Things which bother me

[ap_aelfwine]

Somebody called Stephen Ratliff has written a fic on FFN called "Ritually Yours." It appears to have Hermione becoming Harry's concubine after the troll incident.

Fine,* but she's wearing little clothing and sleeping in a wardrobe in Harry's dorm, where the other boys are still living. And I gather she gets pregnant. At twelve fucking years of age

Comments

[dukebrymin]

I'm offended on your behalf. Solidarity, brother!

Doing NaNoWriMo this year?

[ap_aelfwine]

Thanks so much, brother!

I'm not sure about NaNoWriMo--I signed up, but I've got so much stuff already that I should finish... I'll see. Off for the weekend right now, I am--probably won't be online much till Monday.

IIRC you said you were doing NaNo? I hope all goes well.

[dukebrymin]

NaNoWriMo just about won this year, as opposed to my winning it. But I pulled it out at the end. It was enjoyable seeing your progress reports.

And, my sister (sassyfrass) managed to win her first NaNo this year too, so it was good all around.

[ap_aelfwine]

NaNoWriMo just about won this year, as opposed to my winning it. But I pulled it out at the end.

Coolness. Well done!

It was enjoyable seeing your progress reports.

Thanks!

And, my sister (sassyfrass) managed to win her first NaNo this year too, so it was good all around.

Awesome. Congratulations to her!

[nothorse]

Funnily enough, that fic isn't actually that bad. The pregnancy is magical and treated as the bad thing it is at 12, and there has been nothing but cuddling going on so far between Harry and Hermione.

The setup is very weird and squicky, true, but so far the actual fic hasn't been. (beyond the built-in misogyny that all concubine fics have of course.)

But I can see your squick and I do prefer the cute fluffy pets of you and Rorschach's Blot when he is so inclined.

[ap_aelfwine]

Thanks!

I reckon I probably am over-reacting a bit.

I'm glad the pregnancy is being treated as a bad thing and that the fic is not so much what I was afraid of it being.* There are some things I have very serious issues with--particularly women and girls being treated as objects (and especially being shared with other males, which was the leap I couldn't help but make seeing Hermione in the boys' dorm and sleeping in a wardrobe rather than in Harry's bed), any sort of public humiliation, and the ugliness and brutality of real-world slavery being introduced into a scenario that starts out looking like it's related to kinks of mine. I've seen so much of that in fanfic and on ASSTR and Deviantart** that I admit I'm too quick to assume the worst.

*I was leaning towards a hypothesis of the author's motivation as deconstruction rather than expression of disturbing kinks, but the thought that certain individuals would actually get off on said deconstruction because of it offering the dehumanisation and bruality they don't find in fic

[nothorse]

Squick and squee are traditionally close together. I think it's partly deconstruction, partly the desire to find a fresh variant of the usual harem/bonding/concubine fics. He's actually trying to show the squicky parts as being bad and Harry's desire to lessen any impact of the ridiculous rules.

Norman is just a misogynistic asshole and he really believes what he writes.

[madderbrad]

Hmmm. I haven't read 'Ritually Yours' but I have read 'Honor a Hufflepuff' and its WIP sequel 'Honor to Serve'. I first came across this author in a Yahoo group.

The 'Honour' stories are a bit hard to take because Draco has abruptly turned over a new leaf and he and Harry are best mates. Still, there are some interesting things in the universe, and it's always nice to read a 'good guys (easily) look like winning' story I suppose.

The other thing that makes the 'Honour' series interesting, and hard for me to swallow, is that Draco has Pansy pregnant. This is all in Harry's fourth year. And there's no magic involved, it's a normal pregnancy. The author has told me that (a) Draco and Pansy are both 15 at the time of the story (although I'd say almost certainly 14 when they coupled) and (b) he did it so Draco would have a 'serious shock' which would cause him to 'change course'.

Still, it's hard for me to accept, this pregnancy at such a young age. Given what you've said about 'Ritually Yours' I guess it is not an issue for

[ap_aelfwine]

Thanks. I've not read those particular fics. I remember Stephen Ratliff vaguely from animé fanfiction, umpteen years ago--didn't notice anything about his that struck me so badly at the time

[beege22]

Your response is interesting because his fic is well written and takes a similar tone to yours. I.e: Harry gets dropped into this situation and tries to deal with it like the decent human being he is. The pregnancy happens by magic and the fic, overall, is arguably less risque than yours - Harry and Hermione haven't actually even kissed yet, never mind the stuff with the collars. It's not exactly a deconstruction, but Ratliff is playing the trope *very* straight, with as much realism as you can put into a scenario like this.

I recommend you calm down long enough to read the whole thing through properly and then see how you feel about it.