The choice of what to drain away · 11:00pm Sep 24th, 2014
As prior journals have expressed, I think a lot about stories, tastes and motivations. Since I have to examine others in isolation or using only inference, I think a lot about my own context and motivations. And one of the things which puzzles me, and always has, was what drove me to sculpt the inner life of Racham as I did. Bronystories helped but the ultimate "soul" of the character was mine to shape, like clay. I placed him on the potter's wheel and sculpted a soul that was shocked by its self. His desires and tastes, were bearable and doable but still a shock given the general morality he embodied as a natural thing. I have a similar thought, but must ask the question: Beyond the idea of Style vs. Substance presented in a previous blog, why does one thing repulse me and another delight me when, in essence, they can be considered to constitute the same thing? I think I finally have the germ of an answer. What remains and what is drained away.
I wish to use an example, but prefaced with a powerful word of defense. Bronystories is a man I would consider a friend, and who considers me one. I find him charming, engaging, delightful, talented and in all respects the sort of fellow it is an honor to know, the kind met but seldom in a lifetime. As a collaborator and human being he is all aces, and one of a few to whom I have extended the offer of supper and a drink down at my favorite pub. All that said, his creations can run to the nightmarish. From the emotionally injurious ("Swingerville", "Soarin the Butt" in some respects) to truly dark turns. As ever, the magnum opus that is "120 Days of Blueblood" should serve as the type specimin. Blueblood is awful. All the rich and powerful characters are. They may as well be caricatures in a Marxist propaganda tract. But Blueblood gets the most focus. He's the worst sort of bigot. He's both a classist and a racist, though presented as merely culturally racist which I guess is some attempt at making that better. The thing which he is also... is SERIOUS.
He has a grim staidness about him. Even his laughter is tainted with the heaviness of lead. His humor and glee are all latched, like a tick, to misery and suffering. He is so ashen-faced serious it's depressing, dreary. And non-sexy. His racism against the gypsy Pinkie Pie is bad, but made all the more sickening because of how grimly serious he is about it. He's not even sort of kidding or even aware of his own awareness and acting as an agent of culture and thus capable of appreciating the negative aspects of what he's doing. He's horribly earnest, he believes his society's own bigoted propaganda, as though he is unaware it's all bull invented by his class as a social conformity ploy. It makes his later action (drowning her, a persecuted minority, who is also pregnant) less "Hard BDSM" and more "UN Definition of Crimes against humanity, if not the first action that could establish a pattern of genocide."
That grimness, that seriousness, that lead-heavy staid, dour, sour and washed-out-gray fixity is what takes out sexuality, at least in my eyes. And that is part of what the subject line of this blog is about. If that seriousness isn't what gets drained out then there is something else which is drained out.
On another site, I watch someone, who seems completely wrog for me to watch. (And not the one that might be imagined; that is stubborn loyalty and the memory of a friendship that once was. If friendship was easy or rational we wouldn't need to be told it's magic.) Indeed, they ought to be the farthest thing from me. There are oddities of the most shocking sort. Mothers roasting their own offspring, and vice versa, and mounted heads and such things. How could I watch someone who does such (relatively decent, if plastic-y, Poser-type 3D, rendered) art? Is it because they're a charming person? Actually, that doesn't hurt. They're cheerful, engaging, willing to listen to fans, relatively blithe and usually exceptionally pleasant. Responses from them are swift, encouraging and usually filled with cheer and a positive nature. Artist attitude counts for a lot. What counts for more is World Attitude.
The whole world, such as it is, could best be described as "Goofs goofing goofily." There is not a trace, not a scintilla, of grim seriousness. It's silly sexuality without an ounce of apology. The characters are ultimately aware they're characters. They will either decorate the fourth wall, lean on it or bust through it. They may get roasted and/or eaten a lot (sometimes they just end up cooked) or have some other (self-acknowledged) highly implausible perilous end happen to them, but they're fine in the next scene. They do have a sort of meta-memory that's imperfect (one character has been eaten by the same villain multiple times but still falls into the next wacky scenario) but they still roll with things, to the point that there's a weird and loose timeline. All that chipper cheeriness, the gags, the goofs, the jokes and puns and absurd situations, leaves nothing on which horror could attach, leaving the comedy.
That's the rub. Eroticism-killing horror needs an anchor. Like a barnacle, it must latch itself to a substrate with its bloody meathooks before it can feed and grow. Draining humor leaves the seriousness, and the seriousness becomes the ideal growth medium for the screaming madness and horror. Draining seriousness leaves no surface onto which the horror may latch. The grim, grisly parasite falls away, leaving the humor alone.
And as I said, the Word Attitude is what creates the substrate. However many desperately created Fall of Equestria alleged laugh-fests may be made, they ring hollow, even offensive and far more disgustingly grim and frightening. They're trying to whitewash Hell, or at least paint the antechamber bight chartreuse and add some vases of flowers. The background, the world behind it, always bleeds through such that the memory snaps in and says, "Oh. A brutally bloody military conquest happened, millions are dead or injured and the rest live in filth."
I don't know if there was any grander purpose to this blog besides a journey of personal self-discovery. But it felt good to write.
I don't know why but it seems poetic. in a morbid kind of way.
2481167
What does?
2481959 your blog post. it was strangely beautiful and I don't know why.
2482446
It's the way I've been trained to write. Rhetoric and effective speaking go anpony way to crafting arguments that sound nice. The logic courses craft arguments that are sensible.
2482910 well keep up the good work then.
2483066
Thank you!
Any feeling on the subject itself?
2483122 about bronystories? I don't really know him, although I have read some of his stories and yes they are quite disturbing.
The one I remember was adventures of a teenage foal sitter I think it was called. Not much to say really, except it read like a porn novel and I assumed his other work was like that. It was an interesting read.
2483138
I meant the journal and how seriousness or silliness affect sexuality in stories.
2483627 oh, sorry. well it depends, I have read some funny stories that had sex and I though they were good. I guess it comes down to what the topic is, as well as how you do it. its all in the presentation. so the topic was interesting, sorry if this answer is inadequate, i'm not the best at writing.
2483712
I get you. As I said, I mostly wrote this to personally express that serious expressions of grimness in stories just aren'tthat sexy.
2484547 I agree, I think that if your going for sexy, you should avoid being too serious. you don't need grimness in porn, you need grim for novels detailing destructive behaviors.
2485353
Exactly! Grim seriousness brings nothing to porn. It just makes it creepy.
2489741
You know what's fun? Angry Birds. Whenever you feel the need to reply to something I wrote, try to three-star a level without the helping objects or Mighty Eagle. It'll be fun for all.
2492842 I've not been much of a gamer since I forgot to install solitaire on this computer, and my phone struggles to play mp3s, let alone bird-tossing games.
Fortunately, that leaves me with much more time to draw, and your blogposts are always an endless font of inspiration for that, as I hope they also inspire you to write.
2492858
Inspiration comes from many locations. From simple, and sudden, connections between disparate elements, to suggestions from friends, to personal reactions to broad categories. By the time a concept becomes a blog I've already made a story about it, if I ever was going to do so. Usually the focus and attention paid to a story forces a thought process about the concept. So you sort of reversed the process.
What does this fake cheeriness, this insincere friendliness, gain you? A positive reputation? I already know you're a terrble person. What else am I supposed to assume from the toxic bullcrap you create and champion like a flag-waving Confederate?
2494672 That's very interesting! I almost always have to bounce ideas around and brainstorm with the audience before committing ideas to paper, but I guess proper writers can think things through my themselves, without leaning on other people for creative help.
And please don't call me insincere!
I try to be at least polite, and at best friendly with anyone as interesting or creative as you. Sincere love of ponies and pony fan art can bridge almost any gap between ideologies or cultures.
2495077
Creativity is a strange thing. And it never seems to work the same between two people. I think my training, which happened in a formal setting and emphasized the personal nature of writing, influenced a lot of that. I'm only too glad to take suggestions. I have two request series from a friend on another site, interspecies requests from this site, "Iron Will makes a Porno" was a request/collaboration, which led to others. But when it comes to building a world and putting characters in it I am a bit of a loner.
I feel very inclined to believe you. I tend to be very "easy", as it were, and give the benefit of the doubt. But there must be doubt. I rolled with Bronystories because I had seen he was a good fellow. I don't know you beyond a tainted reputation. You either enjoy screaming madness and horror or are just mercenary enough to take lucre for anything. Plus based on comments on a prior journal as well as on "Though Hell should bar the way" I always picture you laughing coldly as you make your "friendly" devil's advocate comments. To make a geeky reference, as Empress Galina said of Ambassador Laquatus "He smiles with poisoned lips."
But then again, I still have doubt. So I feel driven to indulge that doubt. Perhaps you are a good person and not just someone fixed or hideousness. I recognize that I may be drawing the wrong conclusions. Just what is it that makes you hang about and comment? If, as you say, you are sincere, I am exceptionally willing to engage with you and speak at length.