A Guest's Eye View of Y/CON 11

Y/CON is France's Yaoi and Yuri convention, held in Paris in November, with smaller satellite event in spring or summer as their staffing and schedule allow. Folks I know who have attended, often comment that there is much more BL than Yuri (and the answer to why that is, is both simple and complex and was discussed at length in panels.) I have been hoping to attend for some years now and, after a concerted effort by Yuri community members and Y/CON organizers wanting more of a focus on Yuri, I was invited to be a guest at Y/CON 11. Because I was a guest, I did not have a chance to see too many other panels, but Y/CON kept me busy and I wanted to tell you all how much fun Y/CON was in hopes that ANN readers will plan to visit.

To begin with, BL and Yuri are represented in the French market by a number of publishers. Hana Books, Éditions Akata, Taifu Comics, WEBTOON, Meian Editions, and many others smaller independent presses and imprints for books, comics and online works.

Meian had a back wall highlighting their Yuri titles.

Taifu had a set of life-size scenes from several of their BL books in which fans could take photos. Akata had a huge banner for schwinn's senior Yuri Hana Monogatari, which sadly has not been licensed in English. The picture did not come out, but you'll have to trust me that having a huge picture of two older women from a Yuri manga behind a dealer table was amazing.

My day as a guest began with a book signing session – one of four during the two-day event. I was then interviewed by Lou Vassigh about Yuri fandom, My very capable interpreter Julie Debelhoir, spent both days making sure I understood and was understood, but I could tell that a large number of people had good English, because they'd laugh at my jokes. So many people flexed those language skills to speak with me at the signings, as well.

One of the questions I get most often was brought up by Lou during this panel and again in several others and I want to address it right away, because it is time to put this question to bed forever. I was asked what I think of people who say Yuri is “for men.” My comments here are an amalgam of the answers I gave to this and very similar questions over two days. This will undoubtedly be seen as adversarial, but this is from the perspective of twenty years of watching Yuri fandom grow. When I first began to be interested in what we now call Yuri (and GL) there was always an assumption by straight men that anything they like is rare and important and always “for” them, while anything women like is dismissed as childish or unimportant or just stupid, particularly if it appeals to young woman.

Yuri has always been by anyone and for everyone. From the beginning, when the Magnificent 49ers were developing narratives of love and desire between young men, stories of lesbian romance and gender identity were part of the mix. While straight men drew stories of lesbian sex and called it “Yuri” queer women were also drawing stories for themselves. In 2023, when I ran a global Yuri fandom poll on Okazu, results were not that surprising. Yuri fandom is less than a quarter straight, cis men. This is not to say that men cannot like Yuri – of course they can! Yuri is for everyone. But it is time to let this question die, with other gender essentialist nonsense. Like sports, manga is for anyone who enjoys it.

I did more book signings, and a too-short panel with author Rutile, Louis-Baptiste Huchez, the publisher from Taifu. We discussed the Yuri market in France and Internationally. Louis-Baptiste made the point that I wish more readers understood – publisher publish (and license and promote) whatever is selling. To get more Yuri, we needed to have people buy more Yuri! I believe we have reached that tipping point, with multiple companies competing to get Yuri from multiple Japanese publishers.

On Sunday I had another panel, this one with Dr. T. Pralinus. We discussed BL and Yuri as it related to queerness. Telling our stories—or not—through this medium. Who is reading it, how and why, were all topics we covered. Dr. Pralinus was a terrific speaker and we agreed on a lot of things, about how important and fun the rise of “queer” manga has been. We spoke of politics, the rise of fascism everywhere and we disagreed (very mildly) on how we face this darkness. Dr. Pralinus made the valid point that queer people have always been part of human society and no matter if we had to hide, we would survive. I made a point here that I want to share with everyone who reads this, who consumes Yuri, BL, trans manga or any other media, a point I also make at the end of my book, By Your Side: The First 100 Years of Yuri:

Until very recently queer media has been informed mostly by queer trauma. For centuries queer media centered coming out, rejection, homophobia, death as drivers of LGBTQ+ life. Yes, we can hide…but we won't. I called for aggressive, loud, queer joy. Why should we hide? The fascists are the weird minority, let them hide again. Normalize queerness, because, yes, this has always been part of human society. What does that mean for fans of Yuri and BL? It means that queer joy is resistance. Buy manga, cosplay those characters (I saw no less than four couple cosplaying Mitsuki and Aya from The Guy She Was Interested In Wasn't a Guy at All), and most of all, create your own queer work!

To that point, of course we walked all around the dealers room, picking up original and fan works. I especially love getting original books from folks on the floor, because it takes some guts to put your babies out there for people to critique.

Y/CON was an amazing time, with absolutely fantastic people. My thanks to MEV events and all the volunteers for making this a wonderful experience! If you are a fan of BL, queer, trans or Yuri manga, it's worth making a pilgrimage. I know I'll be back for sure.