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When cautioning their children about things to avoid on the internet, most parents don't know that their kids' interest in Star Wars can get them in trouble. Or ER, Lord of the Rings, or Harry Potter (if the latter is the case, please, listen up- your kids don't need to get in any deeper than they are). I'm talking about fanfiction: unauthorized, nonprofit, mostly online, fictional stories using characters from TV shows (mostly), movies (sometimes), and books (rarely). This is not to be confused with authorized published book series, as in the Star Wars "Junior Jedi" series and the like, which are approved to use the trademark and sold by a marketing division. Online fanfiction is written by the fans. It's a creative method of exploring characters and expanding storylines you may or may not see on screen. Writers are considered contributors to the "fandom": a group of people who are fans of a particular show/movie. Those who can't write, read: the readers' reasons for seeking out fanfiction are the same as the writers'. Not all shows inspire a fanfic community: many shows/movies lack the required inspiring quality or qualities. For many reasons, fanfiction can attract some excellent writers -some writers are honing their craft, some find it a relaxing outlet, especially if they make a living writing, because these particular stories can only be for fun (least they infringe on copywrites). Certain shows attract a larger number of good writers than others. The producers and writers of some of these shows have an appreciation for fanfic written about their show -they see it as it is: an outpouring of love, a sign that they, the professionals, have done their job well and given the watchers something to think about (ex. Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Jane Espenson [currently a senior writer and producer on BtVS], was quoted in The Sunday Times as saying, “Fan fiction helps writers to learn how to master the voices of the characters, which is one of the most important things in writing for television. I actively encourage it.”). Other people/groups don't appreciate fanfiction quite as much (ex. Anne Rice, the author; FOX, the corporation). The danger of fanfiction is that it is almost always written by adults, for adults. As fanfic archives grow, the ratio of NC-17 and R "rated" stories skyrockets above the 'PG's. It seems fanfiction has finally done for the porn business what no one else could: given the world hot porn with a plot. And with sympathetic characters, because the characters, rather than being original, have been built in from the outside. Besides being graphic, fanfiction tends to contain a high average of bondage, anal, and other similarly barrier-bending sex as well. Certain characters require some real morality-twisting: for underage sex, cheating on another relationship, etc. (Most of Rogue's relationships in The X-Men movieverse fic are technically statutory rape. Spike and Angel are demons in BtVS/Angel fic. And so on.) Fanfiction is rarely a recognized threat in Christian communities for good reason, because it also tends to fly under the radar in the secular world (as a hobby, it's often looked down on, and it's frequently misrepresented in any articles that are done on it: this is an internet phenomenon you have to be submerged in to comprehend). This is actually a fairly new phenomenon, and it's mostly a female obsession. The homosexual 'shipper (short for relationship) fic is a particular favorite for the female writers. Here's how it goes: they start looking for opportunity, something to trigger their "gaydar", because m/m sex has become more fascinating than any sex which they could actually (and, usually, have actually) been involved in. In other words, "they don't have the parts": it's an irrelevant or acedemic exercise, complete fantasy, thus "safe", and, again, just for fun. Although, like anything, fanfic can be political -especially as the show grows older, the fandom older and more cliqued. The most policitical fandoms tend to be the slash fandoms. "Slash" refers to homosexual (f/f or m/m) relationship fic (it refers to the ' / ' between the characters' names, as in Jim/Blair, which denotes a romantic pairing). Unsurprisingly, most of the writers are also left-wing Democrats, 'sexually liberated', often "wiccan", agnostic, or athiest in religion, and invariably would be pleased to consider themselves "helping to further the acceptance of the homosexual community" (whether their feelings on the subject are militant or not). They find it's fun to write about the subtext they long to see fulfilled and yet as a writer are happily confident never will be seen on screen, thus keeping their plots 'safe' from being ruined (or as they say in the BtVS fandom, "Joss'd") by canon events (canon, as comic-book fans know, is what actually takes place on screen, or in the -er, if not real then 'approved' universe). Easy to see that "naughty sparks" add something to movies/tv. The "interesting" tension made John Woo's Once a Thief a good movie. Lex/Clark on Smallville. Obi-Wan/Qui-Gon on The Phantom Menace (supposedly). People still have fun going "oooh, they totally waaant each other!" with m/m couples because they're still more forbidden in entertainment than any others. We aren't quite saturated in them yet. Completely understandable as far as human nature goes. Here's where it gets tricky: is it over the line of Biblical morality? Questionable, perhaps, but in itself, no, not exactly. I've written about chemistry between people. The fictional characters are not being portrayed (in the cases I have mentioned, and others similar) as gay. The chemistry between them is completely natural and only an interesting facet of their interactions. Directors and writers who play up that kind of chemistry are brilliant, no matter what sex the characters are or what future relationship is planned. Like I said, chemistry makes things more interesting -in a more real way, because it simply can't be faked. The homoerotic subtext is really just a perversion of the natural chemistry. The perversion is in the mind of the viewer, and they are the ones who take the fantasy to their own conclusions. In other words, that's up to them. However, written porn ...is still porn. It can be a decidedly more thorough sex education than any other method, and obviously not one that anyone -but definitely no children- should stumble into unknowingly. Reading fanfic may not be a completely pointless activity, if you feel that nothing learned can be bad, but it does require a loss of innocence. The safest way to say no is to know what you're getting into.
Alicia |