What is dub con

Complicating dating is that many authors back-date their warnings, so a master list of fan fiction dated , which lists a dub-con tag, may be referring to a story written in Some fans feel that dub-con, like non-con, is a meaningless term and should be labeled rapefic. They believe all sex without clear consent is rape, and "non-con" and "dub-con" are just euphemisms attempting to gain public acceptance for a sharply stigmatized kink. Some claim that dub-con and non-con are harmful genres in that they promote the idea that sex doesn't need to be consensual.

The debate over the dub-con tag and its use began to crystallize in For example, one fan writer argued that what qualifies as "dub-con" is much smaller than how fandom often uses it. Also, fandom's familiarity with the characters sometimes allows writers from showing the readers the necessary explicit consent " Dubious consent bothers me as a qualifier because if you aren't sure whether someone is consenting, you don't do it or it's rape. No excuses.

So, I think that people should just bite the bullet and say, this is a rape fic Yet others seemed to be calling for fandom to realize that their "dub-con" story is most likely going to seen as a rape story by readers, no matter how they position it:. I'm not even asking for more realistic portrayal of rape, or recovery, or effects. Realism has its place, but fandom is, above all, about having fun, and spreading the squee , and the love of whatever fandom we're into.

Many of these early discussions focused on non-con and dub-con equally as both readers and writers navigated their way through the unfamiliar trope terrain. More recently, in June , thingswithwings , the moderator of kink bingo , a kink meme hosted on Livejournal and Dreamwidth, argued that fandom was 'misusing' the dub-con tag and that was a harmful to readers who were trying to avoid being triggered by depictions of sexual violence and b was detrimental to society as a whole.

The discussion spilled over to many other journals, including a thread at fail-fandomanon. Below are a few randomly selected comments from those discussions to illustrate the debate's diversity and complexity. I greatly resent the idea that these very useful distinctions should be collapsed, and that what I create and enjoy should all be lumped together as noncon or rape, whether or not I feel that label is fitting. There's a strong, visceral, kneejerk reaction of "oh, hell, no" I have to that.

Your problem as far as I can tell is that you like the first type but are upset by the second, so would like it to be relabeled "noncon" so that it can be grouped with that genre of stories that you're already not interested in reading about. But the problem for some of us is that we like the second type but are upset by the third, so having it be labeled "noncon" rather than "dubcon" and having them all get grouped together makes it harder for us to find the stories we want, in the exact way that it's hard for you to find the stories you want now.

Jump to: navigation , search. Have the guts to admit that what they're writing is rape. If people want to write rape fic, go for it, and I will probably read it, but let's step up and acknowledge what it is we are writing. I take issue with these qualifiers because I think that it is far more insidious than out and out rape porn. At least when we say it is rape, then we can move on to the next step: saying it's wrong, just a fantasy, etc.

But avoiding the label perpetuates the rape myths that have had such a damaging effect on victims and justice: did she enjoy it, she didn't really say no, she was a tease, they've done it before.

None of those things matter, and when a person labels their fic, they need to stop pretending they do. Or sex pollen stories. Or pon farr stories. Because I love rape-recovery fic. I love sex pollen stories particularly bad! I'm not saying that writing non-con is dirty!

I've written it. I read it. I collect it, in many flavors, as evidenced by the many folders of various fanfic saved on my laptop. What I'm asking for is this: First, that authors be a little more aware of what is and is not consent within our social norms legally and socially. Second, be aware of the social framework within which a given work is set, and the shift in perspective on what is and is not consent that may occur. But most importantly, to be aware that boundaries exist, and that if your story is going to poke holes in or disregard those boundaries, you'll have to be able to redefine them to support the situation you're trying to present.

In fic our rules are there to help you find your kink, to enable sexual fantasies. I really hate this idea that dub con writers would rather be writing non con but don't have the guts. I can't speak for every writer, but certainly I don't read romance novels for healthy romance, no matter how much they might tell me that's what it is.

I am reading it for the dub con, I am reading it for the men who take advantage of the heroines, and the heroines who enjoy it when it happens. I guess in a way you could say that my dub con fantasy isn't just a rape fantasy, it's an 'enjoying your rape' fantasy.

You think I don't realise that's problematic? It's massively problematic. But just because it's problematic doesn't mean it's bad. Dub con is not a mislabelling, just like it's not a deviant sexual desire. It's a valid kink and it's a separate kink to non con, that's why it needs to be labelled as such. Tags: kink: dub-con , type: meta. Flat Top-Level Comments Only. Link Reply Thread Hide 3 comments Show 3 comments. Link Reply Thread from start Parent.

Fantastic essay. To me the dub-con vs. It's a subset of the larger whole. Consent obtained through manipulation and coercion is not freely given consent, but neither is it thwacking somebody over the head. And yes, since this is storytelling and not real life, the grey-areas of dub-con are where some great moments of character exploration occur.

Link Reply Thread Hide 1 comment Show 1 comment. Re: here via metanews Date: pm UTC. Thank you! I definitely agree, the grey areas are where the most enjoyable bits are.

I feel non con can be more instant? Whereas with dub con, you often need to take the time to establish what's going on, and exactly how that's dirtybadwrong, in order to hit the right kink spot.

In general, I'm a big fan of content labels for precisely the reasons you lay out here: because I want to find stories that are going to do my kinks the way I like them. I was thinking, reading about what you get out of dubcon, how different it is from what I get out of it.

Because I would also say that dubcon is one of my favorite things, but I like the variety that isn't so much about badwrong as it is about the externalized expression of suppressed desire, i.

Feminist academic approaches to sexual violence and consent are diverse and multidisciplinary—and yet consent itself is significantly undertheorized. In Dubcon , Milena Popova points to a community that has been considering issues of sex, power, and consent for many years: writers and readers of fanfiction.

Their nuanced engagement with sexual consent, Popova argues, can shed light on these issues in ways not available to either academia or journalism. Proposing that fanfiction offers a powerful discursive resistance on issues of rape and consent that challenges dominant discourses about gender, romance, sexuality, and consent, Popova shows that fanfiction functions as a form of cultural activism.

Popova brings the marginalized wisdom of fanfic writers to the fore, providing fascinating examples of how they've grappled with such questions in their creative work and communities. While other works treat fanfiction as media criticism, Popova shows how fandom's artworks result in new thinking about issues of sexual agency and consent.

A must-read.