Sexual violence and misogyny in SF/F

[Colum Paget]

If the violence adds nothing to the part you are writing, then it is gratuitous...eg someone gets beaten up, you show a couple of blows, a bloody nose, falling on the floor curled up in a ball...all fine, but when you start to avidly describe every moment of this, taking special care to give all the details of the violence it becomes gratuitous, I know what happens when someone is beaten up, you don't have to give an incredibly detailed account, unless it actually helps the story...it's all in the language - "fist connected with their nose, and a sharp cry of pain followed, blood started dripping from the now broken nose", compared with "fist connected with a sickening crunch, hot wet blood, sloshed weakly from the cartilage hanging limply from the swollen, bruised, shattered remains of the once whole nose; an impassioned cry of intense pain, smothered by the blood clogging their throat burst from them" the first is fine, the second (apologies for that) is just gratuitous and unneccessary, unless this is an important point for the story...

I've copied the whole quote into this one, because I feel that this is a very good illustration of the point in question. Thanks for posting this.

 

[Colum Paget]

No, absolutely not. It's not about the violence per se, but about how it's handled. Are the women always victims, and the men always the dominant inflicters of violence? Is the violence gratuitous, as discussed above, or sexualised/objectifying? If the answer to these is no, you're probably OK.

In this regard "I'm okay", as I've never depicted violence from a man towards a woman, that I can remember. It's mostly been woman-to-woman violence (and this has generally not been that long-term serious, though I can think of one case when it was).

I've done a lot of violence from women to men though, (one dropped in a black-hole, one pushed from a tall building, one shot through the leg and subsequently tortured, one shredded by a 'razor swarm' in a space battle where most of the combatants were female, etc, etc) Perhaps I should take a long, hard look at myself, and ask if I'm misandrenous ;-)

Sounds to me like RH has got you so rattled, you're trying to avoid the subject altogether. I recommend you get yourself some female beta-readers who are a bit less thin-skinned (and a lot less aggressive!) than her but still sensitive to misogynist undertones

I wouldn't be in this thread if I wanted to avoid the subject! I'm here because I want to discuss it. Then again, I'll discuss anything, but this was the subject that was proposed.

Perhaps I should point something out, I'm leading the conversation here because last night this thread seemed dead-at-birth, no-one was saying anything. If we're going to get a conversation going, then someone has to stand up and start saying things, and saying things that will encourage responses. (Some have claimed this is what RH is actually doing, but I'm being very careful about my tone here: if the thread becomes a fight then no useful purpose is served).

Some of what I'm saying is a little disingenuous, I'm presenting my own fiction in rather a black light. I think we need to do this a bit if we're going to look seriously at our own work (though it's dangerous, perhaps, to do it in a public forum, because I'm 'priming' people to view my work a certain way. But, ho-hum).

Don't think that everything I'm saying is what I think. If we're going to discuss this, then someone has to play devil's advocate some of time.

As for female beta-readers, I have those, both in my writers group and elsewhere. None of them have ever raised any of the issues about my work that I'm raising, and the only person I remember doing so, even slightly, was male. However, I don't feel this means I've got a "pass" or anything, it's always worth looking at ones work and seeing what one can find in it. It can even be educational to find things that aren't there!

I should also point something else out, RH has never really critiqued my work, it's been my blog-posts and conversations with her.

But let's not keep coming back to RH, they are not the topic of this thread, we seem obsessed with them.

 

[Colum Paget]

While I'm here, incidentally, you might not have realised that it isn't necessary to quote an entire post if you want to respond to someone, and we'd usually prefer you didn't. It's enough to quote the snippet that's important,

Sorry, I'm new here and I got lazy.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Perhaps I should point something out, I'm leading the conversation here because last night this thread seemed dead-at-birth, no-one was saying anything. If we're going to get a conversation going, then someone has to stand up and start saying things, and saying things that will encourage responses. (Some have claimed this is what RH is actually doing, but I'm being very careful about my tone here: if the thread becomes a fight then no useful purpose is served).

Well, that's odd since I seem to remember both myself and Teresa posting quite a lot on it last night. There tends to be a lull during UK overnight on the threads - although I always enjoy waking up to what's been being picked up overnight - but this has been a pretty lively thread.
And it won't become a fight, because it'll be locked if it does. And because, mostly, we're pretty civilised in our disagreements.



But let's not keep coming back to RH, they are not the topic of this thread, we seem obsessed with them.

Well, most of us aren't - most of us have dismissed her as a ranter (That seemed to be the majority view on the other thread, anyhow.

 

[Colum Paget]

Then perhaps you ought to be asking yourself why you are inflicting violence on anyone, and why you are deliberately writing women into these stories. While each story may in itself be unobjectionable, taken cumulatively they may be saying something that is best addressed.

These are good questions. Violence often comes up in my fiction because... hmm, I do feel fiction is often about conflict. Now, it can be verbal conflict, but when I write those stories I get crits and rejections saying "More action!" (I have a liking for talky stories, but talky stories don't sell).

There are times when I want someone to express and extreme emotion, and I feel that words can't often do that, because fiction is words all the time. In "Imaginary Enemies" Sandra suffers a type of MPD, and thus shares her body with Ingrid. Sandra is going to undergo medical treatment that will 'cure' her MPD. We never directly see Ingrid, because Sandra is the viewpoint, so it's easy for us to think that Ingrid isn't "read". Thus I introduced Caroline, Ingrid's lover, for whom Ingrid is very real, and the most important person in her life. I didn't feel that Caroline could just make an impassioned plea to save Ingrid, I felt she had to show it, hence she ambushes Sandra (physically) and threatens to kill her if she goes through with the treatment.

Given the somewhat dire setup of the story, do people feel that Caroline's assault (which involves a kick and a punch, and then threatening with a knife, it's not some kind of sustained torture) is justified? When is violence justified in fiction, and what justifies it? When is it not?

I'm using examples from my own fiction here because the purpose of this thread was to discuss how we can improve our treatment of these issues, and if we all just spend our time castigating Joe Abercromie and Neal Asher for things they've written, and don't look at our own works, well, I feel that's dishonest (though looking at other authors may have a place in the discussion too, but you have to look hard at yourself first and formost).

 

[Colum Paget]

Well, that's odd since I seem to remember both myself and Teresa posting quite a lot on it last night. There tends to be a lull during UK overnight on the threads - although I always enjoy waking up to what's been being picked up overnight - but this has been a pretty lively thread.

It may be a matter of perception on my part, I was up late and hitting 'refresh, refresh, refresh' and nothing was happening, so I figured I should start saying stuff to encourage things a bit.

I suppose in a bit I'm going to go back to work, and everyone will think "Why has he gone quiet?", so yes, it's probably just my impatience with online conversations. I want them to happen when it' convenient for me, you know?

 

[allmywires]

Perhaps I should point something out, I'm leading the conversation here because last night this thread seemed dead-at-birth, no-one was saying anything. If we're going to get a conversation going, then someone has to stand up and start saying things, and saying things that will encourage responses. (Some have claimed this is what RH is actually doing, but I'm being very careful about my tone here: if the thread becomes a fight then no useful purpose is served).

Hi Colum,

I stayed out of this thread until now because the RH thread wore me out a little bit, and I have a feeling this is another one of those circuitous discussions where nobody has the right answer. However, I would say, give the thread a little time, sometimes it takes a few days to kick into life.

Another reason I haven't posted yet is that I'm not quite sure what you're asking - you're shooting from all sorts of different directions, and it's hard to condense into one response. So I'm going to answer what I think is the most important question here:

How should be approach violence in our fiction (not just violence to women, all violence?)

I'm very uncomfortable with sexual violence, because when not handled properly it seems to always give an air of fetishisation. I know springs has posted in here about her male rape storyline, and IMO that's when it is handled well - all too often the long-term psychological distress of sexual assault is ignored in SFF. I would say that is for two reasons: one, it is set in a society where women do not have as many rights as modern day, so it's expected that they suck it up (they have little to no protection from the law, etc) and two, SFF is often more plot-driven than regular fiction, so the psychology of the characters is not fully explored. Now, I'm not saying that somebody should write a SFF novel based solely on the aftermath of a rape, but I think a lot of authors believe they don't have to deal with this because of these two reasons listed above.

I write a lot of violence in my novels, some of it graphic. My poor MC goes through the wringer in book 1, and my other POV character is a torture victim. I'm working on exploring more of his backstory right now, and the impact of torture that leaves physical scars. Like I said above, since SFF is rarely as character driven as other works of fiction, this is often glossed over, or made into something overly simplified: as Teresa said earlier, the horrible 'rape-victim-becomes-evil or in a male case, usually violence makes them stronger and better - aloof hero. It's a complicated issue, there's no mistake, but I strongly believe violence is a good literary tool - it can be used to break down your characters (in terms of psychology) and demonstrate the mental strength (or lack thereof) of the perpetrators.

What's the difference between a character who is a cold-blooded murderer, or one who kills for mercy, or in self-defence? Technically they are the same crime, but they offer a wealth of possibilities to explore characterisation. Odds on your cold-blooded murderer is going to have a completely different psychological outlook than the man who killed to save his (or someone else's) life.

 

[Colum Paget]

# Perhaps I should take a long, hard look at myself, and ask if I'm misandrenous ;-)

I said this with a wink at the end, but if anyone wants to take it a little seriously and ask if the treatment of male characters in my work might indicate a fear of women, or a hatred of men, or self-hate, or something, feel free!

But, I notice no-one else is really putting forth things they've been doing in their own work, except in a very veiled manner?

 

[Colum Paget]

# Another reason I haven't posted yet is that I'm not quite sure what you're asking

Nor am I, I'm just trying to get a discussion going. Who knows where it will lead?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I think it's the summer too, there's a lot on holiday.

On the other note, i think it's important not to confine this sort of thread only to our own work as, despite my attempt to have half the Chrons community read mine, I have not yet taken over the world... and therefore it becomes an exercise in self gratification. Instead, I think it's important to look at the issues critically and use these as a mirror into our own work.

Some of the things mentioned have been very useful for me to consider - I have a few dark storylines in mine, and am juggling how to handle that against a couple of the characters in the book, and I can see that I am handling the male and female characters differently. That's partly because of how comfortable I am as a writer within the boundaries and partly how I expect something to be received.

With violence - and associated themes, we've touched on rape, women to women, but there's other stuff out there - we have to recognise if we choose to present it in our books it will alienate some readers. There are lots of gore fests out there that sell very well - so there's evidently a market for it - but if we choose to become that sort of writer, we will inevitably open ourselves up to being seen as gratuitous.

Also, sometimes the implied is scarier than the explicit, and this is something that the really good writers do to great effect. (Stephen King, for instance in Salem's lot - there is very little real violence in it - plenty of blood sucking, okay - but he ratchets up the horror by our implied fear.)

But, if you choose to write a lot of female on female violence, then it is perhaps becoming a theme, and if so I'd kind of like to know either why the theme is so interesting to that author or what answers it gives me about a view on life. If the answer is it seemed cool and none(which I'm not saying it is in your case), that moves to gratuitous to me.

 

[Kylara]

Any writing is a comment on fiction itself and also on society as whole, so a theme may be picked up by someone and they use it in all their works, commenting either purposefully on that theme in greater society, fiction, their life etc, or accidentally by giving an unintentional view into how they perceive things, both are helpful to us (studyers/critics).
A very good look at female subjugation can be found in The Handmaid's Tale by Atwood, there are some issues in there that are covered well and non gratuitously.

 

[Ursa major]

Just to simultaneously step aside from the particular topic AND agree, in part, with Kylara AND mention my own work (kind of), if only to please Colum....

* excuse me while I fall over, legs entwined *

I've noticed one or two things recurring in my writing, including a structural one that, while unplanned and not necessarily good in itself, feeds strongly into one of the underlying plot strands of my frame story. (Yay subconscious!)


Whether these are evidence of laziness, or a subconscious desire, it's hard to know. I'm pleased to say, though, that sexual violence plays no part in any of them. What may be a problem, though - and however innocuous these idées fixe are - is that the reader picks up on them and sees it as evidence of one or more of:

• lack of imagination;
• obsession;
• the author hammering home some point or other without the necessary subtlety.

 

[Mouse]

Robin Hobb has male/male rape in her Liveships books which is handled very well. Springs also handles it very well.

I've written from the PoV of a rapist before now and managed to make the character likeable (at least, people told me they liked him!).

 

[Anne Lyle]

But, I notice no-one else is really putting forth things they've been doing in their own work, except in a very veiled manner?

Well, since I don't have much in the way of sexual violence or violence by or towards women in my books, I didn't feel any need to 'fess up

I think the sum total for the first book is:

* Gay character acts like a jerk towards girl-disguised-as-boy, including trying to kiss "him" non-consensually (his reasons for behaving like this are complicated, and are eventually revealed by the end of the book)

* The same character is assumed to be a potential rapist by a servant girl, in a scene from his PoV in which it's clear he's not the slightest bit interested

* The girl-disguised-as-a-boy is initially a bit nervous about being alone with the hero, whom she's only just met, because she's been warned that some men have an unwholesome interest in boys

There's a fair amount of non-sexual violence between men, but that's pretty much expected for a swashbuckling spy thriller set in a more brutal era than our own.

 

[Nerds_feather]

I'm very uncomfortable with sexual violence, because when not handled properly it seems to always give an air of fetishisation. I know springs has posted in here about her male rape storyline, and IMO that's when it is handled well - all too often the long-term psychological distress of sexual assault is ignored in SFF. I would say that is for two reasons: one, it is set in a society where women do not have as many rights as modern day, so it's expected that they suck it up (they have little to no protection from the law, etc) and two, SFF is often more plot-driven than regular fiction, so the psychology of the characters is not fully explored. Now, I'm not saying that somebody should write a SFF novel based solely on the aftermath of a rape, but I think a lot of authors believe they don't have to deal with this because of these two reasons listed above.

THIS.

As I said back on page 2, the interesting thing about sexual violence is not the act itself. It's the aftereffects. It's the inevitable, massive and variegated ways in which being the victim of sexual violence can affect one's life, health and psychology for the rest of one's life. There can also be interesting explorations of what happens to people who observe sexual violence. Do they become desensitized, like child soldiers or gang members who are often forced to watch (or participate in) rape as part of indoctrination? Do they instead become remorseful, guilt-ridden and so on? How could they try to atone for what they did, and is it ever possible to do so?

Like allmywires, I think this is largely missing from SF/F treatments of sexual violence. Instead we get rapes that seem to only exist to establish certain characters as "ruthless," as a device to say "these times are really bad" and as part of a general tendency, in fantasy these days, to be graphic and gory.

That I don't care for. Or I'm sick of. Or both.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

No sexual violence actually depicted in any of my stories. In The Green Lion books there is a mental rape of a sexual nature, but it occurs off stage. The victim is damaged by it and has to deal with that through a large part in a trilogy of sequels. There is also some rough sex by two over-wrought people, but that occurs off stage, too.

In The Queen's Necklace one of the important characters is a young girl with a history of repeated rapes (consent, or be thrown out on the street and suffer a worse fate pressure to have sex) but that's before the story begins. In the course of the story, people around her seem quite comfortable with the idea that she's been offered by her uncle as a sort of sex toy for an an insane old man, though she's still in her teens. They look at her disreputable past, and they figure it's OK. But she's become neither wicked nor promiscuous. To a large extent, she's retreated into a fantasy world which makes it easier for her to deal with her life.

So, off-stage stuff, and the consequences shown, though probably not as realistic as they should be.

What I've been doing in my present work (The Rune of Unmaking trilogy, written under the name Madeline Howard) is putting the characters through a lot of pain as a result of the arduous nature of the journey. There is a certain amount of combat, but nature is beating up on the characters as often as people are.

But in the final book of the series, I find I've put myself in a situation where I have to inflict significant and vicious harm (not sexual) on two of my male characters. This amount of cruelty is unusual for me. The characters are both male because they happen to be the ones whose story lines sort of backed me into a corner, and I realized it was going to have to happen. (Actually, the abuse of one of the characters started in the previous book, but it wasn't at all graphic.) I don't like doing it at all, which I hope means it's honestly inescapable and not gratuitous.

I do knock Francis Skelbrooke around a fair bit in Goblin Moon and the sequel, but the violence is brief, and a lot of his suffering happens when he's twice forced to go through withdrawal from a drug he's addicted to.

Colum, since this is a forum with members from all over the world, there are parts of the day when there tend to be long lulls in the discussion. It's frustrating for those of us who are awake and eager to converse when most members are asleep, but there's nothing to be done about that. There is a time when there are only a handful of Americans, Australians, and insomniac Brits (and the Australians are sneaking online at work), when it's very slow.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I think it's worth just saying - since it's been mentioned a couple of times(and thanks mouse and amw who've read the stuff dealing with the extensive fall out of bk 1) - that the scene in question happens off scene( I had it as a 3rd pov at one stage but chose to remove that and go for a more subtle reveal) and whilst there is other stuff on stage I have tried my best to make it about the effects not the cause, whilst also addressing that the reader has to know enough to know the effects are not based on a unrealistic level of stress vs the effects) it's not a slasher (I hope) but it won't be everyone's cup of tea, either.

 

[Anne Lyle]

But in the final book of the series, I find I've put myself in a situation where I have to inflict significant and vicious harm (not sexual) on two of my male characters.

Funny you should mention that. Before I started on the Night's Masque trilogy I always thought I'd never write a torture scene, because in general I don't like reading them, but my protagonist is a spy and torture was used frequently in the 16th century (albeit less often in England than on the Continent) so the topic is somewhat hard to avoid.

I hope it's not gratuitous - I only include it when it would be unrealistic not to - and I don't go into graphic detail. I think one of the most chilling things I've ever seen is Guy Fawkes' signature before and after his interrogation - the difference speaks volumes about the wretched, pain-racked state he was reduced to.

 

[HareBrain]

I think one of the most chilling things I've ever seen is Guy Fawkes' signature before and after his interrogation - the difference speaks volumes about the wretched, pain-racked state he was reduced to.

Good example. The suggested or hinted at can be far more horrific than the explicit, as well as being less likely to attract charges of being gratuitous or salacious.

 

[Anne Lyle]

What really sickens me is that people are making "art" of it:

http://www.myartprints.co.uk/a/englishschool-1/signatureofguyfawkes1570-.html

Just imagine if someone did the same with images from Gitmo...