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i'm also a gay guy, but honestly optic i think you're probably immature and took whatever xeb said as criticism towards you. so i don't wanna try hard to explain why i don't see the things the way which you do. i understand that BL feels like something close to us, because it centers mlm relationships, but when you make clearly exaggerated statements such as 99% of women who enjoy BL are fetishising mlm relationships. it just seems weird from your behalf and overly simplistic since you're just making a generalisation...

sure i can agree with you, that there are definitely cases of weird fetishisation, but that doesn’t mean that every woman reading or making BL is doing that. some genuinely love the characters, stories, and dynamics, and aren’t trying to speak over us or invade our space.  also you're kind of misrepresenting the history of the genre, xeb was right that both BL and yaoi are created by women and the large demographic is women. it wasn't originally some grassroot queer men movement ^^.  bara, on the other hand, was made by and for gay/bi men. that doesn’t mean we can’t reclaim or relate to BL now, but rewriting the origin to say it was always ours isn’t accurate.

and your take on yuri is also kinda misinformed. you keep saying yuri is “made by women,” but that’s just not true in most cases. statistically, it’s overwhelmingly written and drawn by men for men. that includes a lot of the well-known yuri titles. even the more “serious” or “romantic” ones. there are women who create it, especially in the indie space, but they’re still the minority. saying yuri is female-dominated while BL is “taken over” by straight women just isn’t consistent. and about the whole “this is a topic only queer people should discuss” thing. yeah, i think queer voices matter a lot in these convos, but if someone’s correcting misinformation or just joining in respectfully, that’s not some terrible offense. especially when that person knows their stuff. (unlike you, you're clearly misinformed, so i would not appreciate you speaking for other gay guys if this is the attitude shown towards other people (especially how you've treated xeb in the message forumn) respecting others isn't something hard to do, it's the bare minimum.)

also the way you talk to xeb is honestly just rude. they made solid points, backed it up with actual knowledge, and you immediately went for their tone, age, and called them creepy. disagreeing is fine, but your whole attitude just reads like you’re trying to shut people down instead of actually talking. if you think something’s wrong, make your case ^^ but don’t twist their words or insult them instead of addressing what they actually said.

last thing for you; telling people they’re creeps or weird for liking something that wasn’t originally meant for them while also asking for spaces like otome to cater to men too… that’s just double standards. we can want better representation without gatekeeping or acting like everyone outside our lane is an enemy.