Photo courtesy of Patrick Walters, Producer of Heartstopper on Netflix / A group shot of the cast and Alice Oseman, creator. Many are holding their script sheets, and all have smiling, wide-opened mouths. They are outside and behind them is grass and sky.

queerview: Heartstopper fans cyberbullied Kit Connor for “queerbaiting,” which shouldn’t be a thing

Earlier this week, Kit Connor (Rocketman, Heartstopper) publicly came out as bisexual via Twitter after fans of the show accused him of allegedly queerbaiting the fandom. That sentence alone pains me to write, as the announcement came after months of targeted claims and hysterical accusations.

Photo Credit, Netflix / A still from the series Heartstopper Joe Locke (performing as Charlie) and Kit Connor (performing as Nick) stand under a yellow and blue umbrella while it rains. Kit wears a dark hoodie and Joe wears a brown and white striped shirt. City buildings can be seen in the distance.

The trouble only began in September, but the pressure grew fierce and Connor rightfully deleted Twitter amidst the discourse, allegedly because of cyberbullying. The accusations are fabricated from a deliberate misinterpretation of the term “queerbaiting” which refers to a creator hinting at a fictional character’s possible queerness without confirmation. Kit Connor is a real person, a young man, a highly visible young actor, and his sexuality is not up for speculation.

Publicly speculating on someone’s gender or sexuality is inherently transphobic and in Connor’s case, as the internet twisted itself up into a knot this week to reveal, biphobic. When an individual presumes to know someone better than they innately know themselves, they’re participating in a public act of cruelty.

Consumers of the tender British series, Heartstopper, seem to have missed an important theme from the show: cruelty causes queer people immense pain on the subject of being outed and forced to out themselves, most especially as young adults.

Alice Oseman, author of the Heartstopper comics which Oseman then wrote the screenplay for the television adaptation produced by Netflix in 2022, understood the impact of such cruelty. Heartstopper is a tender comic following two schoolboys who begin as friends, and through the encouragement of their friends, realize their own attraction to each other beyond friendship.

Photo credit, Netflix / A still from Heartstopper — Joe Locke wears a blue sweater and stares up at Kit Connor, who is wearing a dark beige denim jacket with a green hoodie inside. There are cartoon leaves of various colors surrounding them above.

The comics are gay, emotional, lighthearted and focused on the importance of coming out at your own pace, which is what brought Heartstopper to the forefront of queer people’s minds. The Netflix show born of these comics then became an opportunity to see love and attraction bloom away from pre-supposed labels and expectations. To let love grow in its own time.

What we witness in Heartstopper is a moment, for many bisexual people, myself included, when you stumble upon an opportunity. To be yourself, to be honest and to be uncertain all at once.

I was cackling with glee when Nick Nelson, portrayed by Connor, was searching for quizzes on bisexuality from the internet, because I did the same thing when I was seventeen, spoiler alert, we got the same results. We see Nick Nelson wrestle with his understanding of sexual attraction and as an actor, Connor embodies this epiphany with the tenderness it deserves.

Photo credit, Netflix / Still from Heartstopper. Kit Connor wears a blue and black diagonal striped tie, white dress shirt, and black blazer. He wears a lopsided smile and a school hallway can be seen behind him.

Any individual requiring a young adult to split open their chest and reveal their queer card is a part of a community grounded in or internalizing fear and skepticism of queer people. Connor is undeserving of any speculatory accusations or assumptions regarding his sexuality.

Bisexuality is a label that is already rife with judgement and accusations of “cishetero-passing” couples as well as bisexual men and women who are frequently invalidated by gays of all genders for “not being able to pick a side.”

It is so unbelievably cruel and unfair to Connor that what should have been a quiet moment of acceptance, and celebration, was turned into a call for “justice” which resulted in him being outed. As a queer person, anytime someone is required to share their identity in a position where they may feel unsafe or forced, has been outed; it is a sickening experience I would never wish on any individual.

Out of all the actors to be outed, why was Connor the target? We have plenty more bones to pick, as queer people, with cisgender men being cast to play transgender women, and loudly straight actors, whose sexuality has actually been confirmed prior to casting, put into roles of queer and gender-non-conforming characters.

Photo Credit, PinkNews / A film still from Carol. Cate Blanchett wears a fur coat that she holds closed with a red-gloved hand. She wears lipstick and stares at Rooney Mara, who wears a black headband and black clothes. The red door of a car rests between them. It is snowing.

Hilary Swank, who is cisgender, won an Oscar for playing trans man Brandon Teena in Boys Don’t Cry. (Insider) Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal, both straight, were both Oscar-nominated for their performances in Broke Back Mountain. (Insider) Harvey Milk, political activist, and a cisgender gay man, was portrayed by Sean Penn, who is heterosexual, in Milk. This is to say, these are heterosexual adults, as they have expressly shared, who not only accepted roles to play queer characters, but went on to win awards for their roles.

In fact, Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, cast as pining lesbian characters in the queer holiday favorite, Carol, are also heterosexual. None of these are at all comparable to the “queerbaiting” Connor has been accused of, because it’s none of the internet’s business.

Photo credit, Gay Times / Sebastian Croft, Kit Connor, and Joe Locke stand in the middle of a Pride parade. Croft poses with his mouth open, wearing a graphic t-shirt, a rainbow flag painted on his face, and a queer flag tied around his shoulder. He clasps hands with Connor, who wears a white graphic t-shirt with a blue baseball cap, and a rainbow heart tattoo on his arm. Joe looks at the camera, eye glasses on his head and a queer flag tied around his shoulders.

Connor being outed after dedicating so much time and energy to carefully representing Nick Nelson, a gentle schoolboy coming to terms with his own sexuality, is frustrating for a multitude of reasons.

Connor has been working closely with queer and transgender castmates on set as well as being under the direction of Alice Oseman, the creator of this entire queer story who has been heavily involved in the casting of her original characters. She would certainly have had something to say if Connor had not been the right fit both as an actor and representation of Nick.

This leaves me to wonder if the fandom has any idea how qualified and exceptional this young man really is? Their actions and accusations from the past week certainly do not seem to indicate so.

Photo Credit, Netflix / a promotional image for Heartstopper. Cut-outs of all the actors as their characters in various poses are placed in a turquoise background.

Fans of Heartstopper made a cruel assumption: that they knew better than Connor, Locke, Finney, Croft, Oseman and the Heartstopper team dedicated to bringing this crucial queer coming of age story to life. How dare anyone maintain a right to their own identity beyond a character they have been temporarily contracted to play? Connor is playing a role, beautifully so, of a queer character; and his sexuality is entirely separate from Nick Nelson’s, which fans would do well to remember. This certainly didn’t seem to be much of an issue when Carol hit theaters in 2015.

These assumptions cause massive harm, and strike a deep cord with bisexual people all over the world. Personally, some days being bisexual feels like throwing an elbow into queer circles, reminding the people around us that there is room for attraction to multiple genders, and that bisexuals are the leaders of trans acceptance long before cisgender gays were.

Photo Credit, ScreenRant / A split photo of Kit Connor as Nick Nelson coming out. On the left, Connor wears a yellow and white striped Adidas t-shirt and faces forward (a plant rests behind him). On the right, Olivia Colman as Nick’s mother Sarah, embraces Connor.

My bisexuality is important to me because it gave me a place to belong, and I found it in my own time. While reactions to my coming out were not what I had hoped, coming out at all was my choice, and my choice alone. Connor deserved the opportunity to come out in his own time, much like Nick Nelson received in his own story. My heart breaks for this stolen experience now associated with toxicity and biphobia.

Connor deserves better, as does the whole cast, from their fanbase. The internet is not owed answers around sexuality and identity from anyone–that is ultimately a violation of consent as well as a cruel act of outing someone. When this person is also a very well known actor, and young man, this act becomes targeted harassment. Something no individual should be subjected to, regardless of status as celebrity or not.

If Connor ever decides to give the internet another chance, most especially when season two comes to streaming, I will welcome him back with a ginormous hug, from one bi person to another. From the bottom of my heart, Connor, I am so unbelievably sad, frustrated and sorry this happened to you.