pregnant with Bryden's baby when he died.

[Anythingatall]

Re-reading the series, it's clear that GRRM intended to make the reason for Brynden's refusal to ever marry a mystery, so it seems clear he also intended for some people to wonder if he is homosexual. Maybe he wrote the character to have a gay character whose sexuality is not relevant to the story at all, for fairness sake - all other gay characters in the story have some story related to their gayness or relationships entangled because of it. If this is his intention, I'd find it refreshing for him to write a character who is not "hetero by default" but whose sexuality is not referred to except in the most subtle of ways.

Or he may have some other explanation for why he never married. It will be interesting to find out if this is ever revealed.

Yeah I like this too.

I don't understand why it is so controversial to assume he is gay. The implication that assuming he is gay makes one judgmental seems really odd to me. We have reason to consider his love life because of the marriage discussion, we are invited by the author to speculate.

[Ser RoddyRuinuous]

Re-reading the series, it's clear that GRRM intended to make the reason for Brynden's refusal to ever marry a mystery, so it seems clear he also intended for some people to wonder if he is homosexual. Maybe he wrote the character to have a gay character whose sexuality is not relevant to the story at all, for fairness sake - all other gay characters in the story have some story related to their gayness or relationships entangled because of it. If this is his intention, I'd find it refreshing for him to write a character who is not "hetero by default" but whose sexuality is not referred to except in the most subtle of ways.

Or he may have some other explanation for why he never married. It will be interesting to find out if this is ever revealed.

:agree:

Does it matter if he's gay? Who cares, really. Brynden is a BAMF, who didn't want to get married to whomever Hoster threw at him. That's all that matters. Also, it makes things a bit easier to trim down the bloodlines of possible claimants for King in the North, Lord of Riverrun, and Lord of the Eyrie.