9670856 Or Granny Smith is the one that knows all 100% of the details of the time travel. having been the only one constant to see and hear everything.
Or because For Reasons, Apple Bloom is Big Mac's daughter by an earth pony mare.
Mare's aren't the only ones who can donate genetic material - frankly, probably easier to get it from the stallion in question, possibly without him knowing about it....
The idea that this stupid magically enforced eugenics is driving some kinky sexy times later really rubs me the wrong way. Sad pun intended.
It literally justifies the canonically rejected-in-world magical racism, and without giving any emotional or foreshadowed rational reasons. Just purple-smart infodumping the pureblood facts of life.
I guess in this story the pony tribes are living in separate but equal harmony? Anyone who is outstanding in Equestria is so only because of their parents being pony pureblood supremacists going forward, huh? That's some instant crap sack world-building--a real heel turn for friendly old Equestria.
Does this mean that in this story ALL of the Elements, all the princesses, and anyone with a non-useless cutie mark is lucky their parents followed a strict breeding program? Kinda sucks to think about.
Fuck man, is that why Scootaloo has wings that are too small? Mixed breeding? Holy shit this is a dark idea this chapter introduced.
Is this a fetish of which I'm unaware? Forced NTR breeding to preserve the purity of the race or something? Yikes.
Saddest thing is, I was really enjoying the time travel build up. What a goddamn downer development in my cute incest pony story.
*Edit Okay that slipped into mean (which I'm leaving because it is still how I feel), but I'll attempt constructive criticism as well.
How about instead of psudo-nazi magical breeding shit, they lose the farm because it was granted by some noble to the first born Earth Pony of the pure Apple family Earth pony line? Even give Twilight something like that for her family line and a noble title or something. And that means nobles will fight them on the Apple farm ownership if they try to change the land grant, costing money and meaning the farm would go fallow while they fought it in court.
Now the racists are unnamed nobles or circumstances or something, not literally everyone.
Crap. Maybe I should have included the other side of this right up front or not at all. I have made some changes to that section. Mostly,
1) drop the references to the other elements that I tossed in in an ill-conceived edit, since she'd be making a wild-ass guess. And of course Fluttershy would be a BAD guess, and Rarity totally unfounded.
2) clarify that for most purposes mixing is ideal.
Does that make it better?
Edited to add: if I was making a political point about it, I probably wouldn't focus on the misery. Big Mac does not seem to me to be at all portrayed as being wrong.
Thanks for pointing this out, the bad version was cringey.
9672490 Hey, thank you for your reply to my comment. I had considered not posting further on this but I don't think that would be fair to you given your response. Hopefully my hesitation will be clear. Assuming you make it to the end, maybe you'll see where I'm coming from.
First, some context for where I'm at:
Readers trying to rewrite an author's work is, at best, gauche, and at worst entitled whining. In this post, I will do some of that. I can't help myself. See below.
As a writer myself, some of the best feedback I can get is honest reactions from readers for what works and what doesn't to them personally. My feedback here is as honest as it is verbose. Make of that what you will.
As I've already put a few hundred words into the topic, I realize I'm hypersensitive about it right now so I'm probably not an average or neutral reader at this point. I am certainly not after writing this essay. It isn't necessary for you to somehow change my mind--though I would love to see how you intended certain passages to be read and interpreted.
The standard tonal advice for most erotica is, don't mix severe emotional or physical pain and sex. For romance novels, it is fine, but erotica usually doesn't have that sort of time to shift tones. Don't have someone's dog get run over "on camera" halfway through the sexy story unless you are a goddamn master writer. Unless that is the kink. In which case, yikes. To me, this chapter had at least kicking if not killing a dog in the middle of the sexy story.
Not everyone has the same kinks (see above). Breeding (including forced and incest) is a well-known kink, and one I thought I was sorta into, but I could be wrong or maybe this twist is some sort of anti-kink for me. Maybe that's not what this plot point is about at all. If so, it only makes sense to ignore my comments on the matter. Don't write for someone who doesn't enjoy the basic premise of your story.
Given that, here are my short replies to your questions about the effects of the edits:
1) drop the references to the other elements that I tossed in in an ill-conceived edit, since she'd be making a wild-ass guess. And of course Fluttershy would be a BAD guess, and Rarity totally unfounded.
Was that all referenced? I guess that's where I got some of my head of steam built up from. I honestly didn't specifically remember that reference in the first version of this chapter.
2) clarify that for most purposes mixing is ideal.
Again, just my opinion, but this still isn't very clear. In fact, it seems like the major change was just reducing the emotional whiplash from the Twi-Dump, making it more neutral overall. I'm not reading anything that says magical mutts are better at all.
I did totally get that Big Mac was in-story shown morally in the right--except for the part where it would mean their farm would suffer, which is obviously his weak point. It is a perfectly fine conflict to have in the story, and would be a great way to contrast having the parents back happy times with something stressful...except that the Twi-Dump has the "always factually correct" character in the series instantly saying all the big kids do it and also, she has a workaround that is very cool and very legal.
It obviously emotionally affected me, which is good writing, but I don't think they were the intended emotions. If you want to know more, keep reading into Part Four of The Commenting.
Let me be clear here: it isn't the surrogate solution that's squicking me out. It is this apparently little known but often practiced breeding thing leading the parents into conflict being instantly supported by a moral guidepost of the series.
Let's use some examples. This right here? This isn't a rational argument from a non-biased source, but it is presented as such contextually:
Twilight said, "Everything else aside, primo-stemmaturgy isn't tribalist, Big Mac. My family uses it too. Shining Armor and I are exceptional in unicorn magic because of it. And you've met my parents. Do they think pegasi or earth ponies are lesser?"
It is clearly tribalist, even if it is the way the world works. Reality isn't tribalist, but having the first reaction to your now-grown son's bride be "she's not an Earth Pony" is hella tribalist. The pony reaction here is what makes it tribalist. The cultural expectation that leads to that being the first reaction for their parents is fucking awfully tribalist because it immediately judges the situation based on the tribes involved, not the content of someone's character.
Twilight saying she's totally into matchmaking (oh, but only for the first foal) based on tribes really, really feels bad to me. By making it tribal in nature via the point being supporting tribal magic, it makes it tribalist when that's the first and primary concern their parents have. It smacks hard of real life racism, including laws about mixed marriages. I get that it isn't that. It is something else. But the parents' reaction isn't just a dog whistle for racism, it is racism, tribalism, because of how they are shown to react.
If instead it was reaction that went like, "uh son, now that we're talking privately, and I hate to even mention it...she sure seems really nice and we're very happy for you both, but it would really help us out if you considered...", then that wouldn't be tribalist. It would be a cold, calculated decision to ask his son to consider something that would help the entire family.
Having their first reaction be to give an innocent mare the cold shoulder followed immediately by defending their reaction should make them in the wrong. Big Mac certainly thinks so. But the Twi-dump says otherwise, giving it all a very bad feeling to me. Twilight isn't shown as being biased or socially stunted here, the parents aren't shown to be massively overreacting and defensive, and Big Mac isn't shown to be the clear victim of some really weird ideas with which he's seriously uncomfortable.
Obviously my preceding example of an alternative narrative has less drama in somes ways, but having purple-smart slap down the idea of it being tribalist so fast and so incorrectly rings literally all the nazi alarm bells while also solving all the drama, sorta, by saying everyone else is wrong to think it is tribalist and they are all therefore overreacting to the situation. The opposite of what the message should be.
Something that smells of racism and forced breeding programs is immediately excused for thin and emotional reasons, without the situation being properly contextualized by anyone. The victims are shocked and the reassurance isn't satisfying even for them. All context also comes from the people saying sorta racist stuff, with an obvious bias towards doing the sorta racist stuff. For example, no solutions are given for the anti-thesis: Big Mac and his wife have a slightly suboptimal for farming kid or kids. They are just told their kids would literally be half as good at farming.
This doesn't save it:
"Anypony can end up good at anything. If you want to tilt the odds way in your favor that your offspring are going to be good at this one specific thing…"
That literally makes it worse. The things we are historically shown are classic Earth Pony and Unicorn things, farming and magic, need purebloods to get the overwhelmingly best chance at outstanding kids. It practically implies that you're basically causing magical or farming birth defects by not respecting pureblood breeding plans. That's fine for a way reality works. But it doesn't support the idea that mutts are better at all when that's what most people think of when they think of tribal traits.
Together, this text says to me that it isn't supposed to be tribalist because this breeding plan "only" works on the most lauded and popular traits that two of the three tribes have--magic and farming--which is of course clearly illogical nonsense if stated that way.
Making the bestest, strongest baby is a classic breeder kink feature, and one I'm totally down for. But making it part of some "what's best for the tribe's keystone magic" thing is antithetical to the basic canon esthetic of Equestria, where the content of your character and the friends you make is what really matters the most. It is also bad that it is linked to his wife even existing as a unicorn, not to him possibly not having donated sperm to an Earth Pony breeding program. The alternative of a "are you man enough to donate to the future of the family bloodline" thing would be so much better than "the tribe's classic magic grows weaker when you breed with the other."
Then, to cap it off, we're told Applejack's kids are auto-fucked farming wise, and her attempts to save the farm for her family (a staple of her story and character) are ultimately doomed to failure unless her brother gets with the (breeding) program. And even then, it won't be her kids continuing the family farm, but his super-foal.
"It's what this farm is built on. Lose this, and your kids can't keep this place up half as well as you can. Jackie's kids won't carry as much of it either. That's why we haven't grown and grown with more farms - the line goes only to the first born.
Do you see why this bugs me? Again, I know this is my opinion only. And I'm a student of history, so I'm naturally hella sensitive about pseudo-scientific eugenics shit. Which this isn't, really, if that's how the world works. But it looks like it and sounds like it. So yeah. That's my reaction. Do with it what you will.
Thanks for writing and I hope this doesn't bum you out or anything. Assuming, of course, that you're not a closet nazi or something. In which case, sure, be bummed out please.
Thank you for putting in so much effort. I see what you're saying. There are two huge differences between Equestria and Earth, though, that I can't get around.
1) the tribes are in fact radically different. Utterly dwarfs any between-race difference on Earth. Utterly dwarfs most if not all differences in a single genus on Earth.
2) extreme power is observed to run in families (Shining Armor is nuts), yet this power does not spread all over the place through evolution.
So, the parallels between this and real life come pre-broken. I can see how bridging that gap is all too easy.
As for the initial reaction, they're kind of overwhelmed and so much is happening at once they can't say it right. Twilight is getting all technical about it. These are not necessarily the right things to do. I'll see if I can write that in better.
>> I'm not reading anything that says magical mutts are better at all.
Did you miss the below-quoted part? I did sprinkle the edits over a bit of a range, so you might have. Or you might have somehow read it differently.
> And it's just that if you want to be solely focused on, say, farming or high-power magic, it helps. For most focuses, mixing helps a lot. Just, not farming
9673557 Let's do things in reverse order this time.
Got the reference to mixed being better for some things but maybe not a strongly as you intended. A careful reading suggests that Earth Pony and Unicorn magic are the only ones you can aim for, though. If mixed is better for other focuses then it isn't really better for anything but a sort of min-maxed population via the power of diversity.
Which means pureblood breeding is bad for diversity and overall pony society, as they'll miss out on all the high-powered bakers and dentists if everyone did what these specific, privileged ponies want to do. And that and other things not being automatically a big deal is another racism issue.
Maybe this Equestria doesn't have that sort of racism, despite an even worse history of its effects? Okay, If racism doesn't work in Equestria like on Earth, either because of their gross physical differences or tribal magic, then why does Big Mac react the way he does: a clear echo of how someone with Earth mores would?
I think I'll leave it there as I've probably explained my take on these items clearly enough. Thank you for your responses.
Last point - I see Tribalism as being a thing, and there are some out there who are noxiously tribalist. They're as wrong about it as they are in real life.
Previous thing - The stemmaturgical implications of mixing are not so cut-and-dried as to make the existence of pure lines a bad thing, so long as the society as a whole is mixed. Shall we say, under this system, it's good to have diverse levels of diversity.
Thank you for sticking with me. I'll continue to see what I can do to get this chapter to convey the right levels and kinds of not-right, and present them so they land appropriately, not just being that way in my head. While still motivating the three sexy-time situations this is supposed to (none of which have to do with breeding fetish)!
Any ideas why Granny Smith is so confident?
9670819
My best guess; Apple bloom (or Applejack) is (somehow) actually the firstborn.
Second best guess; Granny Smith has seen the future.
9670856
Or Granny Smith is the one that knows all 100% of the details of the time travel. having been the only one constant to see and hear everything.
9670997
:looks at avatar:
Username fits!
9670997
*coughs*
Or because For Reasons, Apple Bloom is Big Mac's daughter by an earth pony mare.
Mare's aren't the only ones who can donate genetic material - frankly, probably easier to get it from the stallion in question, possibly without him knowing about it....
The idea that this stupid magically enforced eugenics is driving some kinky sexy times later really rubs me the wrong way. Sad pun intended.
It literally justifies the canonically rejected-in-world magical racism, and without giving any emotional or foreshadowed rational reasons. Just purple-smart infodumping the pureblood facts of life.
I guess in this story the pony tribes are living in separate but equal harmony? Anyone who is outstanding in Equestria is so only because of their parents being pony pureblood supremacists going forward, huh? That's some instant crap sack world-building--a real heel turn for friendly old Equestria.
Does this mean that in this story ALL of the Elements, all the princesses, and anyone with a non-useless cutie mark is lucky their parents followed a strict breeding program? Kinda sucks to think about.
Fuck man, is that why Scootaloo has wings that are too small? Mixed breeding? Holy shit this is a dark idea this chapter introduced.
Is this a fetish of which I'm unaware? Forced NTR breeding to preserve the purity of the race or something? Yikes.
Saddest thing is, I was really enjoying the time travel build up. What a goddamn downer development in my cute incest pony story.
*Edit
Okay that slipped into mean (which I'm leaving because it is still how I feel), but I'll attempt constructive criticism as well.
How about instead of psudo-nazi magical breeding shit, they lose the farm because it was granted by some noble to the first born Earth Pony of the pure Apple family Earth pony line? Even give Twilight something like that for her family line and a noble title or something. And that means nobles will fight them on the Apple farm ownership if they try to change the land grant, costing money and meaning the farm would go fallow while they fought it in court.
Now the racists are unnamed nobles or circumstances or something, not literally everyone.
9672427
Crap. Maybe I should have included the other side of this right up front or not at all. I have made some changes to that section. Mostly,
1) drop the references to the other elements that I tossed in in an ill-conceived edit, since she'd be making a wild-ass guess. And of course Fluttershy would be a BAD guess, and Rarity totally unfounded.
2) clarify that for most purposes mixing is ideal.
Does that make it better?
Edited to add: if I was making a political point about it, I probably wouldn't focus on the misery. Big Mac does not seem to me to be at all portrayed as being wrong.
Thanks for pointing this out, the bad version was cringey.
9672490
Hey, thank you for your reply to my comment. I had considered not posting further on this but I don't think that would be fair to you given your response. Hopefully my hesitation will be clear. Assuming you make it to the end, maybe you'll see where I'm coming from.
First, some context for where I'm at:
Given that, here are my short replies to your questions about the effects of the edits:
Was that all referenced? I guess that's where I got some of my head of steam built up from. I honestly didn't specifically remember that reference in the first version of this chapter.
Again, just my opinion, but this still isn't very clear. In fact, it seems like the major change was just reducing the emotional whiplash from the Twi-Dump, making it more neutral overall. I'm not reading anything that says magical mutts are better at all.
I did totally get that Big Mac was in-story shown morally in the right--except for the part where it would mean their farm would suffer, which is obviously his weak point. It is a perfectly fine conflict to have in the story, and would be a great way to contrast having the parents back happy times with something stressful...except that the Twi-Dump has the "always factually correct" character in the series instantly saying all the big kids do it and also, she has a workaround that is very cool and very legal.
It obviously emotionally affected me, which is good writing, but I don't think they were the intended emotions. If you want to know more, keep reading into Part Four of The Commenting.
Let me be clear here: it isn't the surrogate solution that's squicking me out. It is this apparently little known but often practiced breeding thing leading the parents into conflict being instantly supported by a moral guidepost of the series.
Let's use some examples. This right here? This isn't a rational argument from a non-biased source, but it is presented as such contextually:
It is clearly tribalist, even if it is the way the world works. Reality isn't tribalist, but having the first reaction to your now-grown son's bride be "she's not an Earth Pony" is hella tribalist. The pony reaction here is what makes it tribalist. The cultural expectation that leads to that being the first reaction for their parents is fucking awfully tribalist because it immediately judges the situation based on the tribes involved, not the content of someone's character.
Twilight saying she's totally into matchmaking (oh, but only for the first foal) based on tribes really, really feels bad to me. By making it tribal in nature via the point being supporting tribal magic, it makes it tribalist when that's the first and primary concern their parents have. It smacks hard of real life racism, including laws about mixed marriages. I get that it isn't that. It is something else. But the parents' reaction isn't just a dog whistle for racism, it is racism, tribalism, because of how they are shown to react.
If instead it was reaction that went like, "uh son, now that we're talking privately, and I hate to even mention it...she sure seems really nice and we're very happy for you both, but it would really help us out if you considered...", then that wouldn't be tribalist. It would be a cold, calculated decision to ask his son to consider something that would help the entire family.
Having their first reaction be to give an innocent mare the cold shoulder followed immediately by defending their reaction should make them in the wrong. Big Mac certainly thinks so. But the Twi-dump says otherwise, giving it all a very bad feeling to me. Twilight isn't shown as being biased or socially stunted here, the parents aren't shown to be massively overreacting and defensive, and Big Mac isn't shown to be the clear victim of some really weird ideas with which he's seriously uncomfortable.
Obviously my preceding example of an alternative narrative has less drama in somes ways, but having purple-smart slap down the idea of it being tribalist so fast and so incorrectly rings literally all the nazi alarm bells while also solving all the drama, sorta, by saying everyone else is wrong to think it is tribalist and they are all therefore overreacting to the situation. The opposite of what the message should be.
Something that smells of racism and forced breeding programs is immediately excused for thin and emotional reasons, without the situation being properly contextualized by anyone. The victims are shocked and the reassurance isn't satisfying even for them. All context also comes from the people saying sorta racist stuff, with an obvious bias towards doing the sorta racist stuff. For example, no solutions are given for the anti-thesis: Big Mac and his wife have a slightly suboptimal for farming kid or kids. They are just told their kids would literally be half as good at farming.
This doesn't save it:
That literally makes it worse. The things we are historically shown are classic Earth Pony and Unicorn things, farming and magic, need purebloods to get the overwhelmingly best chance at outstanding kids. It practically implies that you're basically causing magical or farming birth defects by not respecting pureblood breeding plans. That's fine for a way reality works. But it doesn't support the idea that mutts are better at all when that's what most people think of when they think of tribal traits.
Together, this text says to me that it isn't supposed to be tribalist because this breeding plan "only" works on the most lauded and popular traits that two of the three tribes have--magic and farming--which is of course clearly illogical nonsense if stated that way.
Making the bestest, strongest baby is a classic breeder kink feature, and one I'm totally down for. But making it part of some "what's best for the tribe's keystone magic" thing is antithetical to the basic canon esthetic of Equestria, where the content of your character and the friends you make is what really matters the most. It is also bad that it is linked to his wife even existing as a unicorn, not to him possibly not having donated sperm to an Earth Pony breeding program. The alternative of a "are you man enough to donate to the future of the family bloodline" thing would be so much better than "the tribe's classic magic grows weaker when you breed with the other."
Then, to cap it off, we're told Applejack's kids are auto-fucked farming wise, and her attempts to save the farm for her family (a staple of her story and character) are ultimately doomed to failure unless her brother gets with the (breeding) program. And even then, it won't be her kids continuing the family farm, but his super-foal.
i.imgur.com/J0pASyh.jpg (facehoof dash)
Do you see why this bugs me? Again, I know this is my opinion only. And I'm a student of history, so I'm naturally hella sensitive about pseudo-scientific eugenics shit. Which this isn't, really, if that's how the world works. But it looks like it and sounds like it. So yeah. That's my reaction. Do with it what you will.
Thanks for writing and I hope this doesn't bum you out or anything. Assuming, of course, that you're not a closet nazi or something. In which case, sure, be bummed out please.
9673524
Thank you for putting in so much effort. I see what you're saying. There are two huge differences between Equestria and Earth, though, that I can't get around.
1) the tribes are in fact radically different. Utterly dwarfs any between-race difference on Earth. Utterly dwarfs most if not all differences in a single genus on Earth.
2) extreme power is observed to run in families (Shining Armor is nuts), yet this power does not spread all over the place through evolution.
So, the parallels between this and real life come pre-broken. I can see how bridging that gap is all too easy.
As for the initial reaction, they're kind of overwhelmed and so much is happening at once they can't say it right. Twilight is getting all technical about it. These are not necessarily the right things to do. I'll see if I can write that in better.
>> I'm not reading anything that says magical mutts are better at all.
Did you miss the below-quoted part? I did sprinkle the edits over a bit of a range, so you might have. Or you might have somehow read it differently.
> And it's just that if you want to be solely focused on, say, farming or high-power magic, it helps. For most focuses, mixing helps a lot. Just, not farming
9673557
Let's do things in reverse order this time.
Got the reference to mixed being better for some things but maybe not a strongly as you intended. A careful reading suggests that Earth Pony and Unicorn magic are the only ones you can aim for, though. If mixed is better for other focuses then it isn't really better for anything but a sort of min-maxed population via the power of diversity.
Which means pureblood breeding is bad for diversity and overall pony society, as they'll miss out on all the high-powered bakers and dentists if everyone did what these specific, privileged ponies want to do. And that and other things not being automatically a big deal is another racism issue.
Maybe this Equestria doesn't have that sort of racism, despite an even worse history of its effects? Okay, If racism doesn't work in Equestria like on Earth, either because of their gross physical differences or tribal magic, then why does Big Mac react the way he does: a clear echo of how someone with Earth mores would?
I think I'll leave it there as I've probably explained my take on these items clearly enough. Thank you for your responses.
9673701
Last point - I see Tribalism as being a thing, and there are some out there who are noxiously tribalist. They're as wrong about it as they are in real life.
Previous thing - The stemmaturgical implications of mixing are not so cut-and-dried as to make the existence of pure lines a bad thing, so long as the society as a whole is mixed. Shall we say, under this system, it's good to have diverse levels of diversity.
Thank you for sticking with me. I'll continue to see what I can do to get this chapter to convey the right levels and kinds of not-right, and present them so they land appropriately, not just being that way in my head. While still motivating the three sexy-time situations this is supposed to (none of which have to do with breeding fetish)!