[rambling on about nothing as usual.]

[reenka]

You know, before I spent too long in fandom, I had squicks. Now I just have preferences and a whole lot of pet-peeves, where it's just that you'd have to work harder to please me if I've a peeve about it. Like, y'know, I remember in the good old days, where Kirk/Spock sex pretty much squicked me, even if I liked the idea of the pairing a lot; I couldn't get over my adolescent vision of them. I remember when Ron/Draco and Snape/Draco and even Harry/Hermione seemed Deeply Wrong... and now I just don't prefer them. I remember when H/D was the alpha and omega of my fannish universe and I had all these ideas about how it 'should' and 'shouldn't' be done (and okay, I still have those), but I've become quite lax about thumping my chest and hyperventilating, alas.

Anyway, I meant to talk about a specific comment in this Wincest squick post, but it also made me think a bit, 'cause yeah, the sheer prevalence of that reading of a show's canon bothers me a bit-- though that's my 'canon, bitches!' thing, not any anti-incest squick, exactly; actually, I don't think I've ever had a 'traditional' squick in the sense that it's based on my real-life beliefs (I mean, I tend to like characters in fiction I'd probably clobber in real life, for a start). Like, if it's well-written, anything challenging or transgressive can only make the story more interesting, as far as I'm concerned; for examples, look to the many instances of incest in classic literature and also some of the best genre lit of today (okay, mainly Song of Ice and Fire). I cannot imagine seriously reading something good and then stopping and going, 'but this is WRONG, HOW COULD THIS BE??! NOOOoooo'. If I really felt like that, I mean, I wouldn't have graduated from books for toddlers, because isn't there always something unpleasant and 'wrong' and unfair even in (good and/or classic) children's books?

    (Btw, this is where some of my friends woujd just say I'm not a critical enough reader, so I clearly suck. Hehe. Because yeah, while I was careful to say 'well-written' and 'good' stories, the truth is I also suspend a lot of judgment/personal issues/disbelief when reading stuff I just... like a lot for whatever reason. I wouldn't call it a 'kink'; like, I don't have a 'kink' for HP canon, y'know? Most of the time the only reason I'm critical is when I either really love something or really hate it, usually because of aesthetic/story-construction reasons. This mostly applies to stuff that's really bad. How do I explain it. It applies to purple-prosey fantasy books with ass-stupid names & the majority of post-OoTP fanfic I read, hahaha; it very rarely applies to content, in other words, and only to execution-- the big exception being OOCness in fic and stuff I find relentlessly bleak. Because I'm a huge romantic dork. But I try to keep that under control. :P So yeah, it's a personality issue, basically, and one I can't really do anything about, so nyah.)


In any case, I'm veeeery touchy about actually projecting slashiness on any canon... and in fact I can't think of any where I would do so with all honesty. There's liminal cases like Star Trek, The Sentinel and Gundam Wing, but I wouldn't go so far as to explain anything that happened with the characters through that lens. It's just subtext, take it or leave it.

Aaanyway. It's funny because I have the exact opposite reaction-- usually if something squicks me in text/theory, it squicks me less in a visual representation, because I'm more of an aesthete-- I always look at art as an 'art piece' first and a 'statement' second; in other words, I can easily disengage any moral/ethical/other biases and just enjoy the pretty because pretty is what matters with visual media to me. This is why I have no hard pairing preference with fanart, for instance, and why I tolerate and enjoy extreme cheesiness in fanvids of the sort that'd make me run screaming from a fic.
    Coincidentally, it's also why the 6A/LJ wank sticks in my craw like mad. It's really the art-critique aspect that drives me mad, the double-standard where fanfic is okay but fanart isn't-- fanart needs to be judged by outsiders who don't have the first clue what they're looking at. That just drives me mad. Visual art just... the idea of judging it in such pedestrian terms without even realizing that's what you're doing-- it makes my blood boil.

Regardless, I meant to just quote harriet_spy's comment:
    To be honest, there's no way you can take a dynamic that hinges even a little bit on transgressiveness, have ten thousand squeeing fangirls stampede over it, and have anything left but flatness.

I just thought that was really... very true. And it really applies to some of my favorite pairings (*cough!*) rather than just Wincest. It's not that I hate fluff... it's that I'm just so bored & frustrated by the sheer glut of narratives that make the transgressive and raw as acceptable and 'easy' as possible. Actually, the reason I wouldn't ship Wincest is probably because you can't reasonably expect it to be remotely healthy or resolvable in any positive way-- and I'm still a romantic. It's kinda figures that the incest is intinsically everyone's problem, but yeah. This definitely reminds of the sheer flatness I felt before I stopped reading H/D altogether; this sense that the pairing has become... completely predictable and 'easy' (in fandom, not in canon). I can't really think of a transgressive pairing that actually consistently captured its own problematic areas... which is why I'm really way too wary to read S/L, but oh well.

Comments

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

You're too wary to read Snape/Lucius?

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

That too, of course >:D Although honestly I'd be wary kind of for a different reason :))

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

Snape/Lucius is such a fluff-fest. There are some amazing fics out there, but mostly it has the emotional tension of a water chestnut. Worse yet, it's filled with stuff that even squicks *me* out. Fluff + kink = THE WRONGEST COMBINATION.

I still have no idea who you're talking about with S/L, though.

I'm just so bored & frustrated by the sheer glut of narratives that make the transgressive and raw as acceptable and 'easy' as possible.

Well, that's always the problem, whether it be Snape/Lucius kinksex or Snape-mentoring-Harry gen. There's still good stuff out there, though.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

SNILLY OF COURSE, WHAT ELSE CAN IT POSSIBLY BE :))

...The idea of fluffy!Snape/Lucius breaks my brain, kinda. o_0 Whut. I can't even imagine it, seriously. I always stayed away 'cause it's so oooobviously gonna be written as dark & twisted with a kinky cherry on top, but this is somehow worse :> Although I'm not sure what sorta dynamic I'd like Snape/Lucius to have... mostly it's like Ron/Snape in that I've no idea what I'd do with it, myself. Probably 'cause I never know what to do with either Lucius or Snape, haha.

And you're right. I mean, normally this doesn't bother me as much until the fangirl squee totally wears off and I become bitter, 'cause before then I'm all about the good emotionally-charged writing, which tends to have some rawness even if it's not about the right things or what have you, I guess :> Or perhaps I may supply the emotional rawness from the reader side; this definitely happens when I go back to look at a fic I loved and obsessed over and find it flat and dull.

[amalin.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I think she means Sirius/Luna.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Now now, it's not nice to break my brain after playing with it D:

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

That is indeed a good quote. It actually explains why anything I write must read like unhappy fic, non-pairing or break-up, when really I'm all for my pairing, I just need to flap it up and make some creases into it.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

It's odd that I've yet to really write them breaking up, but that's a bit depressing to me ^^; Normally I just want them to have a really hard time together, but if they break up then they can't have -any- time together D: But yeah, mmm, angst :D But then, I can't really truthfully imagine Harry & Draco or Snape & Lily happily ever after anyway, in the skipping-in-fields-and-picking-daisies way, so I sort of like the idea of happily-ever-afters that are messed up and kinda... messy in general. With like, Kirk/Spock and Jim/Blair I totally dig the curtains and cupcakes, though because I'm a dork :>

[http://users.livejournal.com/_inbetween_/]

Sorry, I didn't mean permanent break up (too far into my own head) of course; I also want them together (or dead (together)) and the break-up was just the start of the story, but I seem to keep focussing on writing down (if anything) only the difficult and messy parts, since the other is "obvious" to me, even if people probably couldn't guess that the "together" was always my aim, intention and default setting.

[amalin.livejournal.com]

Are you following seventynine yet! Did you read hugfic yet! Are you working on: Sirius/Harry, DE!Draco, hugfic? REENA I MISS OUR THREADS.

I thought about reviving my pre-DH Occlumency fic just for you ldkfjs.

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

pre-DH Occlumency fic

DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!

[amalin.livejournal.com]

I am tempted!

[amalin.livejournal.com]

WAIT SORRY I MEAN SIRIUS+HARRY SORRY :)))))))

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

*cries* WHY ARE THERE SO MANY THINGS I NEED TO DO RIGHT NOW D: WHY IS IT I DO NONE OF THEM D: WHYWHYWHY AM I SUCH A DOUCHE D: D: *self-flagellates*

Basically I've been reading books in cafes and avoiding pretty much... oh let's see... everything else in my life. *facepalm* Including the internets. Though I do skim my flist & therefore metafandom... perhaps if I friended that comm? But it would make my entries explode D:

Occlumency D: I once wrote a Snape/Harry (http://lunacy.livejournal.com/211408.html) like that, and I'm still not sure if it sucks or not 'cause I really can't judge H/S for shit & it never got much in the way of comments . :-?

Sirius + Harry D: I want to write (and read) that bad D: Poor baby, I still haven't written it for him. I can't believe you wrote a Sirius+Harry one to (or started to), that's so cute!! <3333333333333

[amalin.livejournal.com]

Wait, when did I start to write Sirius+Harry :-? What! I wish I had, though, I love them.

It is okay! There is no pressure, there is not even a two-year-away deadline when canon will change anymore :| But anyway, nobody says you have to skim along fandom always! I mean, look at me, you are my only link anymore.

The Occlumency fic was H/D, though I'm sure you guessed that, haha. Do I ever write anything else that doesn't involve Viktor Krum or Cho Chang or something. I STILL REALLY WANT TO WRITE HARRY/CHO.

[notrafficlights.livejournal.com]

Wincest squick post,

Which is one of the biggest cases of LOL SENSITIVE I have ever seen.

Regardless, I meant to just quote harriet_spy's comment:
To be honest, there's no way you can take a dynamic that hinges even a little bit on transgressiveness, have ten thousand squeeing fangirls stampede over it, and have anything left but flatness.

Which is just a case of, "Then it's not for you, dipshit". If you don't do incest of any kind, then you're probably not gonna get Wincest.

I'm veeeery touchy about actually projecting slashiness on any canon

Even if that canon does it to itself?

I mean, fuck me, you cannot have a conversation about LOL PROJECTING re:SPN without pointing out the obvious fact that they gay it the fuck up so consciously in canon they're just asking for it. No, they're practically begging for it.

This definitely reminds of the sheer flatness I felt before I stopped reading H/D altogether; this sense that the pairing has become... completely predictable and 'easy'

You're doing it wrong.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Haha re: harriet_spy's comment... I guess I thought she was saying it's not the concept, it's the execution rather than 'no incest of any kind'? I do grow tired of people whose only objection is 'but it's incest!' anyway ><;;; Seems kinda beside the point, but then I'm not too fond of moral readings...

Well, I mean, if canon does it to itself it's not projection :> Canon actually does have intentional subtext sometimes (though usually I'm only likely to notice if I see one of the creators say they intended it). I barely watched more than a few eps of SPN so cannot tell you either way; it's like... someone said somewhere in comments to that post that what's 'slashy' for platonic friends isn't slashy for brothers who're close, which seems true. I think what I object to is calling it all-out 'gay', but there are shades of emotional incestuousness that is actually not that rare between overly close familial relationships of any kind. It's like when people become too emotionally dependent on each other and need each other just to get by and invest most of their emotional security in a single family member... it gets dicey, but I wouldn't think of it in b&w terms as sexual vs. non-sexual. I remember watching the priest ep (like, there was a ghost priest killing people or something) & there were some pretty intense moments between Sam & Dean where I was like 'whoah' (I believe it involved crying and booze and promises to kill). I mean, is it 'gay'? I feel like it's more complex than that; or rather, I feel familial/sibling bonds are deep enough to contain that sort of behavior, if in unhealthy versions. What I mean is, you cannot prove it's gay in most canons; in the sense there are still other explanations that work, anyway.


And yeah, they (most of the people I was reading) are doing it wrong, 'tis true, but eventually it sort of got to me, I guess. Not like I thought the pairing itself was 'flat' or predictable, etc, but rather that because so many fics were predictable/banal/etc, this leaked into my own perception of the pairing and made me angry and depressed by turns. But that was years ago now. Bad times, man :>

[notrafficlights.livejournal.com]

I guess I thought she was saying it's not the concept, it's the execution

Still epically missing the point.

Wincest is that kind of incest where we work with canon so ripe it's fit to burst. It's like barely a step down from anime twincest.

So of course the execution is going to be "obvious, duh". Because that's how it is, duh.

someone said somewhere in comments to that post that what's 'slashy' for platonic friends isn't slashy for brothers who're close, which seems true.

I bet these are the same people who say things like, "I don't like slash because young women write men like young women."

Well, here's the thing: even brothers who are fantastically close don't act like Sam and Dean.

like, there was a ghost priest killing people or something

Which is like, one of the mildest subtext episodes ever.

Let me put it this way: Supernatural is the kind of show actual grown men (heterosexual and otherwise) watch and say, "That's pretty gay." It's the kind of show mainstream media reviewers review and say, "That's pretty gay" (except they dress it up in pretty words about how their being brothers cancels it out, or something). So it's not just the fangirls, and it's not just projecting. They crack jokes about pretending to be a "couple" and Dean overcompensating and all the other stuff that equates to "gaying it the fuck up so consciously" which I mentioned before. And we have two lovely actors with enough chemistry (and I'm talking platonic, here) that they burn a hole through your TV.

So really, you have to watch it to understand. If you haven't watched it, you won't get it.

[discordiana.livejournal.com]

because isn't there always something unpleasant and 'wrong' and unfair even in (good and/or classic) children's books?

No? I have the impression you're conflating portrayals of wrong things with wrong statements (for lack of a better word.)

Anyway, I really like that Harriet Spy comment, even though I wouldn't make it just about the aesthetics. It does flatten and artificially simplifies human nature and the world, but it's also problematic (politically?) how things (like H/D) become after they've been appropriated by a majority and made to become this small-minded, domestic, heterosexist fantasy...

I'm sure there is an argument there about the inherent value of repetition (kink) and a feminist tangent even about appropriating male bodies and our own sexuality, etc. But I've always thought both the theory about the inverted gaze and the ones about the dangers of trading up were true. Something being a kink doesn't automatically make it unproblematic and worth protection, actually that's how sleazy mainstream archetypes are created. But then can women's archetypes become mainstream? They can if they're essentially female's versions of the male ones... etc etc.

Though of course H/D is not just the reader response & fanfiction produced about H/D, so it's not like the very idea "became" small-minded and dull, and of course if the point is combating borgeois dullness H/G doesn't seem the best choice either.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Probably? I may be conflating, I guess. Um. I'm not -quite- sure what you mean by 'wrong' statements (I guess you mean the statement made by the portrayal?). But people weren't talking about the WAY the portrayal was made, just the portrayal itself (in the squick post); I mean, they weren't differentiating so I wasn't either, I guess. Sure, the portrayal is always... well, they're children's books after all. :D

For me, of course, everything is about the aesthetics, as I said ;) But I agree... the hetero fantasy aspect of slash in general (and yaoi) is especially draining in regards to halfway transgressive pairings. At least they're doing it to every pairing so there's no agenda :>

Anyway, I don't think she's saying the 'idea' becomes small-minded and dull, but rather that perhaps to a non-shipper and/or someone not instrinsically invested, if you read story after story where a pairing/subject gets totally trampled, your interest/faith in that pairing naturally dwindles. Or something. Besides, I believe harriet_spy is a slasher, so like most slashers she probably wouldn't take a het pairing as the alternative :>

[discordiana.livejournal.com]

I think children stories written by adults are always going to be filled with badwrong things, in that way where the child doesn't exactly understand the wrongness and it's the adult sort of talking both to the superego of the adult reader and the id of the child reader (often through metaphor/surrelism/play). I'm sure Freud would have a ball with this; actually I'm sure freudian readers have had a ball with this (and fairytales in general.)

But I meant that in a book like His Dark Materials there's plenty of horrifying stuff but you know the author dislikes them as much as you do. Plus I'm always wary of the argument that "they all do it wrong so it doesn't matter" (paraphrased) because it seems a way to deflect criticism rather than answer. I mean, I know most writers do some things wrong but why not address all of them rather than none? I actually think when it comes to certain things it's more like talking about society through the specific work since cultural heritage screws us all. The work still stands for the good, strong artistic merits it has (if it has them). Actually, why am I saying this at all, it's so obvious.

I also care about the aesthetics, you know. ;P Recently I've been composing this post about fandom's bad taste... But aside from my assholishness, I've found that tons of things that I used to analyse in other ways can be simply criticised as aesthetically bad concepts. Like you know all those discussions we've had about artificiality and honesty and the bang but not the whimper and how a lot of readers seem to run away from the portrayals with the most tension to them, or turn them into a flatter, simpler archetype.

I didn't mean harriet_spy was saying that! I think I was responding both to my tangent about H/D in fandom and your talk of H/G so it became confused. I know what you mean about becoming disenchanted with an idea when it's executed badly, though I always have a firm distinction in my mind between ideas and their potentials and the way they're framed/wielded so instead than becoming disenchanted with something I feel is true, I get annoyed with people's romantic/reductionist/safe approach. Though a lot of recent discussions made me hate various terms I was neutral/positive about ("sensible" "sane" "cool" even "rational") so yeah I get that rebellion.

.... >n>

[miyavivivi.livejournal.com]

well this is completely off-topic and I apologize for that, first.


But I couldn't find an email address to use.. so this was the next best thing ;n;!



I've recently opened a Draco/Harry archive (http://love.and-hearts.net/hd/) and I'd really like to archive your story "As Good as he Got" on it. I'm more than happy to give you livejournal/email/website/etc credit (anything you want really *w*!)


Thanks for taking time to read this =w=!
<333

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

All right, sure-- though my email is listed in my profile (http://lunacy.livejournal.com/profile) as 'mildlunacy @ livejournal.com' just like everyone else's ;)

Feel free to archieve and use my lj for reference :D

Thanks! :D

[miyavivivi.livejournal.com]

>o>!!! I must have been incredibly tired to have missed that email, sorry! xDD;;


Thanks a lot!!! :3
<333

[hija707.livejournal.com]

A chuj z tym