“I watched a lot of documentaries on post-traumatic stress and a lot of army documentaries about the training programs and some of the extreme sort of circumstances that some of those guys that are training to be Navy SEALs and some who are a part of it go through. I was trying to understand what it is, what it means for someone to be desensitized, to no longer question hurting something. I did as much research on all that stuff as I could in order to kind of know what that was like. And then my stepdad actually has Alzheimer’s, so there were parts about watching and studying that kind of disease, also, observing people like that that kind of helped me a little bit.”—SEBASTIAN STAN
every time you write fic where its primarily about one pairing but you include and celebrate the characters’ other friends, family and loved ones, where you acknowledge that they have other important connections
small animals everywhere are suddenly more fond of you, the wind feels gentle, and the fresh smell of cut grass and crushed flowers lifts the spirits of someone who is having a bad day
and every time you write fic that demonises, ignores, aggressively mischaracterises and stereotypes the characters’ other important connections for the sake of cheap shitty angst
an angel whispers ‘yeah but nah, mate’.
they are an Australian angel and they are extremely tired of their job. how did this happen to them, why does it keep happening, why don’t people understand that no man is an island, that gross character bashing is dull and boring and 99% time entirely out of character.
then the angel gets a latte and eats a mediocre spanakopita to help them get through the day.
Why is femslash the smallest genre in the world of fanfiction? Why is femslash the most underrepresented relationship type by a sizeable margin? More importantly, why is it that almost all femslash writers are queer women? Male slash pairings are written by straight women, queer women, and even some men (I say “even” because men are rarer than a two dollar bill in the world of fanfiction) and they’re read by a mostly female audience. Femslash has a completely different ideology, because it’s almost exclusively written and consumed by the community it portrays. Unlike a straight girl writing about two boys having sex (and I guarantee that they’re two conventionally attractive white boys whose female love interests have been deemed either worthy of death or asexual by the fandom), femslash is written by those whose identities and personal narratives are reflected in the stories themselves. Maybe the writer of that erotic scene hasn’t had sex with a girl yet, but damn, she has thought about it a lot. That queer author writes two girls falling in love even if they’re straight in the original work because two girls falling in love means something to her and to so many people like her, and it’s important that she sees herself in a piece of media whose canon forgets she exists. One of the great frustrations of LGBTQ media is the fact that so little of our representations end up coming from LGBTQ-identified creators, and thus we see inaccurate portrayals with limited diversity. Femslash exists because we were sick of being told we didn’t exist, so we wrote ourselves into their stories.
excerpt from a very long piece I’ve been working on for autostraddle about femslash and why there’s so little of it (and why we need to make more of it NOW)
I’ve always had a firm belief that one of the reasons femmeslash (and even m/f couplings) lacks the same popularity of slash between men is a subconscious desire for the writers to separate themselves from the story they’re writing/reading. Society teaches women to fear their own sexuality. While creating and consuming this kind of story does go against that principle, there’s still a deep uncomfortableness with the portrayal of women enjoying sex. This phenomena is discussed in This Film is Not Yet Rated, where displays of female sexuality receive a higher rating that displays of male sexuality.
Y’all know there are forums of straight guys writing lesbian stuff out there, right? Also that FANDOMS AND FANFICTION exist outside of the AO3-touched world, right? (CF Eric Flint and the Grantville Gazette).
Speaking only for myself – I write m/m slash because I’m 1. attracted to men sexually. 2. Identify strongly with male characters that see themselves as equals in a relationship and so does the culture around them (note, that last part is the important bit) 3. I’m not a queer woman and I’m not sexually attracted to women. All of these things are okay for me 🙂 I like reading femslash and yes I wish there was more of it because I love strong women being with each other but it’s not something that makes my writerly brain go PING and is a story driver for me. I’ve often wished I could but nope.
I’ve been on a bit of a roll lately around diversity, inclusion and privilege. I go through periods where I can’t cope so please do feel free to blacklist #diversity matters amd/or #bitter old cow of fandom. I’ll do my best to keep them tagged with one or the other or both as it suits the tone of the post.
I heard about that re: Clint, and it is unfortunate. But I doubt Steve’s characterization was off because of that. Because the moments where the characterization is the most OCC are carefully crafted plot points, which I don’t believe could’ve been mitigated by any amount of deleted scenes.
Now don’t get me wrong — I like The Avengers. I like the movie. I think it accomplished an AMAZING feat, it handles so many characters, and it has to go through so many channels and rewrites and approvals that things will fall through the cracks. It’s still a fantastic film even with what I find problematic about it. I can love something and still pick it apart, and demand more from the creators. Demand better.
I ultimately don’t think Whedon understands Steve Rogers, and doesn’t understand his relationship with Tony. He’s made it abundantly clear. And as someone who grew up with 616, that has always bothered me. There are a lot of other things that bother me about him, and a lot of other things that bother me about AOU, but you know. I’m trying to be as optimistic and supportive o AOU as I can — cautiously so. But I make an effort not to pass negative judgement until I’ve seen something, so we’ll see in 2015. 🙂
At the risk of oversimplifing the problem I wonder if Whedon leaned too hard on Ultimates Cap and Iron Man. I also think that if you play the man behind the curtain game that Whedon has his archetypes that he uses for everything and that’s what we see here. (I live in fear of what he’s going to do to Scarlet Witch based on the credits scene in CATWS.)
Okay, here is another thing. Based on CA:TWS – The Winter Soldier largely sucks at the job they gave him. The job that HYDRA threw him at. No, wait hear me out.
It’s not discussed much in the MCU except in very elided terms (yay, movies and narrative) but it’s pretty clear if you fill in the…
So after more thought (and a few fan fic stories that point it out) I’ve come to realize that Pierce is still monumentally wasteful but for slightly different reasons.
He clearly thinks/feels he can throw away the Winter Soldier (Asset) after this mission because once Project Insight goes live he won’t need a high maintenance, low return rate to do the dirty work. Why would he need someone that travels when he can push a button in DC to make it happen?
And here is where I still think that’s probably stupid. We don’t as an audience know how effective Project Insight will be. If there are any possible counter measures that can stop it. Based on the immediate targets we know that they were looking on taking out Tony Stark in the first wave – and he’s our most likely candidate in the MCU to be able to come up with an effective response to it which means they are either being smart or they were nervous or both about his capabilities.
It’s Pierce putting all of his evil empire eggs in one basket. I mean, it does make the Death Star look like good planning – it was very clear in the movies that the giant black space station was meant as a propaganda tool – and the helicarriers aren’t. That thought may fall apart with more reflection but we’ll see.
Anyway, I think Pierce is believing in his own press and that of the people around him way too much, fortunately for Cap and his merry band.
[BURSTS THROUGH THE DOOR] Alright Kids, let me tell you something about this cutie right here and why I really am excited for Agent Carter and the next season of AOS AND WHY HE IS IMPORTANT IN BOTH SERIES.
See that cutie, that cutie is Antoine Triplett who is a well respected Shield Agent. He is also grandson to a Mr. Gabe Jones
One of the Howling Commandos and a man who excelled at languages, knowing German, and French.Wonderful man, well respected you should get to know and love his character.
NOW LET ME TELL YOU SOMETHING NOT MANY PEOPLE NOW ABOUT HIM. After the war, he joined SHIELD and became one of their top agents, he went on many missions, but he still had a social life. See there was this girl a few years after the war that he had romantic relations with.
Agent Peggy Carter. Ya’ll think I’m shitting go check their comic Wikis. They where one of the first interracial couples Marvel did. Now, this is what I really think Marvel needs to do, really really really needs to do. In Agent Carter I want them, not in the first season, maybe in the second, but in the third, I’d like for their friendly relationship that they both have had since the war to slowly develop into a romantic one. I want there to be complex emotions about this, I want there to to be period typical drama in regards to their races and how Peggy is his boss, and I want this cutie in AOS
To talk about how he goes to see is grandma every chance he can when he’s in Brooklyn, listening to her war stories about the howling commandos and how his grandfather and Captain America where amazing. She then complains about how sometimes Grandpa Gabe would come home covered in soot from a mission, her vibrant brown eyes twinkling with laughter. Sometimes he has to remind her where she was at in her story, but he doesn’t mind. Not one bit.
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