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reenkaI guess it just hit me that it's not H/D I've gotten tired of as much as any other people's ideas of it. It's so hard to think outside the box-- or at least, to have thoughts that are truly your own-- if you're always in touch with everyone else's thoughts on the subject. At some stages, of course it's helpful and educational-- expands one's worldview-- but eventually the learning is over and done with, and there's truly nothing more to be done except to develop one's own mind on a subject.
And that's where I am-- it's been fun, but I really feel there's nothing left for me to learn about H/D from other people, for now. Which is kind of sad, actually.
I only realized this when I was thinking how H/D the way I want to envision it (whether or not it contradicts canon is another matter) is not a pairing of non-equals. Whatever it takes-- whatever I have to have Draco do-- I want to do it. I can't stand romance between a person who looks down on another and the person who needs the former one's attention. This might be 'as is' in canon, but the reason I write fic in the first place is to supplement canon, isn't it. Actually, that set-up, that imbalance, makes me ill. Equality is my priority, and it's not about turning Draco into someone suave and debonair-- it's about making him 'on the level' in some way I myself consider in character. While I do believe in canon, Harry needs to see Draco as worthy of some sort of consideration/respect 'as is', I don't consider this basic acknowledgement of worth as a human to be enough for romance. And in this, I'm not claiming authority-- I'm only saying it's not enough for me, and as such it's not open to debate, anyway. And that's what this is all about-- the realization that I need to start focusing on my own vision in my writing, and stop dallying about writing on automatic, the way it's easiest.
So it is my vision that for romance, Harry would need to admire Draco in some way. In any way. He'd need to-- well-- be able to put him on some sort of pedestal. That's how romantic love works. It's not about Draco being 'cool'-- it's just about him being a strong, active (vs. reactive) presence. A challenge. A cipher to be unravelled. An equal emotional counterpoint.
It's not about imbalance of feeling-- because feelings can't be equal, and because both people feel overwhelmed and weak when they're in love. This is different. This is about power, and if I can't manage to give Draco different-but-equal power to Harry, then H/D is over for me, and my writing is, in the end, about me (muwahahah! feel my POWER!). However-- in the future, when I feel like it-- I can write fic that rectifies this, because, well, in fic there are infinite possibilities.
But no more top/bottom(!!!) because I don't care who bottoms as long as it doesn't define them; no more laughably-obsessed!Draco, sensible!Draco -or- mad!Draco, no more uber-sexy!Draco, perfect-Slytherin!Draco, secret-Hufflepuff!Draco, though perhaps more His Father's Son!Draco and Snape's Favorite!Draco, 'cause I haven't played with them much; no more smug!Harry (or Draco-- god, the smugness needs to die for now); no more paying attention to any dynamic that didn't come from my own head and what I personally see in canon, basically. No more over-compensation, no more wit meant to cover up a lack of stable foundation, no more lust as the basis of the relationship, no more Draco needing while Harry rejects forever-and-ever-amen. There has to be a change, because that is not the pairing I loved.
Ahhh, it feels good to purge.
...It just seems like fandom's just about a) squeeing-- which gets old after you've first expressed yourself; b) arguing, which gets even older after you've seen everyone and their brother rehash the same arguments 984798347 times; and c) nitpicking, which drives me insane. Maybe it's just HP that's so sharply divided between mindless adulation and utter bitching, and the fandoms which center around older audiences are different, though I can't really be bothered in any case. Mind you, I'd take adulation over the bitching, 'cause at least -that- feels -good-, and I still don't get why one would be in a fandom to feel bad. Maybe it's just me, though.
~~
You know, all this time in fandom, and I'm still not used to the term 'angst-whore'. I mean, I can understand enjoying well-done tear-jerkers or tragedies or what have you or thinking that they're more 'deep' or 'meaningful' than good comedies (offensive as I find that pov)-- but to be specifically geared to only enjoy fic of that nature just strikes me as disturbing. Imagine if nothing made you really happy to imagine except misery! If nothing else, after a certain point, constancy in everything turns dull, even sadness-- as most depressed people know. Oh well. People who favor seriousness all (or most of) the time scare me, but let's move on.
So... thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
shaggirl, I was thinking about gay porn... (I love that sentence, btw).
In particular, I was thinking about the difference between male-oriented homoerotica/porn and (female-oriented) slash. And it seems to me that the difference is between the former's focus on the audience and the latter's focus on the participants.
It seems like in most 'men's' porn, it doesn't matter whether the couple involved really enjoys themselves (this isn't getting into non-con, but I guess you could apply 'enjoyment' to 'scene' non-con too, actually). The focus in most porn/erotica I've seen seems to be on getting the viewer off, rather than the two people playing the parts. This occurred to me in regard to orgasms, mainly-- the orgasms seem to be 'for show' more than anything-- the people can't come when they want to or in any sort of spontaneous way. There has to be a 'come-shot', it seems like, and this is clearly for the benefit of the audience more than anything.
I was also thinking this, wondering why more porn 'actors' don't get it on with people they actually want-- like, why couldn't that be the basis of who does what with whom? Seems simple, doesn't it? I mean, what's the point of supposedly consensual sex (which I consider a Good Thing in nearly all instances as a point of basic philosophy) if one's having it with a person one doesn't lust after? I was even having visions of revolutionizing the whole industry with this idea of fuck who you want, heh. Surely there's a large enough variety of people to always have attractive and willing participants who're also hot for each other. You'd think.
And then I realized that's not the point: because the presumed male viewer basically doesn't care, and the 'bottom line' is the audience. The male viewer doesn't think about the real emotions or desires of those people-- from what I can tell, men (gay or straight) use porn as fantasy-fodder, which means these aren't 'real people' to them, and the male relationship with (sexual) fantasy is apparently intrinsically less emotionally focused and more mechanical/visual. And the visual signifiers of emotion/lust probably don't matter, in that case, so they need not be shown.
Naturally, slash-- and female-written commercial romance/smut novels-- would have the exact opposite dynamic. Here, the audience is present but recedes into the background because what everyone's focused on is the players and how they feel. Especially with a female-centered perspective on two men together, it's going to have to be at least partly about a process of identification rather than objectification; the male viewer, otoh, seems to be predominantly concerned with action vs. reaction. Not that both don't occur in some measure no matter what; it's just a question of balances. It's difficult to fully compare, of course, because part of it is the inherent differences between the storytelling medium-- and its focus on emotion-- and minimalism of expression being so much easier to achieve in any visual medium. Eh. Maybe this explains why I (with my uber-emotionally-centered sensibilities) am apparently given to only writing slash for book-based fandoms.
~~
Apologiesaccepted.com actually made me tear up a little o_0 Well, happily :> I really feel like the net makes the world a village at the moment. Awwww, I kinda ♥ the world right now. <3<3 Apparently there are a lot of cool people in Holland & the Netherlands. Who knew? :> (...Someone stop me from busting out with John Lennon... okay, too late.)
Ahhhh, and such cute H/D art, awwww. I wuv confused!Harry and evilly-smirking!Draco <3<3<3 Oh, evil!Draco. *lovestruck sigh* Though I really like dark staring Harry, too. Basically, I'm easy. :D
Weeheee, `The Lullaby of Nifflish Erumpents' <3<3 Ohhh, laughing!Remus <3
And that's where I am-- it's been fun, but I really feel there's nothing left for me to learn about H/D from other people, for now. Which is kind of sad, actually.
I only realized this when I was thinking how H/D the way I want to envision it (whether or not it contradicts canon is another matter) is not a pairing of non-equals. Whatever it takes-- whatever I have to have Draco do-- I want to do it. I can't stand romance between a person who looks down on another and the person who needs the former one's attention. This might be 'as is' in canon, but the reason I write fic in the first place is to supplement canon, isn't it. Actually, that set-up, that imbalance, makes me ill. Equality is my priority, and it's not about turning Draco into someone suave and debonair-- it's about making him 'on the level' in some way I myself consider in character. While I do believe in canon, Harry needs to see Draco as worthy of some sort of consideration/respect 'as is', I don't consider this basic acknowledgement of worth as a human to be enough for romance. And in this, I'm not claiming authority-- I'm only saying it's not enough for me, and as such it's not open to debate, anyway. And that's what this is all about-- the realization that I need to start focusing on my own vision in my writing, and stop dallying about writing on automatic, the way it's easiest.
So it is my vision that for romance, Harry would need to admire Draco in some way. In any way. He'd need to-- well-- be able to put him on some sort of pedestal. That's how romantic love works. It's not about Draco being 'cool'-- it's just about him being a strong, active (vs. reactive) presence. A challenge. A cipher to be unravelled. An equal emotional counterpoint.
It's not about imbalance of feeling-- because feelings can't be equal, and because both people feel overwhelmed and weak when they're in love. This is different. This is about power, and if I can't manage to give Draco different-but-equal power to Harry, then H/D is over for me, and my writing is, in the end, about me (muwahahah! feel my POWER!). However-- in the future, when I feel like it-- I can write fic that rectifies this, because, well, in fic there are infinite possibilities.
But no more top/bottom(!!!) because I don't care who bottoms as long as it doesn't define them; no more laughably-obsessed!Draco, sensible!Draco -or- mad!Draco, no more uber-sexy!Draco, perfect-Slytherin!Draco, secret-Hufflepuff!Draco, though perhaps more His Father's Son!Draco and Snape's Favorite!Draco, 'cause I haven't played with them much; no more smug!Harry (or Draco-- god, the smugness needs to die for now); no more paying attention to any dynamic that didn't come from my own head and what I personally see in canon, basically. No more over-compensation, no more wit meant to cover up a lack of stable foundation, no more lust as the basis of the relationship, no more Draco needing while Harry rejects forever-and-ever-amen. There has to be a change, because that is not the pairing I loved.
Ahhh, it feels good to purge.
...It just seems like fandom's just about a) squeeing-- which gets old after you've first expressed yourself; b) arguing, which gets even older after you've seen everyone and their brother rehash the same arguments 984798347 times; and c) nitpicking, which drives me insane. Maybe it's just HP that's so sharply divided between mindless adulation and utter bitching, and the fandoms which center around older audiences are different, though I can't really be bothered in any case. Mind you, I'd take adulation over the bitching, 'cause at least -that- feels -good-, and I still don't get why one would be in a fandom to feel bad. Maybe it's just me, though.
~~
You know, all this time in fandom, and I'm still not used to the term 'angst-whore'. I mean, I can understand enjoying well-done tear-jerkers or tragedies or what have you or thinking that they're more 'deep' or 'meaningful' than good comedies (offensive as I find that pov)-- but to be specifically geared to only enjoy fic of that nature just strikes me as disturbing. Imagine if nothing made you really happy to imagine except misery! If nothing else, after a certain point, constancy in everything turns dull, even sadness-- as most depressed people know. Oh well. People who favor seriousness all (or most of) the time scare me, but let's move on.
So... thanks to
shaggirl, I was thinking about gay porn... (I love that sentence, btw). In particular, I was thinking about the difference between male-oriented homoerotica/porn and (female-oriented) slash. And it seems to me that the difference is between the former's focus on the audience and the latter's focus on the participants.
It seems like in most 'men's' porn, it doesn't matter whether the couple involved really enjoys themselves (this isn't getting into non-con, but I guess you could apply 'enjoyment' to 'scene' non-con too, actually). The focus in most porn/erotica I've seen seems to be on getting the viewer off, rather than the two people playing the parts. This occurred to me in regard to orgasms, mainly-- the orgasms seem to be 'for show' more than anything-- the people can't come when they want to or in any sort of spontaneous way. There has to be a 'come-shot', it seems like, and this is clearly for the benefit of the audience more than anything.
I was also thinking this, wondering why more porn 'actors' don't get it on with people they actually want-- like, why couldn't that be the basis of who does what with whom? Seems simple, doesn't it? I mean, what's the point of supposedly consensual sex (which I consider a Good Thing in nearly all instances as a point of basic philosophy) if one's having it with a person one doesn't lust after? I was even having visions of revolutionizing the whole industry with this idea of fuck who you want, heh. Surely there's a large enough variety of people to always have attractive and willing participants who're also hot for each other. You'd think.
And then I realized that's not the point: because the presumed male viewer basically doesn't care, and the 'bottom line' is the audience. The male viewer doesn't think about the real emotions or desires of those people-- from what I can tell, men (gay or straight) use porn as fantasy-fodder, which means these aren't 'real people' to them, and the male relationship with (sexual) fantasy is apparently intrinsically less emotionally focused and more mechanical/visual. And the visual signifiers of emotion/lust probably don't matter, in that case, so they need not be shown.
Naturally, slash-- and female-written commercial romance/smut novels-- would have the exact opposite dynamic. Here, the audience is present but recedes into the background because what everyone's focused on is the players and how they feel. Especially with a female-centered perspective on two men together, it's going to have to be at least partly about a process of identification rather than objectification; the male viewer, otoh, seems to be predominantly concerned with action vs. reaction. Not that both don't occur in some measure no matter what; it's just a question of balances. It's difficult to fully compare, of course, because part of it is the inherent differences between the storytelling medium-- and its focus on emotion-- and minimalism of expression being so much easier to achieve in any visual medium. Eh. Maybe this explains why I (with my uber-emotionally-centered sensibilities) am apparently given to only writing slash for book-based fandoms.
~~
Apologiesaccepted.com actually made me tear up a little o_0 Well, happily :> I really feel like the net makes the world a village at the moment. Awwww, I kinda ♥ the world right now. <3<3 Apparently there are a lot of cool people in Holland & the Netherlands. Who knew? :> (...Someone stop me from busting out with John Lennon... okay, too late.)
Ahhhh, and such cute H/D art, awwww. I wuv confused!Harry and evilly-smirking!Draco <3<3<3 Oh, evil!Draco. *lovestruck sigh* Though I really like dark staring Harry, too. Basically, I'm easy. :D
Weeheee, `The Lullaby of Nifflish Erumpents' <3<3 Ohhh, laughing!Remus <3
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-23 01:27 am (UTC)I didn't understand this (not the projecting myself part, ahaha, that's so blatant, but the receptiveness and how it interfers) until I read this:
I dislike the dynamic of our Harry and Draco, but that doesn't mean my Harry does
because that's exactly what's so meta with it, to me, because I want you to like it, not for it to just work, just like Draco wants to be liked and not just wanted. :/ Those are my issues, though, but I understand that you would react. The meta thing... it doesn't stifle my creativity maybe because I am good at compartimentalising; maybe it's just that for me thought and emotion, my plane and Draco's plane (in me) are so sharply divided that I see things clearly. Also, I like sst and how he plays
out so that probably helps.
I think you should try to finish your things. You should try to write the Crucible and write it how you feel it. <3 THEN we could play the 1996, because it's so not true that they wouldn't.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-23 01:44 am (UTC)I've never really separated thought & emotion; that's why I've never called myself logical, rational or level-headed and am surprised when people think I am. I either ignore things or get swallowed up by them-- it's very hard for me to find a middle ground. Incidentally, it's also why I need humor in everything, and besides everything else writing a relationship devoid of humor just drains me utterly.
Also, on top of everything else, it's hard to like it because Harry is such a bastard, honestly, and it's not how I want things to work, I guess. It's so -easy- to play him like that, but in a way, it's messing everything up, too, and drowning them (and me) in angst, which just exhausts me on top of it all. I liked it at first because it was fun, but the darker my Harry got and the more violently needy and clingy and desperately trapped Draco got, the more I got twitchy. It's like how I felt reading Olympia's fic & Ishuca's, too-- she had this very strong H/D relationship, but I wanted them to -stop- because it wasn't good for either of them.
It does 'just work', though-- that's why we started playing, isn't it? Because it just seemed to 'fit' and we did it naturally? It just happened, so it's not as if my approval was really a factor to me, I guess? I think it's just that a lot of issues are getting mixed into it that aren't intrinsic to it, anyway, so it's hard to even -tell- if I like it at this point.
I don't know about finishing them -now-. A break, I say. A break. But yes, I plan to~:)
we're still funny, though
Date: 2004-11-23 02:12 am (UTC)I liked it at first because it was fun, but the darker my Harry got and the more violently needy and clingy and desperately trapped Draco got, the more I got twitchy.
Draco reacts to that the way he does because he's cornered and probably not strong enough to give Harry an aut-aut. Draco is the moth, and he wants his flame, but the flame is playing with him attracting him and then burning him and all the fun they were having dancing is overwhelmed by the pain of the burn; they can't feel it any longer, all they feel is the burn. I'm not blaming this on Harry. I am actually seeing how the distructiveness is too symbiotic, it wouldn't work that way with other too people. Draco is the one who gives Harry all that leeway. He lets Harry go wild. He's not strong enough to go away and not strong enough to make him see that what he's doing is wrong. So maybe that's what bothers you, that Draco can't do enough? It's not just the literary terms of romance that are askew, it's the humanity that's too dysfunctional.
So of course have your break. Draco's just gonna need his occasional bouts of sap anyway, if that's too much, even, just tell me. BUT, what I am saying is that if we restart playing, we should think of ourselves as writers too, and not just actors. It's not going anywhere because we just accepted the reality "as is" and projected the meta (okay maybe that's just me) on the actors rather that having it play its role where it should have, in the writers.
Re: we're still funny, though
Date: 2004-11-23 03:42 pm (UTC)I think ideally, I want Draco to be a check to Harry-- to somehow be able to... like, influence his actions. That's why I was going on about equality-- that's the sort of equality I want. Harry's not responsible enough or 'good' or strong enough to be some sort of force of Ordered Good, especially a Harry who allows himself to mess with Draco, and Draco very clearly doesn't want chaos in their relationship.
It's like,
It's not that Harry doesn't feel love is enough-- in fact, Harry responds best to love-- but that Draco needs love more than he gives it.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-23 02:59 am (UTC)Also, I think we're different in which all Draco wants is to be loved and have that kind of simple relationship and that comes from me being perfectly happy with feeling the love, and to hell with all the issues, whereas you, probably more honestly and responsibly, can't and so Harry can't take this for granted or feeling it's enough.