ZEL

> But happening in a Pokemon game is just a bit weird.
So is people jumping off bridges, Garchomps beheading people, and curse words.
Reborn is a fan game that touches on topics that the canon games don't. I therefore hold Reborn to the same standard as I would any stand-alone work. It's not a canon game.

As a small side note: Saying that "gay people never talk about being gay" is an iffy situation in itself.
The concept of the closet exists. Many, many LGBT folks don't openly talk about their sexual or gender identity because it may not be safe to do so. Many of them don't "keep it to themselves" because they think it's dignified or don't care to talk about that aspect of their life.
Many do because they'd rather lay low and stay out of trouble. Believe me, I know a lot of people in the community who would love to be able to discuss their crushes with their friends, or introduce their partner to family and friends, or just be out with them in public holding hands. But often they can't. Often they keep all this to themselves because they have to fear losing friends, being alienated from family, or being harrassed in public.
 

I have friends who have no support system IRL and stay in the closet because they'd rather keep the few friends they have, even if they know they shouldn't have to hide something froma  so-called friend.
I have friends who have to keep their crushes and their relationships secret or else their family would punish them.

Many of us don't get to be open about our preferences the same way that cis and straight people do.
Saying that a Good Gay needs to keep quiet about being gay isn't progressive. It's telling us that we're only acceptable to you as long as we speak about our feelings in hushed voices, or not at all.

When we are with people who we know it's safe to be open around, many of us become a lot more open.

> Errrr straight character never talk about their straightness in pokemon... Or almost never at least.
So there's not dozens of Pokémon NPCs in the games who mention their significant other? There's not the trainer classes "Old Couple" and "Young couple" depicting a male and female together with the implication they're partners?
There's not NPC families living their lives in the cities? No parents with their kids?
 

> I am annoyed by the whole explanation of Adrienn about non-binary. I find it unnecessary and forced in.

Cain asks Adrienn about xyr gender. Adrienn answers, and with the help of Radomus proceeds to explain the concept to Cain. That's... a thing that happens. It does. It's literally happend to me on multiple occasions that people asked me about my gender, and when I tell them that I am neither a man nor a woman, they usually do need the explanation.

I don't think the situation itself feels forced. The writing a bit weird? Yeah. But the scene itself? Something I'm used to.

> I remember it now. But I think it was rewrote in a slightly less forced tone starting with E16? Idk, it didn't seem awkward to me the last time I played through it.

Yeah I was talking about the old scene here, I know it's since been rewritten, but when I first played through the game, it did feel awkward.

> Since no characters in pokemon games are defined through their sexual preference, why LGBT people HAVE TO be defined in a pokemon game via their sexuality? 
> Does it add anything to the story? I mean, in Adrienn's case, the non-binary adds nothing. We could just be left wondering.
> They don't have to define themselves through a sexual preference. So why do this in a game?

Because most of us here live in a cis- and heteronormative society, where when it isn't explicitly indicated, a character will more often than not be assumed cis and straight.
Due to that, taking the time to make it clear that a character belongs to the LGBT community is an important part of proper representation.

You probaby saw this happen before, internet and all, but you know what usually happens when a character's gender or sexuality never gets confirmed in canon and someone throws the idea out there that they could be LGBT?
"How do you know this character is gay? We've never seen him with a man!"
"There's no proof this character is trans!"
"This character has only dated one person in the series and they were the opposite gender, they're not bisexual."
"Why do you need to portray this character as gay, there's nothing in the source material to base this on!"

People get upset if others headcanon characters as LGBT, people get upset if a character is canonically mentioned as being LGBT - there's no winning, is there?
If you don't feel bothered by someone's headcanon of a character as LGBT, then congrats, you're not an asshole. But for as long as such a large number of people are, I want content creators to continue canonically confirming characters as such. Because the best way to counter people's continued outrage against including LGBT characters is to create more of em. Until it gets into people's heads that our existence is a fact of life.

Why make this character gay and mention it?
Why not?

Straight characters talk about their straightness all the time - if a straight girl character talks to her friend about the boys she finds attractive, that's showing her straightness. A gay male character bringing up that he finds a guy attractive should be no different. It's only treated as different because he's gay.

Personally I wasn't a big fan of the scene surrounding Adrienn's gender identity, but only because it felt a bit clumsy in writing, not because I at all oppose the principle.
Comments like "are you a girl or a boy" happen. They happen to me. Seeing them happen in fiction and having the character answer them is neither unrealistic nor bad writing (in itself). It's a fairly standard way of confirming a character's gender identity.

Complaining because a scene is not well-written is a completely different thing from saying "why do they have to be gay".

> They want to be treated normally right? So why force them in? 
Because we exist, and as such, it's only logical that we should also exist in fiction. And it is in fact important to name things by their label sometimes. Else you'll get a "dumbledore is gay" situation where the author SAYS x character is y, but you would never know from the story because this aspect of them never gets addressed. Putting in a character who is "technically LGBT" and then never showing anything in-story to confirm this isn't representation.

> Does the character being straight, gay, non binary, a sentient sun, transgender, a black hole, a satellite, or a toilet seat impact the story at all? Does it hold any meaning?
That's the point. LGBT characters shouldn't be weird anomalies, it shouldn't be outrageous and risky to include us. It shouldn't make people go "why does there have to be a gay character". It shouldn't "mean" anything. It should be normal, but as is apparent, it isn't seen as such. And because of that, yes, a character being part of the acronym does hold meaning.

Including us and labelling the character in the source material means representation. It's one more character who is like us. It feels good to see someone like us in fiction, and to have it be okay and normal.

Characters don't need a deep reason to be LGBT, or a long dedicated storyline based around it. It's perfectly fine to have a character who just /happens/ to be gay, or trans, or anything. You don't need to "justify" creating LGBT characters any more than you need to justify making them cis or straight. In fact, including LGBT characters without turning that part of their identity into some central plot element helps to normalize them.
Sure, it's great when a work of fiction discusses the subject in a dedicated plot/character arc, but not every LGBT character needs to have some deep or even tragic story related to them being LGBT. Because y'know, not all of us do. Some of us just live our lives and happen to not be cis or straight.
 

> I won't say them being gay wasn't a surprise, but I won't say it was a good one either. If anything, this only stirs more hate against gays.

If a sidequest about a character writing a love letter to their crush  stirs hate against gay people, the fault doesn't lie with the quest, but with the people. If you find that quest annoying because the character is gay, rather than just because you think the whole love letter thing itself is annoying, then you should probably ask yourself why a gay character bothers you more than a straight one in this conext.

Shhh keep going, there was just something inherently funny about a status badmouthing Mimikyu being followed by 31 responses