Is there any mileage in defending her position on the grounds that she's managed to have a key character in one of her books be gay without anyone much noticing? And that this may cause some people to challenge their assumptions about how easy it is to spot gay people?

Serious question. I was quite impressed with what she'd managed to do, but I know nothing about the theory behind this, and I'm interested to find out exactly how wrong I am (I'm clearly somewhat wrong, based on the reactions of pretty much everyone I respect who actually knows about this stuff).