Gen versus Het/Slash, my thoughts, let me show you them.

[wook77]

Moar thinky thoughts. So I posted what I consider a gen story here (minor spoilers for Star Trek XI). To me, the story isn't about a relationship or anything, it's about Leonard McCoy and what leads him into Starfleet.

It was listed as het with "Leonard McCoy/OFC" at a newsletter. I'm not saying that as a bad thing. It's cool, the newsletter can list it as whatever they want cause it's their newsletter. I can sort of see where they got it from but, IMHO, it's not het. It's gen.

Which brings me to my thinky thoughts. What makes you think a fic is gen versus het/slash? Does the appearance of any sort of relationship in a fic (whether the focus is on the relationship or not) make you think that it's het/slash? Or can it have a relationship in it but not focus primarily on that relationship and, thus, it's gen?

Example -

I write a story about Molly being married to Arthur Weasley.

Story A features the two of them having a romantic dinner. That's het, right?

Story B features the two of them taking care of Fred and George. That's gen, right?

But what about if, during Story B, I mention Arthur and Molly sharing a hug (in a "thank god we're not dead" sort of way)? Is that het or gen? They're still just parenting and that's the point of the story. But does the appearance of any sort of "sexual" contact make it het instead of gen?

To me, the second example is still gen. There might be a bit of contact between two parties but, in the end, the point of the story isn't a romantic angle, it's a story about two characters dealing with some non-romantic plot. Any sort of "sexual" contact between them is incidental, or just part of the flow.

IMHO, it's like this. Fandom is, for the most part, writing romance/erotica stories whether we label things het or slash. We are writing about characters having some sort of sexual relationship (whether it ever actually hits the sexual point or we do the fade to black). We are talking about either an emotional or physical connection. The story is about them, however many "thems" there are in the story. The primary focus is on the characters interactions with each other.

For Gen, we're writing about how characters deal with outside plot points, regardless of the presence of a romantic partner or not. The focus of the story is non-romantic, non-(sexual)emotional, non-erotic. It can feature a couple dealing with something outside but the focus isn't on the couple and their relationship.

So what are your thoughts?

Comments

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

My lines for gen are drawn differently for canon vs noncanon couples. A story where Molly and Arthur are parenting is gen, but the exact same plot only with Draco and Hermione would be het. (Though I would definitely call a romantic Arthur/Molly fic het as well.)

[reddwarfer.livejournal.com]

Actually, that's a very good point.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

So to put it without the parenting thing - the story is about working in the ministry. Story mentions Arthur and Molly being together but point is that Arthur works at the Ministry - gen?

But if the same story (about Draco working at the ministry but mentions Draco and Hermione together), it's het? Even if it's the same scenario?

Just trying to wrap my head around it, is all.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Yes. To me, non-canon pairings can't be gen.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Also, my lines for OCs are different to non-canon pairings, too. If a story mentions Draco with a random wife (say it was written before book 7 and thus we don't know his wife's canonical name), I would not necessarily think of it as het.

It's hard to explain why non-canon pairings ping me that way, but it's mainly to do with the fact that it seems to be asking me to do the shipping/backstory myself, even if it's not in the story. Draco with a random OC wife is not loaded the way Draco/Hermione is. Draco/Hermione cannot just be a random mention, because suddenly I'm wondering how the hell they got together, even if the point of the story is not their relationship at all.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

That makes complete sense. You do have to fill in the blanks when it's a character you know (especially one where there is no basis for a relationship like Draco/Hermione).

So what about a, say, Draco/Pansy story? I know I'm splitting hairs here but I'm just really curious about this. So Draco/Pansy sort of has a basis in book canon but the interview canon says "no way, jose".

God, I'm really splitting hairs, sorry :(.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Hmm, a Draco/Pansy fic would not ping me as odd, because they were canonically dating, and I don't expect everyone to know interview canon or to hold to it (I don't consider interviews as solid canon as the books myself, though personally the fact that the mention of Draco in the epilogue was with a nameless wife made me assume it wasn't Pansy or someone else we know).

Anyway! It's complicated. XD And I don't really go around thinking of fics as het/slash/gen when I'm reading them, so it's not really something that comes up except in meta.

[reddwarfer.livejournal.com]

It's gen whenever the relationships are the point of a story. Like...if a couple is in a story and say kiss goodbye (he kissed him goodbye) but the point of the story was the changing political power, I'd say gen.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's what I'd say. The contact is incidental, not the focus. The above point is very interesting about needing to do the shipping yourself, though. Makes me think more, which is a good thing :D.

I'm so jealous of your kotor icons. I lost mine when my account reverted after Strikethrough. Now I need to get them back :(

[midnight-birth.livejournal.com]

I consider stories pairing-oriented when the story focuses on a pairing. If a story focuses on character and character study etc and mentions a relationship, it's gen. If I`m writing about Draco, his childhood, his journey through Hogwarts etc., and he just happens to be with Harry, it does not automatically make it Harry/Draco to me. To me, it's Draco gen with (slight/heavy) mention of Draco/Harry.

So really, to me, gen/het/slash is what classifies the story. If someone asked me what the story was about and my first answer would be Draco and his life (which may or may not include a relationship), then it's gen. If it's Draco and Harry and some aspect of their relationship, it would be slash, pairing specific.

For your examples. I could list both as het if they explore a part of their relationship. It can be easily done through parenthood (lots of pairing-oriented fics are kid fics). But if the story has a more general feel to it, I would put Weasley gen. It's really how you spin it. You can take one synopsis and spin it two different ways.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

That's the way that I'm leaning though Kyuu makes an interesting point about the canon versus non-canon pairings and having to build up the ship itself in your head.

I don't get what you're saying about the examples both exploring the relationship betwen arthur and molly. One is about them as a relationship and the other is about their kids and the reactions ot their kids.

[midnight-birth.livejournal.com]

I don't really agree with the person above. As I said, gen/het is the classification of the story. An included pairing, especially if mentioned in passing, canon or non-canon, doesn't decide that. If you post a fic on a Draco/Hermione community, say, and talk for 9,000 words about Draco and his whole life and the include in the last paragraph that he married Hermione and lived happily ever after, I think the people who are there to read the Draco/Hermione would be sourly disappointed, and rather believe it was mis-categorized, even if the ship is not canon. Nothing we write in fan fic is part of canon, technically, so just because the pairing was not in canon does not mean it can't be gen.

Oh, I just meant that I think parenting fics can be both gen and pairing-specific depending on the way you write it. If you write Molly and Arthur taking care of the children, learning to function as a family with more units, and put the emphasis on the two of them more than the kids, then I would say it's more an Arthur/Molly. But if it's all about the kids and what they do and their childhood, but Molly and Arthur also there filling in the parental role, then yeah, it's gen. I don't know if that makes sense. :P

But yeah. That's what I think

[vanseedee.livejournal.com]

I personally find the labels 'het', 'slash' and 'gen' that are normally used in fandom not sufficient. I'd love it if stories would be labeled according to the genre, like 'humour', 'romance' or 'horror'... whatever. It's probably because most stories in fandom are romance stories, and as such, 'het' or 'slash' is appropriate; everything else, though, just falls under the table.

If you have a 30,000 words long plotty suspense story that happens to feature a pairing as well, then it's labeled as 'het' or 'slash', even though that's not really the point. But calling it 'gen' wouldn't be appropriate either.

So I'm not sure what exactly I'm saying. Probably that I agree with you; a story with a pairing doesn't necessarily have to be 'het' or 'slash' (not even if there's explicit sex) unless the pairing is the focus. I'd go a step further, though, and say that to me, those three choices aren't genres unless we're talking solely about romance stories.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

I agree totally. I sort of wish we were a bit more like a bookstore, at times - with the "mystery" or "romance" or "romantic mystery" sorts of labels. Sometimes, I really do not feel like a romcom, yanno?

I agree with you but to a point. I think, in the end, the vast majority of stories are romance. A lot of professional mystery books are really romance that feature mystery.

This is a debate that's happened on dearauthor and smartbitches before and it's interesting to apply it to fanfiction, too. I think that it's a completely valid discussion because, in the end, there are some awesome fanfiction that deserves to be published (if only using original characters, instead).

[vanseedee.livejournal.com]

I think that every good story deals with relationships. I cannot think of even one book or fanfic I've ever read, no matter how long or how short, that has ever broken that rule. Some of these relationships are romantic, some are about family, some about friendship, some about the relationship one has to oneself, some stories are about all of those.

It's perfectly valid to describe these relationships within a story with the labels 'het', 'slash', 'gen'. Although it does get difficult if you have more than one important relationship. What if you describe a conflict between mother and son that exists because he's having a m/m relationship she doesn't approve of. Personally I'd say it's gen, but without a doubt slash is in there as well.

So I agree that most stories contain romance, as romance is just a big part of our lives. Most stories also contain friendship, and I'd love to have a label for that as well, because that's one of my favourite kind of stories. Unfortunately people would look at me with raised eyebrows if I started to label fic with 'fri'. (Not that I'm not used to that, but... I digress).

I'd just like to have more genre labels - exactly those bookstore infos - because sometimes I just think a mere relationship label doesn't do a story justice. (And just maybe I'm a bit biased because I just finished a story that I don't want to label 'slash' even though it is...)

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Oh man, I agree with you on the bookstore labelling. I doubt fandom will follow but oh man, that would be lovely.

I agree completely on the relationship things, too. Even the most hardcore sci-fi stuff still has relationships in them.

[kaalee.livejournal.com]

I agree with this comment quite a bit. :)

A couple of years ago there was an interesting discussion about what constitutes "gen" fic (and whether or not it can include sex) over in the triatha_ron community. The link is here. I'd try to reiterate my thoughts, but they are sort of messy and inchoate. Suffice it to say -- I think the way fandom *is* isn't necessarily the best or smartest way of labeling fic, but because so much of it is ship fic, the majority of labels just fall into ship fic (het or slash or both) or non ship fic (gen). So because "gen" fic is the sort of catch all to label whatever is not ship fic, I think there's the assumption that therefore there isn't or shouldn't be any sex or pairing or whathaveyou.

Blah. I ramble. Anyway, some very interesting points in the link I mentioned. From people that can clearly articulate their thoughts, unlike me. :P

♥

[vanseedee.livejournal.com]

I just read your comment in the old discussion and I agree so hard with it. I'm not even that bothered by those three labels, because in the end, no matter how you label a fic, there's always those who won't fit into the categories. I just sometimes think that fandom limits itself by sorting fic according to sexual orientation and non-orientation, if that makes sense.

It's like sorting my friends into straight, gay and asexual (I'm not forgetting or worse ignoring other forms of sexuality, I'm just trying to apply a metaphor with a big hammer). Even though these labels aren't technically wrong, it's rarely what defines them.

[kaalee.livejournal.com]

I think your last point is a good comparison. Sometimes it's the extreme example that sheds light on something a little more complex.

because in the end, no matter how you label a fic, there's always those who won't fit into the categories...

Yes!

You know, and even thinking further about this -- I'm quite guilty of labeling stories with a pairing, even though I don't necessarily think of it that way, because I know that people might be more likely to read AND that if I don't mention the pairing and were to label it as "adventure, friendship" (even if there are sexual overtones and contact), I don't want people to be upset that I didn't warn for it.

This is bringing me to a whole other bunch of thinky thoughts about "warnings" on fic and why they exist or that people think they need to exist. Except, of course, I have to run or else I'll be late for work...

[alznthlay.livejournal.com]

Gen to me is where the relationships in the story isn't the point of the story.

I've read fic where the author has listed a pairing such as "Male/male" but it's come across as a possible pre-slash, and can even be read as a friendship fic because the development of the relationship between the two characters hasn't been the plot of the fic. And that, is what I consider to be 'gen'.

I think with canon pairings it becomes a little trickier, but again, for my own personal tastes I usually chuck in canon pairings as gen unless the story is once again, about their relationship and then it'll go to het/slash/whatevs

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Yah - exactly! I get the labelling it as "slash" so that people won't just wander into a story featuring a homosexual couple even if I don't agree with it.

I agree wholeheartedly with you on the position for everything :D

[spacefragments.livejournal.com]

i've heard of the term genslash and i guess that's used for a gen fic with slash undertones (but where the relationship isn't the main point of the story), but i don't know if there's somethng like that for het.


to be honest if i see a story and it sayd "gen with hints of pairing x" most of the time i will treat it as het or slash. *shrug*

[shygryf.livejournal.com]

i think they put it into het because it had a swear word in the title and they may or may not have had time to read it.

IK also think gen is such a weird label. Personally if the relationship is the focus of the story then it isn't gen, but otherwise it is.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Yeah, idk. In that case, they should adhere to the header. A header is there for a reason and each newsletter requires certain pieces of information. So in that case, I'm not all that happy with it.

I agree with the relationship vs het thing though :D

[titti]

From an editor's pov, the moment there's a pairing listed it's het/slash depending on the gender, now question asked, mostly because I don't read all the fics I list, so I have to draw the line somewhere and usually go with whatever the author wants. If it's listed as gen, it's gen. If it's listed with a pairing, it's not gen, no matter what the subject matter is.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

I can only speak about this case (as it's the only time it's happened to me) but in this case, it was listed as McCoy gen and put into het with OFC listed.

I agree with you - I'm the same way with newsletter editing - if the header says it is, it is.

[titti]

I went back and checked the editions and I've already sent an email to the editing team so hopefully it won't happen again, because I agree with you 100%. Author intent is what goes into a newsletter. To their defense, most of them are new to this. LOL

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Oh dude. So totally not my intent, yanno? Their newsletter, their choice. they're doing something awesome that I don't wnat to so I appreciate all the work that goes into that cause, damn, those are some HUGE editions.

I appreciate it all the same but I really didn't want to be the squeaky wheel. It's more that it makes me wonder about our own labelling of stories and how we look at things. This fandom, Star Trek (that is), has made me think more than HP ever did. IDK that that's a good thing at all *winks*.

[titti]

No, I know it wasn't, but I've been running newsletters for too long not to know how easily wank can arrive, and while I know you won't, I don't know who the next person who has a problem with it will be, and I've dealt with enough wank without starting in ST as well. LOL

I have to admit for a moment, I had to check that I hadn't made the mistake since I'm not used to listing fics in daily editions.

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

I think of gen as a story that's not based on a pairing, even if there are incidental pairings within the story.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

I agree :D

<3

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

Well, you know what they say. *points to icon* <3

[gala-apples.livejournal.com]

for me this is something as slippery as rating something. in my other journal which acts just as a fic placement, i have things labelled as "smuttier" "less smutty" and "character study" because i have a lot of trouble figuring out when exactly r crosses to nc17.

and on my system i can also feel perfectly legit labelling something that has john fucking a lot of girls because the mutant gene passes through the father and he's trying to change the world "character study" because even though it's got the smut, it's more about why john does it.

i'm not sure this is helpful, seeing as i haven't actually used the terms het, slash, or gen. but it's just my two cents.

[wook77.livejournal.com]

For me, I read this once and it made sense so I've used it since. If there's penetration, it's an automatic 'r'. If the author discusses the come, it turns into nc-17. So if you just say "and then they came", it's R. But if you say "and then Kirk exploded all over McCoy, leaving trails everywhere", then it's NC-17.

And ooh, that's an interesting take. Cause, IDK how I'd label that at all. You're making me think and I like it *leers*.

Definitely helpful!

[cornmouse.livejournal.com]

Someone made this point in another comment that got me thinking:

Gen to me is where the relationships in the story isn't the point of the story.

I agree to a certain extent, but I'm in the Merlin fandom and some of our gen fiction can get pretty slashy. In the author's defense, the show is pretty slashy and LOADED with subtext, so technically they're not really working outside the realm of canon. Yet, despite this, these gen stories would be considered borderline slash in a different fandom (such as Potter). The reason I bring this up is because I wonder if labeling those stories as gen is fair to readers who don't like slash. There's a joke in our fandom that there have been a few times where either Arthur or Merlin almost break down and invent CPR simply to satisfy their burning need to make out. Yet, because I'm a slasher, I pick up on that an LOL. To someone who's not a slasher, they wouldn't notice or pick those things up. With these gen stories, the writing is more overt without actually crossing a line into a technical pairing, but even though they're gen, should they be labled as pre-slash?

Which brings me to a different, but related point. Should subtexty stories be labeled pre-slash? They're not. They're gen with subtext, but for non-slash fans, should they be warned? Ugh. I don't know. I'm just sorta rambling at this point.

[alznthlay.livejournal.com]

I was thinking about Merlin fandom actually when I commented before, and maybe in regards to the gen/het/slash label it also depends on the fandom too?

As a slasher, I'd label any story as 'gen' that doesn't get any 'slashier' than the show...if that makes sense (because I honestly don't know how non-slashy minded people can watch that show without thinking "omg slash/femslash", especially when the writers are aware of the slashy undertones).

I mean, coming from Supernatural fandom where we've got incest as one of the main ships, if you throw in that kissing or hugging or saying 'I love you' is a trigger of it being a non-gen fic, well you'd get confused. You understand that they're brothers so you assume that if the fic has "slash" written with the title, you're going to be expecting a story involving an incesty relationship between the two brothers.

So I think the guidelines of having a story listed as slash or het or gen comes down to the fandom as well. Because even if they're a non-slasher, if they've been in the (Merlin) fandom I'd think they'd understand if their Gen was coming across as slashy, because the show comes across that way.


*coughs*
Uhm, totally don't mind me.

[cornmouse.livejournal.com]

Rereading your comment, I can totally see where you were talking about Merlin, now.

As a slasher, I'd label any story as 'gen' that doesn't get any 'slashier' than the show.

As would I, however, I am still mildly curious about those who don't read slash. That's why I raised the question of whether some fics should be labeled 'pre-slash'. Made of Wood, Evidently Stupid was labled as Merlin/Arthur, but I would categorize that fic as purely gen. There weren't even many slashy undertones of it (or, any more than the show itself), yet, that same author wrote another fic about Uther (it was a 5 paragraph observation fic) that was labeled as gen and seemed way more slashy than Made of Wood.

Ultimately, as Wook and Titti have already said, the label is up to the author. You made a really good point about the label of 'gen' etc being fandom sensitive. What flies as gen in Merlin would never fly as Gen in Harry Potter. Though, that goes back to the point of canon vs non-canon writing. Lines get blurred so easily, which is why your fandom specific labeling is so important.

[alznthlay.livejournal.com]

Lines do get blurred easily, and I really wish there was something we could do about it, maybe better summaries or insist on adding more clarification in the 'AN' section or something?

It's funny just in reading this discussion, I came across a HP fic only just last night labelled Remus/Draco, and curious how this pairing would work I gave it a shot. With a "Remus/Draco" label I assumed it would be a somewhat romantic fic and was totally disturbed at how the fic was nothing like what I assumed it would be. It wasn't non-con and the part where Draco and Remus did the nasty wasn't even IN the fic, but for me personally I wouldn't have classified it as a Remus/Draco fic.... I would've labelled it as, "Fic where Draco seems to want to have sex with Snape and Lupin, without actually wanting to have sex with either Snape or Lupin".

So yeah, I guess another question should be, does the label need to include random sex that happens, or does there need to be a relationship involved for it to be labelled? (Do you list it as slash if there's a rape between m/m but the story is het because it's about m/f?)
How picky does the reader want the label to be? (Sometimes I feel that an author wants a little bit of mystery, so it's hard trying to warn the reader what they're in for without giving the entire story away).


Sorry wook77 for just, leaking my brain in your LJ.

[sugareey.livejournal.com]

I think it really depends on what's canon and what's fanon. If you go from there, it's easier to decipher what is gen and what is het/slash. At least for me, if the story is really about what is going on a character's life, whether they have a girlfriend/boyfriend, or family issues and stuff, and if it's all about how they can get through it, it can be gen. Them coping with feelings, trying to figure out what to do next it a rather nasty situation, gen.

So with your fic, I can see how it would be labeled at het, because of the interaction with the girl. I can definitely see the gen too, because Leonard is thinking about exactly what he just did to get onto Starfleet. Not sure where the fine line is, but I'm not sure if there really is one.

Like with slash/het, if the relationship is the main point of the story, whether it's sexual or love, then that's that. It's clear.

I suppose the definition of gen has really greyed out since it can be a lot of things.

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

Actually, I'm at a point in my life where there is no GEN in my brain. But that may be because I'm list keeper of stories posted to ASCEM and there are "single" fics or pairing fics, and pairings are slash, het or femslash.

Gen is almost always het and that annoys me. It's the category of "we write het and it's not slash because we so not do it". It's hetero-normative.

And woah, I didn't think about that for a long time and I really dislike the GEN tag by now. It has a whole world of traditional family values and Disney adventure stuff behind it.

Uh. Guess my queerness shows here...

[wook77.livejournal.com]

I can see your point. There was this great discussion a few years ago in HP fandom about "where is all the slash gen" or gen with slash pairings. And I agree with you that we (meaning fandom) tend to warn for slash and, in a way, it's like we're agreeing with the homophobes that homosexual relationships are something that has to be warned for. I totes don't agree with that.

I'd like to think that a fic where McCoy and Kirk are in a relationship, and that it's mentioned offhand, can still be gen and that the relationship wouldn't have to be warned for.

I'm not a big believer in warnings, though, so that might be skewing my views. I'm also not a big believer in playing to the heteronormative group. Relationships are relationships, yanno?

I do like a warning as to the pairing that I'm going into because there are certain characters in certain fandoms that squick me (like Ron Weasley and Severus Snape. I just can't do either of them in a sexual relationship).

I don't get the tendency to warn for slash but not for het, either. It just irks me something fierce.

Long babble to say - I agree with you on the heteronormative tendencies of fandom and the way that we, as slash fans, tend to go along with that.

Your queer might be showing but it's a lovely thing :D