The two novels, Boy Meet Boy and Luna are more obviously similar. They both tell the story of LGBTQ youth with multiple LGBTQ identifying narratives. The two stories also provide lifelike experiences of queer people, and shows what the community has to deal with on a daily basis. Both novels are well-rounded, especially with how they show the highs and lows of these experiences. The unexpected difference between these two novels is that you cannot always judge a person based off of their looks. For example, in Boy Meets Boy we know right away that Paul is gay because of his interest in boys. This differs in Luna; one might assume Liam is gay (like his father) but in reality Liam identifies as transgender woman. It is important to explore this difference because you cannot always tell who someone truly is solely based off of their appearance. Society needs to learn that you cannot judge people based off of what they look like. It is not as black and white as being straight and gay. Gender and sexuality are a spectrum and two separate things. Boy Meets Boy and Luna both show the reader this.
These two novels matter because they show us lifelike queer narratives. They show the reader that gender and sexuality are two completely different things. Just because a person acts a certain way, does not mean you can immediatly label them. I experience this personally. Due to society’s close-mindedness, people often assume I am gay. That however is not the case, I identify as queer. Like my personal experience, I think the two novels do a great job in showing how people need to be educated in order to not assume things about others. Also, like I have said before, the novels show that gender and sexuality are separate, a fact that most people do not know. As we see in Luna, just because you like boys does not mean you are gay. Liam likes boys but identifies as transgender. This is something that many people still have to learn.
I like your point that the two novels show us various identities of people among LGBTQ through detail stories so that we can remind ourselves not to assume others’ gender identity/sexual orientation base on their look.
Personally, I have intuitively not labeled people by their “style” even before I know the difference between the two terms. I can see what you mean by people in our daily life labeling you because they lack knowledge. I have not been through what you have but if I were you I would feel unfair at first. But as we exposed to so many of them, we can replace our initial anger with calm to access the situation and also because once we have confidence in ourselves, none of the destructive comments matter. We know that many people are not aware of the right terms and among them, there are ones who throw insensitive prejudice on other people of the LQBTQ community with only one word that they know – gay. We walk away not minding their opinion because we know ourselves better than others do, or we let them know what’s wrong with their conception in hope they get it and stop doing the same thing for the next person. Either way, there is no room for their comments to bring us down because it is not the first time anymore. If any, we are happy to enlight them with insight on subject that we study!
I think it is a great point to show how Luna’s father immediately assumes that his son is either gay or straight. People don’t think about the possibility of having more than a black and white spectrum. I think many people simply do not know that a many different sexualities exist. This also makes me think of the necessity of labels. Some people choose not to label and others prefer it, what if everyone just loved who they loved and we didn’t ask so many questions? As I continue to ask more questions, would a LGBTQ-normality take away from LGBTQ pride and culture? Or would we all be a world of beings loving without further question?
I really like your analysis of the two stories, and how you put them into a conversation with each other. I think it is interesting how society finds a way to label these two characters, especially with Luna and her father. Her father asks if Liam is gay, assuming that if he is different that is the only way he can be defined. I find similar connections to this in my personal life as well, people often judging my appearance and assuming that I am one way. This is apart of the whole need for a ‘coming out’ story, and how people must come out again and again, because each person they come into contact with will assume who they are. This makes it necessary to come out. I think that your statement that there is still much to learn is true, which makes it important to read literature like these two novels.
I think this was a great distinction to point out, because so often when trans identities are being discussed, the automatic assumption is that that individual is trans and gay, which is a huge misconception. It’s great that you deconstruct how that concept is explored in Luna, however, I don’t really think that that was explored as much in Boy Meets Boy. I feel like because of the content of that book, a lot of talk about the intricacies of the queer community was oversimplified. Still, this was a great analysis and a great way to tie together the gender commentary in Luna with the sexuality commentary in Boy Meets Boy.