[ SECRET POST #6568 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #6568 ⌋

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


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[Sonic the Hedgehog]



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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 30 secrets from Secret Submission Post #939.
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]

04. https://i.imgur.com/TDcRi3Q.png

Transcript by OP

[fscom]

I don't understand the big deal with top/bottom being a big factor in ship dynamics. Full stop.

Example: posts that say, "Erm, THIS is who y'all headcanon as a top?", showing a screenshot of the character crying. Because people who like to penetrate others can't cry a lot, apparently?

I especially don't get the whole 'ship name order' thing. Double-especially when it's a nonsexual work. "It's tagged as X/Y when it's clearly Y/X!" Then I look and it's a comic where they're doing nothing more explicit than play-flirting. Why would who penetrates who matter in this scenario??

"It's because who tops and who bottoms affects the whole dynamic of the relationship, at all times!! Even in nonsexual scenarios, they don't step out of their roles!" Uh-huh. And dogs are boys, cats are girls, and strawberry milk comes from strawberry cows.

Re: Transcript by OP

[(Anonymous)]

It's one of the reasons I struggled so much with shipping in general, be it gay or straight pairings.

For some reason, despite all the advancements of the feminist movement, people still have a hard time perceiving a romantic couple being equal partners, both of them loving, supporting, and helping each other through thick and thin; no, clearly we have to have a Strong Manly Action Male and a Womanly Female Wife. And no matter how the female half of the couple is depicted in canon, even if she has been continually depicted as being every bit as strong and capable as the male character, in shipping fanfics, she gets turned into a hysterical weepie with a spine of wet Kleenex.

And for some reason, when it comes to M/M pairings, too many people can't write them without one half of the pairing playing the part of the Woman and following the model for straight couples, the character drafted to play the Woman in these pairings displays all the worst femmey stereotypes in existence.

So yeah, regardless of who tops or bottoms or even if they just take turns, can we have M/M pairings where both halves are, well, men who love and support each other through good times and bad, rather than a man and his weeping femmey husband.

[(Anonymous)]

As written, you're right it makes no sense. Top/bottom has not much to do with anything you mentioned.

But, most of the people you're talking about are using top/bottom to mean dominant/submissive. If you replace top/bottom (physical positions) with dominant/submissive (social/sexual/relationship dynamic positions) in most of those scenarios then it makes more sense.

But x2, they don't ever actually do that and always insist on using top/bottom instead, and I don't know why, either. Doms may top a lot and subs may bottom a lot, and there's certainly correlation, but the words don't actually mean the same thing ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[philstar22]

This. And personally, I often find it extra fun when the dom is bottoming and the sub is topping. Changes up the dynamic and makes things more fun sometimes.

[(Anonymous)]

Does this come from from the uke/seme stupid trope in yaoi or is it a different thing? Honest question.

[(Anonymous)]

you're right and you should say it.

[(Anonymous)]

I’m right there with you.

And even with the understanding that “top” is assumed to mean dominant/assertive in sex and “bottom” is assumed to mean submissive/passive in sex…

I’ve met so many people whose general personality is very different from how they are in a sexual context — stoic, high-control people who are subby bottoms; highly emotional people who are dommy tops.

And I love to see that kind of variety in fiction too.

[(Anonymous)]

You're right, but a lot of writers base their character dynamics on who "tops". Sometimes it can be interesting but 99% of the time it's someone slapping some tropes on a character and calling it good. Please note I am not saying this is m/m specific at all, so much m/f stuff leans on this and doesn't even realise it's not "the natural order of things".

[(Anonymous)]

I can understand folks having a preference on which character is topping/bottoming, because things like that are just a silly enjoyment that doesn't affect anything bar their own personal interests, but if it gets to the point of someone being argumentative at others for writing what they don't like, or telling the fandom at large that no one should be writing what they don't like, then they're being assholes and need to fuck off.

For the last point in your secret OP this is from people conflating top/bottom with dom/sub and it's infuriating because those aren't the same thing at all(and often tells me they've never met a gay man irl in their life).

[(Anonymous)]

The first point, too. "This is who y'all picture as dominant? [pic of character crying]" would make a lot more sense; it's still not right because obviously dominant people can be emotional, but it's pointedly depicting a moment of vulnerability, trying to show a lack of control or self-control.

What body part or sex toy/aid goes where has just zero to do with that.

[(Anonymous)]

I think this is a manifestation of the Standard Slash PersonalityTM.

[(Anonymous)]

I tend to have hard-set preferences, pretty boring ones too (SubBottom/DomTop), but I agree that people trying to make it about personalities like there's a hard-set rule are kind of weird.

[(Anonymous)]

I have nothing of value to add except that I love that you chose that pic of Usagi, OP, 'cause it fits your secret so perfectly.

[(Anonymous)]

Eh. There's such a thing as taking it too far, but the basic point people are making when they want the dominant character indicated upfront seems entirely reasonable to me. And a lot of the arguments for why they see dominance as more in-character for one or the other do, too. There's canons where I don't agree with the prevailing view, but the fact that it matters to people, I get. And I like D/s, so the fact that it's unapologetically front and center makes fanfic feel that much more emotionally satisfying to me. It's definitely something where I get what I'm wishing for more consistently from other strangers than from published books.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, there are plenty of ships where I can only see the dom/sub dynamic going one way between the characters just based on how they interact in canon. And I don't always agree with the prevailing fandom view either! There's one ship I love where most people write it as being A/B but I can't see it as being anything other than B/A because to me, A is a power bottom who loves calling the shots from the bottom and B is a whipped top who does whatever A wants. A/B just doesn't vibe with the way I personally see the ship and so if I see that tag in that order I know to skip that fic since it won't be something I'll enjoy.

[(Anonymous)]

OP, let's just come out and say it: it's because most of these people have never had a romantic or sexual relationship. They have no idea how either actually works, or how people actually behave in those contexts.

[(Anonymous)]

That's elitist and dismissive bullshit.

If power dynamics are completely not relevant to the relationships you've had, and you like it that way, great. But it's obnoxious to make sweeping assertions about what everyone else needs to be doing, and accusing them of ignorance, based on just what you like best.

[(Anonymous)]

The order of the slashes is meaningless. It's supposed to be alphabetical, actually, although people also took to adjusting the order of new pairings according to what sounded better. But on AO3 it's alpha by last name.

But the original slash pairing, Kirk/Spock, was never written Spock/Kirk, even though in most of those early stories, Spock was (primally) dominant because of pon farr, and Kirk his willing, helpless plaything. :D

[(Anonymous)]

But the original slash pairing, Kirk/Spock, was never written Spock/Kirk, even though in most of those early stories, Spock was (primally) dominant because of pon farr, and Kirk his willing, helpless plaything.

Back in the day, TOS slash fandom ordered the characters by military rank, e.g. Kirk/Spock, Kirk/McCoy, Spock/McCoy, and Sulu/Chekov.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not complicated.

I want to read about my fav getting railed by my 2nd fav.

I'll never understand people who insist there is a "correct" way to ship. Some people might want their fav to do the railing. Some people might even (gasp!) have a different fav.

I appreciate it when top!x or bottom!y is tagged too. I know what I'm after and I'd love to find it.

[(Anonymous)]

My head canon is that this is about people drawing lines in the sand about who Tops when it comes to Jim and Dwight in The Office.

Secret OP knows that Jim and Dwight can switch depending on how the setup is starting, but there are some Jim/Dwight shippers who just will not stand for one or the other guy to be a Top.

[epicurean]

Sometimes I like to put my peanut butter on top of my jelly, other times I'm in the mood to have the jelly go on top of my peanut butter.

While I disagree with the discourse of being hellbent on who tops and bottoms, it's nice to have it tagged to know what kind of dynamic I'm getting into. Also take into account that there are fixed shippers in fandoms who don't want to see switch or XY when they explicitly say they like YX.

Something something fandom etiquette *shakes cane*

[(Anonymous)]

As an old who started in various Japanese fandoms and now tends to live on the fringes of Western fandoms, and as a fairly ace cis lady who writes more fic now than when I did when I was in school, here's what I can offer.

The others who mentioned top/bottom does not equal dom/sub are right. It might help, though, if you looked at those sexual-sounding things as general relationship-related things. I'd probably go with descriptions like, "Character A is assertive and wants to pursue a relationship with B, and while Character B is hesitant, perhaps even shy or awkward, B is interested in A."

The ship order of names has been important in a lot of Japanese fandoms for decades, and it stems from Japanese fans themselves. At fan cons (where fans make and sell fan comics, light novels, collab anthologies, and a variety of fun handmade goods), it became an easy shorthand to find what you were looking for. A lot of it means Top Character/Bottom Character (and often Dom/Sub thanks to ye olde Seme/Uke tropes) because a lot of it is explicitly sexy PWP. There are anthologies that, for ex, are all comics/stories about Character X being the uke (who's usually a sub bottom, but hey, it might have them topping from the bottom, who knows). Not all of it, though! Plenty of gen and gag and things with actual plot, too.

Note my "ye olde seme/uke tropes" mention. So much of those ideas continue to persist in many Asian fandoms... I tend to pause at teenagers on the internet getting really pedantic about who's who in a ship and must resist the urge to throw fuel on the fire by mentioning how they missed the whole "tatsu/neko" ("dragon/cat") era entirely, lol. (I'm terrible.) (Gay Japanese men are perfectly okay with those kids not knowing that lingo, I'm sure, although it did make its way into some BL manga.)

Thanks to AO3's tagging system, more people go with the alphabetical name order (based on family name, if they have one!) nowadays out of simplicity. In recent years, some fandoms have adopted adding additional character tags that let you know top/bottom or dom/sub (or switch! my beloved). Most, from what I've seen, don't use ship names in the relationship tag category of tags but might use it in the freeform tags.

Idk, to me, it's more important if people tag their fics/art/etc with appropriate warnings and kinks than for them to get bogged down thinking about relationship roles, which can range from exaggerated caricatures to fairly realistic. I mean, let us know if you're doing something OOC, but don't be afraid to play around with the archetypes, either.

Sorry, I lost my hold on this comment due to pets demanding attention, lol. Does it help at all? XD; Btw, I also appreciate your Usagi pic choice. :D

[(Anonymous)]

+100

Also an old who hung around a lot of animanga fandoms, and yes, this. It's annoying--I remember more than one convo with fandom friends where we expressed irritation with the seme/uke dynamic being mapped onto every queer pairing--but yeah, this is the context/comment I was looking for.

I do have my own preferences, but I'm really over caring about who does what to whom most often and how many fans find X or Y hot.