Rather a Story

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.

( Discussion of dub-con and non-con and all sorts of other potentially triggery stuff behind the cut. Please tread carefully, and think about your words before posting. Thanks! )

This is something of a follow-up to a conversation in my post about the hypothetical Gen Big Bang, in which I discovered to my shock and dismay that not everyone agrees on what constitutes gen fic!

Thus I am conducting a poll for SCIENCE!

Please spread the word, I am really curious to hear opinions on the subject.

[Poll #1666301]

Okay.

Some of you may have heard about the latest... *looks for a polite word* disturbance in fandom, which on the surface was a discussion about the creation of a Gen Big Bang, which would focus entirely on gen fics. Not as an alternative to the current Big Bang, but simply as an extra one, if you will.

WAIT! Before you go on to tell me everything that was wrong with the OP's post, you can stop right there. I know what was wrong with it, I agree, and that's NOT what this post is about at all. It's tangentially related, at best.

I saw this last year when the deancasbigbang was created too, and it caught me entirely by surprise.

Why are people viewing the creation of separate, smaller, more specific Big Bangs as an either/or proposition?

No, seriously, I don't understand. It's not like having an extra BB suddenly prevents the other one from existing, or prevents people from participating in it, right? There are lots of people who can't participate in the main BB (the spn_j2_bigbang) for myriad reasons. (Timing is a big one, especially for people in school, since it coincides with exams and papers and such. Having another large-ish challenge later in the year is a great way for those people to write their long fics and get art for them, if they want it.)

For others, there's no reason they can't do both. I got all excited about it last year, and participated in both, and wrote genfic for both (shocking, I know). I didn't feel like the DCBB people were in any way forcing me out of their sandbox if I didn't have a longish Dean & Cas story to tell (I did, as it happened, but if I didn't I simply wouldn't have signed up). In fact, I was pretty excited about the Big Bangs that proliferated last year -though I will admit that, being newish to fandom last year, I wasn't aware that this wasn't standard practice- because there are few things as thrilling for an author as to get art done for their fic.

So I'm confused about the whole argument about segregating the fandom, or that if there's a separate Gen Big Bang no one outside of gen readers will go read the stories. I mean, aren't people going to cross-post on communities? Maybe not everyone, but those interested in sharing will do it, right? If people have a long, plotty fic, slash or otherwise, that doesn't fit in with, say, the Dean/Cas Big Bang, then they can still write it during that time, can't they? And post it anyway? And maybe, if they're less self-conscious about it than I am, they could ask if someone out there would be willing to do art for them. Maybe. I know I get all twisted in knots about that sort of thing, so I'd understand if it's the same for others. :P

There are other arguments against multiple Big Bangs that make more sense to me. Like, because of the huge amount of work that an author puts into their fic, and because they have to respect their posting date, they often end up producing less fic during the Big Bang season. Same with exchanges and challenges. So that feels like a more valid argument to me: that people are leaving aside ideas because they're too stressed about ongoing "big" projects which have looming deadlines.

What I don't get, like I said, is the notion that somehow this is some sort of twisted, underhanded ploy to divide fandom.

So can someone explain this?


:::ETA:::
...

It occurs to me that this might possibly attract attention. So. As usual, the rules of healthy debate apply here. Please avoid flaming, ad hominem attacks, and the like. Feel free to comment anonymously, but I will screen/delete anonymous replies that are deliberately wanky. JSYK.

December 2010 meme : Word count - 510,000 (give or take)

And now the meme:

( 2010 in retrospect )

Everyone has their pet peeves, right? I have many.

The latest one to surface, and it's a recurring problem, but it's been twice in a couple of days now, and I'm officially peeved.

Vampires.

Vampires in pre-series stories.

Remember "Dead Man's Blood?" The boys and John are convinced vampires don't exist/are extinct right up until first season.

Even well-written stories get on my nerves, unless they're explicitly stated to be AU.

It's marring my enjoyment of those fics, which is really too bad. I need to learn to overlook it when they're well-written, I guess. But still. Gnarr.

I was away for the last episode and so there will be no squeeing insta-reaction, save this:

( I do believe in spoilers, I do, I do! )

Okay, this question is for the Big Bang writers on my flist.

A bit of context. I'm currently signed up for the gabriel_bigbang, which has a January deadline. Here's the thing: I have only a vague idea about what I might write, and instead I've been struck by the insane notion that I might want to do art for it instead.

Now, I am not an artist. In fact, I can barely manage stick figures on some days. On good days, however, if I work really really hard, sometimes I produce stuff that I actually like.

That being said, I am worried. I don't want to inflict my art on some poor unsuspecting writer who's expecting, I dunno, talent, as opposed to gobs and gobs of enthusiasm and a lot of sweat and blood and tears.

So, writers, what are your thoughts when you find out the identity of your artist? Have you ever had misgivings upon seeing what they've done in the past and been pleasantly surprised? Have you ever had an artist whose work you just didn't like? How did that work out for you?

I'm looking for opinions, anecdotal evidence, anything at all. I'm just not sure that my plan isn't insane.

Okay, so I have a random thought about hunters' journals which has been rattling around in my head ever since Season 1, especially after "Dead Man's Blood" aired.

John has kept a journal for the past twenty-two years when the show starts. Daniel Elkins has a similar journal (and we are given to understand that he was John's mentor, which would explain the similarities), but much older, dating back to the sixties, if memory serves.

Given the amount of lore out there, and the fact that John himself appears to have not only documented his hunts but also at least occasionally used it as a personal journal, how the heck does it all fit into that teeny-tiny book?

Hell, when I'm doing research for a story, I can easily fill a 100-page notebook with my scribblings, and they're not all that extensive.

I would have thought that a hunter would end up with a string of journals, each filled to the brim with clippings, notes, photographs, and scraps of lore.

Can anyone explain this to me in a satisfactory manner? Please?

Or, y'know, feel free to have a debate in the comments.

Okay, so a few people have suggested that I do something like the lovely and talented roque_clasique has in her master list of fic, which is to provide a few "starter" fics for new people who might feel a tad overwhelmed and not know where to begin.

Alas, I can't for the LIFE of me tell which of my stories (if any) would work for that.

This is where you come in. If you would be so kind as to fill out the poll below (and/or reply in the comments section, as you prefer) and give me suggestions? I will be forever grateful, and I might even be persuaded to write another instalment of the Fusion 'verse (no, I am not above bribery, as you can see). ;)

Halp?

[Poll #1624617]

I shouldn't read LJ during the wee hours of the morning.

I stumbled across a comment about Season 5, to the effect of the poster "missing" SPN, which she (I assume) hasn't watched lately. The end of the comment was "I miss not hating Sam."

...

I don't get it.

It's poor form to start a conversation at 5:00 am in someone else's LJ which has the potential to turn into a not-very-nice debate, so instead I'm going to vent here.


What show are people watching that they can hate either of the brothers? It's obviously not the same show I've been watching all year. Clearly they or I live in some parallel universe where the show is not the same.

Yes, everyone has made spectacularly shitty decisions: Sam, Dean (Castiel and Bobby and Ellen and Jo and... well, all of them at some point or another). But that's what being human is all about.

I hurt for these boys every time they show up. They're so screwed up and they're both trying so, so hard to make things right, and sometimes they try so hard that they go cross-eyed from being too close to the situation and they fuck things up even more. I yell at my TV, cry for them, cringe for them, and very often find myself clutching the nearest cat for comfort.

But never, not ONCE, not even when Sam was choking Dean, or when Dean was telling Sam that he'd never be able to forgive him, did I hate either of the boys.

All that happened was that I got my heart broken. And, as messed up as that is, that's why I love the show and keep coming back.

I don't get it.