[ SECRET POST #4488 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4488 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 42 secrets from Secret Submission Post #643.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

07. https://i.imgur.com/B5NwOVQ.png

[(Anonymous)]

I think part of it is that femslash writers don't have the association of sexual roles with rigid personality archetypes that slash fandom does (probably partly because they don't necessarily have the same historical background, where that was utterly commonplace in slash fandoms, and femslash fandoms have a distinct history, and partly because more femslash writers are queer women than slash writers are queer men) and partly because contemporary femslash seems to have a strong preference for relatively conflict-free egalitarian undramatic relationships. so between those things the question is not as significant and everyone mostly agrees anyway.

Idk tho, that's just a wild guess, also I can't really claim to know every single femslash fandom out there so grain of salt.

[ninety6tears]

IME, the kind of sex in which top and bottom are obvious roles is too relatively rare in f/f for that to be much of a thing. And when it's sex with a strap-on or something it's just not a long/involved enough fic to make it into a cliche about who always does what. If I intensively only read femslash/was in kinkier femslash-friendly fandoms I might know differently.

[(Anonymous)]

Top/bottom not so much but dom/sub or butch/femme are dynamics that you could easily use in that way. On the other hand, the idea that it's unrealistic and stereotypical to turn those qualities into personality archetypes is something that alreasy exists out there (also fandom doesn't really seem to be that interested in butch/femme stuff (which personally I think is too bad)).

[ninety6tears]

Ah, the lack of butch in fandom is sad in general.

[(Anonymous)]

I think there are a few different reasons for this, but a point to take into account is that femslashers tend to be more uniform in general.

From what I've seen of the fannish trends in both, boyslash-heavy fandoms will have a handful of competing pairings (and by extension a handful of competing ways to ship each pairing), while femslash-heavy fandoms tend to consist of a single pairing shipped pretty much the same way. It's just a generally more cliquey way of shipping, I guess, where people glom onto whatever was done first and it becomes the universally accepted 'canon' for that fandom.

[(Anonymous)]

A lot of this also has to do with source material, though. The number of fandoms that have even one potential femslash ship isn't that high to start with, let alone multiple ones. And then on top of that, femslash shippers seem to have a much stronger preference for canon ships than slash shippers, which narrows things even further.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't know about the canon ship argument -- none of the the major femslash ships I've seen floating around in recent months are canon as far as I'm aware (Pharah/Mercy as depicted in the secret, Supercorp, Catradora, etc) -- but even so, you make a good point about the volume of available material. Femslash is by far the smallest of the three major ship categories, so that in itself might make people more eager to conform when a big ship does show up.

[(Anonymous)]

I guess I'm thinking about things like Wayhaught, ships on CW shows, stuff like that generally? I mean, Supergirl has Supercorp and Supercat, but it also had Danvers as a huge thing for a while. Idk I'm not into cartoon and video game fandoms so maybe there's a difference there. Or maybe I'm just wrong. It's happened before.

[(Anonymous)]

Sanvers not Danvers

Stupid autocorrect messing up shipnames

[(Anonymous)]

this. i don't think it has anything to do with femslash fans ~inherently knowing~ that gender roles are especially useless in queer ships, because they indulge them anyway, they just don't argue about it.

the less girly one is dominant, not exactly a shocking deviation from norm.

[(Anonymous)]

That's true to a certain extent, I guess, but I dont think there's a fandom I've been in where it's more than like... 60-40 in one direction or the other

[(Anonymous)]

That's a good point. So much media out there has more male characters than female characters, so there's more opportunity for multiple m/m pairings whereas there might only be one natural f/f pairing you can pull without really scraping the barrel.

[(Anonymous)]

Lesbian here, who is a rabid m/m slash and yaoi fan, and occasionally ships f/f as well.

I think "roles" needs to be defined clearly here. Dom/sub, sure, but I think we're also talking about the nitty-gritty top or bottom. It's 110% true that many of my slash pairs, I like assuming some kind of power dynamic with who is dominant and who is submissive, and that usually aligns with sexual position and visual aesthetic (taller, stronger guy is top, etc.) Not always, but I like it. It just depends on the pairing, I like switches if it feels right for the pair, but I fully admit I'm drawn to those top/bottom dynamics.

For f/f, I can't imagine top/bottom stuff, whether in terms of physical sex positions or psychologically. Maybe it's because that's my real life, and I *hate* when girls I date try to be my "uke" (literally dumped my last girlfriend for this reason) or otherwise try to dominate me and be my "top". Like, fuck off, we're both adults, stop acting this way. The sex demands - or SHOULD demand - you take turns anyway and it's a strain on my arms to always have to be the one propping you up and initiating everything. I'd rather read about two women on an equal playing field.

Plus with f/f stuff, I really hate cutesy gentle meek girls as bottoms, because it's annoying. On the other hand, I find those traits adorable in boys. With m/m, it doesn't at all bleed into my actual dating life, so I can fantasize freely without getting irritated about how anyone is acting.

[(Anonymous)]

As an m/m lover that actively seeks out power balance and switch, I can only say that this puzzles me too. It's not that I don't find good fic, but power imbalance seems more common than not.

[(Anonymous)]

tbh I feel like the big difference is that m/m ships kind of like inherently involve penetration, and so the penetrator vs penatrateee thing is... a thing. but that isn't the case in (most) f/f.

like, 99% of the time when I'm reading m/m the 'top' or 'dominant' character is usually the one doing the penetrating.

[(Anonymous)]

Agree with you. It has more to do with penetration and just a completely male attitude. It's somewhat irrelevant to the female experience.

PS: Lesbian user a few posts up: Liked your post and how you explained reading preferences have more to do with what you'd prefer in real life. Same. It's one reason why I can't read MF power dynamic books. I'm all "Leave me the hell alone with that mess."

[(Anonymous)]

Penetration isn't necessarily on the menu for MLM.

[(Anonymous)]

But that doesn't necessarily cross to how it's portrayed in fic.

[(Anonymous)]

But that's a stylistic choice, not something inherent to m/m sex.

[(Anonymous)]

Absolutely! I assumed they meant "m/m ships" specifically to mean ships in fandom

[(Anonymous)]

I guarantee some of it stems from the notion that sex not involving a dick isn't "real sex" and therefore there is no top or bottom.

[(Anonymous)]

That seems really, really unlikely to me tbh

[(Anonymous)]

I wouldn't have said it with quite so much confidence, but this was my first thought too. If a Real Dick is involved, it's obviously Very Important who does or doesn't do what with it. If there isn't, then there's nothing of importance to police, so who cares?

[(Anonymous)]

I see more top/bottom (or similiar wording in my native language anyway) lesbian discussion in this one actual lesbian forum I visit sometimes and tbh it's just sad. Especially when I see things like "my partner only likes 'bottoming' but I want to 'bottom' sometimes" and I just think...in lesbian terms, like, does this mean your partner NEVER does anything for you? And you're still together? Likely because it's hard to find new lesbian partners? That's just...so sad.

I'm glad it's not really a thing in femslash world, although sometimes I feel like that's just because femslash is barely alive in most fandoms. ;_;