The Kingdom of Durin had two Queens. When this is first mentioned, the viewer is led to imagine that it was something like Sparta: where two rulers from different families oversaw different aspects of life. King Leonidas was free to lead a suicide mission, because he had a partner holding down the fort. Smart idea for a country likely to be surprise-attacked, as the kingdoms in this show are.
Nope, these women were a couple, and they had a daughter. It's not mentioned whether this is Durinese tradition, but nobody seems to think it's an unusual arrangement. Even the show's villain, the manipulative Virin, is accepting. Indeed, Queen Anya's mothers are considered heroes in the kingdom of Katolis as well as in their homeland for dying as part of a gambit to save both kingdoms from starvation. It would appear, that this is a world where homophobia doesn't exist. Even Soren the stereotypical jock doesn't ever make a homophobic comment. This makes sense, this world has it's own unique history behind it. A group of human realms constantly besieged by outside forces far more powerful than them would need to minimize internal divisions just to survive. Indeed, in the episodes where this story is told, Virin is (insincerely) arguing for the necessity of solidarity between the Kingdoms.
Why is this a good example of representation? after all the Queens of
Durin are both dead by the time the main show starts. Because it treats
their relationship as normal. They are treated as if they were any
other couple, any other family. This is a story that could have been
written about a straight couple. This is not a story about a lesbian relationship: it is a story about heroism that happens to star lesbians. What frequently gets forgotten is that gay people just want to be normal. They want to be considered as people first. Often, the only time a homosexual character is included in a show is so that the show can make a point about homosexuality. This is a problem, because it does not question the white heterosexual default. Here we have a homosexual couple included in the show not to make a point about homosexuality, but simply because homosexuals exist. In a real-world setting you can't treat homosexuality as normal, except maybe in a far future setting. Even then, it would be more realistic for bigotry to still exist even if it wasn't socially rewarded. Fully normalizing homosexuality and homosexual family structures is almost exclusively the realm of fantasy or science fantasy.
We also have a character who is modeling how to be "one of the boys" and make "locker room talk" without being a bigot. Soren is clearly immature, but that's to be expected since he is a teenager. He does boast, and often insults others: but his insults are personalized. This indicates that he sees these people as individuals. Soren is a rebuttal to claims like the one President Trump made, that his misogynist and homophobic comments were just "locker room talk". Yet, it is also a rebuttal to people who say that all crude language is evil and hurtful. There is nothing wrong with crude language, and it exists for a good reason. Crude language exists to help people laugh, loosen up and de-stress. It helps people bond, by making them feel safe enough to be vulnerable. Of course, this mission is undercut when bigotry and crudeness are made synonymous. These kinds of claims should be alarming to anyone who cares about our language. The endless capacity that English has for constructing creative insults is not a flaw, it's a feature. It's something that we should celebrate. We should not celebrate the uncreative use of offensive words and phrases. If you mean to insult someone, do it with passion and creativity. Call them a "sniveling lemming", not a "fag". Insults aren't a bad thing, but insults that denigrate an identity group are.
Bourgeois liberal society likes to encourage this myth that all hatred is bigotry, that there is no difference. However, this is incredibly damaging: because this is the logic behind the myths of reverse racism/reverse sexism. See, a minority person understands that people can be cruel without being bigoted: that hating someone for something they did is fine, while hating them for who they are is not. But very often, people from the majority group confuse the two. They rationalize their own bigotry by pointing to stereotyped or nonexistent character flaws. Other times, they start to feel that if someone hates them, that person must be bigoted. Of course, what is this actually? it's an immature ego talking. This simplistic narrative of kindness and hatred advanced by liberals really doesn't help matters. Humans are capable of cruelty, of hatred: without any ideology being behind it. We cannot create a world without cruelty of any kind, nor should we expect to. We can create a world in which cruelty isn't based on a person's identity. Or, as Dr. King put it: where people are judged by the content of their character.
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