fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2094 ]

[ SECRET POST #2094 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2094 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 042 secrets from Secret Submission Post #299.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ], [ 1 - ships it ], [ 1 - posted twice ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Even when I was a baby slasher, I couldn't be assed to care about who tops who, so long as the writing was good and the porn was hot. "Do you think ______ is the seme or the uke?" was always facepalm-inducing (especially given that my beta was a gay dude himself).

But I have to admit, there are certain pairings where I will seek out on orientation preferentially to another, for one reason: it tends to be written way, way more in character. The first one for me was Narusasu (ah, nostalgia). While by Sturgeon's Law, 90% of everything is crap, the vast majority of the crap seemed concentrated in the Sasunaru portion of the fandom. While there were excellent and golden exceptions (which I'd read enthusiastically) if Sasuke topped, he turned into some kind of personality-less uber-rapist, and Naruto a spineless, wibbling wet tissue. Whereas if Naruto topped, Naruto would remain energetic and naive and Sasuke would remain brooding and sardonic. In my newest fandom, too, there's a pairing that I go out of my way to find one orientation of - in canon, both guys are manly as fuck. The vast majority of one way keeps them both manly as fuck, and the other inevitably turns one of them into a weeping wibbler. (Hell, the art of the former will be more like the art in canon and the latter will turn them into anime bishonen, most times - same with Narusasu/Sasunaru. The former would be like Kishimoto's and the latter often bug-eyed shoujo style.)

What about you folks? Are there any pairings you prefer one orientation of, for whatever reason?

Well...fandom generally jokes that Chrono of Chrono Crusade is "topped by everyone" and while that's not necessarily true sexually, he does have a submissive personality in canon, so it's hard to imagine him as a totally dominant person in bed. I don't know if I'd reject a pairing that'd write him another way, though. But when he gets written as like...the dark brooding dominate type in smut fic I tend to kind of laugh since he seems more derpy and awkward than that to me.

...I'd also like to see Fakir (of Princess Tutu) be submissive more often in fanfic, which the fandom tends to be more split on. Sometimes he's written as pretty awkward and otherwise he's written as like...some sort of sex god. that I always find hard to believe unless he's significantly aged up since he's so awkward in canon.

THAT BEING SAID I'm pretty sure I'm nitpicky about this because I like guys being dominated, particularly in het fic, so ahahaha.

Edited (UGH I can spell.) 2012-09-26 23:34 (UTC)

Yeah don't get me wrong: I hate how character-breaking turning someone into a seme-rapist with shoulders of doom is just as much as I despise the OOC wibbling of shoehorning someone into the uke role.

Oh man femdom is the best, and it's oh-so-hard to find.

Yeah, I don't like the shoe-horning into roles, either. I don't mind the seme/uke roles when they actual make sense for the characters as-written but as soon as you start shoehorning characters into roles because of stereotypes I NOPE right out of that fanfic.

And it...really is. It's pretty disappointing.

I pretty much agree with you, and I think that's because--overwhelmingly--the more "feminine" of the two dudes is the popular bottom. However, in most cases neither is particularly feminine, and so there's some required OOC-ness to get that same dynamic, which a lot of people like. Nothing wrong with that, but it tends to...put me off a bit. People who don't seem as concerned with shorter/cheerful/energetic/pretty = bottom don't seem as inclined to muck with characterization to get seme/uke dynamics. There are exceptions to that, but generally.

I feel like this is really obvious in Tiger & Bunny fandom and Star Trek fandom to a lesser extent. The popular pairing orientation (Bunny/Tiger and Spock/Kirk) follow the same problems as Sasunaru, mostly. As a result, I tend to prefer the less popular pairing orientation (Tiger/Bunny, Kirk/Spock, and Narusasu). I'll read everything, but those are my preferences. :)

People who don't seem as concerned with shorter/cheerful/energetic/pretty = bottom don't seem as inclined to muck with characterization to get seme/uke dynamics.

Basically, this. If one character has the stereotypical "bottom" characteristics (e.g. Naruto is shorter, cheerful, etc.) and a writer/artist is having them top anyway, it's an excellent sign that they're more interested in the characters themselves than finding an "uke" and a "seme". There are exceptions, obviously (some excellent Sasunaru writers) but gunning straight for the Narusasu, thusly, is a good way to cut through the chaff.

Interestingly, both in Sasunaru and my new fandom, the stereotypical bottom isn't just feminized - he's often straight up turned into a woman. Whereas with the other dynamic this never happens. (Yeah yeah I know Naruto has this power in canon, but other characters I've seen exactly this phenomenon happen with sure as hell don't.) I don't know what this says, exactly, but it's not something I'm a fan of (submissive = female?).

I don't know what this says, exactly, but it's not something I'm a fan of (submissive = female?)

I think the uke is supposed to be the audience stand-in for female readers, at least to some degree, and...I think that's a reflection of what's considered to be the "norm" for women in bed in Japanese culture (at least from what I've seen in Japanese porn stuff, overall). I'm not 100% sure that's right, but...that's the impression I've gotten anyway.

Yeah, you're right about that, but this isn't necessarily the Japanese audience. Quite a bit of Western fandom follows suit.

It bothers the shit out of me on two levels: one, equating femininity with submissiveness (dommes are hella hot, and hella feminine, what the shit?) and equating submission in a man with the feminization of that man (lots of manly as fuck dudes like to be submissive). Blargh.

Yeah, it drives me crazy, too. It's such a weird line to draw...

And I'm not in LA fandoms much so I didn't realize that was a thing there, too--it's possible that some of the LA stuff is coming out of the same anime fangirl culture that's mimicking the Japanese norms in yaoi, though. Maybe? (That wouldn't explain stuff like the same thing popping up in Spock/Kirk fic, though. If it does. I'm not in the ST fandom so I don't know.)

It does pop up in Star Trek, trust me. It's also common in Harry Potter, Supernatural, X-Men (first class and original trilogy), Starsky and Hutch, the Avengers, Inception, and BBC Sherlock. These are just the ones I'm personally familiar with, but whatever the origin, the "pretty"/short/cheerful character of the two tends to be the popular bottom regardless of medium.

Argh. That's annoying. Now I'm not sure where that stereotype started...

Interesting. I've always preferred the surly, sniping characters on the bottom. I'm not adverse to some switching going on, and typical seme/uke dynamics will make me retreat in a flurry of back-buttoning, but in general I'm more comfortable with the more extroverted character (no matter how slight the difference) topping.

Of course Tiger & Bunny is the exception that blows my general rule out of the water, but that's mostly because I have a hard time seeing Kotetsu being the aggressor in a sexual relationship. (Hell, I think Tomoe probably had to club him and toss him into bed.) It doesn't really matter to me who's penetrating whom in that pairing, it's more that, given his past, I see Bunny as the one needing to feel in control. ~~Plus my utterly shallow opinion that Kotetsu's gloriously long legs are going to waste if they aren't wrapped around somebody.~~

I am not into Starscream / Megatron. I can't picture Megatron bottoming. I have no problem with others who like that and will even give recs, but personally? Can't. I'm sure people will consider me a slave to stereotypes because someone does every time I say it, but I really d see Megatron as a masculine dominant top, regardless of how easily and readily those things vary or come apart for everyone else.

I do think Starscream makes a hilarious, evil, and sassy top though. I tend to prefer him being the sassy smartass bike who tops from the bottom and either manages it or gets slapped down un ways that get everyone off. But either way works if it's not Megatron he's with.

tbh I'm almost the same way. However, I can dig Starscream/Megatron if Megatron is in gunmode yeessss. Otherwise I just can't get into it.

I can appreciate and enjoy anything that is well written. It's just that that isn't how I see the character.

Also, if I read good Bottomtron fic I'm likely to respond positively but abstractly. Like "Hmm, this is interesting and convincing." Whereas good fic with Megatron topping is much more likely to arouse me rather than just cause me to admire the author's persuasiveness.

Edited 2012-09-27 03:07 (UTC)

...

TO THE KINK MEME MOBILE!

wheeeeeeeeeeee

As long as it's written believably and in character, I'm down with pretty much anything, myself. No problem with having a preference, though, especially if you think that it would be more in character.

You know what I'd like to see more of? Couples who can't agree on what their bedroom roles should be, hahah.

I personally really like masculine tops and feminine bottoms. I certainly don't think there's anything wrong with anything else, but that's what gets me off. I'm dominant and butch-y and love femmes of all genders. So sometimes I get the ragging on seme/uke or anything people think resembles it and sometimes I just feel... weary of it all. That I drool over femmes, female or male, doesn't mean I think everybody is supposed to appeal to my turn-ons or something.

I ship a pairing like this. One always tops and one always bottoms but it's because the fandom consensus which I agree with is that the top character is such a dominant top and only a dominant top that being anything else is OOC for him. It's not us doing it either, it's the character; he has IC issues with sex and intimacy along those lines.

That means the other one who luckily is flexible and willing to go with the flow is constantly sub/bottoming by default. I don't think that's bad though as long as the writers keep in mind that somebody being a submissive bottom literally 100% the time in bed doesn't make them a trope-filled yaoi uke in daily life, and has it show through in scenes that aren't about sex.

Every fic with the dom/sub top/bottom aspects swapped around are all kinds of OOC because of who the characters are. There might be one or two somewhere that have it work and have the top character stay IC throughout but it's hard to imagine.

Well my whole issue is how character-breaking shoehorning characters into roles tends to be, so if there's a character with canonically stated preferences/issues, I'd imagine it would be just as character breaking to have him/her not perform their preferred role.

I don't know of many of those myself, but that's because sex and sexuality almost never comes up in the canon of my fandoms. As far as bedroom roles go, everyone's a blank slate. But outside of the bedroom, they're very well-characterized, so once you start breaking that, it just goes right to shit.

I have trouble reading any Glee pairing fic involving Kurt where he isn't topping. He just seems so in control of every aspect of himself that being the more submissive partner wouldn't be nearly as enjoyable to him.

As for all other pairings that I've shipped at one time or another? I'll read whatever is well written.

I <3 when Kurt tops.

I'm still looking for a good Kurt/Karofsky fic but being as picky as I am about Gleefic, finding it has been impossible.

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[ SECRET POST #2094 ]

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