THE YAOI DILEMMA

Yaoi, or “boy’s love”, genre of fictions has been a hit in Thailand in recent years. In bookstores, yaoi novels get their own shelf of doe-eye, maleto-male romance that’s mostly enjoyed by young straight women. A few of these novels are getting their respective screen adaptation as a teen series.

Duen Kiao Duen, or Two Moons: The Series, is one such novel that will soon come to life.

Duen Kiao Duen intertwines youthful romance and university life. The novel garnered more than 2 million views when first published online. All its male leads have been cast and were announced last week. Thus began the controversy.

Many fans of the novel weren’t pleased with the casting choices. And Yot Kornherun, series producer, took to Instagram to clarify the criteria his team followed during auditions.

“The six lead actors have to be straight. I’m not hating or discriminating against ‘the third gender’ [LGBTI] at all because I belong in that group, too. But we just think straight men are more suited for the roles,” wrote Yot on his Instagram @ ohidomedia.

Initially, when the team was promoting the auditions, the casting call said it welcomed LGBTI. However, it’s quite obvious they didn’t mean for leading roles.

While the producer said, on his Instagram, that the cast have to be able to act and engage in other roles in showbiz, nobody seems to care anymore. For some, outrightly denying gay men to star in a gay series is just outrageous and hypocritical.

The hashtag #boycott2moonstheseries is making its way round Twitter and Facebook. Still, that doesn’t seem to have any effects on the team’s decision. Not yet, anyway. It remains to be seen how the producers proceed with the situation.

The series is expected to air later this year.