Dani, I'd love to read that article if you find it again!
I agree with your post! I also wish modern BL wouldn't lean so heavily into heteronormativity, like the rigid ideas of tops/bottoms and how it leans into heteronormativity, and sexualising abuse and non-con is a big no-no for me. I've always preferred BL where the characters feel like LGBTQ people with a queer identity, rather than walking BL tropes like the "only gay for you" cliché you mention.
While I get that BL nowadays is a "dreamworld" as I mentioned in my reply above, originally the genre leaned toward melodrama that explored heavy topics like forbidden love, identity, religion, sexual abuse and so on. The characters were usually quite androgynous. My read on these early days of BL (before it was even called "Boys Love") is that the writers weren't trying to exploit LGBTQ+ people, though there was actually a bit of an exotic angle to their writing as these were Japanese women mainly writing about European young men falling in love.
Obviously BL has transformed completely since then, and since BL (as well as western slash) spread across the world it has become almost mainstream. I think that once they started making movies and tv-series based on BL manga/novels, it became something very different.
For one, BL now isn't something that's mostly being written, drawn and/or read by a female audience; it also includes male actors who star in these fantasies of male gay love. I remember how straight male Hollywood actors used to win Oscars for portraying gay men because of how rare it was, and nowadays we have so many male actors breaking into the industry by taking these BL acting roles and even established artists taking a BL role in order to grow their brand. The BL fandom and industry are almost unrecognisable from what it was when I first became a BL fan.
IRL shippers was the biggest surprise to me. I knew about it from the Supernatural fandom, but I never knew that it had grown into such a huge part of the industry as well, with all the PR events and actors being contracted to use performative fanservice as a way to attract attention. It's...quite down putting actually. There's a discussion to be had about privilege – both the actors' and the audience's.
It's also a bit uncomfortable to see fans so utterly convinced that all the actors experience character bleed. I've seen so many references to partners – real or suspected – being attacked by fans, and I've also seen the heartbreak when fans realise that their IRL shipping couple "breaks up" or are otherwise revealed not to be real. It can't be good for anyone involved, except for the ones making money on this sham.
