Okay, I'm guessing this is because I have no idea which discussion you're responding to, but parts of this don't make much sense to me. Let me see what I can figure out:
1. People write hurt/comfort that involves one or more characters becoming disabled. For fun. For kink. For personal / psychological / therapeutic / emotional / social reasons. Some of it stinks as quality writing, but not everyone agrees on what that consists of. Overall, the fandom accepts it.
2. Other people, who have said disabilities, object to their being written unrealistically, or used as an excuse for other characters to help, comfort, and potentially feel bad for the one(s) that got hurt.
3. The clash of these two viewpoints is causing fandom drama, based on whether it's exploitative to write a story that uses something without making it the focal point - without the author doing extensive research, thinking, soul-searching, etc. - as opposed to making a story that is about living with a disability. Or growing up black, or whateverIs that ... about the
( ... )
There wasn't much context, I know, but that's because it was largely intended as a comment to someone else's post that got too long and spun off. XD; And I felt it was too much of a big rant to wade into the journal of somebody I didn't know and post, but I wanted to post it somewhere, and yet... didn't think I could capture the entire history of the debate accurately.
Re: Whoops, this was me. Not Nisei :pexecharmoniousJune 25 2010, 23:08:03 UTC
For point 1: I get the feeling that a lot of the debate has occurred because queer/disabled/etc. fen have found fandom to be Their Last Refuge, and the place where they thought they could be accepted. And when they run up against the same ableist, etc. stuff that they see in the rest of their lives... well, I've heard people say things like "fandom used to be my happy place, and now it's not". So I think that's part of it
( ... )
non-disabled h/c writers' priorities are always going to be different from disabled non-h/c writers' priorities
There are also disabled fans who read and write h/c, though, and I think it's important not to lose sight of that. Not because it makes h/c magically always okay because we have the disabled fen seal of approval, but because h/c writers aren't just writing for an able-bodied audience. We can't say "this is about our kink; it's not for you," because sometimes it is.
You're talking about the wider ethics of kink here as opposed to the specific circumstances of the hc_bingo challenge, but to bring it back to the challenge -- there are a couple people on my flist who eagerly wanted to participate in it but then didn't sign up because the content or wording of various prompts made them uncomfortable. So they weren't objecting to the kink itself, but to the specifics of the way the challenge was set up. I've only seen a few people actually object to existance of a h/c kink in general.
There are also disabled fans who read and write h/c, though, and I think it's important not to lose sight of that. Not because it makes h/c magically always okay because we have the disabled fen seal of approval, but because h/c writers aren't just writing for an able-bodied audience. We can't say "this is about our kink; it's not for you," because sometimes it is.
*nod* Which is why I dropped that in in the next line, and I didn't spend too much time on it because that wasn't the part of the discussion I was raising points against. What disabled h/c fans think of the whole thing is a whole other aspect of the debate, as you said, and one that I've seen a lot of intelligent writing on.
I was mostly responding to the fact that there have been some posts that seem to be pretty upset, offended, squicked, horrified, "hey, no way", about the fact that something like a disability of theirs is someone's kink. It seems demeaning and trivialising to them, because it feels like they're being reduced to a subset of themselves, and a subset
( ... )
And as this debate has apparently bled over even into Slacktivist, one of my regular haunts:
It's a lot like that fanfic where the author sent her protagonists to the killing fields of Cambodia so that they would have an exciting background as they fuck- the fact that you care more about seeing two hot guys screw than about genocide says something about you as a person, and pointing that out isn't meanspirited or unfair or an illegitimate extrapolation from your writing choices.
This is something of a different-if-related issue to h/c and disability specifically, but that implication, that it says something about you to inherently think this way, is something that I want to unpack
( ... )
(Which is also not to say that my hurt is the be-all and end-all, or more important than the hurt of other groups of people, or something. Nor do I expect anyone to feel particularly emotionally motivated over the fact that it exists. It's more just an explanation of "why care about this nitpicky detail?"
I think it's partly that I'm incapable of looking at a ship with a small hole in the hull and not going "but there's a hole in the hull", even if the people involved have decided to prioritise hauling water out and going full steam ahead to stopping and fixing the hole, because it'll ultimately get them where they need to go faster. It slows down the process of getting to an end goal, and I should probably feel bad for being nitpicky because of that. But I'm very much "what about the hole?" It's my mental structure and probably makes me unfit to participate in debates about progressive fandom ever, because the majority of the participants can get to whether they're going better without me, but I do because... hole.)
I'm disabled and a cancer survivor, and I have no problem with the idea that my disability/illness might be someone's kink. I'm also female and fat and have green eyes and I know for sure that those are people's kinks (especially the last one in fandom!)
The next step, of course, is how to express that kink without hurting other people. Offline, there's a big difference between talking sexy to someone who wants to hear you talk sexy (or is paid to, or is reciprocating later) or shouting at a stranger on the street. Then the kinkster is valuing "expressing my kink" over "someone else's life". Hence, warnings - invite people into your kinky space all you want, but let them know what's there, whether it be the most fantastical h/c magical healing wingfic or a thoughtful examination of trauma or a hot sex scene with people who happen to have disabilities. But don't shout "magical cock heals cancer" at me, please!
I am big on warnings. I often worry that I don't warn enough, on my fics, but I really try to warn for everything that I think may trigger someone, and one thing this debate is teaching me is that you can always Warn Moar. It's definitely giving me new things to think about warning for that I might not have otherwise (like if a character embodies sexist/racist personality traits - which I think might not have been part of this debate but a related one, but ANYWAY it was a great idea and I was glad I saw it said).
So yeah, I'm all for warnings. They help keep you from being the equivalent of being That One Person who goes up to someone at a con and thrusts their porn collection in your face, for sure.
I think you hit the nail on the head. I love slash, but still try to be civil when I meet gay men. It's common decency and social skill. The same goes for the things we don't like about people we meet: it's encouraged to keep it to ourselves until we are invited to open up on it.
Yeah. And I think part of acknowledging that it's a kink that has nothing really to do with the real people's pain/situation, too (and is more a dramatisation/fantasy version of it), is acknowledging that these real people do not, usually, embody your actual kink. Gay men's lives don't always work like slash (I imagine that some gay men's lives work like some slash, but they're pretty few and far between). A person's real experience is not going to play out like your fantasy version of a kink. And so your kink for someone's thing is not only something you shouldn't be expressing to them off the bat, if you do it's often going to be beside the point.
Another repeat of elspethdixon's first point.. I'm considered mentally ill, but mental hospitals (at least the ones that actually do what they're supposed to) are one of my kinks. I don't know if it's the setting itself, the chance to get better, or that I just happen to like characters who seem like they'd end up in one, but it's there just the same.
And moreover to the OP, a lot of things are someone's kink. A lot of occupations (librarian, priest, police officer, etc) are very common kinks. But no one's going around telling those people that they're someone's kink. No one would. Why is this any different? The fact is, if something exists, someone's going to get turned on by it. Isn't that an internet law?
I agree with the main post here, and I mostly agree with your comment, but I think that the reason why some kinks are more potentially harmful than others comes back to the damn privilege.
Yeah. And it sucks when that's true, for everyone involved. Especially for the people who are kinked over, I don't doubt, because... well, one more thing to add to the othering/objectification/dismissal of your real issues pile, huh? :/ And so I can understand there's a lot of friction. I think that the part of it that purely involves the kink (i.e. not going into the issue of whether prompts are worded thoughtfully or whether fics are written conscientiously, just the bare kink) is a very much unavoidable and blameless hurt; but I can see where it still hurts.
Part of my kink with h/c is the power of love to make bad situations better (unless you're writing dark!fic).
If you do your research and are not patronizing, I don't get how that would be hurtful to RL people with diseases/disabilities. Don't people with chronic illnesses deserve a love story?
I've been itching to include my particular type of cancer in a fic - hopefully that doesn't make me a Bad!Person. And I love to read cancer!fic if it is done well.
Being on the 'inside' of the disease, improper medical procedures/treatments will throw me out of a story, but that's just lack of research on the part of the author - not something she's doing to hurt or degrade me personally.
Don't people with chronic illnesses deserve a love story?
I am going to gently demur here, as somebody with chronic pain.
Really, if I have to choose between respect/understanding and comfort/love from people I don't know?
Door No. 1, please.
"I respect that you hurt" means much more to me than "I'm sorry you hurt. What can I do to make it better?"
The former tells me that first and foremost, they see me as a person who just happens to be hurting. The latter parses to me as "You are a hurt person."
One makes me more than my pain, while the other makes me nothing but that.
Of course, this only works for how my mental/emotional furniture is arranged. I don't guarantee anybody else sees this the same way.
I must have phrased that badly. As a person also in chronic pain that limps around all day, I agree with you (although I always appreciate an offer of help).
But I would not be offended if I ran across a fanfic about a completely healthy person falling in love with a post-cancer patient in chronic pain who limps around all day, as long as it was a good story that respected the person in pain.
If that's someone's h/c and/or disability kink, I say go for it - and email me the link.
Comments 42
1. People write hurt/comfort that involves one or more characters becoming disabled. For fun. For kink. For personal / psychological / therapeutic / emotional / social reasons. Some of it stinks as quality writing, but not everyone agrees on what that consists of. Overall, the fandom accepts it.
2. Other people, who have said disabilities, object to their being written unrealistically, or used as an excuse for other characters to help, comfort, and potentially feel bad for the one(s) that got hurt.
3. The clash of these two viewpoints is causing fandom drama, based on whether it's exploitative to write a story that uses something without making it the focal point - without the author doing extensive research, thinking, soul-searching, etc. - as opposed to making a story that is about living with a disability. Or growing up black, or whateverIs that ... about the ( ... )
Reply
There wasn't much context, I know, but that's because it was largely intended as a comment to someone else's post that got too long and spun off. XD; And I felt it was too much of a big rant to wade into the journal of somebody I didn't know and post, but I wanted to post it somewhere, and yet... didn't think I could capture the entire history of the debate accurately.
Reply
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There are also disabled fans who read and write h/c, though, and I think it's important not to lose sight of that. Not because it makes h/c magically always okay because we have the disabled fen seal of approval, but because h/c writers aren't just writing for an able-bodied audience. We can't say "this is about our kink; it's not for you," because sometimes it is.
You're talking about the wider ethics of kink here as opposed to the specific circumstances of the hc_bingo challenge, but to bring it back to the challenge -- there are a couple people on my flist who eagerly wanted to participate in it but then didn't sign up because the content or wording of various prompts made them uncomfortable. So they weren't objecting to the kink itself, but to the specifics of the way the challenge was set up. I've only seen a few people actually object to existance of a h/c kink in general.
edited to add: Though, the general ( ... )
Reply
*nod* Which is why I dropped that in in the next line, and I didn't spend too much time on it because that wasn't the part of the discussion I was raising points against. What disabled h/c fans think of the whole thing is a whole other aspect of the debate, as you said, and one that I've seen a lot of intelligent writing on.
I was mostly responding to the fact that there have been some posts that seem to be pretty upset, offended, squicked, horrified, "hey, no way", about the fact that something like a disability of theirs is someone's kink. It seems demeaning and trivialising to them, because it feels like they're being reduced to a subset of themselves, and a subset ( ... )
Reply
It's a lot like that fanfic where the author sent her protagonists to the killing fields of Cambodia so that they would have an exciting background as they fuck- the fact that you care more about seeing two hot guys screw than about genocide says something about you as a person, and pointing that out isn't meanspirited or unfair or an illegitimate extrapolation from your writing choices.
This is something of a different-if-related issue to h/c and disability specifically, but that implication, that it says something about you to inherently think this way, is something that I want to unpack ( ... )
Reply
I think it's partly that I'm incapable of looking at a ship with a small hole in the hull and not going "but there's a hole in the hull", even if the people involved have decided to prioritise hauling water out and going full steam ahead to stopping and fixing the hole, because it'll ultimately get them where they need to go faster. It slows down the process of getting to an end goal, and I should probably feel bad for being nitpicky because of that. But I'm very much "what about the hole?" It's my mental structure and probably makes me unfit to participate in debates about progressive fandom ever, because the majority of the participants can get to whether they're going better without me, but I do because... hole.)
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The next step, of course, is how to express that kink without hurting other people. Offline, there's a big difference between talking sexy to someone who wants to hear you talk sexy (or is paid to, or is reciprocating later) or shouting at a stranger on the street. Then the kinkster is valuing "expressing my kink" over "someone else's life". Hence, warnings - invite people into your kinky space all you want, but let them know what's there, whether it be the most fantastical h/c magical healing wingfic or a thoughtful examination of trauma or a hot sex scene with people who happen to have disabilities. But don't shout "magical cock heals cancer" at me, please!
Reply
I am big on warnings. I often worry that I don't warn enough, on my fics, but I really try to warn for everything that I think may trigger someone, and one thing this debate is teaching me is that you can always Warn Moar. It's definitely giving me new things to think about warning for that I might not have otherwise (like if a character embodies sexist/racist personality traits - which I think might not have been part of this debate but a related one, but ANYWAY it was a great idea and I was glad I saw it said).
So yeah, I'm all for warnings. They help keep you from being the equivalent of being That One Person who goes up to someone at a con and thrusts their porn collection in your face, for sure.
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And moreover to the OP, a lot of things are someone's kink. A lot of occupations (librarian, priest, police officer, etc) are very common kinks. But no one's going around telling those people that they're someone's kink. No one would. Why is this any different? The fact is, if something exists, someone's going to get turned on by it. Isn't that an internet law?
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Yeah. And it sucks when that's true, for everyone involved. Especially for the people who are kinked over, I don't doubt, because... well, one more thing to add to the othering/objectification/dismissal of your real issues pile, huh? :/ And so I can understand there's a lot of friction. I think that the part of it that purely involves the kink (i.e. not going into the issue of whether prompts are worded thoughtfully or whether fics are written conscientiously, just the bare kink) is a very much unavoidable and blameless hurt; but I can see where it still hurts.
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If you do your research and are not patronizing, I don't get how that would be hurtful to RL people with diseases/disabilities. Don't people with chronic illnesses deserve a love story?
I've been itching to include my particular type of cancer in a fic - hopefully that doesn't make me a Bad!Person. And I love to read cancer!fic if it is done well.
Being on the 'inside' of the disease, improper medical procedures/treatments will throw me out of a story, but that's just lack of research on the part of the author - not something she's doing to hurt or degrade me personally.
*shrug* different strokes, I guess.
Reply
I am going to gently demur here, as somebody with chronic pain.
Really, if I have to choose between respect/understanding and comfort/love from people I don't know?
Door No. 1, please.
"I respect that you hurt" means much more to me than "I'm sorry you hurt. What can I do to make it better?"
The former tells me that first and foremost, they see me as a person who just happens to be hurting. The latter parses to me as "You are a hurt person."
One makes me more than my pain, while the other makes me nothing but that.
Of course, this only works for how my mental/emotional furniture is arranged. I don't guarantee anybody else sees this the same way.
Reply
But I would not be offended if I ran across a fanfic about a completely healthy person falling in love with a post-cancer patient in chronic pain who limps around all day, as long as it was a good story that respected the person in pain.
If that's someone's h/c and/or disability kink, I say go for it - and email me the link.
:-)
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