Things I have learned, things that make me proud, and clarifying things.: seanan

Things I have learned, things that make me proud, and clarifying things.

Things I have learned in the last week:

If you make a post about the state of rape culture in urban fantasy, be prepared to deal with a lot of comments, reposts, and administrative scramble. This is not a complaint, I just want to write it down so that I'll remember next time. Also, I am still answering email and comments, it's just taking me a little while.

Things that make me proud:

With one exception, every discussion thread I have encountered has been totally civil and cool. Like, seriously, one site has had people going "but rape is essential to modern storytelling," and that is an amazing ratio. Thank you to everyone who has participated in this conversation, anywhere. This has been an incredibly civil, enlightening, interesting discussion, and I am so, so grateful that we all played nicely with each other.

A clarification of my position:

Okay, so. The one thing that I have seen people saying, which is reasonable, is that rape is an unfortunate reality of the world in which we live, and saying it never happens is not just unrealistic, it can feel like we're trying to erase the reality of survivors of sexual abuse. As a survivor of sexual abuse, this is absolutely not a thing that I am intending to do, or interested in doing.

But here's the thing. Had the question been "Will you ever write about a character who has been raped or otherwise abused?", I would probably have answered in the affirmative, just because I write a lot, about everything, and I'm not taking anything off the table. That wasn't the question. The question was "When will a character whose story you are already telling, who has not had this experience, have this experience on the printed page?" (Note that this was not the exact wording of the original question, but my reading of such. It's better punctuated, for one thing.)

I am not willing to write rape. I am especially not willing to write the rape of a first-person character, which describes all my current urban fantasy protagonists. I don't live vicariously through my characters, but there are sentences I am never, never writing as "I, me, mine." That doesn't mean I'm trying to erase the reality of sexual abuse. Just that it will never be a thing which happens during my books, because honestly, that is a thing I am not willing to put myself, my characters, or my readers through. I'm not telling stories that require it. I don't want to.

The other point I'd like to clarify is this: I've had a few people say that sexual violence should always be on the table simply because it's so realistic for male villains to want to use that against female heroes. Well, in my two primary universes, I have feral pixies living in a San Francisco Safeway, and frogs with feathers. If a lack of "I will dominate you with my dick" is all that makes you think I'm being unrealistic, I want some of whatever you're having.

notalwaysweak

October 7 2012, 07:13:20 UTC 4 years ago

New comment

I'm pretty damn proud of people for reacting the way they did, too. I was reading the comments on the post for pages and pages until I couldn't stay awake any more, and I remember thinking at the time, 'Wow, it's so good that nobody's posting dissent.' It's good to hear that was the case in places where the post got linked as well.

seanan_mcguire

October 8 2012, 15:14:28 UTC 4 years ago

Literally ONE SITE didn't play nicely. I was, and am, amazed.

mel_redcap

October 7 2012, 08:07:27 UTC 4 years ago

I have to admit, the thing that keeps coming back into my head when I think about your original post about asshat-questioner dude, is that I would fear he was looking at me and wondering when I was finally going to get raped. Because hey, I've been known to dress to show off an asset or two, and walk home late from class, and while I wouldn't describe myself as 'cocky' I would describe myself as 'frequently oblivious to nuance and threat', which is at least as dangerous if not more... so by his reasoning, I am a walking victim waiting to be happened to. Um. No thanks.

As for male villains and sexual violence, sheesh! It's perfectly valid to have someone who is thoroughly unpleasant and downright evil, but who has standards and limits, and will not rape. Wasn't it Genghis Khan who established an empire where it was said a virgin carrying a sack of gold could ride across it without being molested? That was apparently one of his standards, for his subjects if not his enemies...

October 8 2012, 15:22:14 UTC 4 years ago

That would be my concern, too.

And I don't know the guy.

saoba

October 7 2012, 09:42:23 UTC 4 years ago

Clawing my way out of a prescription induced haze to say wow. And thank you. Because having the ever-present rape threat hanging over damn near anything starring a strong female lead gives me the creeps. And I resent it like whoa when I am reading something and the story takes a sudden left turn into TriggerLand.

I don't buy it for one hot second when people try to pass it off as character motivation/raising the stakes/realism. If it takes fridging the girlfriend to motivate the action hero then frankly the action hero in question is an ass.

I'll give a pass to the "but it's realistic" crowd when they can show me an actual dragon just like in the series they're defending. Otherwise nope, not buying it.

October 8 2012, 15:22:32 UTC 4 years ago

If they can show you an actual dragon, I want it.

kimuro

October 7 2012, 10:46:00 UTC 4 years ago

I have been staying out of this conversation for no real reason except that in my opinion you said everything that needed to be said elegantly and succinctly. Frankly, it didn't even occur to me to comment even though I agreed with you. However ...

... that last paragraph cracked me up. Well crafted. Well done. May I quote you?

October 8 2012, 15:22:41 UTC 4 years ago

Yes, you may. :)

arcaneblades

October 7 2012, 10:55:09 UTC 4 years ago

Your original post inspired me to link it to a RL friend, and led to an interesting in person discussion. That said, much of what we discussed is, at least in spirit, covered in your clarification. I am reminded, once again, what a stellar individual I find you to be when I read your blog. Utterly aside from my appreciation of your published works et all. Plenty of authours whose work I might enjoy have shown themselves to be people I might not want to know in real life. You, on the other hand, are someone I think I would really enjoy knowing on a more personal level, and I hope you take that as the complement it is intended as.

October 8 2012, 15:22:57 UTC 4 years ago

Thank you very much. :)

sparrowpunk

October 7 2012, 12:01:16 UTC 4 years ago

I'm glad you wrote this and the original post- I wouldn't be put off to the point of not buying by rape scenes or backstory (it's too late! I have to find out what happens next!), but it is so nice to know that I won't have to skim one and skip it forever after. Not what I am looking for in my comfort or late night reads :)

October 8 2012, 15:23:14 UTC 4 years ago

Me, neither.

princesselwen

October 7 2012, 12:29:48 UTC 4 years ago Edited: October 7 2012, 12:30:36 UTC

I don't want rape to happen to my characters. I would not be comfortable writing about it, and if I did it badly that would insult people who really have survived that sort of thing. And not every villain automatically has to be a rapist. Thank you. People can want power . . . and not want sex.

October 8 2012, 15:23:23 UTC 4 years ago

Absolutely.

4 years ago

etcet

October 7 2012, 12:36:54 UTC 4 years ago

You have enjoyable and interesting brainmeats, and I, for one, am glad to have subscribed to your newsletter.

October 8 2012, 15:23:30 UTC 4 years ago

Hooray!

Deleted comment

October 8 2012, 15:23:48 UTC 4 years ago

You are very, very welcome.

silvormoon

October 7 2012, 14:13:01 UTC 4 years ago

That is pretty much exactly what I came here to say. Hear, hear!

I enjoy reading about villains with motivations - people who are doing what they do for what they believe is a truly worthwhile purpose, even as it compels them to do terrible things. Reducing all the fictional villains of the world to "This person must do this hideous thing regardless of what their motivations are because they are contractually obligated as a villain to do it" would suck all the joy out of reading.

lilairen

October 7 2012, 16:11:49 UTC 4 years ago

I am not willing to write rape. I am especially not willing to write the rape of a first-person character, which describes all my current urban fantasy protagonists. I don't live vicariously through my characters, but there are sentences I am never, never writing as "I, me, mine."

Okay, from a writing craft perspective here - as someone who has been through a sexual assault - even if I were inclined to write such a thing for one of my characters I do not know how to structure it. All of my memories of the event are discrete moments, images, flashes; I can pin them together into what is probably the correct temporal order from internal logic clues and a very vague sketch of scenario, but not in a way that's actually continuous.

Writing this is pointilism, not narrative. The stylistic choices required to adequately portray the only mindstate I know in the context of an actual assault are not consistent with actually telling a coherent story, because there is no coherent thread of the experience. It's an unintegrable curve. I am not a bad writer (though as of yet none of my fiction is published) but I am simply not skilled enough to slot that kind of thing into a narrative structure in anything resembling a coherent and functional way.

In an unrelated statement, I need to buy your books. This has been placed on my to-do list.

October 8 2012, 15:25:06 UTC 4 years ago

The craft angle would definitely be a problem. Stephen King handled it very well in a recent novella, and it was mostly by not being linear.

mariadkins

October 7 2012, 16:38:52 UTC 4 years ago

:standing ovation:

i'm a huge fan of that last paragraph ;)

pbristow

October 7 2012, 21:51:47 UTC 4 years ago

Me too. There seem to be several of us here. I think we need to start a club.

lilrongal

October 7 2012, 17:18:37 UTC 4 years ago

Not to mention the fact that YOU'RE the one writing the story, so you can write whatever you damn well please.

October 8 2012, 01:17:00 UTC 4 years ago

oh so totally that!!

kassrachel

October 7 2012, 17:36:48 UTC 4 years ago

Thank you for saying all of these things. Thank you for your characters and your universes. Thank you for being awesome.

October 8 2012, 15:25:36 UTC 4 years ago

$Stef: girl\\cat hair$

morningapproach

October 7 2012, 21:43:49 UTC 4 years ago

Ithink that there are enough stories out that that have rape as a central story line, and I don't think that you should get flack for not wanting to write about a horrifying and damaging experience, not to mention something that you yourself have gone through in some form.

(Hugs)

October 8 2012, 15:25:47 UTC 4 years ago

Thank you.

slwk

October 7 2012, 22:14:28 UTC 4 years ago

Thank you for the discussion, thank you for not raping your characters, and thank you for sticking to your guns. Yes, sexual abuse is a harsh reality, but it does not need to be played out in our urban fantasy books. We need a new paradigm where rape is not a matter of course. Wish you and your chainsaw lived nearby (or nearer; I think you're sorta in my neck of the woods) so I could meet you at a booksigning. You're good stuff.

October 8 2012, 15:26:00 UTC 4 years ago

Thank you. :)

ladymurmur

October 8 2012, 01:43:06 UTC 4 years ago

I didn't think your original position needed clarification, but anything that allows for cleverness like your last paragraph is to be encouraged.

Personally, I haven't been able to look at the produce department at my grocery store in quite the same way since reading about the feral pixies. I'm fairly positive I saw the cilantro wiggle out of the corner of my eye the other day... :-)

October 8 2012, 15:26:17 UTC 4 years ago

If you see one, don't meet its eyes. They bite.

naath

October 8 2012, 09:30:53 UTC 4 years ago

I like my fantasy better without rape. Sure, it's not a depiction of the real world I'm really living in; but see also - dragons, magic, pixies...

It's nice to sometimes sit down a read a book that's just *fun*. (It's also nice to sometimes read things that are more challenging).

October 8 2012, 15:26:25 UTC 4 years ago

Agreed.

peachtales

October 8 2012, 15:22:04 UTC 4 years ago

I figured the same thing you clarified here, about how you might possibly write about a character who had run into sexual violence of that sort, was possible. I appreciate your stance on not using it as a cheap plot filler for characters who already have stories.

October 8 2012, 15:29:38 UTC 4 years ago

huggebear

October 9 2012, 00:13:55 UTC 4 years ago

I didn't comment earlier, but I wanted you to know that the original entry really made me think about a lot of things. Rape in fiction is not necessarily dealbreaker for me, but after you published your entry I thought about just *how* often we see it in urban fantasy. One of the reasons I gravitated toward urban fantasy in the first place was because it was such a female-dominated genre, both the authors and the characters. The genre depicts these strong, kick-ass females who get to basically act like superheroes--which is awesome, because I love superheroes and most of them are male. But over and over again, we see that strong, kick-ass female character being raped, often several books into the series.

And yes, I get the argument that rape can, and does, happen in real life, and I get the argument that these worlds are often very dark. But even taking a step back from the "what is 'realistic' in urban fantasy" question, what does it say that we continue to depict these strong, kick-ass females as victims? And what does it say that many of these books are written by women? Do these types of books reflect the cultural attitudes about rape, or perpetuate them? (Maybe both.)

I would never presume to tell another writer what they should or should not include in their fiction. But as a writer myself, I don't want to perpetuate the women-as-walking-victims stereotype.

February 18 2013, 22:25:42 UTC 4 years ago

jorhett

October 9 2012, 01:16:01 UTC 4 years ago

I have feral pixies living in a San Francisco Safeway, and frogs with feathers. If a lack of "I will dominate you with my dick" is all that makes you think I'm being unrealistic, I want some of whatever you're having.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love you?

Perhaps I should say your words, as I wasn't intending a come-on. I absolutely really have to work hard not to quote you unattributed, given how often you throw such joy out there for us.