[ SECRET POST #2567 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2567 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Tumblr and/or social justice in and of themselves aren't fandoms, unfortunately.

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 077 secrets from Secret Submission Post #367.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

Small things in fic that drive you insane

[blunderbuss]

Be petty mothefuckers, F!S, and tell us the small things that make the record scratch play for you in a story.

1. Guys giggling. To me giggling is the light tittery laugh that girls make and thus I always imagine the guy making that sort of laugh. 99% of the time it doesn't work. Now, I know that 'giggle' is just a synonym for a laugh but to me it's a TYPE of laugh, like a guffaw or chuckle. So don't make a dude giggle unless he's that sort of guy.

2. Pop-culture references that are not already present in the original work. If you have your characters watch Insidious or love The Rolling Stones it just snaps me right out of the work. Firstly, it's because I will bet serious money that it's the writer who likes those things and is making the character like them, secondly it makes the fanfic dated super quickly, and thirdly it sometimes causes culture clash/confusion. Just because the fic is in english it doesn't mean that everyone will know the reference. Just use 'scary movie' or 'rock music'.

3. Actually, on that note, making cultural references specific to your country/culture/area and making no effort to explain what it actually is. No, I don't know what the 'colour guard' is and why a teenage kid would join it.

4. Homophobia being treated as just an obstacle between two tragic lovers and having homophobic people presented as eeeeeeeeevil moustache-twirling villains. Homophobia is horrific and has ended lives, I know this. That's exactly why I'd like writers to treat it with some measure of seriousness that it deserves rather than cheap melodrama for sexy boys that girls want to watch fuck. (And I swear to god if you use gaybashing or other serious hate attacks as an excuse for one character to 'realise their love~' then I will murder you.)

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[loracarol]

Random Japanese words for which there is an English translation. I mean, I get it, some words don't have the best translation, but for the love of everything, occha means tea. Just use the word "tea". It's okay.

And then, and I know this is a me thing, but buzzwords in narration, especially when it just seems out of place? Like, I was reading a fic yesterday where someone who was supposed to be from 1923 made reference to the fact that she was "used to the male gaze", and while I know that, logically, those words do make sense together outside of the term "the male gaze" as is used in text books, and stuff, it just threw me out of the fic?

Like, the words make sense, but I'm just so used to seeing it not in fic, that having it in the narration/thought of the fic just threw me out of the story.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

The giggling thing bothers me too, but for me it's annoying unless it's a child. I don't even know grown women who giggle. To me it's more of a young or childish type of laughter. Or drunk/high.

Having a character smoke in fic for no apparent reason when they don't smoke in canon. I just don't understand why and I hate it. Even if they give some random plot reason it still annoys me, to be honest.

On that note, random recreational drug use. Particularly if it's not tagged.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[sarillia]

HP-specific one: The Slytherin common room is not guarded by a portrait. I don't know why this annoys me so much but it does.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed so hard on all of these, but especially the fourth one. Homophonia is fucking serious and shouldn't be fucking used in your story to derail characters, particularky female characters, just to show how they're oh so fucking horrible and just to use to push your ship together. It is usually a horrible combination of sexism, totally missing the fucking point, and romanticizing a fucking terrible thing for ship war bullshit. I just can't deal with it.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[silvereriena]

Overuse of "nodding". People seem to nod at everything in fic, and I just keep noticing that word that it's starting to bother me. And lip biting. EVERYBODY IS ALWAYS BITING THEIR LIPS. Also, blushing. Not everybody blushes when they're flustered, dammit.

But I think the thing that has gotten to me the most is the whole "We are fighting/broken up/can never be together because of some silly little misunderstanding that could be cleared up in a snap if we would just COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER DIRECTLY LIKE MATURE PEOPLE" trope. It's rare that I find a fic that does it well.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[dreemyweird]

I'm guilty of the giggling thing :/ Did it once. It bothers me in some other languages, but not in English.

I'm with you on everything else, though. Plus, Ron the Death Eater and the verb "to stroke" and all its synonyms. To caress. To pet. Just, no. I can't take it seriously.

Oh, and "luv", "hun", and "pet". Once I saw a Joanlock story where Sherlock used "luv" and "hun". I'll tell you what, I hate Joanlock as it is, but this rubbed me all the wrong ways so badly that I was ready to spontaneously combust.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[shortysc22]

I'd have to say references to specific things that don't exist in that region. In the US, grocery stores are very regional and it throw me out of a fic when they will say they went to a Publix/Kroger when the story takes place in Pennsylvania. Or liquor laws are also very different state by state. I can only buy alcoholic beverages at a liquor store, no where else. But where I used to live, I could get beer or wine at any gas station/pharmacy/grocery store.

It's the little details.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

"We should lock our friends, A and B, in a room, or trick them into going somewhere together, so they will realize they are in love with each other," said the tall brunette woman.

The blue-eyed man nodded in agreement. "Yes, that is an excellent idea and is totally not manipulate or douchey at all."

"And we must make sure the place they are in has lots of ketchup or mustard or some other condiment to use as lubricant when they inevitably get it on," said the brown-eyed woman, who was a brown-eyed brunette, in case you haven't figured that out after having it brought up every fucking time she is mentioned.

The older man nodded again, because this was a great idea and was not gross at all.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

When "that moment" when a character realizes their friend is romantically in love with them, rather than just having a deep platonic friendship with them, comes because someone who was "just a friend" wouldn't care about them so much/treat them so well. Not because they realize their friend's behavior towards them shows distinctly romantic feelings, oh no. No, it's just because the only reason to care about another person is being romantically in love with them (or more accurately, as the depictions of "love" in most of these fics seem to imply, wanting to get in their pants).

I always assume that any writer who writes a story espousing this view most likely a) has never had a long-lasting friendship and/or b) has never been in a serious romantic relationship.

(This happens just as often in het as in slash, btw, and it's just as irritating, particularly when the guy is doing the worrying.)

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

With regards to 4, I agree completely, though I see it in original fiction too (books, shows, etc). I know someone who is deeply homophobic, but most of the time she's a perfectly nice Church-going Grandma. Until she starts her spiels. Then she isn't. And that's the problem.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[caerbannog]

Shitting on the canon girlfriend so the guys can get together.

Why is it so hard to just...write the canon relationship as never happening or have them part mutably? Why do you have to turn the girl into the petty bad girl stereotype?


>:(

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

Dynamics between characters being sacrificed for the ones in the fics, romantic OR platonic.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[pantswarrior]

Not EVERY instance of this is terrible, but it happens way, way too often: When two characters who are friends confess that they are in love and five minutes later are having sex. The rest of the story can be pretty good, then it's like "I love you!" "I love you too!" "Now we can have sex!" *the end*

Some people are going to behave that way in the real world, sure, especially if their friendship is such that they know they both are totally cool with spontaneous/casual sex. But the vast majority of people are going to go "Whoa, how long has this been going on?" and "I really don't want to mess this up" and "I have to process this for a little while" and "Is this for real or am I just getting carried away?" and so on.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[queerwolf]

I hate the giggling thing, too.

-Somebody mentioned blushing. It annoys when characters who wouldn't normally blush do in fic.

-a character smoking in fic when they don't in canon

-a character using words/language that they just never would. This especially grates when American characters sound British/Aussie. I don't even like it in the narrative.

-pop culture references I don't understand. Not everyone has seen every movie or TV show.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[othellia]

1. People who rush to make their OCs/canon characters smart by describing them as having IQs 200 or greater. Most the time, the resulting characterization does not match up. And regardless, it's a total disregard of show not tell and just strikes me of wanting to quantify everything. Like introducing a big-busted character and then proceeding to list out her cup size because heaven forbid we imagine her as anything except a 34D.

2. Stuff about programming and music. Mostly because one's my job and the one's my life-long semi-pro hobby. Programming actually comes up less in fic than music stuff does, mostly because "programming" is all delegated to "hacking" and completely removed from the actual mundane "...shit. Not another syntax error. Where the fuck are you this time?" line searching it normally is.

But yeah, music. Characters picking up random instruments and learning to play them masterfully in less than a month is my version of the "character picks up a weapon and becomes a master sword/staff fighter in less than a month" cliche. Also, just people tossing in random phrases and figures in an attempt to sound credible, annoys me so much. It's especially egregious in the Phantom of the Opera fandom. I recently read an AU where Christine had no vocal training whatsoever and the narrative describes her at one point as ONLY having a three octave range. It's only when she extends it to five octaves that the narrative deems her decent, but still having room for improvement. That line jolted me out of the fic so much, I couldn't really get back into it.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[morieris]

People who feel the need to post something in the tags on tumblr that's already fucking there. This is especially bad with those tags referring to Mattel Doll Lines.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

People biting through their lip, clenching their fists, doing whatever until blood is drawn because they're so overwhelmed with an emotion. Unless the character in question sharpens their teeth it's going to take quite a lot of force for them to puncture a hole in their lip, let alone one large enough to immediately start dramatically dripping blood.

Worse still, accidentally chewing through your face or slicing your hands apart with your own fingernails is damn near impossible, and yet fics inevitably portray it as something that's happening without the character even noticing, only so the Love Interest can swoop in and clean their wounds. I might buy it if the character was deliberately harming themself for whatever reason, but 'oops my fist is bleeding how did that happen'? No.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[forgottenjester]

I actually like giggling but I'm biased because I know a lot of gigglers in real life, men and women.

As for me, I really dislike characters not knowing they're in love. I know it's probably realistic for some people but in fic it's normally such an over the top realization that I can't take is seriously.

The use of the word "lover(s)". No.

Writers who don't know how to use the enter key.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

The characters are having sexytimes and suddenly one of them starts thinking about all the previous people they'd had sex with or the time she/he was giving a blowjob to a stranger in the bathroom of a seedy bar. Nothing makes me lose interest faster than this. Extra points if the author has tagged the fic as "first time", since I don't think it qualifies if this is the first time she/he is banging this specific person.

"And then she released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding."

The stupid misunderstandings, when people can't, I don't know, JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER. Sam and Dean get a pass. Both are such idiots in canon.

The pop-culture references that don't belong there.

Sudden photomanips in the middle of the fic. Usually badly done and take me right out of the story.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

Anon who's read far too much MCU fic only has one instance where no. 1 works and doesn't throw me out of the story - movies!Tony Stark I can imagine giggling, because seriously, have you heard RDJ's laugh? Pretty sure the man's given a pitchy,honest-to-God giggle or two in his time.

4 I absolutely agree with. While homophobia is awful and should be presented as such, the insidious, acceptable on the surface kind of prejudice is often what gets people killed and regimes started, because people can't point and label villains - overt, 2D homophobes are easier to write but irritating as fuck to read. I'm a history nerd; I love to see social contexts and consequences written well. Having something like that treated as a plot device offends me hugely.

Myself, it pulls me out of a fic when a character "in lurve" suddenly loses all other aspects of their personality - becomes a blithering schoolgirl or ridiculously unprofessional. Yes, I know it happens in real life, but it's painfully ATG and takes away the reason I'm reading about them in the first place.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[nightscale]

Oh jeeze the giggling one gets me too, it's just doesn't fit in most cases.

I'm not really fond of overusing the word 'lover', like a couple of times sure but if it's in every other sentence I find it annoying.

Things that are used as lube that really shouldn't be used as lube, my main peeve for that: spit. Why, just... Whyyyyy?

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

Now, I know that 'giggle' is just a synonym for a laugh but to me it's a TYPE of laugh, like a guffaw or chuckle."

1. It's kind of both. When people don't take into account that different words that fit under a general meaning carry different connotations, that's just bad writing and you have every right to be annoyed. Me, I hate it when people overuse the word "grin" for much the same reasons.

2. Eh, I don't mind as much as long as people don't let it get out of hand. Pop culture references can help flesh out a character beyond what appears in canon. The problem happens when writers don't distinguish between "omg things i love!" and "things this character would love". Again, sloppy writing.

Re: Small things in fic that drive you insane

[(Anonymous)]

Even the most macho of men may devolve into giggling fits when they're drunk or high. But that's probably the only situation I would accept.

I actually like specific pop culture references, as long as they are plausible (i.e. story setting appropriate). I know they only reflect the author's taste, but I don't mind because I see each fic as that particular writer's unique vision of the characters. The quirks and kinks just reinforce that notion. And many series take place in specific (or semi-specific) time periods anyway, so what does it matter if a fic becomes dated? A story that only uses generic references would be... generic; 'scary movie' and 'rock music' sounds like something a kid would write for their homework assignment.