Excuse me while I rant

[asimplechord]

From an Out interview re: slash fanfiction.

In Nasa/Trek: Popular Science and Sex in America, academic Constance Penley asks the obvious question: Why are women fans so alienated from their own bodies that they can write erotic fantasies only in relation to a non-female body? She surmises that perhaps men’s bodies are simply easier to fantasize with because they aren’t the legal, moral, religious battleground that women’s bodies are.

While I know organic sexual preferences are neither elective nor politically motivated, I couldn’t help but feel, as a heterosexual female, that there was something self-assassinating and a little bit politically disturbing about the M/M fiction I read.


I haven't read Penley's work before, and am not clear why this should be the direction the journalist takes this article.

But I have to ask... does anyone ask a straight man why he's so alienated from his body if he gets off on f/f porn? REALLY?


Once again, main-stream media makes fandom look stupid.

>>>>>:/

This entry was originally posted at http://favoritemistake.dreamwidth.org/6410.html.

Comments

[wordsalone.livejournal.com]

...maybe you'll like the articles by After Elton a little better?

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Is this the series you interviewed with/contributed to? B/c I read the first part of that, and thought it was a much less "omg, why do women have these weird hobbies/fantasies", more even handed.

I think that I was pre-disposed to be annoyed by this article from the moment I read the subtitle: Meet Alex and Erastes, two women who write erotic man-on-man fiction for other women. Confused yet?

Why should anyone be confused, given the broad spectrum of hijinx people get up to in person, let alone what they'd read on a page or watch in porn?

Kudos to Alex and Erastes, and at least the author tries to understand the import of slash to their sexualities.

[wordsalone.livejournal.com]

Yeah. There was a second part that I had the link for, but I can't remember where I put it.

*nods* Totally understandable. I think you have to come at it with some respect for fandom/fandom culture. At this point, I think it's more likely that people are involved somehow (maybe not in slash fandoms, but fandoms in general) than not.

[a-carnal-mink.livejournal.com]

I am becoming... increasingly easily infuriated by this attitude that if something is enjoyed by men there is no need to question it (they're the default, donchya know?), but if women enjoy it, it must be pulled apart and analysed - a REASON must be found! ('cos obviously something's gone wrong somewhere)


Also, I love your Misha icon. :D

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Given the venue (Out magazine, ffs) I was expecting something with a slightly less narrow view. The After Elton piece (http://www.afterelton.com/print/2010/08/slash-fandoms-part-one?page=2%2C0) that wordsalone references has a more balanced perspective, I think.


I am very excited about the tomorrow's episode of SPN. For obvs reasons. :D

[enchanted-jae.livejournal.com]

Mainstream media just don't get it. Frankly, we shouldn't have to explain why it works for us; they can just sit there and wonder about it.

This brings to mind last year's Survey!Fail debacle, in which the "researchers" could only compare straight women's fascination with m/m erotica to a straight male being attracted to a transgendered person. It never frickin' occurred to them to compare it to the fascination straight men hold for f/f erotica. I wanted to knock their heads together and yell, "Big red truck!"

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

It's just so ridiculous that this sort of double standard still exists. Ridiculous and demoralizing.