Fandom definitions: non-con and dub-con

[ratherastory]

Hola, flist!

Okay, I can no longer claim to be new to fandom (damn, has it really been almost a year and a half?), but there are still aspects that I find hard to define/quantify/whatever.

This has popped up lately because of a problematic fic (which I haven't read, I will hasten to point out), in which there is apparently an issue of consent. Without getting into the actual debate about posting warnings (for the record, in fandom my rule of thumb is "better safe than sorry" and "add warnings if your readers inform you that they found the material triggering"), I would like to clarify the whole notion of dub-con and non-con.



"Dub-con" is something I had never heard of before fandom. I used to be a pretty active member of a feminist group back when I was in university (yes, back in the dark ages), and so as far as I was concerned, until I got into fandom, the issue of consent was pretty cut-and-dried. No means no, is the catchphrase I live by. Being pressured into sex means no. Being drugged unconscious before sex means no. Feeling like you have no choice but to have sex means no. No means that any attempt to have sex with you is an attempted rape. A husband who has sex with his wife when she tells him she's not in the mood is, in fact, committing rape. In short, I err on the side of caution when it comes to that.

Okay, so rape is not a term I see often in the warnings for fic. Rape usually gets translated into "non-con." Which, okay, I can understand, because the term itself can be triggery.

So what, exactly, constitutes dub-con? I figure this HAS to be a grey area, so I'm curious to hear opinions on the matter. Readers, what do you consider dub-con? Writers, when do you decide to warn for dub-con?

Also, if you feel like staying anonymous, that's fine, just keep it civilized. :)

Comments

[katwoman76.livejournal.com]

But where do you label informed consent?
con, dub-con or non-con?

I mean if you compare it the matching sex-scene:
Isn't
"stop fighting and let me fuck you or I kill you/your brother"
pretty much the same as
"say yes or I kill you/your brother"
?

[ratherastory.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's certainly non-consensual, inasmuch as they aren't actually willing, they're being coerced. The angels just don't care/are douchebags.

[katwoman76.livejournal.com]

Angels are douchebags = that's a truth if there ever was one.
And it includes our beloved angels who might have their good moments - but often enough are still...douchebags. Yes Cas, that also includes you.

[ratherastory.livejournal.com]

Cas is an asshole a lot of the time. I adore him, but his motivations are not the same as human motivations. He lives by a completely different set of rules.

[hsifeng.livejournal.com]

This. I love Cas, but he's like a heavenly Union rep; he isn't working for the good of individuals, he is working for a ‘greater good’. If a few people get screwed over in the process, so be it.

*sigh*

[katwoman76.livejournal.com]

But why is he so mean to Sammy all the time *sniff*
Calls him his friend one moment and the next an abomination with wrong choices and a grating voice *glares at Cas*

[4thejourney.livejournal.com]

I think he just doesn't know how to be tactful- probably everyone at some point has had a friend who they didn't like everyhing about or who sometimes annoyed them, most people just know how to hide it so as not to be hurtful, but it just doesn't even cross his mind that he shouldn't say somethings- sort of like a little kid (like Dean said when he found out Cas told Sam about robo!Sam ( at least I think that was when he said it):-)