Queer Baiting
I am not a shipper. Would Batman and Captain America hooking up be hot? Of course it would. It would be like eating devil’s food and apple pie at the same time. But my associating food with eroticism aside, I’ve never seen the same sexual attractions that some people have put on characters.
Easiest dog in the pile: Sterek. For those who live under a bridge and/or think it’s deep that they don’t pay attention to pop culture, or who don’t own a TV (seriously, burn in Hell), Sterek is a ship between werewolf Derek Hale (Tyler Hoechlin) and funny Stiles Stilinski (Dylan O’Brien) from the popular TV show Teen Wolf, based on the eighties cult classic. People have invested in this “relationship” since the first season and I get it. Derek has a jawline that could cut open William Wallace, and Stiles has hands designed for ass-smacking.
But I have watched this show bow to stern, and I don’t see it. I see two polar opposites with a funny, annoying little-brother-and-his-older-sister’s-boyfriend dynamic. But that is my perception — it’s not wrong or right and it casts no judgment. For others, they feel like they are being teased with a will-they-or-won’t-they and that falls under the term queerbaiting. Now, the definition of queerbaiting, is:
A marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but then do not actually depict, same-sex romance or other…
