(no subject)
Oct. 14th, 2003 11:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rusty_haloI got woken a half hour early today because of jackhammers. Jackhammers! Right outside my building. I was thinking (as I held the pillow uselessly over my ears) that if I went outside and killed the construction workers, I could probably get off on temporary insanity. On account of being driven insane by jackhammers at eight in the morning.
That was a crappy way to wake up.
London Hellmouth got recommended on BBF. Yay! If you had trouble getting to it yesterday, it should be working fine now, so check it out. Wonderful story.
Also, Carolyn Claire's Thirst completely kicks ass as well. Spike/Xander, post-Gift, very creepy and sexy. She does a really wonderful job of creating a place and an atmosphere and a mood ... you really have to read it to get what I mean.
I have so much wonderful stuff to archive right now; did I mention how glad I am that Spike's on Angel? But I'm spacing it out, because if I archive everything at once, some stories will slip through unnoticed. So ... going slow. (If you're waiting for me to archive something, that's why it might take a little while.) I wonder if I archived too many long stories at once in the last few days ... is it too much to read? (For those who usually read a lot of what I archive.) Just curious if anyone has an opinion. I worry about these things.
Also,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
deborahmm has some interesting thoughts here on the kink thing, inspired by posts by eliade and thebratqueen. I don't entirely agree with deborahmm's view of Spike (though I do agree with a lot of what she said). Her post is interesting because I've been thinking about a lot of the same things lately, too. eliade and thebratqueen have both been posting very wonderful stories recently that don't turn me on at all, because they both hit what is, basically, my anti-kink. (Has nothing to do with the quality of their writing or anything like that, so no offense intended.) But basically, my anti-kink (something I can't enjoy no matter how well it's written) is a character having little sense of self that they want to let someone else have complete control over them. Like the idea of Spike (or Wesley) as whoever's "pet" just creeps me out completely, regardless of whether the "pet owner" is affectionate or cruel.
What's interesting to me is that there's such a fine line between kink and anti-kink for me. Because I totally think Spike is love's bitch, he needs his lover to to be the powerful one in the relationship (which was very true of Dru and Buffy; without that, he'll have no respect for them, as with Harmony). But Spike's also got a very strong sense of self (a lot of insecurity, but still a strong sense of self). When he wants something, he's not going to roll over and give it up. He'll always struggle, and he'll never let himself be totally dominated. He'll be in the submissive role because he likes it and needs it, but it's never total. (Like, even when he's totally in love with Dru and does her bidding most of the time, when he feels that she's lingering too much over Angel, he'll go behind her back and make a deal with the Slayer.)
So, I guess one way to explain the difference is, say there's a Spike/Angel story where the point is that Spike breaks and totally gives in to Angel. That's squicky. But say there's a story where Angel is still the powerful one, but Spike struggles and never stops snarking and demanding. He never totally gives in or accepts the situation. That's good. Or, something similar: Intervention totally hits a kink in a similar way. It's not romantic, but I just love how, even when he's being horribly tortured, Spike's making fun of Glory's hair and her big ass and completely refusing to give in at all. Whereas if he gave up and broke, it would just be sad and depressing.
Anyway, just some vague ideas. I wouldn't usually talk about kinks or any of that, because I'm horribly repressed. (Yes, I read gay vampire porn regularly and still manage to be horribly repressed. Not quite sure how that works.) But it's an interesting topic anddeborahmm has a view similar to mine, so I figured I'd attempt to articulate my thoughts. Though my views may change later as this is probably the first time I've made any attempt to articulate them at all.
That was a crappy way to wake up.
London Hellmouth got recommended on BBF. Yay! If you had trouble getting to it yesterday, it should be working fine now, so check it out. Wonderful story.
Also, Carolyn Claire's Thirst completely kicks ass as well. Spike/Xander, post-Gift, very creepy and sexy. She does a really wonderful job of creating a place and an atmosphere and a mood ... you really have to read it to get what I mean.
I have so much wonderful stuff to archive right now; did I mention how glad I am that Spike's on Angel? But I'm spacing it out, because if I archive everything at once, some stories will slip through unnoticed. So ... going slow. (If you're waiting for me to archive something, that's why it might take a little while.) I wonder if I archived too many long stories at once in the last few days ... is it too much to read? (For those who usually read a lot of what I archive.) Just curious if anyone has an opinion. I worry about these things.
Also,
deborahmm has some interesting thoughts here on the kink thing, inspired by posts by eliade and thebratqueen. I don't entirely agree with deborahmm's view of Spike (though I do agree with a lot of what she said). Her post is interesting because I've been thinking about a lot of the same things lately, too. eliade and thebratqueen have both been posting very wonderful stories recently that don't turn me on at all, because they both hit what is, basically, my anti-kink. (Has nothing to do with the quality of their writing or anything like that, so no offense intended.) But basically, my anti-kink (something I can't enjoy no matter how well it's written) is a character having little sense of self that they want to let someone else have complete control over them. Like the idea of Spike (or Wesley) as whoever's "pet" just creeps me out completely, regardless of whether the "pet owner" is affectionate or cruel.What's interesting to me is that there's such a fine line between kink and anti-kink for me. Because I totally think Spike is love's bitch, he needs his lover to to be the powerful one in the relationship (which was very true of Dru and Buffy; without that, he'll have no respect for them, as with Harmony). But Spike's also got a very strong sense of self (a lot of insecurity, but still a strong sense of self). When he wants something, he's not going to roll over and give it up. He'll always struggle, and he'll never let himself be totally dominated. He'll be in the submissive role because he likes it and needs it, but it's never total. (Like, even when he's totally in love with Dru and does her bidding most of the time, when he feels that she's lingering too much over Angel, he'll go behind her back and make a deal with the Slayer.)
So, I guess one way to explain the difference is, say there's a Spike/Angel story where the point is that Spike breaks and totally gives in to Angel. That's squicky. But say there's a story where Angel is still the powerful one, but Spike struggles and never stops snarking and demanding. He never totally gives in or accepts the situation. That's good. Or, something similar: Intervention totally hits a kink in a similar way. It's not romantic, but I just love how, even when he's being horribly tortured, Spike's making fun of Glory's hair and her big ass and completely refusing to give in at all. Whereas if he gave up and broke, it would just be sad and depressing.
Anyway, just some vague ideas. I wouldn't usually talk about kinks or any of that, because I'm horribly repressed. (Yes, I read gay vampire porn regularly and still manage to be horribly repressed. Not quite sure how that works.) But it's an interesting topic and
deborahmm has a view similar to mine, so I figured I'd attempt to articulate my thoughts. Though my views may change later as this is probably the first time I've made any attempt to articulate them at all.
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(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 04:12 pm (UTC)You know, I can even read a slave Spike fic occasionally, if it's very beautifully written and insightful about the characters. But where I can tell I'm supposed to feel turned on or whatever, I just feel sad and want to give poor Spike a big hug.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 05:14 pm (UTC)Dunno. I have this whole scenario in my head that I wouldn't mind seeing on Angel - where Spike gets resurrected as human, and has to be afraid of Drusilla. What a rich mine of emotional storytelling that could be. I could get behind that arc (but only if they verged from the Darla arc and didn't re-vamp him).
That said, I've had this thing about vampires since I was very, very young indeed, so...::grin::
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 07:55 pm (UTC)It's hard to explain but it sort of ties into the anti-slavery kink as well. Part of the Spike I love is the demon, and if you take away the demon it's like giving him a lobotomy, then forcing him to live on as something utterly changed, doing things he'd never have done before. And having power over the self taken away (through drugs, brain damage, mental breakdowns, happiness in slavery, etc.) is something that I've always been terrified of and horrified by more than anything else.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 06:03 pm (UTC)This is exactly how I feel about the slave-thing. Or even Spike being utterly broken, with no slavery involved. Spike too broken to snark is just depressing beyond measure. And I find it's actually harder to deal with in really well-written stories, because it's completely believable and much harder to write off as someone manipulating his character to fulfill a kink, even if that's what it is. Gah. I really hate that.
I should have known I could count on you to disagree openly with the slave-kink. Just reading all the descriptions of how much people love Spike-the-dead-inside-slave has been kind of depressing. I need my Spike to at least have his illusions of independence.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 07:18 pm (UTC)My Spike? Might love unwisely and too well, but he's always his own man.
Now, I'll own up to sometimes finding the violence sexy (a la Fool For Love, in the train sequence), and sometimes finding the predation sexy (it's a vampire thing. Hey, I make no brief for my weird vampire fixation.) But slavery? Not sexy at.all. to me.
I don't particularly care for torture stuff in my fic, either, but don't mind it when it actually serves the story (rather than just being gratuitous shocking stuff).
(no subject)
Date: 2003-10-14 08:00 pm (UTC)But yeah ... Spike too broken to snark is just so depressing. It's sort of why S7 depressed me, actually. He was so broken that he couldn't see through Buffy's bullshit anymore; he was just her pathetic slave, thanking her for crumbs, praising her without seeing her flaws anymore, when he used to be so perceptive. Poor deluded fool. I pitied him, but I stopped liking him.