On a different note

[bubosquared]

Yet Another Article On Fanfic and Slash

I really wish someone would write an article about fanfic, and especially about slash, that isn't all "Look at the freaks!" I want one article, just one to actually go into motivation and (slash) fanfic culture/"community", something just a bit more in-depth.

Of course, this might be because I want to read such an article -- I want to see what fan culture looks like from the outside, but apparently no one really sees fan culture from the outside. Apparently, the "nerds and wankers" aura is too thick for people to realise there's a bit more behind it -- we are nerds and wankers, of course, but I like to think there's a bit more, as well. (If nothing else, a large group of tiny groups of writers banding together, which, to me, was one of the big revelations of discovering slash.)

I'm not making much sense, I know.

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Part 2, damn word limit

[redfiona99.livejournal.com]

>>Slash stories are not always about love, and include bondage and rape fantasies. But romantic or not, the stories mostly focus on the emotional aspect of sex.

Apart from its sexual appeal, the focus on male/male relationships is also a result of the lack of strong women characters. Curtin says it's hard to construct a heterosexual relationship when most of the interesting lead characters on television are men.

"Female characters may start out interesting but they usually get progressively more cardboardish and stupid," she said. "So if you want to write a romance, it ends up being slash. It's the dynamics of what's available on screen."

The increasing number of female-led shows, such as Xena, Warrior Princess or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has produced an explosion in female/female slash, but done little to dent its focus on men.

Slash writers say they avoid heterosexual relationships because they are inherently unequal. "A man and a woman are never going to start from the same place in terms of power," Rayne said.

But the genre's rapidly increasing popularity is creating lively debates about the definition of slash. Recent trends include Real Person Slash, which focuses on celebrities such as the Backstreet Boys, WWF stars, and NASCAR drivers.

But whatever the changes, slash is unlikely to get any less controversial. And slash writers will probably continue to receive a barrage of hate mail from outraged fans of popular shows.

"What I say about such people is that they don't know Kirk's ass from their own," Curtin said. "They identify too much."<<