I’ve often maintained that one of the fundamental differences between straight people and gay people (especially young people) is that straight people have a clear desire to be their role models, whereas gay people have a muddled desire to both be and do their role models.
I know, it sounds ridiculous, but it’s true on some level. And that’s what makes growing up gay so hard. The world is designed with easy rules in place, if you fit into the mainstream category. If not, you may as well be floating in space.
My point here is that we have to create our own path, which means creating our own heroes. It’s hard when we still see so many gay characters in the media being portrayed as comic reliefs.
This is why the Mass Effect trilogy resonated so strongly with me. My Commander Shepherd was a badass hero who saved the galaxy and had a hot romance with Steve Cortez. I got so caught up in the story that I found myself looking to Commander Shepherd for strength in day to day life, wondering what bold, noble choices he would make in my situation.
And then I suddenly realized that I had created this character. Everything I respected and admired about him was because of the choices I had made. Noble choices to save individual humans and aliens, to tell the truth – and even to choose to romance a male character.
This realization was powerful for me. It gave me the opportunity to project all the heroic qualities I’d always admired into a character who was like me. And the best part was, since I realized I had become the character, I didn’t want to do him, just to aspire to become more like him.
It also inspired me to want to create more heroes who can resonate with people the way Commander Shepherd did with me. The Commander Shepherd that I created served as a basis for the kind of badass respectable, noble character that became the protagonist of The Other Side, Captain Darren Quest.
I feel like this is what I have to offer the world, these heroes we can look up to and aspire to be – examples who help us see our own inner strength and let us know that we are great.
William Wolfe 