Frog & Toad

Taiwan, I will always love you

When I exclaimed in celebration, "This is so gay!", at the animated Frog and Toad show, an offended Japanese man in the same room chided me, saying it was wrong to say those words.

“What do you mean it's wrong?” I asked.

He then revealed to me that people had once assumed he was gay based on his behaviors so how could I presume that the characters were flaming cookie-loving homos?

Clearly, this person took what I said personally even though my original statement was directed at the animals on screen. I revealed to him that the creator, Arnold Lobel, was a closeted gay man. Frog and Toad are a happily domesticated genderfluid-presenting couple. Not only that, marginalized people have been making ragingly closeted stories for thousands of years. In some other stories, you have to explicitly opt-in for what feels like proper representation in order to publicly, openly, and joyfully exist. Also Frog and Toad are fictional characters.

Finally, I added, “whereas you're a real person and I am too. 'This is so gay!' should mean very differently depending on what you know about the speaker."

He chewed on my words in silence.

RIP comfort women and Taiwan's undersea infrastructure.

Speaking of Japanese culture and 2D art though, I made an interactive Domokun web app! Check it out here.