In which I rant about fandom
So yesterday, dementedsiren forwarded me this link to an entry over at the journal of a writer called iibnf. It discussed the potential motivations of rape fic in fandom. It was a well written, well reasoned piece one the subject, and I espically liked it's not something that gets discussed about in fandom very frequently. Rape fic is coyly referred to as "non-con", and is largely accepted as a typical fandom trope.
My comments to her post, which included my own view on rape fics in fandom, were so extensive that I actually exceeded the character limit and had to break it up into two separate posts.
I'm reposting my comment(s) here because I'd like to see if any of you who lurk around my journal have anything to say on the subject, and because I'd like to keep the dialogue on this thing going.
The original entry, if it hasn't been locked due to the sensitive nature of the topic and me potentially starting a flame war is here. My comments are below the cut.
(edit: Ack, sorry! I seem to have exceeded LJ's character limit, so I'm going to have to split this up into 2 parts. Again, sorry for spamming your comments page!)
Hallo! I, too was referred by dementedsiren. Lordy but the woman does spread the crack and good thought provoking convo posts around, doesn't she?
First, let me say that I really like your post, and agree with most of what you say. Including the overpowering urge to spell it "SUV", which I totally think should become the next series in the franchise cause we all know that vehicular accident investigation has it's own special unit. Though I'd like to point out that porn can be pretentious and work well- just look at Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty series.
I've got a couple things to say on this. First, a disclaimer. I used to read the occasional rape fic waaaay back when I got into my first fandom- Gundam Wing- many, many moons ago. Regrettably, the anime lent itself particularly well to rape situations and there was a great deal of it to be found in the fandom. So I've been there, and actually done it, but found myself so incredibly disturbed by the things I read and the situations that writers used tried to justify or excuse said rape, that I had to start avoiding it completely.
Because ultimately, that's what it is. Most rape fic out there is really rape apologist fic. "He secretly wanted it". "They're really each other's One Twue Wuv, so it's completely okay." "She took her revenge, so the scales are balanced." You're right that rape fic is a cheat- a cheap way for the author to get the characters together. The trade off is that once they get the characters together, they then have to justify, excuse, or apologize for said rape- either by making it a sign of love, a catalyst for character growth, or letting the character take revenge on their attacker.
And that's bullshit. I'm a writer, and once I got over the whole angst/woe/character torture=serious thing that always floats around fandom (sometime around the time I turned 16), I came to realize that there are many, many other ways of developing your characters besides having them brutally tortured. And I think that you become a better writer when you have to stretch to get that same effect. It's hard to write good comedy or fluff fic- and kudos to you for pulling it off, pulling it off well, and writing what you want to write rather than what will cause people to take you "seriously" in fandom.
Further, I agree with your observation and also call bullshit on the silent fandom agreement to refer to rape fics as "non-con". Because you're right. It's soft peddling, and it's a way for both readers and writers to absolve themselves of the reality of what they're reading and writing. If you don't call it rape, then you don't have to think of it as rape. I've seen this on other non-fannish erotica sites, too. "Non-Con" is always an euphemism for rape presented in an erotic fashion, so people don't have to feel bad or squicky about what they're reading. You hit the nail on the head when you identified it as "consequence free" because that's what we like to think that rape fic within fandom is- there are no consequences, because they're not real people and anyway, it's fiction. But I think it informs our attitudes outside of fandom, and both normalizes and romanticizes the act of rape, which is fundamentally messed up. So "non-con" conveniently avoids all those issues, and helps to give the illusion that rape fic is consequence free because it doesn't really have the same name as "real" rape.
I'd also like to address the whole "fantasy" argument that has been brought up in the comments. I will say this bluntly: people with a healthy sexual identity do not fantasize about being raped. Not real rape. They may fantasize about rough sex, about anonymous sex, and if they're into the S&M scene, maybe they do fantasize about being humiliated. But people don't fantasize about the reality of the situation- they don't fantasize about being dehumanized, about having any and all power over what happens to your body- to you- forcibly taken away and used against you, they don't fantasize about screaming and crying in terror and begging someone to make the pain and humiliation to stop, and they don't fantasize about being shamed and humiliated afterwards, and having people tell them that they "asked for it" or that it was "their fault". People who have never been raped may think they fantasize about it, but what they really fantasize about is a safe, consensual situation with a partner who knows the rules and will stop when certain lines have been crossed. I guarantee you that no one who's actually been raped and understands what it entails fantasizes about it happening to them again.
Finally, I will admit that my opinions on the subject are informed by my experiences. I've got friends who have become statistics. They've been raped, often by people with whom they were in an intimate relationship. And you know what? Afterwards, they couldn't stand their rapist touching or even talking to them. It was too painful and terrifying. It definitely didn't bring them closer together, or take their relationship to a greater and more pure level where they worked out their differences and it solidified their bond. One of my friends was truly able to grow as a person from it, because she had to work through a lot of shit after it happened. Another friend of mine tried to kill herself, became an alcoholic, and now "self medicates" because she can't deal with what happened to her- or what happened afterward when she tried to get help and neither her family or the police would believe or help her. Finally, all of these women have had the opportunity to take revenge- they all had male relatives or friends who were willing to go out and kill their rapist. But none of them ever took that route, mostly because they were either so messed up that it was all they could do to keep themselves together, or because they were so shamed by what had been done to them that they thought that they some how "deserved" it. That's the reality of rape.
And that's what bothers me the most about rape fic. Aside from being completely unrealistic and having little contact with the realm of reality, it romanticizes and glorifies something hideous and horrible. It makes it okay. It makes it normal. And in my opinion, rape is something that should never be "okay", and should never be "normal".
And now I shall stop ranting, sit back, and prepare to be flamed horribly. But really, thank you for writing this. I may not be an active participant in the Smallville or HP fandoms, but I think we need to have more dialogue about this issue over and across all fandoms, and hey, maybe outside cyberspace as well. So thank you for kicking off this dialogue, and standing up and saying something about it.
Oh, and for even thinking to involve a rape kit and due process. You and your attention to detail rock!
My comments to her post, which included my own view on rape fics in fandom, were so extensive that I actually exceeded the character limit and had to break it up into two separate posts.
I'm reposting my comment(s) here because I'd like to see if any of you who lurk around my journal have anything to say on the subject, and because I'd like to keep the dialogue on this thing going.
The original entry, if it hasn't been locked due to the sensitive nature of the topic and me potentially starting a flame war is here. My comments are below the cut.
(edit: Ack, sorry! I seem to have exceeded LJ's character limit, so I'm going to have to split this up into 2 parts. Again, sorry for spamming your comments page!)
Hallo! I, too was referred by dementedsiren. Lordy but the woman does spread the crack and good thought provoking convo posts around, doesn't she?
First, let me say that I really like your post, and agree with most of what you say. Including the overpowering urge to spell it "SUV", which I totally think should become the next series in the franchise cause we all know that vehicular accident investigation has it's own special unit. Though I'd like to point out that porn can be pretentious and work well- just look at Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty series.
I've got a couple things to say on this. First, a disclaimer. I used to read the occasional rape fic waaaay back when I got into my first fandom- Gundam Wing- many, many moons ago. Regrettably, the anime lent itself particularly well to rape situations and there was a great deal of it to be found in the fandom. So I've been there, and actually done it, but found myself so incredibly disturbed by the things I read and the situations that writers used tried to justify or excuse said rape, that I had to start avoiding it completely.
Because ultimately, that's what it is. Most rape fic out there is really rape apologist fic. "He secretly wanted it". "They're really each other's One Twue Wuv, so it's completely okay." "She took her revenge, so the scales are balanced." You're right that rape fic is a cheat- a cheap way for the author to get the characters together. The trade off is that once they get the characters together, they then have to justify, excuse, or apologize for said rape- either by making it a sign of love, a catalyst for character growth, or letting the character take revenge on their attacker.
And that's bullshit. I'm a writer, and once I got over the whole angst/woe/character torture=serious thing that always floats around fandom (sometime around the time I turned 16), I came to realize that there are many, many other ways of developing your characters besides having them brutally tortured. And I think that you become a better writer when you have to stretch to get that same effect. It's hard to write good comedy or fluff fic- and kudos to you for pulling it off, pulling it off well, and writing what you want to write rather than what will cause people to take you "seriously" in fandom.
Further, I agree with your observation and also call bullshit on the silent fandom agreement to refer to rape fics as "non-con". Because you're right. It's soft peddling, and it's a way for both readers and writers to absolve themselves of the reality of what they're reading and writing. If you don't call it rape, then you don't have to think of it as rape. I've seen this on other non-fannish erotica sites, too. "Non-Con" is always an euphemism for rape presented in an erotic fashion, so people don't have to feel bad or squicky about what they're reading. You hit the nail on the head when you identified it as "consequence free" because that's what we like to think that rape fic within fandom is- there are no consequences, because they're not real people and anyway, it's fiction. But I think it informs our attitudes outside of fandom, and both normalizes and romanticizes the act of rape, which is fundamentally messed up. So "non-con" conveniently avoids all those issues, and helps to give the illusion that rape fic is consequence free because it doesn't really have the same name as "real" rape.
I'd also like to address the whole "fantasy" argument that has been brought up in the comments. I will say this bluntly: people with a healthy sexual identity do not fantasize about being raped. Not real rape. They may fantasize about rough sex, about anonymous sex, and if they're into the S&M scene, maybe they do fantasize about being humiliated. But people don't fantasize about the reality of the situation- they don't fantasize about being dehumanized, about having any and all power over what happens to your body- to you- forcibly taken away and used against you, they don't fantasize about screaming and crying in terror and begging someone to make the pain and humiliation to stop, and they don't fantasize about being shamed and humiliated afterwards, and having people tell them that they "asked for it" or that it was "their fault". People who have never been raped may think they fantasize about it, but what they really fantasize about is a safe, consensual situation with a partner who knows the rules and will stop when certain lines have been crossed. I guarantee you that no one who's actually been raped and understands what it entails fantasizes about it happening to them again.
Finally, I will admit that my opinions on the subject are informed by my experiences. I've got friends who have become statistics. They've been raped, often by people with whom they were in an intimate relationship. And you know what? Afterwards, they couldn't stand their rapist touching or even talking to them. It was too painful and terrifying. It definitely didn't bring them closer together, or take their relationship to a greater and more pure level where they worked out their differences and it solidified their bond. One of my friends was truly able to grow as a person from it, because she had to work through a lot of shit after it happened. Another friend of mine tried to kill herself, became an alcoholic, and now "self medicates" because she can't deal with what happened to her- or what happened afterward when she tried to get help and neither her family or the police would believe or help her. Finally, all of these women have had the opportunity to take revenge- they all had male relatives or friends who were willing to go out and kill their rapist. But none of them ever took that route, mostly because they were either so messed up that it was all they could do to keep themselves together, or because they were so shamed by what had been done to them that they thought that they some how "deserved" it. That's the reality of rape.
And that's what bothers me the most about rape fic. Aside from being completely unrealistic and having little contact with the realm of reality, it romanticizes and glorifies something hideous and horrible. It makes it okay. It makes it normal. And in my opinion, rape is something that should never be "okay", and should never be "normal".
And now I shall stop ranting, sit back, and prepare to be flamed horribly. But really, thank you for writing this. I may not be an active participant in the Smallville or HP fandoms, but I think we need to have more dialogue about this issue over and across all fandoms, and hey, maybe outside cyberspace as well. So thank you for kicking off this dialogue, and standing up and saying something about it.
Oh, and for even thinking to involve a rape kit and due process. You and your attention to detail rock!