€0.02 (currently almost 3 cents) on warnings in fic
I think that a fic writer, especially in this medium, owes it to the readership at large to put up warnings at the head of the fic. General courtesy, and doubly so if the fic involves topics or situations that reasonable people of various persuasions might find uncomfortable.
Me, I once followed a link from the fanficquotes community to something that looked like an entertaining Supernatural/Harry Potter crossover. Well, it was entertaining right up until the point where, without warning, the Winchester brothers' bickering transformed into an explicit incestuous encounter, at which point I found myself closing the browser window as fast as I could and wanting to claw my eyeballs out. Which may go to show my own limitations, I suppose, but I don't want to read that stuff.
And yes, there are people out there who have been victims of assaults, and yes, even reading about something vaguely resembling an old trauma can mentally bring you back to that traumatic situation (I speak from experience; granted, not of an assault, but other traumas in my past leave me susceptible to flashbacks), and people generally don't want to confront that sort of thing without a little warning to steel themselves first.
Oh, and "people will know what to expect based on what I generally write" is flat not good enough. See above example, which, I forgot to point out, didn't have any warnings that I could discern.
Granted, sometimes people will see stuff that isn't there (I think someone saw some slashy context in "The Scarab" once, and posted about it in a rec, which must have taken some doing because it's for damn sure I didn't put any slash in), and sometimes an author will be clueless as to undertones of some of what he's writing. That happens, but I suspect one function of beta readers is to pick up that sort of thing and nudge the clueless author about it.
But putting in explicit assault and refusing to label it as such, because you don't like that people might not want to read it if they knew, or that it might otherwise restrict your readership? And blaming the assault survivors for it?
Seriously not cool.
Me, I once followed a link from the fanficquotes community to something that looked like an entertaining Supernatural/Harry Potter crossover. Well, it was entertaining right up until the point where, without warning, the Winchester brothers' bickering transformed into an explicit incestuous encounter, at which point I found myself closing the browser window as fast as I could and wanting to claw my eyeballs out. Which may go to show my own limitations, I suppose, but I don't want to read that stuff.
And yes, there are people out there who have been victims of assaults, and yes, even reading about something vaguely resembling an old trauma can mentally bring you back to that traumatic situation (I speak from experience; granted, not of an assault, but other traumas in my past leave me susceptible to flashbacks), and people generally don't want to confront that sort of thing without a little warning to steel themselves first.
Oh, and "people will know what to expect based on what I generally write" is flat not good enough. See above example, which, I forgot to point out, didn't have any warnings that I could discern.
Granted, sometimes people will see stuff that isn't there (I think someone saw some slashy context in "The Scarab" once, and posted about it in a rec, which must have taken some doing because it's for damn sure I didn't put any slash in), and sometimes an author will be clueless as to undertones of some of what he's writing. That happens, but I suspect one function of beta readers is to pick up that sort of thing and nudge the clueless author about it.
But putting in explicit assault and refusing to label it as such, because you don't like that people might not want to read it if they knew, or that it might otherwise restrict your readership? And blaming the assault survivors for it?
Seriously not cool.