Whole lot of missing the point going around apparently.

 

Lol yep. I'm sorry for the role I played in it. At this point, everybody's accusing everybody else of being narrow-minded and deliberately obtuse, when the whole point of Taure's thread was to create a distinction to avoid that.

 

I am not talking about the HP fandom. Nor am I talking about about all fanfic writers who are still writing. I am talking about Generation Z's entry into the fanfiction community. While slash has been popular since the 80s and 90s, it has grown considerably in the last five years and now dominates several fandoms. I'd even make a bet that there have been more HP slash fics being published in the last two years than het pairings but not by much. They still won't make up the HP majority for a long time due the sheer amount of HP works out there.

Moreover, I am including non-binary people in the LGBT community, which has exploded in the last couple years. Hell, just recently my old high school did a poll and 70% of the students said they were LGBT or non-binary. The younger generations coming into the fandom are far more likely to be LGBT than not.

Perhaps HP is the exception then. HP seems to attract more men than most other major series outside ASOIAF.

This is exactly what I meant. You had very few real famous female authors until the mid to late 90s outside of romance. Now you are seeing countless books, of all different genres, written by women and becoming successful. Don't get me wrong, it's still a majority of men in many genres but it's been changing and will continue to do so imo.

Here is a great representation until 2015: https://pudding.cool/2017/06/best-sellers/

 

I can only assume wilful misunderstanding at this point.

 

At least in Ao3 out of 113 643 works in Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling -fandom updated since 1st Jan 2020, 47 446 of them have been marked M/M, it being the largest category by incrediby narrow margin (F/M containing 47 435 works). Most used relationship tags are Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter with 17 086 counts and Sirius Black/Remus Lupin with 11 614. Following them are Hermione/Draco with 8 075 and the first canon pairing, James/Lily at 7 927. Hermione/Ron and Harry/Ginny follow with 6 274 and 5 190, respectively, with Harry/Snape and Harry/Tom Riddle coming after with 2 883 and 2 545 counts. Rounding up the top 10 are Hermione/Harry (2 294) and Hermone/Snape (2 245).

 

Yeah. with "mentally stimulating" I meant to be truthfully fully engaged with the work because it's actually telling you something.

You'd have to read a good book or two, or maybe three to know. If you honestly believe that world-class literature and average Joe's fanfiction story (or even good fanfiction stories) are comparable in any way whatsoever, then I really can't help you.

That's all off topic though. On topic, I still maintain that a clear distinction between "I, as a reader, am not into that stuff because I'm limited in this way" and "the story is bad because it's badly written" is needed. As it stands now in the OP it reads a bit as though it's the story's fault if the reader is self-inserting himself and can't enjoy the story otherwise.

 

No, I haven't. I care about the story, not what the author is trying to tell me through the story. I have a deep emotional connection to Lord of the Rings, but how could I possibly relate anything that happens in it to myself? I've never experienced anything like what happens in the book and none of the characters are anything like me. I've never been at war and had it leave me a hollow shell of my former self. I've never been faced with the temptation of using evil means to achieve good ends. If industrialization destroying nature didn't cause global warming, I wouldn't give a damn. I've never had a friend 1/100th as good as Sam and I'm not sure if I even want one but I'm still moved by the friendship between him and Frodo.

I love the story but it doesn't mean anything to me. I learned nothing from reading it, it didn't make me think about anything it was saying and it had zero impact on how I chose to live my life. I read it for purposes of entertainment and that's what I got from it, that's the only reason I consume any kind of media.

I'm sorry, but that's just absurd. There are not that many LGBT people, unless bisexual now includes people who are willing to acknowledge that someone of their gender is attractive, or if the bar for being non-binary is a man who's not against wearing nail polish. I'm Generation Z (admittedly one of oldest) and my school year had 180 people in it and there were, to the best of my knowledge, two gay kids. My school wasn't a hostile environment to that kind of thing, there weren't over a hundred more people who were still in the closet.

There's nothing intrinsic to fanfiction that will attract the LGBT community. It might provide a good outlet to LGBT people who are still coming to terms with their identity and sharing their work among online communities will bring in a bigger audience of LGBT fanfic authors and readers than straight people who learn about the concept by stumbling across a decent fanfic. However, the majority of slash have always been, and will always be, written by straight cis women, just like how the majority of wanky harem power fantasies will always be written by straight cis men.

Every story is telling you something. The Very Hungry Caterpillar is telling you something. It's educating you on the butterfly's lifecycle and warning you about the dangers of binge eating. Millions of children have been gripped by this compelling narrative for decades.

Well, perhaps you could help me by giving the names of these works of world-class literature and tell of what profound truths of the human condition they taught you.

 

Interesting post! I would say this is the part I disagree with. Not to be all like meta here (if that's the right terminology lol). But while on a surface level you don't relate to hobbits and magic rings or even environmentalism, thats a somewhat simplistic viewing of the book imo.

A lot of times, what you are relating to is a lot deeper. Like you said you have a deep emotional connection to LOTR (as do I). Why?

There is something the author did there that connected to something in yourself. Like you went so far as to say a "deep emotional connection." That clearly means something in the story is resonating with you, right?

Like to take me personally (also a huge LOTR fan). Part of my love of the series is it has an emotional resonance to a specific time in my life.

Part of it is i love history and lore in real life, and so I relate to that in the books.

Part of it is just I love epic heroic battles. Something about those sort of figures and actions rings a bell to me, so I connect via that.

Part of it is maybe connecting and relating to a desire to escape my world for a fantasy world.

And so on.

So I agree with you fully in terms of the direct surface level relation, but I do think in a good book there is a deeper level and the very fact that you are describing it as a deep emotional connection makes me think that something the author did formed a connection even if it is not the obvious surface experience of going on a magic quest lol!

I suppose the key is, what the author is trying to tell you is not just the obvious plot. The ENTIRE WORLD is the author telling you. If you emotionally connected to it, then something the author was trying to tell you resonated, even if it wasn't the actual plot say.


Also you've got great taste in books!

 

If you're sincere in your question, perhaps you wont mind if I jump in here to answer this as well.

The Gulag Archipelago trilogy is non fiction, but genuinely immersing and life changing to read. If you can get through those without learning anything about yourself, I'd be amazed.

If your question is only applicable to fiction, The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike by Philip K. Dick is a short read. As far as I know it's his only non scifi book, but just like all his books, it's packed full with characters that confront the reader with the absurdity off everyday human behavior. I'm only recommending this book above his other ones because perhaps the lack of shiny scifi will help you to look at the 'lessons' you usually disregard.

 

LGBT stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans. It's also been expanded to include queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, and agender. While my high school is probably an exception on the numbers (because of living in a very liberal area, being 'woke' and self reporting), most studies say that LGBTQIA rates for Gen Z are between 25% and 50%. The numbers vary as many of the Gen Z generation are still in middle and high school and aren't being polled as often compared to older Gen Z members. Now, a good portion of these numbers are probably made up of bisexual members, but it's probably these same members writing slash fanfic. Fanfiction has always been a safe space for minorities-- it shouldn't be surprising that it has higher rates of LGBT and other minorities compared to the general population too.

My point stands though, Gen Z has increased the amount of slash being posted by a decent amount and will continue to do so as they age up, especially as more and more millennials leave fanfiction.

 

I think beyond just nostalgia for the series and me being emotionally effected by it being habits formed when I was younger and less emotionally stunted, I think a lot of my love for it comes from the comfortableness of the experience of going through the books. There's no real awkward interpersonal drama or cringy romance, I don't feel the need to question the characters actions or details of the world and the story's well crafted enough that all the great moments land with me correctly.

Lord of the Rings has no negatives attached to it for me. I can just happily be an outside observer and go along for the ride. There might be some deeper reasons behind it, but I don't think I have the introspective skill to figure them out.

I just don't agree with your conclusion that more teenagers identifying as LGBT+ means they're writing more slash fics because of it. Testamentary said that he found them weird and fetishistic. I thought it was universally agreed that slash was the woman's answer to lesbian porn, I don't think many of them are being written by gay or bisexual boys as a form of exploration.

I think this new deluge of slash fics is being caused by fanfiction becoming more and more well-known and accepted by the mainstream. I discovered fanfic's less than a decade ago and had no idea they were even a thing beforehand. These days I think most people know about their existence and that's brought a higher number of enthusiastic amateurs who are slash inclined. The non-slash writers might find fanfiction earlier but I think most did find it in the end, so there's less of an influx of them.

 

Meh, this isn't directed at you at all @Silirt , especially since I don't know what you do and do not strictly read, but I remember in past threads on this issue of slash fics, several people echoed the same point that they wouldn't read slash fics with a gay Harry, gay Sirius, gay Lupin, etc, because it was out of character.

Except those people gladly wrote and rec'ced fics with lesbian characters confirmed to be straight in canon. They wrote murderous characters confirmed to be lawful good in canon. They wholeheartedly rec'ced Dark Lord Potter stories. I could go on.

The OOC argument has always baffled me. It's fanfiction. Almost by definition of OOC much of fanfic features OOC characters, locales, plots, etc. So if you'll gleefully read Bellatrix slobbing over Harry's dick, but Lupin snogging Sirius under the moonlight is OOC, then your real issue isn't the presence of OOC elements. It's the presence of gayness as an OOC element.

Canon straight characters being written as gay in slashfics doesn't even begin to register as OOC in my books because of how fluid sexuality is for some people. I thought I was straight till 18. Loved girls, crushed on girls, hardcore envisioned married life with my chemistry class crush lol. It wasn't till 18 that attraction to guys even blipped on the radar. At 29 now I'm pretty happily bi.

If someone doesn't want to be deemed homophobic for abhorring slash fics, just the rejoinder shouldn't be because it's OOC. It should be because it's a trash fic because the writing is terrible, or there is no plot, etc. If a slash element is the only dealbreaker in what would otherwise be a very readable fic, then...

It goes without saying most slashfics are barely readable.

Again, not directed at you @Silirt. Mostly just used your comment as a vehicle.

 

I understand; I'm aware some people will gladly read one kind of homosexuality and not the other and then they use inconsistent arguments to justify their preferences, which they believe to require justification. It's pointless at multiple stages and that's kind of what makes it funny to me. There are people who have clicked on threads on the internet to express their preferences on sexuality in Harry Potter fanfiction and leave argumentative comment threads a mile long with some other idiot addicted to a different kind of smut. You'll notice how I'm not saying this is objectively funny; my sense of humor is kind of ruined by a decade of nearly constant internet use.
A word about OOC- I read the first three books of Prince of Slytherin and while I can't say it's efficient, it's entertaining. The author decided to just do whatever he wanted with the characters, was upfront about it, and what he did worked. Hats off. Similarly, I'm sure there are stories that have compelling narratives and interesting characters despite having godawful grammar. Thing is, it's the exception and not the rule. I'm willing to bet the most likely reason that someone writes with bad grammar is not particularly caring and I'm willing to bet the most likely reason someone writes, I don't know, Snape, to be a real stand-up guy, is thirsty wish fulfillment. Not caring and thirst are not ingredients for good stories, and that is why I close the tab without a second thought. I've noticed, for other people, the simple presence of Harry Potter or a character with that name is perfectly necessary and all other stories are boring and stupid or something. OOC works as a filtration keyword for me, and not having Harry works as a filtration keyword for them.

 

Ah, tbh I don't read female slash either generally speaking. At the end of the day when a fic is slash it's %99 of the time it's slash for the sake of being slash and it's mostly romance / comfort / hurt focus. Which is quite out of my usual habits regardless even when it's straight. Also the way the writing is done is quite jarring as well.

 

I'm straight but would read Slash fics if they didn't come with completely unrealistic male characters. Lots of angst, a focus on emotion over action, etc. are not my interest in fanfiction. Seems like the vast majority of the time, slash is written by female authors and effectively features stereotypically female characters in male characters. I don't want a fic filled with angsty Harry or Naruto. Not my interest.

Not sure I've found more than a half dozen slash fics over years that are good and don't fall into those traps.

So my instinct at this point is to assume "slash fics tend to suck".

 

To a point, but I mostly agree with you here... I don't know that some people ARE a reader of one type or the other (or even hybrid). It's more of an ongoing construction and about how we interact with fiction.

I've always read a lot, ever since I was little, and 3rd person was the first style of reading I learned. It wasn't much different than hearing my parent's telling me bedtime stories. I got more into the SI style as I got older and turned into reading as a form of escapism and as I started being more into fantasy ^_^

As to what sort of POV characters one relates to, I think that's also a matter of learning. It's an exercise of imagination... one that always enjoying reading whatever I could get my hands on and playing various styles of RPGs (from the classic adventure to horror, etc) helped with too.
Someone who never reads a female protagonist and who learned to engage a story better as a SI reader could have a much harder time relating to the MC than someone who's used to reading said stories.

SI Readers definitely explain why some people prefer certain pairings that seem to have a lot more to do with looks than with narrative lol.

I do love reading as a 3rd Person Reader, but for genre fiction and especially in fanfics I still prefer going SI Mode hehe. That said, I do change between them a lot, sometimes in the same story.

Sure, I can totally immerse myself in a romance between Harry and Daphne, I can relate to the successes and obstacles in the relationship, and if there's a sex scene, it's no different than a movie... the particulars don't do anything for me, but I relate to the emotional beat that moves the plot. As soon as things get too graphic or if certain scenes go on for too long, my mind gets pulled back from the story and I'm there as a 3rd person observer. Quality of writing might also pull be away from the immersive experience unless the plot is good enough that I can get past that and the one that will completely jar me away from SI-mode is breaking my suspension of disbelief (breaking character as he was presented in the story - not canon; breaking universe rules presented, etc.).

It's an on and off thing for me.

Like I said, I like going full SI when I'm reading fanfiction. I'm also a gay man and sometimes it's nice to read about a gay man. Sure, most slash is trash, especially due to this "slash style", but tbh loads of fanfics are... for every good Harmony there's ton that makes me want to set both Hermione and Harry on fire and the less said about soul bond fics the better.

I guess my threshold for how much I endure this weird "qualities" is much higher for slash than for other sorts of fics lol. There are much lower expectations involved lol.

As someone who experiences both, we do exist. And no matter how well written, we've all got soft and hard limits on how much we can suspend our disbeliefs and engage with a story.

Those are not set in stone though and are very dependant on how we interact with fiction in general, I think.

It's much how the first time I had beer I thought it was disgusting but now I love it. Reading in general is an acquired taste, and how you engage with fiction and the sorts of stories we read as well. I've always really hated mechas and technomagic. Then I got started with Jumpchain and rolled loads of jumps were those features were everywhere! It's still not my favorite style of story, but I've learned to enjoy some of them.

That's not to say a SI reader has to train themselves to enjoy different stories. I can't relate to Xianxia style protagonists, at all. I'm sure that if my friends gave me the right stories (since they know what I usually read) and if I made an effort, I could... it's an exercise in imagination, much like when I play a barbarian in D&D (I'm always a caster class of some sort - usually a wizard or sorcerer), but there wouldn't be much of a point... Xianxia for me would be an acquired taste, but it's one I don't see much sense in acquiring.

On nature/nurture, I think the answer is somewhere in between. I believe very much that it's mostly a nurture thing, about how we interact with fiction in general as we grow and read more and more.

That said, there's probably some nature involved, a tendency towards one or the other. Plus, you know, most readers don't grow up reading books X and Y because they'll push their minds this or that way (except for mandatory books in school lol). We read what picks our interests and we develop our reading taste based around what we enjoy. Being primarily a 3rd person reader or a SI reader is probably a reflex of that.

Yeah, I definitely go through periods where I couldn't be bothered to actively look through the ocean of fics myself, all of it, not just slash. TBH over the last year I don't think I went browsing for new fics at all and just stuck to recommendations.

I care more about canon-compliant setting than any particular canon-portrayal of a character.

If the rules of the universe are respected (or if it's at least clearly stated that you're gonna throw them out of the window beforehand and the new rules are consistent) I'm fine, change the story itself and any character however you like lol.

I have a hard time going full SI on a femslash fic, for example, usually staying as a 3rd person reader.
Since I like my fanfic reading immersive, that pushes me away from most femslash fics, but I guess for some people who are interested in having this space between themselves and the story, going for stories they won't get sucked in can be comforting.
That's an interesting take that I hadn't really thought about before.

This! Very much this lmao.

Yeah, loads of the classic slash stories feel writen by women for women and some weirdness is to be expected (and possibly laughed at a little, like we - or I - do when men get women really wrong - not that I'm an expert lol).

I do have to admit my threshold for wonky writen slash is probably a little larger than some lol, but sometimes that involves reading through the "pain".

You're probably not alone in that take... quite a few times when I pass through a thread and see fic authors commenting on this or that fic, even when they're recomending the story, it feels as if there's some mix of distance and appreciation for the fics.

So I should keep my mpreg dragon-shifter stories to myself? Jk lol
Yeah, I agree... no sex-shaming people for what rocks their boat.

Yeah, I don't ever go into a story wanting to read straight smut, but I've had to slog through my share of sex scenes and even if it throws me from SI to 3rd person, if it goes on for too long I'll just be waiting for the scene to end, but not skipping ahead in case something plot relevant shows up.

Plus, you know... you might enjoy a story without enjoying a relationship portrayed in it. I could read a story that features Vernon/Petunia from their POV and enjoy the plot without actually feeling love for the couple. Sometimes the whole point of a novel is not enjoying the "relationship" but denouncing it (Lolita comes to mind).

As someone who loves a story that deeply moves/affects/shakes me, what was the book? ^_^

While I can enjoy a good romance, it's also not something that can truly keep me going for long in fics. If the adventure/story is interesting enough though, you could convince me of almost any pair (I mean, you'd have to be ridiculously good for some of them but it could happen).

Yep... I love good writing, but sometimes it's fun to turn off my inner critic and enjoy fantastic wish-fulfillment. Don't usually go for smut, I prefer my porn in video, but to each his own ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

There is a lot of crap in veela fics, especially when that's the center of the story.
It's been a while so I'm not sure I'd enjoy it in a reread, but I remember liking A Cadmean Victory, though I had to slog through a few sex scenes.

I guess if I were that restrictive on sexuality in the POV of characters I read I'd find myself lacking (good) reading fanfics lol.
I'd probably not have read the original books either.

But I partially agree... If the author keeps going too deeply into things that break my ability to follow along, it's like being jarred out of my immersion and thrown into 3rd person. Reading a straight character doesn't usually do that to me, not to such a strong degree and not unless the fic suddenly turn into a surprise graphic smut. It's more about the author breaking character/tone/rules they've already established in the story out of the blue.

Poorly organized thoughts I couldn't agree more with @Testamentary
I mean, weird and fetishistic fics are probably ok if you're interested in reading gay smut. But as actual story material?

That's a problem for me too... not so much the angst. I'm a fan of drama movies, so I have to admit I like the occasional angst fic.

Not exactly the fem!characters either, some gays are pretty fem. Not ALL gays, but having your MC be a fem queer character on its own would be more than fine.

My problem is that slash characters feel mostly like flat, two-dimensional caricatures of what the author imagines gay men to be like.

 

I remember when people used to mock canon Harry for being an untalented whiner. Oh how the time has change!

Joking aside, this is a pretty interesting discussion. I guess I'm more of a default third party reader, but depending on how interesting certain characters are or the genre, I might shift to being a SI reader.

Great observation! To be generic, a self insert is simply an OC with some form of extra knowledge. The knowledge is usually cultural (they were normal 21st century people) and sometimes meta (reading the HP books or watching the movies).

Because of this, I often just treat them as normal characters with extra knowledge. The fact that they're supposed to be "real" never really impact me as much due to my third party reading. Honestly, I find a lot of self insert characters to be similar to time traveling Harry's due to meta knowledge.

On the other hand, SI readers like you probably find that "realness" or meta knowledge immersion breaking.

That said I do know of another reader who once told me that SI stories are a lot easier to "connect" with due to the shared cultural familiarity between them and the OC. It seems like they were a SI reader that didn't have much of a problem projecting their sense of self to a self insert OC character.

So there probably does exist people who enjoy self insert fic that aren't third party readers, though I do think a majority of them are.

 

This isn't complicated.

Slash fanfiction, in 99,999% of cases, comes packaged with a host of other tropes and elements that I can't stand (and they have been elaborated on itt) so excluding slash is a quick way to filter out a lot shit fanfic from a search. This isn't up for debate, it's fact that there is a strong correlation between slash and everything Taure laid out in the OP in the Slash Style section. Most slash is touchy-feely angst. It's not homophobic to dislike that, just as disliking detective novels doesn't mean you hate cops or some such bullshit.

Of course I acknowledge there might be a rare good story that features a slash pairing, but I have no inclination to spend my time looking for it. If someone else finds it and recommends it, I'll check it out.

People who don't understand this either don't mind those slash-associated tropes, or they haven't read enough fanfic to know better.