And I haven’t yet reached the end of the tale. After I’d become intimate with Olivia by learning SVU’s languages of exposition and omission, and by absorbing the fan narratives that fill in its interstices with passion, angst, and sex, I was curious what other people thought of my new girlfriend. As it turns out, debate about Olivia’s romantic status is far more prevalent than I anticipated. One notable thread on USA’s online SVU discussion board begins with a cautious, open-ended query by mariskafans — “So, would anyone be too terribly offended if Olivia started dating a girl?” — that has thus far garnered over 50 responses (more than any other topic, though another about Olivia’s relationship with married partner Elliot Stabler is rapidly catching up). Tellingly, the question is immediately transmuted into a dispute over Olivia’s probable sexual orientation. Some fans consider only the most explicit textual citations admissible as evidence, and say so quite emphatically:
dtobe2008
She is DEFINITELY straight. There have been many episodes where she's had a date with a man and you've seen a few.teresa985
The fact that she's dated men before on the show, and no women, leads me to believe that she's straight. Unless she flat out says: “I'm dating a woman” or something of that nature, I'm not going to believe she's a lesbian.
Others respond to this literalism by pointing out both the inherently partial nature of the picture of Olivia’s love life we get from the episodes, and the possibility of a less rigidly binary sexuality:
Bekster
We don't know that she's straight — she's mentioned a significant other, what, once? She could definitely be bisexual, which would be great, she's gorgeous!Kloie
And... just because a girl's slept with men doesn't necessarily mean she's straight. lol
This strategy is then countered with references to extratextual gossip (the avowed heterosexuality of Mariska Hargitay, who plays Olivia) and TV industry logics (the imperative to appeal to a mass audience and remain within the program’s formal constraints):
svu junkie
They will never make Olivia gay 'cause her heterosexuality has already been established. If she decided to 'jump the fence' then they would have to focus on her personal life and we all know they would NEVER do this!! Heck... the show's been on 5 years and we've seen the interior of Olivia's apt. ...what...maybe once??SVUFreak107
OMG YOU GUYS ARE CRAZY!!! Mariska/Olivia is not gay no matter what it will just screw up her image in real life and no one will like her. It will take people away from teh show not to it!!!
A recent poster objects to the idea on political grounds, citing a crucial pitfall that lurks within this sort of discussion (one which this paper itself must struggle to negotiate):
SVUAddict
I find it very frustrating when females who are strong and assertive immediately get labeled lesbians. Yes, Olivia is tough and independent, but she's also straight and I've grown tired — in my own life and in Hollywood — of seeing powerful women labeled as gay. To me, at least, it undermines the potential of straight women to possess these characteristics.
Meanwhile, what is perhaps the most fascinating response overtly describes the influence of fan production on Olivia’s hypothesized sexual orientation:
Munchz Hunch
as far as olivia and being gay goes, the only reason i ever thought she WAS gay was because of all the fan fics about her BEING gay! that was what made me question her sexuality... people write fan fics from what they got off the show, and i havent seen every episode, not even CLOSE, so i was wondering after reading those fics if they [Olivia and Alex, Olivia and the new ADA Casey] truly WERE gay couples on the show. but that was put to rest after seeing her with cassidy [“Closure”] and with that reporter dude [“The Third Guy”]... so i have had my suspicions, but they were all eventually cleared up.
In this viewer’s hierarchy, fan fiction has substantial authority in the investigation of Olivia’s sexuality because it is written by those with above-average expertise in reading the television text. However, verification within the program itself trumps these fan interpretations, offering a stable resolution to the issue (at least if one conveniently overlooks the option of bisexuality, as mentioned above). We return, then, to the priority of textual data in the homo/hetero calculation, with the implication that if some are arriving at the wrong answer their viewing practices must be perverse or deluded. Spank puts this dismissal most succinctly: “This is ridiculous... You lot look for things that aren't there.”
As we see here, the question of whether Olivia could potentially be anyone’s girlfriend is a particularly contested one across the SVUniverse (online SVU fandom). While there is clearly intense investment on both sides in definitively determining the answer, there is at the same time significant confusion about how much fluidity is allowable and about the proper source of the necessary evidence (text, audience, or metatext). Given the apparent elusiveness of the boundaries of both heterosexuality and textuality, there seems to be little hope of closing the case once and for all.
