How did a 3 word question spiral into this
the answer is no for the reasons you listed but people will downvote you to feel superior to you <3
Agreed. To add, fujoshis aren’t fetishizing by the fact that the form of media consumption varies on genre and not exclusively on smut or kinks, anyways. Yaoi consumption essentially stems from romance and love, smthing women have always been fascinated since time immemorial. Irregardless of the sex, race, etc. women will inhale anything with love plot and romance. The idea of reducing liking yaoi to just fetish feels like an insult to all the wonderful works of yaoi so far. Works that has no kinks, smuts, or anything. Works that display raw genuine emotions and evoke sincere tales of love, life, and passion.
But to disagree with one point, i feel like its not a similar comparison between liking yaoi the same way to straight male consumption of yuri/ lesbian works. Cos that fascination majorly stems from their fetish of girls making out with girls.
Someone earlier asked if fujoshis are fetishist, and it hit me again how easily we get this label. While that is a common surface-level assumption, I believe the phenomenon is vastly more multifaceted. I basically answered "no" with a text using analytical psychology as theoretical background, and I’d love to get everyone's thoughts on this perspective. For context, I am a 26-year-old female, pansexual, fujoshi, and hopefully graduating as a psychologist in two or three months.
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One of the reasons that makes fujoshi attracted to yaoi is the fact that they feel able to project (in a psychological way, meaning: attributing to a character traits, feelings, and characteristics, either desirable or not, that one is unable to perceive, realize, or recognize in themselves) onto both the bottom and the top. Basically, they use the characters as mirrors of themselves.
Carl Jung, the famous psychiatrist and creator of analytical psychology, defined the Anima and Animus: anima means the feminine side in a man, and animus is the unconscious masculine side in a woman. In traditional romances, a female reader's projection is often interrupted by her own ego and social conditioning, such as judging or feeling pressured to relate somehow to the girl in question. By removing women from the romantic equation, female creators and consumers can project their animus onto both characters (top and bottom), eliminating the baggage of patriarchy and male objectification. This allows them — us, better said — a safe place to explore our own inner masculinity, which is often rejected consciously or unconsciously.
The bottom often holds traits like sensibility, empathy, and a gentle, likable character (sometimes so girly you can't tell the difference, but he is still a guy), but he also holds the social power and gender roles of a man, which means he is not seen as presumably fragile and delicate. He holds certain powers often not attributed to women, and that is why strong female leads, femdom, and gender bender (I'll elaborate later) are common and also consumed by the same public. This means that, in a same-sex relationship between guys, gender roles are not defined by gender itself but purely by choice—something most women don't have and/or are stripped of. This makes the act of submission not equal to giving up power, but an act that holds power within itself; a possible alternative to relationship dynamics, not a certainty or a fate. He also represents a part of the animus.
The top is often represented as strong and trustworthy, dominant and powerful, even aggressive. One side of the interpretation—though not the most accurate one—is that he holds characteristics women often feel secure with, thus stimulating the desire to make them happy (naturally, as in any fulfilling relationship) and turning submission — in this case, through the bottom character — into a possibility, but safe from real-life downsides like potential violence. Now we are working with the desire to submit, not the obligation, which is turned into an empowering act.
Gender bender is the perfect representation of breaking through gender roles; it can represent a kind of "revenge" against patriarchy and plays literally with the meaning of being a man or being a woman. A more accurate view is that the top represents the manliest part of the animus, since women are commonly discouraged from showing rage, aggression, strength, and assertiveness. So, both the top and the bottom represent aspects of a woman's animus, allowing her — again, us — to recognize those aspects in ourselves and opening a path to the Conjunction (Coniunctio). Basically, it is the dialogue between seemingly opposite aspects of one's self, creating space for a new reality and a more mature self. The relationship between two men is often reframed to explore aspects like vulnerability and emotional depth, meaning women can witness and experience the aspects of their animus becoming one, mirroring their own internal journey of balancing masculine and feminine characteristics.
Now, if a woman's animus (again, her manly side) is neglected, repressed, or shaped by negative real-life experiences with men, it manifests as what Jung called the Negative Animus. Dark yaoi stories—those with toxic dynamics, non-con, obsession, etc.—are possible means to process the Shadow. The shadow consists of aspects that society or the context see as "bad" or undesired, which leads to their rejection and suppression, and eventually to psychological suffering. In short terms, your shadow is everything you reject in yourself. These dark yaois then become a safe psychological lab to work through those traits without real-life danger or consequences.
Finally, the same thing happens with yuri consumed by men: it is a safe space to project the anima, or things popularly seen as undesirable in men.