More Fannish 50 ramble
Sep. 20th, 2023 09:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tellshannon815I will completely understand if anyone chooses to skip this particular discussion, I'll be putting up another one soon I'm sure anyway as I want to get more in for Fannish 50 (which went a bit by the wayside during Evil Virus of Doom back in June and not properly picked up) so feel free to just come back to that one, whatever it may be.
When it comes to incestuous pairings, would you read/write? Does that come under your "wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole"?
An angle I'll open on is, what if you don't know they're related at first and then later find out - would you still ship the pairing once you know, or is that it, done with that ship? While I never shipped them I'll use Lost's Jack and Claire as an example. In season 1, the question of them being related was never raised, so if I'd been writing at that point (I only really got into writing somewhere around mid season 3 after a big binge throughout 2006) in theory I could have considered them an option. Then we get to season 2, where Christian is seen in a flashback demanding to see his daughter in Australia, and at the time, a lot of people did call that being Claire. So by the time it was actually confirmed in season 3, it was the biggest non-reveal ever because everyone had worked it out months earlier. Because the idea was in the back of my mind that they were possibly siblings before it was official, in my head at the time, that pairing was off limits as a romantic ship. Similarly with Jacob and Ilana, they actually didn't end up being father and daughter, but because the theory that they were had been doing the rounds for a while, that had made the pairing off limits to me. As for Jacob and What's his Face Asshole...finding out they were siblings was a part of the reason why I stopped shipping them. Unless you've only met me quite recently, you will be well aware of the fact that aforementioned asshole has been dead to me ever since wiping out my het pairing and one half of my slash pairing. Said episode is now on my DNR (Do Not Rewatch) list, although that may be one for another post.
If you come across it in a fic and there wasn't a warning for it, would you still continue with it or immediately hit the back button? If you've known me a while you'll likely have heard this story, but somewhere around 2007, I was reading a Harry Potter fic - the basic concept was, Harry, Ron and Hermione accidentally sent themselves back to Marauder era, and Harry decided to try and save his parents. I can't remember exactly how but he exposed Pettigrew earlier on, and chose to kill Snape by giving Sirius the idea to suggest the prank of Snape going after Lupin, and then making sure James was out of the way and didn't know anything about it in time to save Snape. So far so good, until the fic went down the Harry/Lily route without warning. Okay...nope.
Where do you actually draw the line at all? I've seen people talk about Riverdale's Betty and Jughead as being too incestuous a pairing, and personally I wouldn't count that at all - yes, they share a half sibling, yes, their parents have dated, but there's no actual blood relationship there. With Lost's Shannon and Boone as another example, again there's no blood relationship but there is the argument there that some might make about the fact that they had been raised as siblings for so many years (their parents having married when they were primary school age, and the show didn't make clear how long their parents had been together before getting married, so it's possible to add a couple more years perhaps on to that time.) If you'd avoid parent/child, would you read sibling/sibling? Or maybe a specific pairing you get that vibe from?
What about taking the context of the specific fandom into account? If you're familiar with Game of Thrones-verse, well, in that fandom if you see an incestuous pairing in canon, must be Tuesday. Or take Supernatural and Wincest - if you think of the early episodes, before characters such as Castiel and Crowley among others had appeared, Sam and Dean were the main consistent characters, then over time more characters appeared. If the likes of Castiel and Crowley had been around in SPN canon from day one, more characters to potentially ship, would Wincest have reached the heights that it did? The one thing where it's potentially coming up for me at some point is English history. Yes, I have been saying for years about a Legends of Tomorrow and Princes in the Tower fic, yes I have started and will finish. At the time, there was a rumour that Richard III intended to marry his niece, Elizabeth of York. It never happened, we'll never know how much truth there was to it and whether it would have ever come to anything had Richard III survived Bosworth (or even whether they'd have got the dispensation from the Pope that would have been required at that time - would that one have been pushing it?) but while trying to think of how the Legends could break the timeline, that is a possible angle.
When it comes to incestuous pairings, would you read/write? Does that come under your "wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole"?
An angle I'll open on is, what if you don't know they're related at first and then later find out - would you still ship the pairing once you know, or is that it, done with that ship? While I never shipped them I'll use Lost's Jack and Claire as an example. In season 1, the question of them being related was never raised, so if I'd been writing at that point (I only really got into writing somewhere around mid season 3 after a big binge throughout 2006) in theory I could have considered them an option. Then we get to season 2, where Christian is seen in a flashback demanding to see his daughter in Australia, and at the time, a lot of people did call that being Claire. So by the time it was actually confirmed in season 3, it was the biggest non-reveal ever because everyone had worked it out months earlier. Because the idea was in the back of my mind that they were possibly siblings before it was official, in my head at the time, that pairing was off limits as a romantic ship. Similarly with Jacob and Ilana, they actually didn't end up being father and daughter, but because the theory that they were had been doing the rounds for a while, that had made the pairing off limits to me. As for Jacob and What's his Face Asshole...finding out they were siblings was a part of the reason why I stopped shipping them. Unless you've only met me quite recently, you will be well aware of the fact that aforementioned asshole has been dead to me ever since wiping out my het pairing and one half of my slash pairing. Said episode is now on my DNR (Do Not Rewatch) list, although that may be one for another post.
If you come across it in a fic and there wasn't a warning for it, would you still continue with it or immediately hit the back button? If you've known me a while you'll likely have heard this story, but somewhere around 2007, I was reading a Harry Potter fic - the basic concept was, Harry, Ron and Hermione accidentally sent themselves back to Marauder era, and Harry decided to try and save his parents. I can't remember exactly how but he exposed Pettigrew earlier on, and chose to kill Snape by giving Sirius the idea to suggest the prank of Snape going after Lupin, and then making sure James was out of the way and didn't know anything about it in time to save Snape. So far so good, until the fic went down the Harry/Lily route without warning. Okay...nope.
Where do you actually draw the line at all? I've seen people talk about Riverdale's Betty and Jughead as being too incestuous a pairing, and personally I wouldn't count that at all - yes, they share a half sibling, yes, their parents have dated, but there's no actual blood relationship there. With Lost's Shannon and Boone as another example, again there's no blood relationship but there is the argument there that some might make about the fact that they had been raised as siblings for so many years (their parents having married when they were primary school age, and the show didn't make clear how long their parents had been together before getting married, so it's possible to add a couple more years perhaps on to that time.) If you'd avoid parent/child, would you read sibling/sibling? Or maybe a specific pairing you get that vibe from?
What about taking the context of the specific fandom into account? If you're familiar with Game of Thrones-verse, well, in that fandom if you see an incestuous pairing in canon, must be Tuesday. Or take Supernatural and Wincest - if you think of the early episodes, before characters such as Castiel and Crowley among others had appeared, Sam and Dean were the main consistent characters, then over time more characters appeared. If the likes of Castiel and Crowley had been around in SPN canon from day one, more characters to potentially ship, would Wincest have reached the heights that it did? The one thing where it's potentially coming up for me at some point is English history. Yes, I have been saying for years about a Legends of Tomorrow and Princes in the Tower fic, yes I have started and will finish. At the time, there was a rumour that Richard III intended to marry his niece, Elizabeth of York. It never happened, we'll never know how much truth there was to it and whether it would have ever come to anything had Richard III survived Bosworth (or even whether they'd have got the dispensation from the Pope that would have been required at that time - would that one have been pushing it?) but while trying to think of how the Legends could break the timeline, that is a possible angle.
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Date: 2023-09-21 04:21 am (UTC)I used to watch an old show called Simon & Simon, about two brothers who were private eyes. If they weren't related, I would have definitely shipped it, but they were, so I didn't. They were both attractive; the chemistry was there... from a purely aesthetic pov I enjoyed those moments - but never reading or writing it.
If the relation is more distant I'm not as averse. I was into a show where the characters were hinted to be cousins, and them I was able to ship somewhat.
Exceptions... I actually did write a relationship that was briefly incestuous - but it was about vampires and was meant to be disturbing and twisted. And the evil one was killed for doing it (the other one didn't know).
I wonder if one's own family makes a difference? Like if one doesn't have siblings, the aversion might not be as strong? (although I don't have any and I'm not into those type of pairings, but I'm thinking it might make a difference for those who are).
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Date: 2023-09-22 09:51 pm (UTC)I don't have siblings but I have stepsiblings, and it's not something I'd really thought about before. (Apart from watching Wednesday and whenever I see the actor playing Xavier, all I can think of is his strong resemblance to one of my stepbrothers).
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Date: 2023-09-21 05:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-09-25 09:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-09-21 09:02 am (UTC)One of the incestuous pairings I've read recently was actually your Jack/Claire Lost example! I was posting a Jack & Claire fic, so I was checking whether a Jack & Claire tag existed; in the process, I spotted the Jack/Claire tag and wandered in out of curiosity. It's a pairing with interesting potential to me because the characters don't know they're related, and they have absolutely no reason to think that they might be related - they're two strangers from different countries who happened to be on the same plane - so I can picture a scenario where they get together and then the revelation absolutely blindsides them. Jack has terrible self-control and strong potential for guilt, both of which are characteristics I enjoy a lot, and I think it's a pairing with good potential to bring out those characteristics.
I definitely consider Boone/Shannon to be incestuous, but that doesn't prevent me from enjoying the pairing; it's so interestingly fucked up!
If I came across incest in a fic without warning, it'd probably put me off, although I almost got used to it in Supernatural fandom back in the day. There are also plenty of non-incestuous pairings that would put me off if I wasn't expecting them, though!
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Date: 2023-09-22 11:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-09-21 02:41 pm (UTC)Incest in lit is ancient ancient stuff.
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Date: 2023-09-25 08:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-09-24 06:34 am (UTC)Of course, both in real life and fiction throughout various cultures, people have been marrying their relatives, including uncles marrying their nieces so it isn't unique to Richard III. I mean, if you look at Jane Austen alone: Darcy was intended to marry his first cousin and in Mansfield Park, the endgame ship were first cousins too.
Blood is not the only factor. A little like the Betty and Jughead argument, I've seen people say Barry and Iris on The Flash are too incest-y because they grew up in the same house and see Joe as a father/father figure but in that case as well as many others like it, I think how they saw each other would make or break it for me.
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Date: 2023-09-25 03:48 pm (UTC)Of all the pros/cons of Barry/Iris I never got the whole "they grew up under the same roof" as a reason for them to be apart. Barry already had a crush on Iris and I don't think - tying in with your point - he ever saw her as his sister.
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Date: 2023-09-26 04:52 pm (UTC)I haven't watched The Flash (though it's on my long to watch list) but that's the vibe I always got too. I never thought they saw each other as siblings - just best friends who grew up in the same house (and as you said, he always had a crush). But I just threw that out there because it is an argument I have seen (though again, I don't agree with it).
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Date: 2023-09-27 07:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-09-27 03:45 pm (UTC)People tend to assign family roles very quickly even when characters aren't related and have never expressed familial feelings toward one other and then try to claim it is like "incest" when others try to ship them. A lot of time, as you said, it is due to shipping wars and getting the other ship "out of the way".
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Date: 2023-09-25 08:53 pm (UTC)I've definitely come across it in Greek mythology as another example (Richard III happened to be the first person who came into my head because I've always been fascinated by the Princes in the Tower story). Then, of course, there was his great-nephew Henry VIII and his Secret Matter, as he tried to dispute his marriage to his late brother's wife (for a long time afterwards, such a marriage would have actually been illegal here and that was only repealed somewhere around 2005).
Mansfield Park is one I've been meaning to read, I was given it among other Jane Austen books once but I was about 7 at the time and a bit young for it.
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Date: 2023-09-26 05:06 pm (UTC)Oh right, Greek mythology is a big one! I feel like you don't even need to go that back to see in life either. My mom has told me stories of villages in India where it was uncle/niece marriages were common and I'm sure it's not only there. Apparently cousin marriage (including first cousin) is still legal in some states in the US.
Mansfield Park was the Austen book I read last because I just never got around to it. I only read Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, and Emma when I was younger and the rest as an adult. Apologies for the spoiler!
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Date: 2023-09-25 03:46 pm (UTC)Same for GOT Jon Snow/Dany (nephew/aunt)
Occasional Thor/Loki but I'm not deep in the MCU fandom and I've read a ton of different ships, it's not like I have an OTP there. That can get messy because it depends if you feel incest between siblings is bad because you feel it's icky, or if you think it's too much power dynamics for the elder sibling, or it's bad because they might have deformed babies. That last one is not an issue with m/m pairing or adoptive siblings.
Also I don't see cousins as incest in the same way, I've got some (eg Riario/Lucretia, Da Vinci's Demons). There'a s Georgette Heyer mystery novel I love (she's more known for her Regency History works) called "Behold Here's Poison" and the obvious not shippable because cousins ship does sail at the end because the current sensibilities from America weren't a Thing then. (I find it interesting that Americans don't know/have forgotten some of the presidents married distant cousins). Also Mansfield Park, my fave adaptation the Billie Piper/Blake Ritson one, where they're cousins who end up married and no-one blinks at it.
I'm not there for parent-child incest, the power dynamics seem all wrong. But I don't feel the same about vampires and the vampire children they 'sire' as some people do. And "The Vampire Lestat" has an odd grey area there when he makes his biological mother a vampire.
I've also heard some people try to insist any angel/angel or angel/demon pairing is incest and I can't even with that.
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Date: 2023-09-25 09:23 pm (UTC)Maybe no one blinks at the Mansfield Park married cousins because that's never actually been illegal here?