A World in Shadows
A look at why secret societies resonate with queer audiences
Most goth teenagers my age resonated with vampires. It’s an understandably popular fantasy in adolescence, particularly for me as a gay teen in a small town with few friends and a secret I hadn’t yet even begun to comprehend. The idea of someone taking me away, granting me with power and immortality and beauty forever was a compelling power fantasy. All the drawbacks of living a life in darkness and secrecy were already a part of my everyday world that it didn’t seem like such a harsh price to pay.
Even when we aren’t closeted, queer people walk a thin tight-rope every day of how much of our real selves do we share with the world. This extends even to our online interactions, where even expressing our romantic and sexual desires is done with an apprehension and nervousness cisgender heterosexual couples never once have to think about. In order to function safely and happily, many queer communities circle about one another, utterly cut-off from an uncaring cisheteronormative world. Our societies are not secret, but they may as well be.
I think it’s for this reason that you find queer audiences drawn to the shadowy worlds of vampires, and even underground secret assassins. There’s something undeniably queer about the John Wick series, and it goes beyond the lurid violet lighting scheme and the sexiness with which Daddy Keanu Reeves mercilessly dispatches countless hit-men. We see a protagonist who cast aside this world of shadows to attempt a life in the light, only to have it stolen away from him, and invariably he is drawn to the darkness once more, a piece of himself that will never truly go away.
While it would be uncouth to compare queer culture and society to a world of violent murder and assassinations, the feelings of shame and self-loathing for many queer people still struggling with their identity is all too common. We live in a world that tells us every day to be ashamed for who we are. Many of us attempt to assimilate into a larger society, to reject those innate pieces of ourselves, rather than accepting what we truly are.
Despite John Wick’s shame and attempts to leave this world behind, do we as the audience really want him to leave it? Of course not, we are supporting and cheering our protagonist on most when he enters into the persona of the Baba Yaga, when he accepts who he truly is and unleashes his inner monster. There is a sort of revenge and reclamation into embracing what the world at large tells you to reject, to don the mantle of monster proudly when they tell you to live in shame.
And in the world of secret-societies, vampires, deviants, and assassins, we are allowed so much room and potential to exist. A world of bright-washed sunlight is full of standards that people are meant to adhere to, social rules and constructs and clearly delineated power-structures to define what is “good” and “evil.” In Wick’s shadowy underworld there are a host of eccentrics, weirdos driven into a world of darkness with unusual personalities, talents, and abilities. Each entry into the franchise introduces us to increasingly colorful characters we would never see prowling among the daylight, including now two non-binary characters played by non-binary actors (Ruby Rose and Asia-Kate Dillon). The world of the secret society allows room for our imaginations to envision one in which we can walk around freely existing, where our uniqueness and alleged deviance can become a strength rather than something to be ashamed of.
One thing that deeply resonates with me in stories like this though is a scene we also don’t get often in the John Wick universe, where seemingly everyone seems to know about this secret order and is apart of this gothic underworld of contracts and assassins. It’s the scene where the member of the secret society is forced to interact with someone outside of it, with someone from the world of daylight. I feel this one deeply when I go to work or I’m talking with cishet members of my public D&D group. I’ll share a joke, a story, or a meme that I am suddenly forced to realize would only work with those from that shadow-circle. I’m reminded that the safety of that community is that we are cut off, that for the most part, cishetero people are very much unaware of many aspects of our community and culture, whether it’s as something innocent as a meme, or as deadly important as how walking in daylight comes with fears and threats of violence.
This pride-month as the discourse surrounding our Pride Events attempts to sanitize these spaces for cops and corporate brands, remember where we started, and who we are. We are the vampires, the assassins, the monsters, the ones who were shoved underground to feel safe to express who we truly are. Even as we fight for a better world and enjoy the progress we’ve made, let us never forget the darkness we carry with us, and the threat that still hangs over our heads. We should not be forced to sanitize away that which makes us who we are so the world of light will accept us. If we succumb to that, then they’ve won, and all that makes us beautiful will be lost. And for me, that is too high of a price to pay for a rainbow-smeared coca cola ad.
Dorian Dawes is the author of Harbinger Island and Mercs. Their non-fiction work has been published on Bitch Media, Harlot Media, and the Huffington Post. You can find and support more of their work at patreon.com/doriandawes
