Gay People are Real, Slash is Meta
Jul. 2nd, 2009 10:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eumeliaThe first line of today's Torchwood radio play was Ianto's and he said:
"All right Jack, I'm in position".
My mind immedeatly went to "hehe, sex positions".
Not only do I have Slash goggles, I have Slash earphones.
I haven't written a fandom meta in a while, not just a review or a small comment. But full fledged talking about the affect of media has on us.
I mention my Slash love because yesterday there was a bit of bigotry in fandom:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
xtricks reports:
Now, homophobia is a bad thing. And really, fandom for me, is an escape from that. But of course that isn't really so. Fandom, like everything else, cannot be culturally removed.
I link to her a lot, but she's really brilliant;rm wrote an entry about this little bout of bigotry regarding the fact that Gay people are real, Slash is a genre... the two are connected:
Quite a bit if discussion are in those posts, but I have my own thoughts about.
Personal preference for me is Slash(1) of the male/male kind.
My current fandom favourite has a male homosexual couple as part of the canon.
I prefer to read stories in which sex and violence are explicit.
I've often tried to think about why I, a feminist, a queer woman; I prefer to read stories, get turned on by stories, share sexy man-on-man stories with my dyke GF who also enjoys 'em (I only send her the really good ones!) in which my subjectivity has to be shifted into that of a man.
What's the difference between that and girl-on-girl porn written by men? Or a "Mills and Boon" bodice ripper written by women?
Personally speaking, it just feels difference. That's gut feeling.
There are plenty of PWP (Plot? What Plot?/Porn Without Plot) stories out there, in which the only thing written is sex, explicit and very fun.
The gut feeling difference is that good stories, even PWP, is that the people written still feel like People.
Jack and Ianto remain them even when they're just fucking. They remain who they are, whether they are comforting each other, dominating one another or are hating each other to their marrows and the consent in dubious.
Mainstream porn (both written and visual) is about objectification and fetishism.
Slash... well, good slash, subverts that.
The fucking that we love to read is done by characters who are people. It's what I love about fandom, it uses a world that more often than not is pretty hole-filled and manages to construct an alternative narrative which manages to make a world that actually feels more real than the one originally created... even if it's just a bedroom.
Of course, the main thing I love about Slash is the fact that it is not Straight(2). Through fanfic and Slash in particular, this confused 13 year old girl learned what it is that people of the same sex can do together, because honestly, look around, we are only now seeing characters with desires that match our own that aren't accessories, comical tropes or tragic figures(3).
I like reading characters who revel in their sexuality without the mind numbing crushing shame - or actually see them deal with the shame that may or may not be thrust upon them and not die - or see that sexuality explored without apology.
As a queer woman who reads fiction that is more often than not written by other women (queer and not) about men who are sexual with each other... in a society that tells me that that is not so legitimate, I feel stronger.
It brings me comfort.
It enables me to consider sides of characters (humanity) I did not think about, because slash is a literary Meta on the world and characters written about.
And that's awesome.
However, as stated in the above quotes, queer people are real, homophobia touches us. The stories we read and write are not in a vacuum. The internet is a hot bed of hate and vitriol that surpasses the "real" world.
That some in fandom consider it disconnected from the very real power dynamics that affect us is at best silly and at worst exclusionary and violent.
And that, friends, is awful.
Yeah, I know, I ended it on a bit of a low note. Whatcha' gonna do...
Notes
(1) I love Het, Gen and Femmslash as well. But Slash is what I look for more than any other genre.
(2) Good Het or Gen isn't Straight either, imo.
(3) I hated "Brokeback Mountain".
"All right Jack, I'm in position".
My mind immedeatly went to "hehe, sex positions".
Not only do I have Slash goggles, I have Slash earphones.
I haven't written a fandom meta in a while, not just a review or a small comment. But full fledged talking about the affect of media has on us.
I mention my Slash love because yesterday there was a bit of bigotry in fandom:
xtricks reports:On the bad:
Rules here: http://community.livejournal.com/vidorama/597.html?thread=9557#t9557
Screencap of an expanded explanation here: http://pics.livejournal.com/mresundance/pic/0002267r
And the comment I left on her journal about the issue, complete with smilies; because smilies make everything okay!
Just dropping a quick note to let you know that I’m publicizing as widely as I can that you’ve implemented a homophobic policy and that you are explicitly and openly discriminating against topics or interests that aren’t straight. I’m encouraging everyone I know not to participate in any way with your contest.
Hope your contest sinks into obscurity like a stone! :)
Now, homophobia is a bad thing. And really, fandom for me, is an escape from that. But of course that isn't really so. Fandom, like everything else, cannot be culturally removed.
I link to her a lot, but she's really brilliant;
rm wrote an entry about this little bout of bigotry regarding the fact that Gay people are real, Slash is a genre... the two are connected: Look people, it's pretty simple. Slash is a word for a type of content that pairs two characters of the same gender together (the specificity of whether this means non-canon pairing or includes canon pairing is a debate, but not one relevant to this post), and you can feel pretty much any which way about it, I don't much happen to care -- because the issue here isn't sentiment, it's conduct.
But what slash means is that the content it applies to tells stories about gay people: what they do at work, what they argue about in the kitchen, what they feel in their hearts, and yes, often enough (because holy crap, the Internet is for porn) how they fuck.
The key words in the above sentence, in case you got distracted by the implication of curtains!fic or porn: "stories about gay people."
Gay people are real. We are in your fandom. We are very happy to be here. We are happy to exist in fandom content in a way we don't often in the original material content. We, and the fictional characters whose lives reflect our own to some small degree, get to have full lives here in a way we don't often get from ABC or NBC or CBS or the BBC or WHATEVER at 8pm and sadly for many of us, in a way we don't always get to have with our families or in our workplaces.
So stop treating us like we're fictional. Like that real gay people are inconveniences or blow-up dolls or just some weird, slightly novel, abstract idea.
It's rude, it's ignorant, and most importantly, it's boring. Knock it off.
Quite a bit if discussion are in those posts, but I have my own thoughts about.
Personal preference for me is Slash(1) of the male/male kind.
My current fandom favourite has a male homosexual couple as part of the canon.
I prefer to read stories in which sex and violence are explicit.
I've often tried to think about why I, a feminist, a queer woman; I prefer to read stories, get turned on by stories, share sexy man-on-man stories with my dyke GF who also enjoys 'em (I only send her the really good ones!) in which my subjectivity has to be shifted into that of a man.
What's the difference between that and girl-on-girl porn written by men? Or a "Mills and Boon" bodice ripper written by women?
Personally speaking, it just feels difference. That's gut feeling.
There are plenty of PWP (Plot? What Plot?/Porn Without Plot) stories out there, in which the only thing written is sex, explicit and very fun.
The gut feeling difference is that good stories, even PWP, is that the people written still feel like People.
Jack and Ianto remain them even when they're just fucking. They remain who they are, whether they are comforting each other, dominating one another or are hating each other to their marrows and the consent in dubious.
Mainstream porn (both written and visual) is about objectification and fetishism.
Slash... well, good slash, subverts that.
The fucking that we love to read is done by characters who are people. It's what I love about fandom, it uses a world that more often than not is pretty hole-filled and manages to construct an alternative narrative which manages to make a world that actually feels more real than the one originally created... even if it's just a bedroom.
Of course, the main thing I love about Slash is the fact that it is not Straight(2). Through fanfic and Slash in particular, this confused 13 year old girl learned what it is that people of the same sex can do together, because honestly, look around, we are only now seeing characters with desires that match our own that aren't accessories, comical tropes or tragic figures(3).
I like reading characters who revel in their sexuality without the mind numbing crushing shame - or actually see them deal with the shame that may or may not be thrust upon them and not die - or see that sexuality explored without apology.
As a queer woman who reads fiction that is more often than not written by other women (queer and not) about men who are sexual with each other... in a society that tells me that that is not so legitimate, I feel stronger.
It brings me comfort.
It enables me to consider sides of characters (humanity) I did not think about, because slash is a literary Meta on the world and characters written about.
And that's awesome.
However, as stated in the above quotes, queer people are real, homophobia touches us. The stories we read and write are not in a vacuum. The internet is a hot bed of hate and vitriol that surpasses the "real" world.
That some in fandom consider it disconnected from the very real power dynamics that affect us is at best silly and at worst exclusionary and violent.
And that, friends, is awful.
Yeah, I know, I ended it on a bit of a low note. Whatcha' gonna do...
Notes
(1) I love Het, Gen and Femmslash as well. But Slash is what I look for more than any other genre.
(2) Good Het or Gen isn't Straight either, imo.
(3) I hated "Brokeback Mountain".
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-07-02 08:32 pm (UTC)I think a lot of slash is objectification in more or less the same way as f/f porn made for straight men. But not all of it, and I keep thinking that's not the primary point or appeal. There's a difference in medium, for example: fake!lesbian porn is filmed, involving real actors, and generally more explicit as a result, while slash is written or drawn. The porn industry is commercial and competitive; fanfic is inherently collaborative. And while there's a lot of "oooh the pretty boys are doing dirty things," there's also a lot of higher level thinking going on. Is this a platonic buddy-cop relationship, or is there homoerotic subtext? How would this character react to the realization that he's gay? How would the characters around him react? What would this mean about his identity, etc.?
And PWP shouldn't be discounted either. I've read some stuff where it's totally about characterization even in the midst of smut, and that's the stuff that I actually find hot.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-02 08:39 pm (UTC)Those are really good points, the difference in medium and economy are definitely part of the deal.
And Yes! with the Brokeback hate!
today's radio lay
Date: 2009-07-03 04:23 am (UTC)Re: today's radio lay
Date: 2009-07-03 06:14 am (UTC)Golden Age was superior than Asylum in more ways than one (though I love PC Andy) - but definitely the interaction between Jack and Ianto was one of them and Jack guarded tone about the relationship with the Dutchess was very interesting.
Once the I've heard all the plays I'll probably write a comparative review. Those are always fun!
My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-03 04:32 am (UTC)And also a liquor store called "DTs" with a pink elephant on the roof that had a mechanical trunk that went up and down...
*sighs* I am not making that up. I could show you photos... Okay, we were somewhat hick-ish.
Now, Milk, on the other hand, was a fantastic movie that didn't get nearly enough hype it deserved and Christ, was Sean Penn amazing and the whole film held my attention longer than Slumdog Millionaire and Gus Van Sant was robbed! HE WAS ROBBED. I liked the strength in Milk. Yes, Harvey Milk died tragically, but he lived.... He LIVED. He was not a tragic figure. He was an heroic figure—one that inspires.
I've come to the uncomfortable realization that perhaps there will never be a serious character on TV who is gay and deals with it openly and less comically than, say, "Will & Grace" (a show I hated). I enjoy seeing John Barrowman as Jack—but I would be interested in getting into his head more than seeing him get into everyone's pants. Yes, he's a sexy bitch. Yes, he and Ianto are super. But the closest we've gotten inside someone's head was back in season 1 and it wasn't really Jack's head, it was the man he got his misnomer from (so what is Jack's real name? How did he become the man he is? What choices has he made?). Even then, it was a little vague... I want to know how Jack came to terms with his sexuality. Or Ianto. Insight would be nice, but is that just too "boring" for TV viewers? Not for me.
But that is the BBC. See, here in the States we get Filtered!BBC in BBC America. We get Top Gear and all that, but we're a season behind and they aren't showing us all the TV that's available on... all four BBC channels. Okay, bad example. The closest we get is HBO or Showtime and those we've got to pay extra for. Hell, I have to pay extra for the BBC America. And all I watch on Showtime is "Dexter," which I wait for the DVDs because a week between episodes would give me a heart attack. As for HBO...
Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) on True Blood... He's openly gay. In a time when apparently gays are slightly more acceptable than vampires (which makes me think this is the faaaar distant future we're seein'). He beat the shit out of two guys who came into Merlotte's and returned their burger because it had "AIDS" on it (seriously, best scene in that show when he told those two rednecks off and practically snapped one guy's arm like a twig). The problem I have with True Blood is ALL THE GODDAMN HET SEX ALL THE GODDAMN TIME. Ms. Harris ('scuse me while I get my Southern on) wrote a great series of books. With a few sex scenes. NOT A WHOLE GODDAMN ORGY EVERY SINGLE PAGE AND CAN WE GO ONE EPISODE WITHOUT SEEIN' JASON STACKHOUSE'S BARE ASS, PULEEZE? SWEET BABY JESUS... My aunt is obsessed with this show and when I told her I watched it too, we had to censor ourselves around my super-conservative parents.
AGAIN I HAVE LOST THE POINT. My point is, I agree with you. And I'm troubled by the thought of young writers writing slash without knowing what they're really writing about. Does that make sense? If you aren't old enough to legally buy/rent/download it, you shouldn't be reading/writing it. That goes for het PWP too.
Because you kids have no idea what you're writing. And it's embarrassing.
I've actually tried really hard to write a PWP, but for some reason, I keep coming up with a goddamn plot and then BAM! Thirty chapters later... *shrugs* that reminds me, I'm waaaay late for an update...
And don't get me started on F/F fandom. A, where is it? B, I said not to get me started.
Seriously, my answering comments to your journal entries are so goddamn long...
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-03 07:17 am (UTC)Dude, Wyoming is not a total hick state. We had ranches, yes, but not many sheep ranches (more horses, cattle, and...buffalo). Plus! We had a Target. And a Perkins.
To be fair (though I hate that movie with a passion) it was set in the 1960's and most likely was quite different from when you lived there.
Regarding Milk... it was better, but it still felt very much like a "Gay movie for straight people" - I dunno... it didn't resonate in me as much as I thought or hoped it would. Plus I'll now always associate it with this (http://eumelia.livejournal.com/396319.html).
Regarding Jack and insights to characters: My suggestion is that you watch Season 2 as well, a whole slew of character development. See, one of the things I'm kind of tired of seeing is queer people coming to terms with their sexuality, as though it is this great hardship on their lives because no, it is not the sexuality that is a hardship, but the stigma. Jack, specifically speaking, hasn't had to come to terms with his sexuality because he comes from a time where it doesn't matter who you fuck or how much. The show centres around relationships and how they deal with each other and the dynamic of gender is interesting because it is rare. It is rare to see an office romance where the actual issue is the fact that a boss is screwing and the power dynamic therein.
Ianto has gone through a whole lot, including his relationship with Jack, why do we have to see him angst about being with a man? That's not the interesting part IMO. Insight into why he wears suits... now that's interesting... insight as to his coffee fetish, that's interesting.
Beside the fact that the whole coming to terms thing is somewhat homophobic because it implies that the heterosexual dealing with it is normal (seeing as heteros don't have to come to terms with anything when it comes to sex) it doesn't leave a whole lot to the imagination. I don't want my characters to have a whole detailed history outlined. I like to try and figure things out for myself - that's what fic is, figuring out characters and gaining insight through literature.
I'll stop now. Yes, not realising that there are real gay people out there and writing slash oblivious is... problematic. Same as writing Rape or Non-Con (Dub-Con is a bit different) as though it is something rare and kinky... is problematic.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-03 08:18 am (UTC)Goddammit, we were still using horses in the 60s, what am I talking about. I lived there in the 90s (mid to late) and we still had some guys using horses instead of cars. Which was actually more reliable since it was usually too damn cold for the engine to turn over anyway...
Regarding your regarding Milk... I understand. See, I'm just so used to seeing one side of the story (that crazy ass Anita Bryant POV) with the progress of GLBT rights and it was so... Different in a good way to see the 70s alongside someone as vibrant as Harvey Milk (though it is true Sean Penn < The Real Harvey Milk because he was just so... alive) and as someone as secure in himself and his identity. But I suppose I just proved your point—it's a "Gay movie for straight people."
I do need to watch season two. I got distracted by the horrible mess that was the end of season three for Doctor Who (don't get me started on that) and the fact that Jack is supposed to be the Face of Bo... I think my love for Ianto was cemented in season one when Gwen started fooling around with Owen and Ianto and Tosh were kidnapped by those cannibal The Hills Have Eyes Even In The UK people. He proved to me he was more than just "the coffee/information guy." Ianto has strong instincts. And he has gone through a lot... His ex-girlfriend was part Cyberman for crying out loud. I don't want to see him angst about anything. He needs a break. I would die if I saw him in "casual" wear. What does Ianto wear when he's kicking around his flat? Does he EVER go home? How, exactly, does he take his coffee (that, for some reason, I really pay attention to in TV shows—like the detectives on Law & Order; most of the time we get that five second pour/six sugar packets from the guys)?
seeing as heteros don't have to come to terms with anything when it comes to sex
I have to come to terms with a sweaty man who is far heavier than me touching me in places only I have touched and than shoving his penis into my vagina and probably not getting an orgasm out of the whole traumatizing experience... But that's my problem. Let's have a TV series about a girl coming to terms with that. Instead of the promiscuous teen, can we have the shy one who knows enough about biology to say: "okay, ow, and whoever does that to me better have a clean one."
And, can I restate, USE CONDOMS, PEOPLE.
Writers, it isn't sexy, but sometimes a girl wants to be certain.
I can't read Rape/Non-Con (and Dub-Con is different because usually I find that the writer went the "rough sex" route) for personal mental image/sense memory reasons. I'll stumble across the ones that aren't "warned" or mis-"warned" as dub-con... I start feeling those hands again and I just... Panic. I often wonder if writers of rape stories have even the slightest idea of how personal and damaging rape is. I can't think about the guy who touched me without feeling this electric sense of hate and disgust (self-disgust, even—mostly)... And now I'm wondering if I should write one just to set the record straight...
Perhaps this is more of what the hetero!me needs to "come to terms with" before I can really start a relationship. Or find one. Or get any of the men I know to see me as a person first and a partner second. Or at least get ONE KISS BEFORE I TURN 25. What the fuck is WRONG WITH ME?!?!
I like the things you have to say...
Date: 2009-07-03 12:39 pm (UTC)I hear you, really I do, having been in a relationship with a man, what you are talking about exists and also very problematic. The whole heteronormanive sexual discourse is crap and bad for everyone.
However, straight identity is not stigmatised like gay identity, which, huh, I wrote about this week ().
God, I'm so sorry you've experienced that. You don't have to come to terms with anything. The kind of healing psychologists and psycho-therapists offer is not the only of being able to bear the fact that the trauma you experienced is in fact part of "normal life" so to speak. I don't think there's anything wrong with you, for the record, a number of my friends have never been kissed and they're in their twenties and a number of my friends enjoy one night stands more often then not.
There's nothing wrong with either that and your age is irrelevant. Society and culture can kiss your ass with their idea if Normal.
Re: I like the things you have to say...
Date: 2009-07-04 02:19 am (UTC)Right now, reading this, I feel like some of that weight has lifted off my shoulders. Thank you for being here to talk about these issues with me (and everybody else), Mel. It really means a lot to me. I love the things you have to say.
I'm so tired I'm about to pass out, but I promise to read the linked post ASAP.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-04 10:07 pm (UTC)Yes, this.
I've got one on my hard drive; while I don't think anything can accurately portray rape, I think it at least comes close. But I'm afraid (cowardly?) Partly because what if someone comments with how hot it is? But also, it's a very personal story. Even though I've changed the act itself for a much more physically painful one and displaced the POV onto a male character, the humiliation and the helplessness are very much mine.
I had to dig deep to do it. And I don't want it to be someone's turn-on.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-05 02:54 am (UTC)I've been tempted to write my personal experience and put it "out there." Mainly so I can finally PUSH the experience from my mind and perhaps I won't feel those ghost-sensations when I think about it after I've shared it in detail—but I too am afraid to post it because I'm worried people will take it the wrong way or I'll be "looked at" differently. I'm still the same person—just now you know a bit more about me and my life experiences. It's not a cowardly thing to think—it's a genuine concern. Something that would require a personal warning before the actual text.
Rape should never be a turn-on. Rape is probably the most obscene violation of the human body and mind besides telepathic mind-scrambles and last I checked, Scanners was just a movie.
I admire that you've had the courage to actually write one, though. You aren't cowardly for not wanting to post it. Not at all.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-06 05:30 am (UTC)*nods* I always worry that people won't take me as seriously as they did before they knew. That they'll think of me as fragile, damaged, walking wounded.
I'm not sure I could write down what happened to me without the filter of someone else's character. It's a layer of protection, something that I'm writing about happening to someone else.
The funny thing is, my original purpose in writing it was as a reaction to thinking about "non-con" vs. rape, and wanting to write a story to show how not-fun the real thing is.
And now I'm too damn scared to release it, because I'm afraid that the very people who I wanted to explain the difference to will think it's hot, anyhow.
Apparently, I fail at logic.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-04 08:11 am (UTC)Brokeback Mountain is a hard film for me. It brings back very painful memories of growing up queer in that time and in the midwest. Like the story or not, it very accurately reflects the time period it is set in.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-04 09:41 am (UTC)Being very young it's really easy for me to forget that lives are still affected by a time period and place that was so much more physically violent and oppressive.
I'm sorry if I came off as flippant in that regard.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-05 02:45 am (UTC)Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-04 09:27 pm (UTC)Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-05 02:35 am (UTC)If you aren't old enough to legally buy/rent/download it, you shouldn't be reading/writing it. That goes for het PWP too.
Mainly, the real, trivial reason behind this is that I'm sick of reading PWP that I know by the writing style/descriptives that someone who doesn't quite grasp the adult nature of the subject. It takes me out of the "experience."
And I am being hypocritical since I stumbled across my first "adult" fic when I was underage. And I also agree with the difference between visual and written images. The written image does not come off as explicit as a sex scene in a film (rated or not). The problem is this "written image" is rated according to the "movie/TV scale" on Fanfiction.net. Here on LJ, comms require authors to post warnings above the summaries and cuts that let a user know if it is appropriate for them to be reading the following or not.
*hands in the air*
I dunno... It all boils down to how we think kids should be raised I suppose. I, for one, would not do the following:
I went to a late night showing of the
crappysequel to the first Underworld movie a while back, and a mother came into the theater with three of her kids. From what I could tell, the oldest was 13 and the youngest was about 9. Now, I still don't understand why she was taking them to see this movie (boobs, sex, lots of violence—to include two instances where jaws were ripped apart) so late at night in the first place. Then, when it started, I hoped she'd told the 9 year old all about sex because *BAM* there it was 20 feet talland probably one of the worst sex scenes I've ever witnessed in a theater-distributed film as far as realism goesand all gaspy.Then I remember being 10 and going to see Forest Gump and getting the "hand over the eyes" treatment during that movie's sex scene.
It's a conflicting, backwards kind of logic. Is it even logical? I don't know... And I am such a freakin' hypocrite.
Re: My comments on your LJ are more often than not incredibly long...
Date: 2009-07-05 02:12 pm (UTC)Sex didn't start being meaningful to me until I started to feel I wanted to have it sometime in the future. That's when it started to be something to blush about, before that it was all a joke about the adults. I started reading fanfic when I was 13 (het, anime. Most of it wasn't very good and I went back to watching anime soon enough) and then again at 15 (slash, HP, it was awesome and I started to read the subsequent books to stay in the loop of fandom) and it was then that sexual revelations started to shock me (pleasantly or not unpleasantly since I kept reading it), but nowadays everything new shocks me so much more than it did back then. I accepted anal sex like, hu, there's another hole, cool (and double penetration as "woa, does it stretch") and now, as an adult, all these things seem way "scarier" than they did them. Kids are way more resilient than adults and adults always forget this (when they are not giving them talks on sex, when they are policing what they read).
Here on LJ, comms require authors to post warnings above the summaries and cuts that let a user know if it is appropriate for them to be reading the following or not. (If you go to check the numbers collected in the recent warning debate you'll see most people in lj do NOT warn)
I think kids know what they like and dislike and people should stop trying to control them so much as long as it doesn't represent a physical risk to them (and in that case parents don't have much of a chance of controlling them either but they should try to stop them from meeting with strangers from the net alone, for eg, because in the physical world they are disadvantadged). I think the people who head the NC-17 warning are NOT 14 year olds but adults who have gotten tired of reading only about sex. I would be willing to bet you can't find me a single underage person who regularly (not even always) heads the age warnings (which are kinda random, as you said, since they are movie ratings for written stories and there's not a commitee or anything to determine which stories are what). And even if an underage person reads something they end up finding squicky? It doesn't traumatize them for life, the girl from the cinema and riped jaws? Maybe she'll have nighmares, maybe she'll develop an interest in the working of the canine jaw, maybe she will forget. She's not an abuse victim with specific triggers, you can't tell how it will affect her simply because she's young (many kids her age watch that kind of movies all the time even if they have to hide it from their parents)
I haven't seen any of the things you mention, Underworld n1 was sucky enough!
Part 2 of comment starting "I think it should be a matter of self-policing"
Date: 2009-07-05 02:14 pm (UTC)Not everybody is discerning enough to wait until they have the skill to write to publish, but I'm sure it's not something only teenagers suffer from. In fact, looking at published books, I'm certain of it, so yeah, I understand what you feel (although I avoid PWPs as a rule) but it's not a legitimate complan or maybe it was just worded in a way that bothered me. Maybe you were just telling your friend "I'm too tired of reading porn by kids, they don't know what they are doing") but since it was a public discussion I reinterpreted it in a larger scale.
*hands in the air*
I dunno... It all boils down to how we think kids should be raised .
Sure, it all boils down to that, and I don't completely agree with you and I've ranted a lot in the above comment even though I've extrapolated a lot of the things I implied you think (because you seemed to agree with the general opinion). If I'm wrong about something or sound a bit harsh, sorry, it's just been a long time coming.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-03 06:13 pm (UTC)Thank you, yes!
no subject
Date: 2009-07-04 09:14 am (UTC):D
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Date: 2009-07-03 10:36 pm (UTC)I like reading characters who revel in their sexuality without the mind numbing crushing shame - or actually see them deal with the shame that may or may not be thrust upon them and not die - or see that sexuality explored without apology.
Substitute "18 year old" for "13 year old" and that's how I feel about slash as well. Figuring out my sexuality in college would have been a lot more agonizing if I hadn't discovered fandom and slash at about the same time, and had access to a wealth of reading material that told me that bisexual/gay people could be policemen, and superheroes, and vampires and vampire hunters, could be the hero of the story. And that sex and love between two people of the same gender was normal, sexy, and something to celebrate, just the same way that hetersexual romance was.
Honestly, I have a strong suspicion that a lot of the slash people criticize as fetishizing homosexuality was the same stuff I was clinging to as a college student because it validated me and didn't erase me or pathologize me, because I was 19 after all, and probably not that discriminating in my reading tatstes yet, which makes me ponder: slash and fetishization is a really complicated messy grey area given that a substantial percentage of those of us who read and write it are LGBT. Can you fetishize homosexuality if you yourself are not straight? When lesbians/bisexual women read and write porn about gay men, is it really fair to compare that to girl-on-girl porn for guys, given the male priviledge issue? (okay, bringing male priviledge up isn't entirely fair, since gay men certainly aren't major consumers of girl-on-girl pr0n as far as I know and being know to be gay pretty much negates male priviledge in many places, but still)
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Date: 2009-07-04 09:24 am (UTC)I think straight women who write m/m porn/romance and whether it is fetishism is also a question because despite not having an intersection with queer, women are still an underprivileged class of consumers.
Being known to be a gay man may endanger ones privilege in certain spaces, but you're still a man in a Man's world, and that gives one a whole lot more advantages than for some straight women.
But regardless, yes, there is a fine line between the fetishism and revelling in sexuality, imo. You have to tread carefully and examine yourself and your desires (which is also fun!)
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Date: 2009-07-06 09:07 am (UTC)This argument is bollocks.
Sure, gay men have advantages - when and only when they hide everything they are. If not, they have "advantages" - like less job possibilities than women, the risk of being beaten up or killed for being gay, constantly being villified by the population at large, and so on.
Gay men don't have it better than women, and your argument that they do is ignorant beyond belief. The best for them would be to have it as bad as women - which is already arguable at best.
Oppression olympics have no winners and no medals, and you should really learn this.
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Date: 2009-07-06 09:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-10 02:33 am (UTC)Within fandom, I know of no gay male femslashers. Obviously I'm not familiar with every femslasher there is, especially in fandoms with different conventions than my own (i.e. the OTP-ers), but I know plenty of female femslashers, both straight and queer, and femslashers who like myself are male and heterosexual, but not one gay male. Which is odd when I think about how much every possible combination of gender and orientation seems to be included under the m/m slasher tent; their absence is conspicuous when compared to all the queer female m/m slashers.
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Date: 2009-07-10 11:16 pm (UTC)Then again, I've found that a lot of femslash that isn't comics based (comics seems to be the exception because the female character are generally all action heroes as well and to have the same mega-angst backstories as everyone else ina cape) tends to be very good as pr0n but not so good as romance -- it's physically hot because girls = hot and two girls = twice as hot but it isn't emotionally hot in the same way that a lot of slash and het is because outside of Xena, you don't get the same melodrama and "I would kill/die for you!" and action and drama (and epic-length stories) that good slash tends to have (except in Sarah Waters' Fingersmith, which is wonderful in general). Femslash often doesn't have the same epic feel. There really is a different aesthetic, and it's one that often doesn't appeal as much to me on an emotional level in prose fiction unless we're talking comedies of manners (I eagerly await the day some author starts a line of f/f regency romances, which would be like printing pure brilliance).
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Date: 2009-07-11 12:09 am (UTC)I was prepared to stipulate that femslash generally doesn't deliver romance in the way you seemed to me to be constructing that genre, but it occurs to me that that's not true; there's a small but steady stream of Devil Wears Prada femslash that seems to have all of the characteristics you cite. I'm pretty sure it's true of other femslash fandoms, too, but I don't know much about them, because they tend to be OTP-focused (like Xena/Gabrielle was?) and I avoid OTP-focused femslash fandoms because they don't usually give me what I want from a fic, but instead oversentimentality. I've been waiting forever for a good subversive D.E.B.S. fic that digs its claws into the universe and focuses on the minor character--but instead it's just one ode after another to how much Amy/Lucy love each other.
But if we stipulate the point that the sort of femslash I like to read--that focused on queer intertextualities and potentiality rather than melodramatic romance--tends to be shorter and less "romantic" (in the sense of presenting an idealized quasi-heteronormative relationship between two participants)--it certainly doesn't follow that the only thing left for it to do is be hot in a pr0nographic sense.
After all, non-romantic femslash does much of the same things all fanfiction does: it explores the universe, analyzes characters, makes connections, problematizes canon, etc. And much of the same things m/m does: creates a space for gay characters, portray non-heteronormative relationships, etc. I have a strong feeling that there are certain things the "femslash aesthetic" is particularly good at (other than just being hot), something about complicating and queering canon, but a) I'm having trouble articulating them, and b) I know there are (both romantic and non-romantic!) m/m slash stories which do the same thing.
But I think we can just leave it as axiomatic that it is possible to succeed as art without succeeding as porn or romance, no? My favorite stories are just that: good stories, which tend to reveal to me more about myself than anything, brimming with wisdom and insight.
So it'd seem there'd be plenty of stuff for a gay male to potentially be interested in femslash. That doesn't do the work of actually getting him into femslash fandom, work which obviously has not been done, but I don't think the problem is lack of stuff he could be interested in.
(Also I have to question why one would automatically expect gay men to be interested in melodramatic romance, either. Now I'm thinking back to Radway's Reading the Romance, and trying to decide how much of what she says about heterosexual female romance readers could maybe also apply to gay men.)
Furthermore, I suspect you're constructing "slash" in a way that would be alien to many of its practitioners (some of them gay men? I dunno), especially those of contemporary, "third-" or "fourth-wave" slash stories--although I don't read enough m/m to be able to make the claim. (Most of the m/m I do read is in SGA, and while I can think of one story that arguably fits your "romance" paradigm, none of my other favorite m/m stories do.)
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Date: 2009-07-04 03:58 am (UTC)Now I don't get the concept behind this VIDORAMA -is it an annual contest? Did freelancer_47 change the rules? Is it a contest she made up herself [because it sounds like she and a friend are the only judges]? Wouldn’t that be considered a little unusual in vid contests? I have seen a few contests at cons and there were usually panels of judges - some handled slash/adult while others did gen or other genres. Then they’d have the “best of _____” and maybe BEST in SHOW or have groups of fans vote for the winners. What are her qualifications to be the judge of quality and value in vids? Is she a BNF in fandom with a lot of experience? Does this mean anyone could just say "I'm having a vid contest so send me your vids in the fandoms I select and I'll pick the winner"??
I also just don't get the ban on same-sex pairings if they are part of the actual aired shows. (BTVS; ANGEL; DR WHO) Very restrictive. I'll be curious to see how many contributors join the competition.
This inquiring mind really wants to know. Thanks for the heads up on this new wrinkle in fandom.
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Date: 2009-07-04 04:30 am (UTC)So it's all about her which means that her preferences rule!
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Date: 2009-07-04 09:13 am (UTC)The link below suggests that this person really does not get the concept of Gen and why banning Slash under that title is discriminating. *sigh*.
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Date: 2009-07-04 04:29 am (UTC)And also note the latest excuse from Vidorama's mod who despite being religious and against homosexualism has bestest friends who are gay: BINGO!
http://community.livejournal.com/vidorama/597.html?thread=24661#t24661
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Date: 2009-07-04 09:04 am (UTC)Dude!
And thanks for the cheer :)
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Date: 2009-07-04 08:57 pm (UTC)What I want to reply (but I know comments are likely screened & deleted, and obviously she's not interested in honest reactions):I wonder if she realizes that if she said, "please give me vid recs, including your own, in these fandoms, no slashy vids please," it would've gone completely unnoticed. It's the contest factor that's getting her all the attention--she's going to announce "THIS VID IS GREAT" for some number of vids, and she's declared that same-sex couples just can't be that kind of great.
Oh, but she's not homophobic, because that would mean, umm, throwing rocks at gay people or something like that. She has gay friends, but she doesn't approve of the gay "lifestyle;" that doesn't make her anti-gay. (I wonder if she's ever been told by pagan friends that they like her, but they think her Christian lifestyle is immoral? And whether she'd think that of course they're not "Christian-bashing;" they just don't want to see her acting Christian in public.)
(Sorry for delete & repost of comment; I missed a crucial word that drastically changed what I was saying.)
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Date: 2009-07-05 03:20 am (UTC)I would love for the world to switch one day and put the shoe on the other foot—make those of us (me included...I think? I'm not so sure anymore) who are heterosexual be the "odd" thing and homosexuality "normality" (or what the majority of the world considers "normal"). It would be fun to see how she handled with being her lesbian friend's weird "straight friend" who is "fun to hang out with 2-4 times a week, but I don't want to see her make out with her boyfriend..."
Oh man, that would be priceless...