I read the books and never did I ever have the idea that the ethnicity of the Emondsfielders was that clear cut. Actually the whole of Andor was a bit non-descript in that way. Unlike all the other nations that had a specific flavor. The only thing I actively remember is that Rand had some traits of one of those other people's.

Emondsfielders in the series to me came accross as a credible group of mixed race people. But how da fog did their ethnicity become a core of the WOT story? They were living in the ruins of a society that could barely have known any such lines of demarcation.

I never got any gay vibes from the books and the pillow sisters thing was so veiled that even when it was pointed out to me it felt more like a reluctance to include homosexuality than actually being inclusive. And yeah, the times we could feast on the description of female's breasts were many more than I could appreciate.