Recently the latest side book in Martin's "Song of Ice and Fire" came out, called "Fire and Blood" and it's the history book from which the historical novellas thus far released( "The Princess and the Queen", "The Rogue Prince" and "Sons of the Dragon" ), are excerpts. So those stories are folded into it, along with a lot of text that made it into the Red Book of Westeros (as I prefer to call "A World of Ice and Fire" ). But one character whose whole life story was written was Rhaena Targaryen, the eldest grandchild of Aegon the Conqueror. Also his daughter-in-law, because Targaryens. And in the tradition of the rule of three, now I'm wondering about the point that all the significant homosexual characters are pretty awful people.

The best one, arguably, is Loras Tyrell. Most of his flaws can be written down to obnoxious adolesence, and he shows capacity to grow and be a better person, if he survives his current state of affairs, last seen suffering massive burn trauma from a stupidly suicidal castle assault (see above, re: obnoxious adolesence). There are other sort-of bi characters, but they can't really count as homosexuals, or are also horrible. Cersei is one, though both of those caveats count with her, in that it's pretty clear the gender of her partner isn't much of a sexual factor, and what she's actually doing is exercising a rape fantasy. She gives no hint of personal attraction to Taena, merely clinicly noting her physical attributes and only describes her genitalia disparagingly during their encounter, which she also finds sexually unsatisfying. Taena is pretty scummy for how and why she came to be in that encounter in the first place. She's a traitor to someone, breaking confidences and plotting the arrest and prosecution of innocent children, as well as perjuring herself at Tyrion's trial. So even if she's into Cersei and not just using sex to get close to her, we're back to horrible person.

Danaerys has a few same-sex encounters with her servant, one of which was initiated by Irri. The other two, Dany initiated out of loneliness, and which she also found unsatisfying. It's clear that all her sexual interest is in males and to whatever extent Dany is gay, it's prison gay. Oberyn Martell is supposed to be bisexual, and possibly his daughter Nymeria. Well, Nymeria's most significant act is advocating child murder in a cause for which she has no justification, by any reasonable standard. Bad person. Oberyn, on the other hand, despite being the subject of lurid rumors, is known to have had six heterosexual partners and claimed two others, and rumors only name a single same-sex partner, Daemon Sand. All we know about Daemon's sexuality for sure is that he has had sex with one woman, and proposed to her afterward, so it's not exactly like he was grossed out. But even if Oberyn and Daemon had a thing, the circumstances knock Oberyn down into the bad guy category, since Daemon was his squire and thus, it's an issue of abuse.

With those out of the way, the major homosexual characters in the main sequence novels are Renly Baratheon and Jon Connington. Jon's a delusional asshole who is so obsessed with a guy whose just not that into him, he regrets not committing massacres for his crush and is starting yet another war in order to put a likely false king on the Iron Throne. As well as being a dick about it. And he's carrying a deadly communicable disease without telling anyone.

Renly is also an asshole who was trying to usurp a throne over his own brother, planned to kill said brother in furtherance of his ambition, came to a parlay in bad faith intending to eliminate any reasonable argument to work with his brother, and detained an envoy in order to have her witness what he expected to be a massacre in order to make an object lesson. Before he decided to try usurping a throne, he trash-talked Stannis to their colleagues, including making off-color jokes about his wife and mocking his daughter's affliction. He had to be aware of Cersei's incest and the treasonous replacement of his brother's children, but said nothing, while he schemed to turn the situation to his advantage. His treatment of various women is pretty bad too. He is contemptuous of Brienne, but uses her affections for his own protection. He plays up to the expected treatment of Catelyn as a noblewoman and a widow, made so by his own enemies, but he keeps her from returning home, forcing her to watch him massacre Stannis & his supporters to terrorize her through her maternal inclinations. He first plans to use Margaery as a sex object to induce Robert to be open to the revelation of Cersei's actions and then as his tool to gain influence and position at court, and when that falls through thanks to Robert dying, he flips neatly to marrying her and using her as a beard and incubator while he carries on an affair with her brother. At the time the story begins, Loras is sixteen and Renly 21 and their affair has been going on for a while. At the least, they looked at porn together in Renly's home, in which he is never seen over the course of the series. So he started a sexual affair with a kid under sixteen, whom he came to know when said kid was under his care and supervision as his squire. Double gross.

And if Renly wins, the new precedent for royal succession in Westeros is that nothing matters by brute force. That's a method used all too often as it is in Westeros. The country certainly does not need a whole new civil war every time a king dies.

And now, in "Fire and Blood" is Rhaena Targaryen, who by all accounts short of a PoV in her bedroom, is also homosexual by inclination, three marriages notwithstanding (one was arranged to her brother, because Targaryens, the second compelled by threats to her children and the last clearly a cover and undertaken in the interest of preventing yet another unwanted marriage). She doesn't initially present as all that bad and has a number of good qualities and there is certainly reason enough to explain her bad behavior later in life, but she is still pretty selfish, entitled and horrible to deal with, basically alienating just about every member of her family except the pushover daughter she dumped in a convent, and getting all pissy that people get sick of feeding her dragon with nothing in return but the dubious pleasure of her company. She drives at least three members of her immediate family to suicide or influences their actions down paths that lead to their deaths. And blames other people, of course.

That's three now, George. Gotta wonder.