Re: #3: but somehow it's okay for thousands and thousands of books (mainly YA) where one of the main plots of the book is which boy the main female character picks? Thinking of Twilight and The Hunger Games mainly. Those books shine a "huge light" on heterosexuality but that's okay with you? Just look how much the media focused on who Bella or Katniss would end up with.
And the thing about the "struggling LGBT hero" is that, we (as a community) kind of need characters like that for now? Because if LGBT characters don't practically hang a sign around their neck saying "I'm not straight," homophobes were certainly 100% do their damnedest to deny that that person is not straight. You say you're bi, right? Have you ever heard that BS people say like "oh bi people are actually just gay people who are scared" or like "she just hasn't met the right guy yet, she really is hetero." Same shit happens to fictional characters in fandom. They deny the character's sexuality and aggressively "ship" them with characters of the opposite sex. Or they scream and shout and stomp their feet and say the character's relationship with someone of the same gender "came out of left field" or "doesn't make any sense" or "had no development." (Legend of Korra is a prime example of this) The most popular BS complaint lately is that F/F or M/M relationships are "abusive." And yet these same people have no problems making manips or writing fic about male and female characters who probably haven't even been in a scene together (OUAT is a prime example of this) or who are actually abusive to each other (or the male abuses the girl). Or, like for a bisexual/pansexual character, they trash and degrade the character's relationship with someone of the same gender and promote how much better their relationship with someone of the opposite gender is so much healthier, bla bla bla. (The 100 is a prime example of this)
And also, a lot of people, of all ages, are struggling with being not-straight. And characters like this do help them come to terms with who they are and might actually help them come out. I think it also helps build empathy in people who are willing to learn how other people experience life.
I agree, subtle would be so much better. I don't know if you watch The Flash, but I love how subtle Captain Singh's marriage is. Just shown with no fanfare. (I haven't finished Jessica Jones so no comment on that). But I think we still need loud and proud LGBT characters in media. Same for black characters, or Latino characters, or Asian characters.
But do we accept tokens? We absolutely fucking do NOT accept tokens. I'd rather not have LGBT characters at all than some one episode poorly written token that's afterwards ignored (looking at you, OUAT). Or some crappy episode that's done for sweeps week where someone is LGBT but then at the end of the episode or the next episode reveals it all to be a dream. Or it's some shitty one-off "musical episode" where someone is gay but it's not considered canon because "musical episode". I hate sweeps week episodes. (I also really hate the obsession that canon is the only thing that matters, blegh).