A discussion of sorts....

[tabaqui]

Yesterday, reremouse and i posted part one of Drowning Not Waving.


pretties_4u had a comment that we decided would be better off discussed out of the community.

His comment is here, and it concernes graphic depictions of sex that occur in the part one of the story. Please read, and reply if you feel moved to do so.




However unpopular this feedback may be, and expecting the worst in the interpretation of my comments, I have reached the point where I am unavoidably compelled to address these feelings I have regarding this story.

I've been enjoying the HBO series "Deadwood" quite a lot, especially now in the gritty third season. I was over at my dad's house visiting him the other day, and knowing he's a big fan of good western type movies, I inquired as to whether or not he had given "Deadwood" a watch at all. I was a little surprised at his response. He said that he had watched the first season, and while he had enjoyed the story and the characters very much, the extreme over abuse of vulgar language had made the show overall unbearable for him. Now don't get me wrong, dad's not a saint by any measure, I've heard some profanity out of him now and then myself. It surprised me to think that the language was *too strong* for my dad to be able to overlook it and enjoy the series.

It boils down to this, I guess - we all have our limits.

I have been reading over parts of this Reremouse/Tabaqui work, Daddy!Xander, though admittadly not in it's entirety. I try to read a lot of what Tabaqui writes, some is down my alley, some isn't. I read the things I enjoy, but I mostly skim the ones I find myself not enjoying.

I am put off by the graphic, explicit, blow by blow usage of sex in this story. I'm not an old prude, and certainly not in any way a homophobe... I have seen some wonderfully written stuff that alludes to the man sex, love, relationships of all types. I'm fine with it! Usually!

There is a point, though, like my father and the vulgar language in "Deadwood" - the line is crossed and for me the pornographic content becomes overbearing, seemingly gratuitous and much like "masturbation" by the authors, exhibitionists performing their never-to-really-be-lived kinks out on all Joss's children.

This story, especially this chapter, has become just that in my eyes.

I would like to ask the author's of this story to step up and address this issue. To explain to me the need to go to such lengths, to move beyond a good "pay TV adult rating" where we get a little mild sex to season the story (ala QAF, Six Feet Under, etc...) To delve into overly detailed ponographic sessions like this.

Do you the authors feel like your story can't bear the weight, have enough "plot substance" to carry it's weight without so much excruciatingly detailed sex fic? Do you write hardcore porn into your story to appeal to the reader's lust for porn, or is it more along the lines of Mary Sue'ing without literally putting your own selves into the tale? Do you have the need to describe the size of Xander's cock, for example, or the need to tell me the reader that Xander's balls "twitched"? (Incidentally, I always get a good chuckle out of twitching cocks and balls. Women writers always over-twitch our parts.)

It was necessary for some reason to make Xander a porn industry whore in this story. Further though, it seems also necessary to detail the in close and graphic matter that this is tied to. Why? Must it be so graphic and juicy? For what reason is it so, because the point couldn't have been made clear in the reader's mind without including Xander wiping come off of his chest and face? Is it *necessary*, or is it merely self indulgence on the part of the authors?

I believe both of these writers to be GOOD writers, with the ability to write strong and sturdy tales.
I find myself most dissapointed in the extreme use of porn in the telling of this tale. It crosses the line for me, and makes the whole of it unenjoyable.
We all must tell our tales, in one way or the other - I only bothered to spend a half hour of my life to write this response in order to ask WHY. Why the need for such strong and thick detail?

Thank you for considering my query, and thanks in advance for your explanation which I hope will follow.

regards,
-Cat



Read, discuss - reply! I know my flist is intelligent and has strong opinions - let's just keep it civil!
:)



ETA:This is the link to the post on the S'cubie board. Please heed julia_here and what she says about the purpose of the board.
It's down near the very bottom. S'cubie.

Comments

[riani1.livejournal.com]

I must first confess that I didn't read all the chapter, but not from any qualms about explicit sex (I didn't get that far). More, it was the descriptions of Xander's hopeless, appalling life. The sense of being stuck. Strikes a little close to home these days.

Regarding explicit sex: The first time it appears I can cope, especially if it's integral to the plot (as it apparently is here). Repetitions, though--my only qualm is that it *does* get repetitious. There are only so many variants of in-and-out you can do. It loses eroticness and becomes choreography--which anyone can imagine is deadly dull to read but great fun to watch. When I come across such scenes in a fic I otherwise love (ie, anything by Tabaqui), I generally just skim until we get to where the plot kicks back in. If the sex is integral to the plot, though--aliens are making them do it, they have to do it just right or the ritual won't work, someone kicks in the door in the middle of it--I will read it.

I've been trying to think of when modesty/whatever would kick in re: explicitness. Unless it's intentionally degrading or coarse (someone using the crudest words possible), it doesn't ping anything on a taste/morality scale. A description of balls twitching doesn't bother me--and having observed at least one male fairly continuously for nearly 30 years, my experience is that the equipment does twitch with the right encouragement.

Then again, I don't want to tell someone they're being overly delicate or prudish. We all have lines. I have abandoned fics for their delight in hopping over my personal lines. But I didn't ask the author to "step up" to explain him/her/theirself. I simply stated, "Not to my taste for this reason," received a couple of flames from the author's devotees, and received more off-board comments saying, "Oh, I'm so glad someone said that out loud."

On the whole, I find skimming a better reaction than "I expect you to explain why you wrote that this way." It was written the way it wanted/needed to be written.

[wilde-moon.livejournal.com]

Let me first say that I have not read the story. The warning was enough to tell me that it is not what I'm in the mood for right now.

Having said that, let me address the issue in general. There is definitely a point for me when I find the sex in a story detracting from it, rather than adding. When that happens I find myself skimming to the end of scene. Regardless of my like or dislike of detail, there can be intent to the detail other than titillation. Again, not speaking of this story specifically, but it could be the author's intent to show sex for what it is. The intent could be to show the gritty, dirty details, and not just the glossy fantasy. But even if that is the case, that doesn't mean I should like it.

I find myself thinking of my first introduction to Gertrude Stein. We were reading Three Lives and my professor asked me how I was liking it. I said that I wasn't really, as the repetition of words and phrases was driving me nuts. It was just too repetitive for me. She asked me, "Do you think life is less repetitive?" My response to here was, "No. I understand the technique and reasoning behind the repetition. That doesn't make it any less annoying."

So anyway, my point is that yes, sometimes sex scenes become too much. Sometimes times there's a reason, sometimes not. Sometimes I read it anyway, sometimes not. I don't think author's should gloss over everything and just to make some people happy. No matter how graphic or soft you make the sex, there is an audience for that, and you'll never make them all happy. The line of "too much" is different for everyone. Ultimately, the story is the author's and should be told the way he/she wants to tell it. The author is really the only one who needs to be happy with it. Everyone else can make the choice to read it, skim it, or skip it all together.

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

We sort of had this out in my reading of the earlier draft- I felt much like Cat does about the earlier version of the porn scenes in the first chapter, but I think it's essential to the work as a whole to show how he's using sex and drugs to escape the pressures of the rest of his life.

I'm very close to my own limits on this story, though, and as good as I think it is, objectively speaking, it's not going to be on the "reable" side of the line for a number of readers. I don't think that's a matter for the writers to correct, though: the story as it sits is worth having written, and is not exploitative nor gratuitous.

Has Cat seen my rec and the next post from the S'cubie Board?

Julia, who has other thoughts but they're wildly spoilerish and therefore not going here

[tabaqui]

On the whole, I find skimming a better reaction than "I expect you to explain why you wrote that this way." It was written the way it wanted/needed to be written.

Exactly.

This is not 'gratuitous masturbation' - it's a portrait of a life, and yes, some of it is ugly.

[tabaqui]

And i totally get that - i and Rere were amazingly gratified that you beta'd this for us despite your reaction to the content, sex and otherwise.

He doesn't read the S'cubie board, so no. Can i post the link here?

[tabaqui]

I hope your other thoughts get voiced once the 'spoil' part it passed!

[tabaqui]

Ultimately, the story is the author's and should be told the way he/she wants to tell it. The author is really the only one who needs to be happy with it. Everyone else can make the choice to read it, skim it, or skip it all together.

Yes, i totally agree with that. There's a *reason* i skip some fics altogether, but i would never, ever demand that the athor 'explain' why they chose to do something unless it completely didn't do anything for the plot and it was just...confusing.

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

Of course- it's a public site, although I always want to remind authors that the audience for what's written there is potential readers, so the comments are sometimes different than what I write in comments: readers need different information than writers.

Julia, this is especially true of the discussion thread

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Well, I haven't read the fic yet. But I will say that if I'm in the mood for graphic porn, then that's all I want. In a fic wtih plot and a message, I don't mind some sex. I think it can certainly bring a lot to the story at times. But at other times, it's too much. You can say more without the sex. I have read fics where I actually skip over the sex because it feels like 'here we go again, the requisite sex for the chapter'.

When the sex doesn't push the story or develop a character or reveal some sort of motivation, then is it needed? And if the fic is about characters or if it's plot driven, do the sex scenes need to be graphic?

I think it's up to the writer to decide what level of detail is right for a story, but I think many writers (and this is no judgement or opinion of you or rere, just a general statement) make it explicit because they think that's what the readers want. And maybe some readers do want that, but as writers it's important for us to be true to the story. If you think your story needs graphic sex, then you should include it.

I think the inclusion of graphic sex is no more (in)appropriate than the inclusion of graphic violence or character death. If it's what the story needs then it should be there. But when it's there just because you can? Maybe it's time to edit it out.

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

But I thought gratuitous masturbation was a good thing!
(sorry - lowering the tone of the debate, as ever!)

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, as they come along.

[wilde-moon.livejournal.com]

I think the inclusion of graphic sex is no more (in)appropriate than the inclusion of graphic violence or character death. If it's what the story needs then it should be there. But when it's there just because you can? Maybe it's time to edit it out.

I agree with that 100%. I think that sometimes authors do put in graphic sex just because they can, and there really is no reason or need for that. It's a fine line, and should be walked with caution. You really do have to take into account the type of story. Most often, you don't need the same level of detail for a character piece as a PWP. Where the story falls in that spectrum is a call the author needs to make. I think that some authors don't take the time to do that, and it can end up hurting the story.

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Well put. It definitely can end up hurting the story.

[tabaqui]

Get serious, you wanker!
:)

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

Putting my two cents in on pretties_4u's comments and I guess I should start out by saying that I have not read Drowning Not Waving yet.

However, I have read some of tabaqui's fiction and I've always found the sex, be it explicit or otherwise, to be written into the story exactly where it needed to be and in the manner that the story called for.

I haven't seen anything of hers so far that screamed that the fiction was capitalizing on the porn and/or the explicit nature of the relationship, and abandoning the plot-line of story itself. If anything else, the exact opposite is true.

It's true we all have our limits. We have all at one point ceased watching a series, reading a story or listening to music when it became repetitious or squicked us in some manner.

That does not mean that the story has no merit for others, even if we ourselves have found we don't like it.

[tabaqui]

I think the inclusion of graphic sex is no more (in)appropriate than the inclusion of graphic violence or character death. If it's what the story needs then it should be there.

Yes. And i'm confident that what we've written *is* what the story needs. This is about sex - and lets be clear it's not on every page or every other paragraph - that isn't joyful or happy or loving. It's about doing what you feel you *have* to do, and it's a bit ugly and the details just help show that.

[tabaqui]

Thank you so much.
:)

[tabaqui]

Thank you. :)

It's true we all have our limits. We have all at one point ceased watching a series, reading a story or listening to music when it became repetitious or squicked us in some manner.

I've done that myself. Rere and I were both very conscious of how sex was used in this story, and the 'sordid details' are something that adds to the effect and overall tone, rather than something that's just there for giggles or titilation.

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Then I think you can comfortably stand behind your writing. Good luck to you both.

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

*grins* Titilation...that's it-the exact word I was searching for. I haven't felt anything of that in any work of yours I have read.

However, to be fair to pretties_4u and his comments, I feel I should go read the story, since I'm basically blind here.

I'll go do that now. *hugs*

[samifidler.livejournal.com]

Maybe I'm missing the point, but the descriptions of what Xander did to earn a living had very little to do with erotica and everything to do with the picture that developed in my mind of how totally trapped he was in a life where every part of his existence had been stripped of its joy, magic and pleasures. Home, family, the physical pleasures like enjoying a meal, or a partner in sexual pleasure-he has them all, but they are the stuff of nightmares, not gratification. "Drowning Not Waving" is a brilliant title as far as I can see, having only read the first part, because at a casual glance, safe on the shore, someone waving a greeting and someone frantically signaling that they need help can to a casual, disinterested observer look remarkably the same. There are some fics where graphic sexual descriptions are hot and appropriate , some where they are written in such a formulaic manner that they bore me, some where they just seem gratuitous. I don't think the descriptions in this fic fall into any of those catagories- Ithinkk if anything they describe anti-sex. JMHO

Sami

[savoytruffle.livejournal.com]

This describes my feelings on the subject exactly.

I don't think the sex in this chapter is intended to be sexy at all. It's not for the readers' pleasure, it's for their horror. That's the point and that's what makes it necessary, not gratuitous.

And that's why their are darkness warnings on this one.

[tabaqui]

Wow, yes, exactly.
You got it, right on the head.

I don't think the descriptions in this fic fall into any of those catagories- Ithinkk if anything they describe anti-sex.

Exactly! It's *not* good, or joyful, and barely even pleasurable - it's a way to turn his mind off and the humiliations that come with it are all part and parcel of the low he's sunk to.

[tabaqui]

Yes!
:)

[tabaqui]

Yes, thank you. Not that *not* reading disqualifies you, but i think having the chapter under your belt gives you a better idea of what's going on.