Tag: rape for ts

paininthecasbutt:

apersnicketylemon:

livinginthequestion:

apersnicketylemon:

apersnicketylemon:

Pedophilia is bad should not be a radical statement.

No really, please reblog this if you can, because this site in general, but fandom spaces especially bad for this, to the point where people are genuinely afraid of harassment they may face for saying ‘Pedophilia is a bad thing and you probably should not encourage it’ or for calling it what it is. Fandom spaces are also especially bad for screaming about how it’s ‘just fiction’ when we know damn well that fiction impacts reality.

Actual, real-life pedophilia is bad. People dealing with their personal pain by writing about it, in a fictional setting where tags and opt-in measures allow others to avoid it, are fine; in fact, a very effective way of working through one’s issues. Oversimplifying the process from ‘pedophilia is bad’ to ‘all people who write fiction about it are bad’ is policing in its worst form. 

Actually, trauma survivor here,  these people are in fact still furthering the normalization of the trauma they are working through, while also actively hurting other survivors!

If you feel the need to write it to process it, I understand that completely. In fact I’ve DONE that as a part of processing my own trauma in the past! However, you do not get to publish it into public spheres, including online, where all it will do is hurt other people. Likewise, this form of trauma processing is not, in fact, helping you!

These people include other survivors who may have been trying to avoid it and were unable to, people who are being groomed for abuse, people who are already being abused, and do not recognize that abuse for what it is, and the person writing it (assuming they ARE in fact a trauma survivor, because the vast majority of the people shipping siblings, minor/adult relations, and other abuses, are not in fact survivors of this. They just get their jollies off to it!).

Likewise, this is not, in fact, a coping mechanism, and it is not fine. This is retraumatization and self harm in many cases, being written off as ‘coping’. When you publish that, particularly the people who are writing it as ‘romance’, you hurt other survivors. In fact it’s predominantly survivors calling this shit out.

When you have a dozen people telling you ‘if you need to process it through these means, you cannot publish it because this is normalizing it and hurting all of us and people who will be hurt by it’, then you need to recognize that what you are doing is hurting someone and then saying “I’M JUST COPING!!!” which makes you an abusive piece of shit.

Now, consider the fact that you essentially just said “pedophilia is bad BUT FICTION IS OKAY!! FICTIONAL PEDOPHILIA IS ALWAYS FINE AND EFFECTIVE FOR HELPING PEOPLE SO YOU CAN’T CALL ANYONE OUT ON IT EVER!! YOU’RE POLICING COPING!!!”

Like, no. Most of those people writing hebdophilia, abuse, incest, and pedophilia fics on AO3 in some fandoms are NOT coping with a goddamned thing and pretending they are and saying ‘buuuuut fictional pedophilia/hebdophilia/abuse should never be policed!!’ is only going to create MORE victims. (like, I am in one of these fandoms. The people shipping the 25year old with the 14-17 year olds are not ‘coping’, they are fetishizing. Their argument is not ‘It’s my coping mechanism’ it’s ‘but it’s just fiction!!’).

And yes, coping SHOULD be policed. If you are hurting others, normalizing abuse, and retraumatizing/hurting yourself, it’s a bad way to cope, and isn’t coping but self harm, and you need to let it go and find something healthier. You should be helped through this process, definitely, but you should also be working on it, particularly if your ‘coping’ is being read by actual pedophiles, attracting them to your work.

Yes, changing how you cope can be hard, but it is hardly impossible, and acting like people using these things to cope should be allowed to without ever being challenged in that is actively preventing their recovery too. It was when I gave up self harming and found better ways to deal with stress (baking, video games, a long bath, a bad movie, a favourite comedy show) that I began to heal and recover.

I was hardly perfect, it was hard work, but if you actually care about survivors you should consider listening to us when we say that what you’re talking about still hurts us, doesn’t help us work through our trauma, and is not being primarily produced for or by us and therefore continues the normalization of the abuses we faced while failing to display healthy relationships and thus draws in more future victims who do not know the difference between ‘healthy’ and ‘abusive’ due to the excessive normalization both in fanfiction and in published fiction and other media, and society at large encouraging hebdophilia already especially.

Also listen to us when we say we are tired of our abuse being fetishized for the consumption of others, particularly by people who are writing/drawing it and have never been in that situation themselves, and they and their readers ignoring us saying these things. As these people are often also fetishizing mlm and wlw relationships we’re especially tired that they are portraying us as hebdophiles and pedophiles when we’re already accused of this by the outside world too.

@rosemoonweaver what do you think about this?

I’ll tell you what I think.

First, I think that unless you’re a licensed mental health professional you have no business telling anyone how bad their therapist approved coping methods are. I’ll get into why I think that’s so insidious in a little bit.

Second, I think that you can write absolutely anything fictional AND publish it no matter how vile or disturbing the content is.

Third, I think our lemon friend here is slippery and has gone from “this thing we all agree is bad is bad” to “all these things that make me uncomfortable are bad and don’t you dare publish them ever”. And I think that is really harmful.

Alright. Let me break this down a little more and refute some shit.

First of all, the mental health thing. How dare you? How dare you tell people who are survivors just trying to get by that the coping methods they’ve found or have been offered to them by a therapist are bad for them. Do you have any proof that this coping method literally helps no one? I mean actual studies and research, not individual testimony. No? Didn’t think so, because it’s not true. This is argumentum ad populum. If a bunch of people say it, it must be true! No, no it’s not. A bunch of people say that the earth is flat and that’s bullshit, too.

Here’s the thing – writing about trauma is hard. It’s painful. It kinda sucks sometimes. Last year I wrote the aftermath of a car wreck and I had to keep getting up and walking around my kitchen because even though it was very brief and not very detailed, it struck a nerve. It was tough to do, but you know what? I felt better after I did it. I was able to process my own feelings a little better, and in the end, I was proud of myself for doing it. But here’s the thing, you say that we’re not allowed to share that with other people and I have to ask why. When I first talked to my therapist about writing my pain out (she suggested it, by the way) she wanted me to share it when I finished. She wanted me to either share it with her or in a small group or even online because a very important part of the process for me is to be heard. I need people to hear me. I need people to believe me. I need, after years of being gaslighted and hiding away in the corners of my own mind, for people to witness me. And a great way to do that is to share the work I’ve written, in a way that makes me comfortable, in a place where there are safeguards so that others who might not want to see it don’t have to. For me, that means content warnings all over the place and posting under a cut if we’re talking tumblr.

And you know, the idea that work that deals with sensitive topics can only hurt people is false anyway. I’ve been triggered by some fiction. It was properly tagged but I read it anyway, thinking I was in an okay state of mind but I wasn’t and it brought up some icky intrusive memories. And, you know, that sucked. I lost a lot of sleep over that and had myself a panic attack. But you know what? I survived. I had tools at my disposal to calm down, to center myself, and to relax. But I’m not mad at the author for writing that stuff. I’m not mad at them for sharing it, either. I’m mad at the person who did the things that caused me to be traumatized. And, you know, I have hope that they way the particular topic that triggered me was addressed might’ve helped someone. The whole scene that freaked me out was a character realizing they’d been abused and if that helps just one person understand what happened to them wasn’t okay, I’m over the moon happy for it. I’ve had lots of friends (all who write darkfic) tell me that they’ve had comments from people who thank them for allowing them to understand what happened to them and how it wasn’t okay. Hell, I personally have learned what the hell gaslighting looks like because of fanfic and that’s helped me understand how it was done to me!

And I know, the examples I gave were car crash related and not CSA but you know what? The attitude and impression you give off isn’t good for survivors. I don’t have to share anymore than I already have about the shit I’ve been through or the crap other people have done to me, so I won’t. I don’t want to use my abuse as some kind of instant credentials. Darkfic (aka cope shipping) can help a lot of people. It doesn’t help everyone, though, and you know what, that’s okay too! A little too much dark stuff can be bad for people (like me) and it’s about knowing your limits and knowing when to take a step back and when to not engage. But, I’m sorry, I really really hate the idea that cope shipping or writing darkfic or writing The Bad Thing is somehow bad in and of itself. It breeds a deep shame in people, one I’ve had to beat back with a stick so that I’m okay with expressing myself to people who will actually care. I don’t want survivors to feel like writing about their abuse in a fictionalized way is a bad thing. I don’t want survivors to feel guilty about sharing their experiences with others, no matter how they chose to do it. We deal with enough guilt and shame and blame already, we don’t need to put more of it on ourselves.

Second, the fiction thing. I believe that there is nothing you can’t write about. I’m serious, too. I’m so over the moral panic over what people are reading and writing. I love torture porn horror movies. Saw 6 is one of my favorites, and it’s gorey and bloody and completely contradictory to the whole “save yourself by saving others and changing your ways” kinda message the other movies had. But I love it because it’s creative and gory and sometimes I just wanna be a little grossed out. I’ve read so much rape, molestation, genocide, torture, false imprisonment, racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-semitism, and murder in books. A few years back I read a book called The Ministry of Special Cases which was so disturbing I couldn’t sleep for two nights. And the really disturbing thing was that the book was a fictionalized way of bringing attention to shit that really happened in Argentina. None of the fiction I’ve been exposed to has turned me into a monster. None of the objectively terrible crap I’ve enjoyed in fiction has made me a bad person. That’s because it’s fiction and I knew right from wrong before I started reading the books and watching the movies. I know that murder and torture aren’t okay and if I really saw someone being murdered and/or tortured I would probably cry and throw up, but in fiction it’s fine.

Fiction exists for so many reasons. Sometimes it’s there to titillate, sometimes it’s to gross you out. Sometimes fiction is there to give you a world you might like to escape to and other times it’s to give you a world you’d want to escape from. Fiction is catharsis and hope and despair and repulsion and love and lies and death and rebirth. But, most importantly, it’s not real. Fiction is made up. Nothing is really happening here, other than the reader is sitting and moving their eyes across a page or staring at a screen. Can fiction affect people though? Sure! It absolutely can! But it’s not a case of monkey-see-monkey-do. Humans have critical thinking skills and we don’t just imitate what we see in fiction because we think it’s fun or hot. If you’ve ever seen a work of “romanticized noncon” or “romanticized incest” and you were grossed out or repulsed by it, you’ve proven my point for me. We don’t automatically see a thing that we know is bad and suddenly go “you know, maybe I’ve been wrong” because it hasn’t been painted in a bad light. Children, too, are a lot smarter than people seem to give them credit for. Children know the difference between fantasy and reality. Adults do too, unless they’re having mental issues and then that’s a separate issues I don’t want to get into here.

Now, I know it’s kind of uncomfortable for some people, but the fact of the matter is is that people have some kinks and fantasies that are taboo. Some people have rape fantasies, and you know what? That’s perfectly okay. There’s nothing wrong with having a rape fantasy. It does not make you a rapist or “damaged”. And some people would like to express those fantasies either in a safe and consensual way with a partner or with fiction. That’s 100% okay. The thing is, like I said before, when reading, the only thing that’s really happening is that the reader is moving their eyes across a page. No one is actually being raped. No one is actually a rapist. Can it trigger discomfort in some readers if the rape is romanticized? Yes. Can it trigger bad memories and panic attacks in some readers? Yes. Does that mean that that piece of fiction should not exist? No. It does not. Sorrynotsorry, the fiction can still exist and I think it should. It’s a separate issue, really, but I don’t think anyone should feel shame about having fantasies that are consensual (like consensual non-consent is). I don’t want people feeling damaged or gross. That helps no one.

And before this argument comes up, no pedophilia is not a kink. Pedophilia is a mental issue and if anyone is having thoughts about kids of attraction to kids (real kids) they should seek help. There is help available and it should be addressed. That’s as much as I’m willing to say on the topic, but again, if someone wants to depict that in fiction I support them, too.

Look, I get the disgust over heavy topics that are written as titillation. I really do understand it. But I don’t agree that it’s always retraumatization and self-harm. I don’t agree that it should be policed. I don’t agree that if you’re not writing it “the right way” you’re bad and not really a survivor. Seriously, fuck that. I can’t stand no-true-Scotsman’s and that’s what that is. If you don’t write or ship it the “right way” you’re not a survivor – fuck that. Every person is different. Every shipper is different. We all write things for different reasons and sometimes some ships are better suited to work through issues that might not even really be trauma but is still something that bothers the author. Just because someone isn’t a victim or survivor doesn’t mean they’re barred from writing The Bad Thing. I hate this reductionist way of thinking. It started as “you’re only allowed if you cope ship” then it was “you can only cope ship if you’re specifically affected by the issues you’re writing personally” and now it’s “nope! No cope shipping allowed”. Nope, screw all of that. You’re allowed to write it. You’re allowed to write whatever the fuck you want. Now, this is a separate issue, (again) but I also think we’re allowed to talk about The Bad Things in fic. I think we’re allowed to say “hey, this thing here? That’s rape if it were to happen in real life and rape isn’t okay.” or “this is abuse if it happened IRL” or “this is sexist and here’s why”. BUT I think it can be done without attacking the authors and making them defensive so that they won’t listen. There’s a way to discuss things with people if you think they’re not taking it seriously, but you know what? If their response is “yeah I know, I just don’t care” or “yeah, I know, that’s why I tagged it like I did” then your job is done. It’s over. Move on and do something else. (ALSO, TAGS ON A FIC ARE THERE BECAUSE THE AUTHOR KNOWS WHAT THEY’RE WRITING. IF IT’S LABELED “ABUSE” IT’S BECAUSE THE AUTHOR KNOWS THEY ARE DEPICTING ABUSE NO MATTER HOW IT’S WRITTEN IN THE NARRATIVE.)

Fandom is a really cool space because we can always have discussions about the implications of our works and how we come across with what we’re trying to say. So, you know, we can have actual fruitful discussions about what abuse is and what it looks like while also depicting it and all the complicated things that go along with being a abuse survivor (like still loving your abuser, thinking you deserved it, guilt, shame, reluctance to talk to others, fear ect.). We don’t have to make every work of fiction perfect or wonderful or an outright condemnation of The Bad Thing because sometimes we’re still working on it. Sometimes we just need to say something and throw it out there.

Lastly, the more I think about this, the more insulted I am. OP admitted that writing about their trauma was therapeutic but has now decided it’s wrong for others to do it. Which, you know… that’s just fucking cruel. No, it’s not appropriate to walk out into the middle of the street and scream about your abuse because you’re not really doing it in a way that everyone present has volunteered to be subjected to. That’s not okay. But putting something up on your personal blog on the internet, tagging it properly, or writing it and putting it on Ao3? That’s not the same thing. Tags exist as warnings and filters. Ao3 is a safe space for readers and writers. It allows writers to put their work up, no matter how many Bad Things it has in it, and it has an organized tag system that allows readers to know what they’re getting into. And I think that’s amazing! It’s wonderful to know what kind of themes and topics you’re about to deal with while reading. Ao3 allows people to decide whether or not they’re ready to engage with the topics present and that’s fantastic!

But you know, that can’t happen if we don’t write it. It may surprise some people, but reading something that deals with a person’s trauma can be cathartic. Again, trauma is complicated. Sometimes one of the brain’s defense mechanisms is to fetishize that which hurts us. Sometimes the brain goes “hey, that Bad Thing is scary but let’s make it not scary! Let’s handle it this way instead!” and that’s healthy. It’s a way of processing and recontextualizing so that we can start to work through it. Does everyone do this? No. Do some people? Yes. Is it okay? Yes. There’s nothing wrong with it. But the people who aren’t comfortable with writing their own trauma or haven’t reached that point yet might need fiction to do it with. If we’re not allowed to write it, the people who need to read it can’t do that. So you know, if there is just one trauma survivor reading a fic to cope and process that was written by a non-trauma survivor, I think that fic is more than worth it.

But I said I’d point out why the idea that I can’t share my trauma is so insidious, so I’ll address that now. It’s telling survivors to shut up. If I can’t talk about who hurt me and what happened in a way I’m comfortable, how can I ever really help myself? How can I heal if I’m not allowed to express myself? Yeah, I have a therapist and a support group but that’s not enough. I need to be acknowledged. Survivors need to be seen and by telling them that they’re not allowed to express themselves in a safe place (which is what fiction is) you’re effectively telling them to shut the hell up. The message is effectively, “no one cares what happened to you. You’re gross. Stop talking” and that’s so fucking gross and cruel and wrong. No! We let survivors speak!

I know plenty of people who the softer things don’t actually help. I’m one of them. Taking a bath doesn’t help me process my trauma. Baking doesn’t help. Jogging and mindfulness and drinking smoothies doesn’t help. I need to write about it. I need to express it and physically talking about it, physically saying “this happened to me”, is too difficult for me. I’m getting better, but a lot of that is thanks to writing and the community of darkfic writers who help me process, who listen to me, who are the shining light in the dark for me. I’ve been free of self-harm for a year this past October and you know what? I think a lot of that is because I’ve given myself permission to express my suffering. I no longer have to hurt myself because I can be seen and that’s so fucking liberating.

To the survivors out there who are uncomfortable with darkfic existing, I sympathize. I actually do. There are things in fiction that piss me off and squick me and make me mad. There are things I don’t like seeing. But, it’s not my issue. I can’t tell other people they’re not allowed to write it. I can wonder about their motives, but I can’t say for sure what those motives are b/c I don’t know them. I understand the discomfort. I understand the side-eyeing. I understand being disgusted. But I’m not going to tell them to stop because there’s a chance that writing it the way they’re writing it is saving their life. Bottom line is this: there is no way to know why every person writing what they’re writing is doing it. Are some doing it for titillation? Yes. Are some coping? Yes. Are some harming themselves? Yes. But it’s not up for me to say that everyone participating is doing the same thing and I damn well am not going to condemn a whole group or practice that I know can help just because it makes me feel weird. Have a little compassion and empathy. Try to understand that we’re all at different places in our journey in life, and that some people cope differently and that’s okay.

OP asks that you listen survivors and I have. I’ve got my own thoughts and opinions and so do friends of mine who are survivors. We disagree with the notion that darkfic shouldn’t exist. 

samanddeaninpanties:

it’s not dark fic that squicks me.

it’s comments made by readers or the writer.

it’s the people who victim blame. it’s the people who make excuses for their favorite character. it’s the ones who say “so what if they were drugged? X only touched them – it wasn’t really rape” and other equally terrible things.

we have endless posts where someone calls dark fic and everyone who reads it evil and people respond with some very thoughtful reasons why OP is wrong.

but I can’t say i’ve seen much conversation regarding comments. i find other people’s reactions more squicky or triggering than anything i could have read in the fic itself.

This. 

It’s really bothersome to see the comments on darker works where people make any and every excuse to justify the behavior of villainous characters just because those characters and those ships are a person’s favorite. To be honest with you, it almost feels like gaslighting. I know that’s not what commentors are intending, but it feels like it. Because if you’re writing this thing that’s maybe or maybe not based on your own experiences and someone comes along to tell you that it’s not *really* XYZ… well… maybe what you experienced wasn’t *really* XYZ either. Maybe you’re a faker. Maybe you’re a liar. Maybe the problem was you. And that’s a really shitty feeling. 

There’s a worrying trend I’ve seen friends in other fandoms talk about surrounding dark fic. Readers will insist that the clearly tagged and very dark shit they’re reading isn’t dark because it’s their OTP and how could their OTP ever be anything but good? Readers bend over backwards to justify it because if they don’t they have to face the fact that what they’re reading isn’t wholesome or happy. I don’t know if it’s guilt or ignorance, but I wish it would stop. If it’s ignorance I suggest readers take a good look at the tags again. If a fic is tagged rape, noncon, or dubcon, it’s equivalent to rape irl. (In terms of consent being not clear, freely given, and revocable.) Tags are there to be your guide. They tell you what the author’s understanding of the material is. If the author thinks it’s noncon, assume that it’s noncon. If it’s guilt, honestly, tell guilt to get bent. There’s nothing wrong with reading and enjoying dark content. You’re not a bad person and you’re not contributing to the social decay of the youth, or whatever. Enjoy it if you enjoy it, but don’t make excuses about how it’s not what it clearly is. 

It just… it bothers me. Most writers know what we’re doing with our fics. Many of us agonize over our work and the tags on our work so we don’t accidentally expose anyone to a major squick or trigger they weren’t prepared for. We actually do care about our readers and how they handle our works, so maybe commentors can do some of that to. Maybe readers should think a little more about the way they phrase things and why they think clearly dark content isn’t that dark. Dark content is created and shared, a lot of the time, so that people who have things they want to express don’t feel so alone in it and comments that miss the point and victim blame do the opposite of that. 

@unforth-ninawaters replied to your post:
@unforth-ninawaters replied to your post:
…
Everything is still pretty nebulous right now but it’s tending in two drections…for pure dark fic PWP rape/non-con nonsense, Qstiel sees some of Cas’ fantasies and decides to reenact them out of curiosity. For something more plotty, Qstiel returns to earth because if he has to be awake it might as well be FUN and this Dean Winchester (and/or Sam Winchester) person seems mighty interesting…

I mean, they’re all family…what can he make them do for their friend Cas?

If you write either or these, let me know. I’m very into the idea of Qstiel impersonating Cas, though. Just for him to see what he can get them to do, what kinds of lines he can get them to cross just to see how deep these affections go. I’m very into the manipulation. 

Also, just throwing this out there, but Jack is also living with the Winchesters. I wonder what he might do to get approval. 

there was a post going around saying “”dldr is meant for things like, “if you don’t like coffee shops, don’t read this coffee shop AU,” not, “i can be as racist as i want and you have to deal with it because i used a disclaimer””. a lot of people in the tags argued that this is what they mean when they say incest/p*dophilia/abuse portrayed in a positive light in fanfic is problematic. whats your opinion? xoxo

freedom-of-fanfic:

… phew. this ask almost passes as a legit question, but the ‘xoxo’ at the end is a little much.  still, what a great opportunity to talk about this ongoing problem of people ignoring warnings that a work contains content that upsets them, then complaining that they were upset when they viewed it.

(first, a side note: don’t censor the word ‘pedophilia’. It’s not a slur – it’s a content warning. If you censor it, the blacklists of people who don’t want to see posts that mention pedophilia won’t catch it and they could be harmed. Just use the word.)

anti-shippers who look at a fic or fanwork’s tags and say ‘this has problematic content! I better go tell the author how problematic their content is!’, I have news for you:

warnings on fanworks indicate that the person creating the work knows the content is ‘problematic’, not for all audiences, and may hurt people if they view it unsuspectingly.

stop taking fanwork warnings and tags in bad faith and using them as an excuse to harass and harm creators.

warnings aren’t ‘disclaimers’ (and aren’t used as such). they’re the CONTAINS NAPROXIN. KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN sticker on painkillers. The content is good, even helpful, for some people, but for others who don’t need it or are too young to understand what they’re consuming could be harmed. take the warnings seriously and if you don’t like what they say the fic contains, you really are better off not reading/viewing it!

‘they’re not warnings, they’re advertisements!’ they can function as both! people who want to read that content can find it and people who don’t want to read that content can avoid it. everyone is happier, except anti-shippers who are mad that people are enjoying content they don’t personally approve of.

‘If the creator knows their content is problematic, then they shouldn’t have created it in the first place! Or if they did, they shouldn’t have put it on the internet for people to see!’ well that’s a very different conversation. What you’re saying is that you advocate for censorship, and in that case ‘don’t like don’t read’ would be worthless: only things you like would be allowed to exist in the first place.

But let’s talk about how ‘they shouldn’t have put it on the internet for people to see.’ the basis for this is, I know, that it could corrupt the unsuspecting youth who read the bad content. But isn’t this a bit contradictory? if a fanwork is tagged with a warning that it contains abuse, everyone who looks at the fanwork is going to know that 1) the author believes that abuse is bad and needs to be warned for, and 2) the work contains abuse. Taking these points together, no matter how positively the abuse is depicted, a viewer has foreknowledge that it’s abusive and the creator thinks abuse is bad.  It’s simply insulting to imply that viewers will look at the abuse in the fanwork so uncritically as to not think it’s horrible after receiving such a warning.

In fact, I’ve heard anecdotal evidence that people who have been raped or abused (or still being abused) or undergone other harm have read fics with these warnings and because of the warnings, realized what had happened to themselves was not okay.  If anti-shippers had their way, those fics wouldn’t even exist, much less be warned for.

I’m about to say something radical, so brace yourself: 

because tagging warnings is the accepted way to warn people about dangerous content in fandom, the things more likely to cause confusion and harm in fanworks are the things that aren’t warned for.

Even the most positive depiction of abuse would be spoiled by a warning. Can you imagine if the beginning of every copy of Nabokov’s Lolita started with ‘Warning: this work contains depictions of csa, abuse, and child grooming.’ It would force readers who are blind to the hints that the narrator is unreliable to read the work with a very different eye, and I doubt most people would read it and conclude it’s a love story the way many people do today.

Now Lolita was intended to be a kind of monster story from the point of view of the monster – it was never meant to be a positive depiction at all. Nabokov’s work was too subtle for most people, but he was a master storyteller. I think if he could, he’d go back and add a warning so people would stop getting the wrong idea.

In fandom, where we have a widely-accepted tagging system, potentially harmful content that the creator adds deliberately will be warned for. But the potentially harmful content that the creator doesn’t know about won’t be – and that’s the stuff that tends to be a lot more sneaky and insidious.

Let’s take your example: 

“i can be as racist as i want and you have to deal with it because i used a disclaimer".

Racism does crop up a lot in fanworks, but not in the way this implies.  There’s a huge difference between a creator recognizing racism exists and utilizing it as an aspect of a setting or acknowledging it in a respectful, truthful way and a creator who does not recognize their own racist blind spots and therefore ends up perpetuating harmful stereotypes or providing racist narration without realizing it.

The former tends to be warned for; the latter never is because the creator doesn’t even know they’re being racist. The former may be painful, because racism is shitty and harmful and real, but a person can steer clear if they want to avoid it and the warning shows the content is known to be bad. The latter is more painful because it’s not just depicting racism: it is in fact perpetuating racism.

So which is actually worse: the fic that has a warning for racism or the fic that doesn’t?

And this can be applied to anything. A fic that depicts a character being abused but doesn’t warn for abuse tells me that the author doesn’t know the work contains abuse (which is worrying for the safety of the author). A fic that contains dubious consent but the author doesn’t warn for noncon/dubcon/rape tells me that the author has a poor understanding of consent.  These are the fics that are more likely to be dangerous. Fics without content warnings are also the ones most likely to unironically and uncritically depict the bad behavior in a positive light – because the authors have been taught by the rest of society outside fandom that what they’ve depicted is normal/not harmful. They are victims, and they need help, not people yelling at them about how problematic they are.

Two last notes, which I’ll try to keep short:

  • If a fanwork depicts a relationship that’s canonically unhealthy in a world where it’s fluffy and healthy, they are not responsible for putting warnings on their fic that pertain to the canon version of the ship.  For instance: Kylo and Rey are enemies in current Star Wars continuity and Kylo tried to torture Rey for information. But if a fic is set in a future where Kylo is well-adjusted and happy and dating Rey in a non-abusive relationship, the fic does not need to warn for ‘abuse’. the fic doesn’t contain abuse. Let it go.
  • No creator is beholden to using anti definitions of words like ‘pedophilia’, ‘abuse’, and ‘incest’ for their warnings. The definition of what antis call ‘pedophilia’, ‘incest’, and ‘abuse’ varies from fandom to fandom – sometimes from pairing to pairing. While tags will always be somewhat subjective, the wide variety of definitions these words have in anti-shipper parlance makes them all but meaningless, so use them when you see fit, not when antis demand it.  If antis have a problem with it, they’ll just have to start treating ship tags as warnings* and avoid all depictions of ships they don’t like. (which is what we all wish they’d do anyway.)

And now for the final irony: every time anti-shippers use warnings as a reason to go yell at people about how their fanworks are bad, antis give creators less incentive to tag warnings. People might start to hope that if they just don’t warn up front for the potentially dangerous content people will stop yelling at them without even looking at the work itself. Or if the work is borderline (’maybe this is abusive but maybe it’s not’), they may opt to go without the warnings so they can avoid the extra trouble. this is already happening with dubious consent depictions. If a noncon warning gets you yelled at, then fics where the consent isn’t completely denied will just not get warned for at all, and that’s fucked up.  And when the warnings aren’t there, people are way more likely to stumble on something of a nature that upsets them! 

So as usual, in their crusade to eradicate all content that isn’t unquestionably wholesome and pure antis make everything a little less safe for everyone. Thanks, guys.  (please stop.)

and creators: please, depict terrible things in your fanworks in whatever light you choose – and warn for them. you might accidentally help save someone from a real situation that’s terrible.

*ship tags also work as both warnings and advertisements, as it happens. Funny, isn’t it?

Ehhh I definitely think the April/Cas thing was Rape on some level, but I don’t think he had to have sex with her after receiving food and shelter. April didn’t give him any kind of ultimatum, and didn’t make him feel like he HAD to have sex with her in return. Cas just genuinely wanted to have sex with her. Assuming April had been who she said she was and just a normal woman, there would have been nothing wrong with it. Yeah, there was rape. But not about that specifically.

deaneatscake:

Well, I disagree with that. Let me explain to you why (disregarding the “April was actually a reaper thing”). 

Cas was in no condition to make an informed judgement. He was tired, starved, bleeding and soaking wet. Seriously, if he had been out there for longer, it would be totally possible he would have died of exhaustion. Also, he was being new to human which meant that his emotions were overwhelming him even more. No one in this condition can enthusiastically say yes to sex. It just isn’t possible.

Furthermore, she maybe didn’t say “have sex with me” but it’s quite possible that this was what she implied. Because she initiated everything (I really, really doubt Cas would have gone there and he definitely didn’t seem to be into it at first and even then he just reacted) and it’s a common theme with a lot of people who were raped that they didn’t say anything because they assumed they owe it to the person who just gave them material things! You can find this in a lot of date rapes but also when people take other people in, it’s really happening very often. 

She said “you’re not alone tonight” and then she made sexual advances to him. That just reeks of = you WILL be alone tonight if you don’t comply. I need you right now for sexual things. Maybe that’s not what she meant. Maybe she wanted it to be comforting. We can’t possibly know because Buckleming are shitbirds and don’t give a fuck about consent. But this is definitely what her whole demeanour indicated: I give you food, I give you shelter, and fuck you if you don’t give me something in return.

It’s just a huge power imbalance. If someone would offer you free shelter and then demand that you clean their whole house you’d probably do it, right? Because you feel bad and you don’t want to get thrown out? Maybe you don’t even mind cleaning the house that much. But it still doesn’t change the fact that you were forced to do it. It wasn’t Cas who went for the kiss because he was lonely and desperate, and even then it would have been on her to say “nope, there’s no way you can make an informed judgement now”. 

I mean, in the end, Cas was all happy and chill about it but that’s just horrific because he doesn’t know what just happened.

In addition to all this (which is excellent, btw) I would just like to say that just because the show doesn’t seem to understand that what happened was incredibly fucked up doesn’t mean it wasn’t. April didn’t have to issue an ultimatum (if she didn that would be coerscion) because Castiel was effectively trapped. Sure, he coud have left but he wasn’t in the position to and doing so would have been at great risk to him. Additionally, putting the onus on him to remove himself from the situation removes focus on the person who took advantage of his vulnerability. (In this situation, you really can’t escape the fact that April was doing this because Cas was vulnerable and it allowed her to make him more vulnerable because she absolutely had malicious intent.)  

Cas’s choice was absolutely between 1) have sex with this stranger or 2) possibly be thrown out into the cold. It doesn’t matter that April never said those were his options, it matters that this was the implication. It matters that this is the implication for many people who say yes to sex to avoid something they deem worse. If a person can’t really say no, they can’t really say yes either and Cas, by my interpretation, isn’t in the position to give consent to anyone. He’s newly human, dealing with all kinds of bullshit human things for the first time ever, hungry, tired, cold, and let’s not forget that he’d just had his grace forcibly removed. So, ya know, he’s got a lot going on pyhysically and mentally and emotionally. She took advantage of him and it was incredibly fucked up. Even if she wasn’t intenting to torture and kill him later, even if she was human, she took advantage in a predatory way and it was grossly unethical. 

We can have the “but he went along with it” “he wanted it, too” “he was okay with it after” BS (I’d rather not because that’s so victim blame-y to me) but the point is that she should never have put him in that position in the first place. That’s fucking gross. 

But, I guess the real test is to flip the script. If Cas had been a girl and April had been a guy, would it still be “fine” if April wasn’t a reaper? 

Questions for Writer Friends

rosemoonweaver:

So these have been on my mind lately and I just wanted to throw them out there to see what other people thought.

1. What do you consider Major Character Death? Is it any character important to the plot or just someone in the main ship?
2. What warrants an Underage tag? Is it any sexual relationship under age 18? Under age 16? Do you base it off the consent laws where you live?
3. What do you classify as darkfic? Is tone or content more important to the classification?
4. How violent does a fic have to be to warrant Graphic Depictions of Violence?
5. How do you rate fics? How mature is Mature as compared to Teen?
6. How do you decide what to change about a character when writing AUs? Have you ever writren a character so divorced from canon that you yourself had trouble distinguishing where canon ended and artistic interpretation began?
7. How do you decide how to write charactera that don’t appear in canon much?
8. Has writing ever changed your opinion on a certain character? If so, who and how?

So I wanted to bring these back up because I’ve gotten a few really interesting responses and there seems to be some agreement and some disagreement when it comes to these topics. Based on having this hang around for a while and with absolutely no scientific weight, here are some things that interest me.

1. What do you consider Major Character Death? Is it any character important to the plot or just someone in the main ship?
With few exceptions, it seems like the general consensus is that if a character who is important to the plot of the story or the show dies, the fic gets an MCD warning. That makes sense, of course.
2. What warrants an Underage tag? Is it any sexual relationship under age 18? Under age 16? Do you base it off the consent laws where you live? 
Again, with very little variation, underage is considered anyone under the age of 18 and extreme underage warrants it’s own separate content tag. I’m both unsurprised and surprised by this. Personally, I had always thought about underage in terms of consent laws where I live, which is 17. In this respect, I tend to think about it in terms of teenage sexuality. I can absolutely see tagging a fic underage if the people involved are 15 or younger, or if there was an age gap that would be considered illegal where I live. But to me, the idea of two sixteen-year-olds having sex isn’t something I want to read but it doesn’t seem that big of a deal to me. I think, to me, the connotation of an underage tag was more present in my thinking. But I completely understand the reasoning and I will change my own thinking.
3. What do you classify as darkfic? Is tone or content more important to the classification? 
This one was really mixed. Some people said it was content, some said it was tone, and others argued that it was a combination. There does seem to be a few things that make a fic automatically dark to some (rape, serial killers, torture, horror) but other things were subjective. Some people claimed that the content can be dark but the tone can be light and that doesn’t make the fic “dark” while others argued that a lighter tone with heavy content makes the fic darker than usual. It was very interesting and very subject, honestly. I suppose, as with many things, it comes down to how the author chooses to tag it.
4. How violent does a fic have to be to warrant Graphic Depictions of Violence?
This one was really revealing in my opinion. Obviously, if the violence is “graphic”, meaning described in detail, it warrants this tag but something like a punch to the face doesn’t really. But what I found interesting is that some people said that if the violence level was higher than that shown on screen (for Supernatural in this case) it got the tag but show typical violence was fine. Which to me is absolutely wild because regardless of cuts and how “off screen” it usually is, there are definitely scenes on SPN that I think qualify for this tag, if for no other reason than the sounds. But, that’s me.
5. How do you rate fics? How mature is Mature as compared to Teen? 
The general consensus seems to be that fics with light kissing or fics a person would be comfortable reading to their young kids are G rated.
Fics with make outs and swearing are typically Teen rated.
Mature seems to be where people are divided. Some say that implication of sex is fine for Teen rated fics, others say that’s a Mature rating. Some say light sexual content and fade to black is Mature, while others say that fade to black is Teen and sex just can’t be described in detail in Mature fics.
Explicit seems to feature detailed sex scenes.
What really surprised me, though, was that no one (or maybe one or two people) mentioned violence having anything to do with their ratings. I would have figured that a fic with Graphic Depictions of Violence as a tag would at least get a Mature rating, but apparently, violence doesn’t come to mind when fic rating is concerned. I found it interesting.
6. How do you decide what to change about a character when writing AUs? Have you ever written a character so divorced from canon that you yourself had trouble distinguishing where canon ended and artistic interpretation began?
In general, writers said that they either try to boil a character down to what they think their core personality is and change details based on the AU or that they don’t write AUs at all. There did seem to be a little discussion about when other writers get it wrong and write a character in a way that doesn’t seem true to the reader, which I also find very interesting. This is a question I think about a lot, and I tend to think about what characters would be like if they lived different lives. To me, AUs are an opportunity to do a bit of character study and obviously, that’s not going to be the same for everyone.
It’s also interesting to me the way in which AUs are approached. There does seem to be an element of character archetyping, by which I mean that Dean, Sam, and Cas all fit into certain archetypal roles, and those can be used to inform where the character goes in a story. It’s quite interesting in regards to different approaches and I think I’d like to explore that further.  
7. How do you decide how to write charactera that don’t appear in canon much?
Unsurprisingly, the consensus seems to be that rarer characters are blank slates and are used to explore headcanons and/or to advance the plot.
8. Has writing ever changed your opinion on a certain character? If so, who and how?
I was really surprised to see a lot of no’s with this one. While some people answered that they learn a little more about the character by writing them (like their personality, their mannerisms, the way they see the world) most people stated they write from their own personal interpretations of characters.

So, anyway, thank you to all the people who took the time to answer my questions. You all have given me some things to think about.

@unforth-ninawaters replied to your post

I mean we’re historian types of course it’s meaningful to us. (I actually gave up pursuing my masters in history because the department I was in insisted that we had to use exclusively post modern approaches, like, “political history is dead long live social history!” And since I’m primarily a military historian…fuck that…but the intersection of the “old” way of doing history and the “new” way is producing really fascinating reexaminations. I wouldn’t want to take a

Post modern approach but that’s a choice. Before condemning
it one still has to know what it is.

My thought on people who unilaterally condemn things like
post modernism and “author is dead” kind of lit critique is that
these are not their fields and they’re in fields that are filled with
meaningless jargon. Since they’re used to that they assume every other field is
filled with meaningless jargon, and that if you spew that jargon you’re just
part of a brain washed mass.

I think it has truly never crossed their minds that some
fields, even non-science fields, have specialized terminology that actually
means shit.

Like, I’ve worked in education. There’s so much bullshit
jargon in ed, and people who work in that field learn to not only tune it out
but also to think less of the people who use it, because they tend to be
self-promoters who want to disrupt shit to make themselves look better and then
leave the regular teachers to clean up the mess. (This is a gross
oversimplification but it’s what I’m familiar with, so). So if you go to
someone in a field like that and start throwing

Around technical social science or liberal arts language,
they think you’re full of it. They just here, “here’s an over educated
asshole with no real world experience who thinks they know better than me and
I’m going to have to pick up the pieces and repair the damage they do.”
Whether they’re right or wrong is incidental; it makes then disinclined to
trust terminology they don’t know coming from ANY field, especially a non
science field (were all conditioned at this poi

Point to accept big mystery words in the sciences so I
haven’t found it provokes quite the same negative reaction.) But when we say,
“post modernism” they hear “blah blah blah leverage the
coefficiences to increase student performance blah blah.” It means
nothing. That’s the kind of background I’d guess a lot of these folks come
from. And they can’t be bothered to learn the nuances of the fields to find out
what DOES mean something.

(…sorry that got long, I’m done now. 😉 )

No, but you hit it on the head here. There’s this weird strain going on (mostly on the internet) where if you discuss things that are mostly theory to explain real world events, you’re told to “prove it” with hard sciences or completely dismissed as an elitist moron. Like, hell, you can’t talk about feminism on the internet without some asshole spouting shit like “rape culture isn’t a thing… blah blah blah reasons”. Like, no, asshole, rape culture is a thing it’s a shorthand to discuss the ways in which society regards rapists and rape victims and doesn’t mean that society says “it’s okay” just that there is a systemic way in which perpetrators and victims are treated. Same with Patriarchy Theory and Gender Theory.  It’s the same with words like “social construct” which drives me fuckin’ crazy because debt and money are a social construct but no one argues that debt doesn’t exist because that would be asinine.

Like, I get it, not everyone is educated to the degree that some of us are. I haven’t finished college at this point and while I would very much like to, my lack of completed education doesn’t mean I have no idea what the fuck I’m talking about. It also doesn’t mean I’m too “elitist” because I know about and enjoy literary theories, feminist theories, and historical perspectives.

But I think a huge part of this, too, is that people don’t know what the words they’re using actually mean. Like, okay, if we’re talking about postmodernism, “the author is dead” doesn’t mean “I can do whatever the hell I want”, it means authorial intent doesn’t matter. That is absolutely useful for examining some texts and using other literary and critical theories to discuss them. I always think of Fahrenheit 451 in that respect, because Bradbury was pretty adamant that his book was about mass media reducing interest in literature and NOT the Red Scare or McCarthyism. So does that mean the interpretation that Fahrenheit 451 is about McCarthyism is valueless and should be discounted because the author told us not to look at it that way? Hell no! What Bradbury meant doesn’t matter because if I can make a well thought out argument based on the text and possibly the historical context of his novel, I’m right. He’s also right. There are multiple interpretations of a text across time. What Bradbury says about what he intended does not matter and neither do Orwell’s real-world thoughts on Communism if I’m reading Animal Farm or 1984. That’s postmodernism (well, one aspect at least). It’s not about “right” or “wrong” it’s about finding meaning. But that’s just how it’s applied to literature. There are other aspects applied to history and social theory.

But by the same token, there are schools of thought that argue we should take into account what the author means. There are people who argue that authorial intent and historical context matter so when discussing Fahrenheit 451 we should only discuss the rise of mass media. That’s okay, though. That is useful as well, and knowing historical context and literary tradition is important, too. Modernism is just as interesting and important as postmodernism is.

(Now, as you said, postmodernism doesn’t always work. I had a class a few years ago about World War One in which the professor focused on social history in lecture and all of our readings were military history. It was jarring as hell and hard to keep up with, but it did provide a lot of interesting insight into the technical aspects of the war and the personal aspects. It was really interesting but also hard to follow. I don’t think postmodernism works with some history, especially from a military perspective. I also don’t think it works for analyzing certain texts, like religious doctrines, either.)

But the outright dismissal of jargon is ridiculous. I do think there is an issue in some people who discuss things on the internet are not experts and don’t completely know what they’re discussing (hell, I’m not an expert, either) so terms get muddied and arguments become “this is what I understand of postmodernism based off what so-and-so said so it’s all bullshit” but that’s not helping anyone either. Just… I dunno. I don’t know how to fix it or how to make it all make sense but then again, I don’t know if it’s worth it. I will continue to go on my rants and scream into the void while everyone else circles the drain.

What the fuck is this “witholding sex” shit anyway? No one owes you sex. It’s not your right to have and no one has to give it to you.

Seriously, divorce his from The Discourse for a second and think.
Does “if you don’t have sex with your partner even though you don’t want it, you’re an abusive shit” sound like “if you really loved me, you’d let me fuck you even though you’ve already said no” to you?

If yes, congrats, you have at least three functioning brain cells. If not, why? Could it be that you’re so desperate to hate ace folks that you can’t see sexual coercion when it’s right there in black and white for you?

Seriously, if you think guilting and shaming anyone for not having sex (and by extension, guilting and shaming anyone into having sex) is okay then you’re the worst kind of asshole and you need to seriously reevaluate what the fuck you’re saying and thinking.

On the Subject of Noncon Fanworks: Thoughts of a Reader, Writer, Survivor – Anarfea

porcupine-girl:

arkhamarchitecture:

out-there-on-the-maroon:

vmthecoyote:

rhodanum:

meeedeee:

For those who want context surrounding the debate whether women should be allowed to continue reading or writing non-con erotica. Additional context is also provided regarding fandom harassment of abuse survivors who write or read non-con fiction. 

An excellently written piece, if rather hard to swallow for the crowd which believes fannish expression that includes dark kinks / sexual fantasies should be constantly policed. 

However, it should be noted that the expression ‘debate if women should be allowed to continue writing non-con erotica’ makes my hair stand on end and typifies what I can’t abide in this entire thing. I didn’t come into fandom to be allowed or disallowed to write something or other. I came into fandom do straight up do so, there was no concept in my mind of ever giving someone the power of disallowing me to write the thing. Fandom was never about control for me, it was about solace, about joy, about pleasure, about deconnecting temporarily from the drudgery of a difficult and often unpleasant life.

I already live my life, as a woman, under a constant stream of being told what I’m not ‘allowed’ to do. I’m not allowed to be too harsh, too sharp, too abrasive. I’m not allowed to say I’m childfree and mean it. I’m not allowed to get a buzzcut (I’ve straight-up had hair-dressers who refused me!) I’m not allowed to continue being interested in video-games at nearly thirty, whereas with my brother it’s ‘eh, boys mature much more slowly.’ I’m not allowed to criticize street-harassers and gropers without being insulted for it. 

And now it’s ‘I’m not allowed to explore my darker fantasies in the safe, secure medium of writing, without potentially becoming a target for Purity Culture Wank.’ Fandom was my refuge from all the ‘not allowed’ nonsense and I’ll be damned if I ever let it become filled with it! 

I’m like, at most 30% woman, but my reaction to this was still try and stop me, motherfucker

“… I think this is true for many women and people who are sexual or gender minorities. We exist in an environment permeated by the threat of sexual violence. Some people cope with that fear by eroticizing it. Like the horror movie or roller coaster, noncon fanfic is a way of scaling down something terrifying until the fear becomes manageable, even, for some people, thrilling.”

An interesting essay. Long, but worth reading.

That was a long essay but god what a good one. Especially the part about how demonizing darkfic ultimately ends up creating spaces where people stop tagging for it because they don’t want to be demonized for it or because they’ve convinced themselves that since all noncon is bad and they’re not a bad person, the fic they wrote that is noncon must not REALLY be noncon because that would make them bad.

And of course, once people stop tagging their darkfic then everybody loses.

I know that most of my followers are not from the Sherlock fandom these days, but this is applicable to all fandoms. Especially because I see indications of OMGCP fandom going down some of the same roads that Sherlock went down two years ago (and that this essay was written as a response to). If you have seen those same indicators, read this essay.

If you read my response to a post a week or two ago, where I talked about how adults in fandom are not responsible for the experiences of minors in their fandom beyond tagging their content appropriately, I want to make something clear – I was not just talking about people who write unoffensive, vanilla explicit fic. I specifically said that I was talking about content that people decide could be dangerous to minors, and I did mean dangerous. There were some responses to me saying that “we’re not talking about people writing NSFW stuff that minors might find” and my response to that is, neither was I.

If you have ever labelled, or thought about labeling, someone who writes or reads underage fic, rapefic, or any fic that depicts an act that would be reprehensible in real life, as a “pedophile” or “rapist” or any other label that indicates that they condone those acts IRL, if you have ever thought that those people need to be “called out” or removed from the fandom, please read this essay.

Read the whole damn thing. I thought about quoting some of my favorite parts, but there are too many, and some are near the end. Even if you think there’s no way it will change your mind, you damn well better know what you’re actually arguing against.

And for those not in Sherlock fandom: Anarfea refers many times to events that happened at a con and in the months following, which inspired this essay. I think you can work out most of what happened if you read all of this, but if you’re confused, I was at the panel and had several friends (including Anarfea, whom I will not hesitate to vouch for as an awesome person) on the panel. Message me privately and I can explain it to you.

On the Subject of Noncon Fanworks: Thoughts of a Reader, Writer, Survivor – Anarfea

Your tags on that last post are right on point, about the difference in policing fanfic for violence compared to sexual content. It has always been suspicious to me that those who express deep concerns about fanfic seem to zero in on only the sexual aspect.

Thanks! Sorry it took me so long to reply, I was trying to figure out what I wanted to say and how I wanted to say it. (Apologies in advance because this got ranty) 

I really feel like fandom is a double-edged sword at times. It’s pretty good about bringing people together and for shedding light on important things like consent, sexual education and health, gender and sexuality, and all manner of abuse but at the same time there are people who want to shut some of these topics down when they show up in fic. Like, we can talk about what consent means all damn day but it better not show up in fic unless it’s enthusiastic consent. We can talk about the joy of being proud of our sexualities but if a woman writes two dudes doing butt stuff she doesn’t know anything about gay sex and needs to stop. It’s like, on one hand you do get good discussions that can help you understand the world around you, but on the other now you must always apply those standards to everything or you’re terrible and contributing to the problem. 

But the only things I ever see about violence in fic is how to write it more realistically – like how bruises form and fade and what kinds of gunshot/knife wounds are fatal and how much blood a person can lose before they pass out. 

Now, I’m not saying I want people to start telling people who write violent fic to stop, I think that’s just as stupid as telling people not to write sex and sex related topics, but I do think it’s kind of interesting. Like, we’ve all heard the arguments that children shouldn’t play violent video games because it “makes them violent” but we know that’s a load of crap so we scoff and roll our eyes. We say things like “the parents need to keep an eye on what their kids are playing” and “as an adult, I shouldn’t have my access restricted because kids might also play them. It’s not my responsibility to parent other people’s kids”. And I think that mentality seeps over into fic, too, which I agree with. I don’t want to parent other people’s children so it’s not up to me to worry that my properly tagged and rated fics might fall into the hands of some kid. The same should apply to fics with sexual content no matter how vanilla and romantic or dark and depraved.  

A lot of violence on television is glorified, but not all of it is. If an action hero throws a grenade at the bad guys we cheer. If a man slaps a child we want to see him punished. We understand the nuance here. Not all violence is the same. And there is room for violent fantasies in television, movies, and games. I can play games where I can beat people to death with a comically oversized dildo because it’s absurd and weird and fun. But I’m not going to go out and actually try it because I know the difference between real life and fantasy and I enjoy hurting pixel people but can’t stand hurting real people. I think most people get that. 

But I think people worry more about sex than they do violence. It doesn’t matter what ship you’re writing or how dark you go, if it’s a violent fic we seem to get that making an argument like “but what if children see it!” will get you laughed at. If you make a fic that ships siblings in a loving way people can make the “but what about the children!” argument you will be taken seriously. Maybe it’s because we still have a lot of shame around sex. Maybe it’s because we’re uncomfortable. Maybe it’s because we don’t want to see nuance. But honestly, violence if fic is pretty common and yet we never seem to see calls for people to never write murder or death or fist fights. 

But I will say this: we still need to have conversations about consent and boundaries and abuse and sexuality. We definitely still need those because I think those are great for helping people understand themselves and the world around them. But I think we need to quit trying to apply those to fanfic. I think intent and understanding should be a factor but I don’t think it should be the factor that decides whether or not we should yell at an author (the answer, of course, is never). If someone writes a fic that contains sexual assault/incest/rape/etc and it seems to skirt the line of what we are comfortable with we should think about why. Maybe the characters don’t understand consent the way we do. Maybe the author is trying to capture a specific feeling for the readers to digest. Maybe the author themselves is misinformed. Maybe the author is writing a fantasy. We don’t really have a right to ask the author those questions, but we can ask those questions of ourselves, determine our comfort level with these things, and take action from there. If that means we don’t keep reading, so be it. If it means we try to write it better, that’s okay, too But the attitude that some people seem to have that says “you can’t write this topic ever because you don’t understand it/have no experience with it/are glorifying it/will hurt other people” needs to stop. 

If I can write a fic where a person deals with child abuse and domestic abuse and no one says to me “YOu can’t write this!!! what if a survivor finds this???what if a kid sees this??? aren’t you glorifying abuse because the characters still love their abuser???!! ” then the same should apply to fics that deal with taboo sexual topics. 

And no, these topics aren’t the same. They’re all pretty complicated and deal with a lot of emotions and reactions. They’re nuanced and some people can do them well and others just can’t. But I don’t think that we shouldn’t write them just because they’re “glorifying” something bad. We understand there is nuance to violence in fiction so why don’t we get that there’s nuance to sexual content as well? 

And I’m not here to parent anyone else’s kid. If anyone ever wants to talk to me about real issues they’re facing I’m here, but I’m not going to hold back on my writing just because someone somewhere might be potentially put off by it.