Homoerotic poster with China vs military poster with North Korea
“When”? Like it’s something we expect? Or something everyone does on purpose? Strange question.
i’ve always found it somewhat strange how many people in the west consider all these soviet international friendship posters to have a homoerotic subtext. is friendship between people of the same gender so unthinkable there that one immediately assumes that doing things together must be romantic?
As someone who has grown up in the west but from a POC background, I think one thing I’ve noticed is that a lot of things that are considered normal in say West Asia or South Asia are considered gay in the west. Friendships in the west are literally at rock bottom. It’s just two dudes playing a video game and then one of them saying “oh remember that time we went to Japan 10 years okay” “oh yeah so nice should do it again sometime” and that’s it 😭
its not all of them who are viewed this way, its the sino-soviet ones in particular because they are weirdly intimate. other friendship posters often had many figures together, handshakes, soldiers marching and workers together but the sino soviet ones are noted for very close hugs, eye contact and a focus on two figures in particular. they also make them look quite similar in terms of face and body shapes which elicits the idea of a couple even more
