yuletide_coal | It's always coalest before the dawn

You're making it very easy on yourself if you just say "oh, it's one step removed, that's okay then". Either RPF Is sketchy, then fictional canons about actual real people are exactly the same and writing fic about them is sketchy by association. Or fictionalization of real people in books and movies is okay. But then RPF is okay too. You can't have it both ways, be all "well, someone else did it first" and wash your hands in innocence.

DA

I agree with this in the sense that conceptually, they aren't very different. Saying that you can write fic of a person if they're a character in someone else's fiction is indeed like saying "you can only do RPF of them if someone else did RPF first."

On the other hand, I can see it being useful for a rule - if a rule is needed - because it allows you to identify more clearly what's okay and what isn't.

Sure. But any exchange or place that blanket bans RPF unless based on fictionalized canons would be an exchange I'd give a wide berth, and I'm glad that this isn't a thing.

I would actually be okay with RPF not existing. Totally don't get it.

People writing Legolas being raped and brutalized eternally, as so, so many have, hits me a lot differently than people writing Orlando Bloom suffering the same, for big instance.

It's all sketch, IMO. I know that's an unpopular opinion so I just try to avoid RPF spaces.

I know this isn't going to change your stance about it and I'm not trying to, but not every RPF is a kind of "replacement" for characters. In fact, I think most isn't. If I'm into figure skating and shipping two skaters, no amount of writing about Legolas and Aragorn or even about those two skaters in the anime that was so popular a while ago is going to scratch that itch.

I just find the anti-RPF thing incredibly weird because it seems to be such a normal thing. When I grew up, there were columns in teen magazines where people wrote out their fantasies about meeting and falling in love with celebs. No one batted an eye. People write books and movies about fictionalized versions of celebrities (who usually don't get a say in it). Fandom is the only place I know where people make a fuss about it.

AYRT

I don't make a fuss, but I don't get it. When I was a teenager, I fantasized about Duran Duran, spinning stories at length with my cousin about how we'd met them and get to do all sorts of things with them. But we weren't telling or writing stories beyond self-insertion fantasies. We actually never wrote them down, in fact, just talked. Still, it was RPF I guess.

But we never made up stories where Nick Rhodes was hog-tied and strung up on stage with Simon, John, Andy and Roger brutally raping and torturing him. I know all RPF is not this kind of thing, but a chunk of it is. There are rapes, murders, pedophilia, torture, kidnappings about real people the writers claim to love...I can't wrap my head around that. One of my favorite "wtf is wrong with people" moments when was when someone elsewhere requested stories about Jensen Ackles using Misha Collins' infant son as a cock-warmer. I guess that person could write Dean Winchester diddling kids all day long if they wanted, and while I'd think they were a sick twist, at least it's not about a real person.

Philosophically speaking, maybe people can write that stuff because they don't see celebrities as actual real living human beings, which both is a relief (so writing the murder of Orlando BLoom's family means they're not really writing about *him*) and alarming, because of course they're real people.

Like I said, unpopular opinion given the popularity of RPF.

ayrt

I mean, I don't understand that kind of fic either. Personally, I just want fic about the people I ship being happy and in love and building blanket fords to cuddle up in. But I can't say the kind of fic I want is okay and fantasies that are more kinky or violent aren't. Does it make me want to stay away from the people who write violent rape and torture porn? Sure. But at the same time, I don't think it should be banned.

I don't believe most (!) RPF writers "don't see [the people they write about] as human beings". I just think when you write RPF, you have to be conscious that you're writing about a heavily fictionalized version of this person. They're a celebrity and what we "know" about them is part of a public persona. There needs to be a clear line between, say, Jensen Ackles the person and Jensen Ackles the character in your fic. Even if the RPF is perfectly mild and G-rated. What's worrying is when people lose that perception and believe that their made up fictional persona is actually the same as the real person. But that's tinhatting, and while there's certainly an overlap with RPF, it also exists outside of it, so it's not really fair to bundle them together.

(And for the record, I didn't mean you about making a fuss. You seem very laid back about your perfectly valid personal dislike for RPF. But fandom as a whole is historically much less laid back about it than non-fannish circles.)

AYRT

I totally get you, and can't really argue against anything you've said. I know the tinhatters and extreme RPF writers aren't fandom at large.

I can see where people writing it are writing characters more than the actual real people, too. I'm willing to admit that my opinion is no doubt heavily biased by the dark stuff, and that I think LotR fandom broke me years ago.

This entire conversation is awfully civil for coal. When are we going to start calling each other names?

AYRT

I think I spent like two months in LotR fandom after the first or second movie came out, and I have almost no memories of it, so it was probably so awful that I mentally blanked it out. Wasn't there some extreme tinhatting in the 'they're wearing this particular shirt which means they're sending out super secret messages that they're secretly dating' kind of way, or am I mixing that up with something else? Oh, and I do remember some crazy fan walking up to the actors in a restaurant and showing them RPF about them. So, yeah, I kinda understand why this would make you wary against RPF as a whole.

I came into fandom in general via a small-ish, mostly sane and wank-free sports RPF fandom, so RPF was normal for me before I got into FPF, and that definitely influenced my stance on it.

This entire conversation is awfully civil for coal. When are we going to start calling each other names?

I know, it's awful. Quick, let's start some wank so people can have the coal experience they came for! This cult of nice thing just won't do.

I'm curious what the reaction would be to Nazi RPF where the writer or requester was obviously anti-Nazi, and had Hitler being raped repeatedly by the Incredible Hulk or something equally nasty?

There would be outrage about it because it's such an obvious attempt to sneak MCU into Yuletide!!11!!!

You don't need RPF to write Hitler as a character being raped, though, do ya? So many fandoms where a dead guy can be brought back to life, or revised history would work, wouldn't it? You can make fun of and do horrible things to Nazis in so many fandoms. Even RPF, because you can throw fantasy into anything you want, can't ya?

Also, I'm flatmeming, but LOLs to the comment below that people would freak about someone slipping MCU into Yuletide. *high five*

+1

NA

I'm not into rpf and people have tried to explain the appeal to me but it didn't reach me, but explaining how people separate rpf from the actual people/from the tinhatting actually does explain a lot to me. Thanks.

SA

It IS different, but I'll admit it's a subtle difference, and this is coming from someone who thinks all RPF is sketchy. Doesn't mean I'm going to push for it to be banned from Yuletide. Nazi RPF however, yes, of course that should be banned.

I'm still in awe anybody argued against that. What a world.

AYRT

You're not SA though. (I think this was meant to go under your comment above?)

Yes! Sorry.

na

they're just using different anon meme standard usage than the ffa style you're using.

NA

I feel like even with fictionalised versions of either Nazis or serial killers I instinctively believe shipping/slashing them is in very poor taste. At the same time I wouldn't ban it, just side eye while I scrolled fast. I do think the real thing is beyond the pale though.

To comment on Conspiracy specifically:

It's no doubt partly the fact that we know ars_belli of old and thus read into her requests, but I find her prompts for fic about Reinhard Heydrich in particular troubling, because 1) it's so obvious she just fangirls him personally, and 2) he's played completely straight in the film. There's no hidden conflict there, or any of the things she's prompted for. He is 100% an ideological Nazi, committed to every one of his beliefs and plans. I'd find it easier to believe someone wanted genuine exploratory fic if they'd prompted for Doctor Stuckart, for example, who initially lulls the viewer into thinking he's the "good German" by being softly spoken and played by Colin Firth, and then you suddenly realise he's as viciously racist as anyone else, he just believes in doing things by the book, and wants the law to be observed. I'd read Yuletide fic about that, though I wouldn't request or write it.

AYRT

I think it's in poor taste too, but I think there's a fundamental difference between a fictionalized version of a real person and a real person.

I haven't seen Conspiracy, and yes her request is skeevy mostly because we know of her hard-on for Aryan murderers. I am curious about the movie now, and frankly hope her writer matched on something else and can avoid giving her Nazi fap material. All while thinking at least thank goodness she couldn't ask for a story making the real-life Goebbels or Himmler or Mengele some kind of hot freaking hero.

A fictionalized person in a 2-hour film or TV series, unless it's a documentary, is not the same as that real person. If I write Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter fan fiction, I'm not writing about actual Abe Lincoln, but the character in the novel or movie. It's a limited canon.

If I write about John Wayne Gacy in the context of that stupid serial killer dinner on AHS: Hotel (that prompted be stop watching that show), it's in the context of that show about that fictionalized version of him. Writing Ed Kemper and Holden in Mindhunter is the fictionalized character of Ed Kemper in the context of that show. It may be a subtle difference, but it is one.

Fictional canons about real people aren't the same, no. And again, no, NAZI or Serial Killer RPF in a damn holiday fan fiction exchange is not the same as fictionalization of real people in books in movies. That's absurd.

So, if a_b would ask for kinky fic about Ralph Fiennes' character in Schindler's List (random excample because he's the only real existing Nazi in a fictional canon I can think of) that's somehow less creepy than asking for kinky fic about the actual person (i.e. the Nazi, not Fiennes)? Yeah, no. That's not a distinction that works for me at all.

It's creepy as fuck as far as I'm concerned. But it's also a fictionalized character played by Ralph Fiennes, with his face and his voice and his body, and not the actual Nazi.

That being allowed does not equate to "then all Nazi RPF should be okay."

DA

+ 1

Is it a perfect line? Of course not, there's no such thing. But I think it's about the best balance we can have.

It's always coalest before the dawn

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli

Re: ars_belli