Fanfic musing

[nialla42]

I was reading a fanfic about a week ago, and right from the start, things felt off. I couldn't tell if it's was the author's style, or a case of "your kink is not my kink, and that's OK, but I'm closing this fic". I kept reading to see if things improved, and got to a reference of one of the characters as an Irishman. Um. He's American. Or at least

Comments

[lmichelle599]

Can't we all just get along?

it seems to me slash has more kinks in it than het does. The authors warn of the kinks, but I don't remember as many kinks in het fic (which I pretty much read exclusively when I started reading fanfic back in the 90's). Maybe slash writers are more adventurous with their writing or enjoy kinks more than het writers. *shrugs*

We all have kinks and there are enough fics to go around, dammit! :)

[nialla42]

What's really odd is in recent years it seems to be slashers themselves berating fellow fans. I don't get it. I do know some who'll read slash, but not anything explicit but they wouldn't read explicit het either. Maybe the folks making these claims are just extreme versions who don't think anyone should write or read kinky fic

[lunachickk]

This post totally deserves an applause and a *HELL YES*.

I agree with all of it!

[nialla42]

Danke. I've just had to much time to ponder recently, and that "Slashers are..." bit pushed my buttons.

[lunachickk]

I actually tend to try to keep my nose in the fic most of the time and try to ignore those doing the bitching commenting. I find myself getting much less irritated that way.

[nialla42]

I miss some discussion about the shows I'm watching, but some shows devolve into a line in the sand regarding ships and you must take a side in any discussion.

My attitude about ships?

[superbadgirl]

I can see one and two, only there's a decent amount of misogynistic BS in fandom at large, not limited to slash. I'm quite positive I've taken part in it, though thankfully I have grown up quite a lot. You can find creative, non-offensive and *gasp* sometimes even respectful ways to deal with that pesky obstacle to your OTP, be it het or slash (or even gen, that poor abandoned genre of old!).

The racist thing makes me scratch my head, though. It is true, as you mention, that by sheer want many other options (it's a white, white, white Hollywood world out there), we all participate in the racism machine. It reminds me of that time Pat Sajak went on a bizarre rampage against global warming believers, calling them racist. I ... huh?

I'd love to see more racebending fic, actually. It's funny, though, how we can turn characters into ... alpacas and no one bats an eyelash, but change the color of their skin and we've crossed the line. So, maybe there is some validity to racism, but again - how is this a slash-specific thing? It isn't.

[nialla42]

There are times when I've been told I don't like Female Character because I slash Male Character A and Male Character B. Um, no, it's usually I just don't like Female Character, because I can get all the slash I need reading fic

[betacandy]

Wait. Film and tv are still lost in the 50s, but what we're going to get worked up about is fan fiction? It kinda lost me right there. Fan fiction is not being broadcast to millions of viewers. It generally inherits the demographics of the cast from the Hollywood original. Could it be more inclusive? Probably, as most things in US pop culture could be. And people should feel free to write a story in which they explain that Idris Elba will now be playing the role of Mr. White from the show, because that man is super nova hot. But if you're going to spend time talking about these issues, direct it to the people most responsible - the people making these shows.

Makes me think these people are really just trying to psychoanalyze slashers, and using any issue they can think of to do it.

[nialla42]

I think you're onto something with the psychoanalyzing of slashers. Though I think it's reflecting on them more than slashers at large.

There's an undertone of "You're not writing what I want, so your work is bad, and you should feel bad. In fact, I'll come up with a list of reasons why you should feel bad!"

[graculus]

In some ways, I'm seeing parallels between this and the 'not all men' thing about feminism. Sure, we're not like that, but that doesn't mean this type of behaviour isn't going on - hell, maybe in some fandoms and some bits of those fandoms, the cited behaviour is pretty much standard. I only know I wouldn't be associating with those folks if I was in those fandoms, but that doesn't remove the possibility that there are idiots out there doing just what's been stated.

In particular, there definitely is a bunch of folks out there who'd much rather slash two stereotypically pretty young white guys than any other possible pairing, regardless of (imo) chemistry. And some of them probably think they're being really transgressive

[innocent_lex]

Please save me from the "but it's a woman - isn't that what you wanted?" folks. Crikey, sure, it's good that there are women being somewhat acknowledged in media. Now if we could acknowledge them as more than brainless eye candy, that would be fab. Thanks muchly.

Various of the men I worked with at the time were very excited for me when Sarah Palin was in the running for US VP. "Look, a woman, just what you wanted!" they said. After me and the other woman in the office had got over our horror, we had to sit them down and explain the real world to them. Yikes.

[nialla42]

"It's a woman, aren't you happy?" [sigh] I hear variations of that so often. We're at the point where I expect more of female characters because we've got a long way to go to get to the point where they're characters who just happen to be female.

Male characters can be anything, but female characters have to have "female" attached to it. You have a sniper, and you know it's probably going to be a guy. If there's a female sniper, she'll be referred to as a female sniper, as if to say, "Hey, we put in a female character, give us points!"

[nialla42]

I don't doubt that some people are doing stupid stuff, because people are people and do stupid stuff on the regular. I just don't see how it's all falling on slasher's doorstep instead of fandom in general. Or the Hollywood machine that churns out female love interests and white dudes as the default lead character

[green_grrl]

I'm seeing a lot of that in ONTD right now; I'm following their Teen Wolf tag because it tends to get the best news. I just need to learn to stop reading the comments. It's all "Malia hate comes from Sterek shippers" and "Sterek shippers hate Scott and ignore Danny because they're POC and all they care about is seeing their straight white boys get together." Argh.

I understand the impulse to see racism. My OTP in Psych is Shawn/Gus and I have side eyed why Shawn/Lassiter is the juggernaut pairing. But I think it comes down to chemistry onscreen and the way it hits the viewer. For whatever reason, in Psych the BroTP does it for me slashily and the antagonistic pairing doesn't, and in Teen Wolf it's the opposite. Yet it clearly doesn't have to do with race. Just, as you say, Hollywood gives us more white guys to play with to begin with.

Also, Idris Elba, UNF!!! I came out of Pacific Rim all about Stacker/Herc, and who cares about anyone else.

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Shawn/Lassiter is the juggernaut pairing
WHAT?
Gladder than ever I never got into Psych fanfic.

[nialla42]

Yeah, when I first tried to get into it, I was amazed by this. I guess hate!sex won out over an epic canon BroTP.

[green_grrl]

Fortunately there is a decent amount of Shawn/Gus, too, it's just not the top pairing. D: Over on AO3, trascendenza has some good stories, and this vid by jarrow makes my LIFE:
http://jarrow.livejournal.com/1157514.html

Those boys are so married!

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