I should have numbered the questions, so it would have been easier to refer to them.
Anyway, the first question: I don't think it's that simple. Some ships feel transgressive and some feel obvious, and whether it's a het, gay or poly ship is really irrelevant. It depends very much on the characters. Generally I like ships that feel a little transgressive, but not too transgressive. When I watch or read canon, I like the ships that immediately click for me, but have a bit of difficulties to overcome.
When I read fic, I like to be challenged and see something new, but for example power differential or enemy ships have to be very well-written not to squick me. Very generally speaking, het ships and f/f ships often feel more transgressive to me, because I often feel like the female characters aren't as real to me as the male characters, and because certain traditional het dynamics are very squicky or even triggering to me. There are certain fandoms where the female characters feel very real to me, and I enjoy shippy fic about them, and there are certain authors I trust to write female characters in a way that appeals to me - usually people who also write m/m slash fic.
When I look at vids or drawings, I'm more open to gen, het and f/f. Mostly I just enjoy the pretty, I don't emotionally engage the way I do with fic.
Gen has never felt transgressive to me, I just tend not to seek it out. I think a lot of gen fic doesn't have much of a plot, and that bores me. Also, an emotional pay-off is important to me, and sometimes gen fic doesn't have that.
Second question: I often check out fanworks for canons I don't like/don't follow. If I like the fandom enough, I might familiarize myself with canon. Other times, I love canon, but don't feel the need to explore fandom at all. I like the remixy/transformative aspect of fanworks, and canon knowledge is necessary to enjoy that, but there are many other aspects I also like. Sometimes, there's nothing better than finding recs for novel length fic in fandoms I'm totally unfamiliar with, and reading them as stand-alones. I also like to read recaps and reviews of art I haven't seen/heard. Meta can also often stand alone, and be interesting in itself. I don't understand vids if I haven't seen canon, and often not even then. I'm not at all interested in filk or play lists. Drawings can be pretty to look at even if I don't know the context, but I never seek them out, and tend to ignore them except for a few favorite artists, or to help me decide whether I want to read a long fic they're illustrating.
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Date: 2009-09-02 09:30 am (UTC)Anyway, the first question: I don't think it's that simple. Some ships feel transgressive and some feel obvious, and whether it's a het, gay or poly ship is really irrelevant. It depends very much on the characters. Generally I like ships that feel a little transgressive, but not too transgressive. When I watch or read canon, I like the ships that immediately click for me, but have a bit of difficulties to overcome.
When I read fic, I like to be challenged and see something new, but for example power differential or enemy ships have to be very well-written not to squick me. Very generally speaking, het ships and f/f ships often feel more transgressive to me, because I often feel like the female characters aren't as real to me as the male characters, and because certain traditional het dynamics are very squicky or even triggering to me. There are certain fandoms where the female characters feel very real to me, and I enjoy shippy fic about them, and there are certain authors I trust to write female characters in a way that appeals to me - usually people who also write m/m slash fic.
When I look at vids or drawings, I'm more open to gen, het and f/f. Mostly I just enjoy the pretty, I don't emotionally engage the way I do with fic.
Gen has never felt transgressive to me, I just tend not to seek it out. I think a lot of gen fic doesn't have much of a plot, and that bores me. Also, an emotional pay-off is important to me, and sometimes gen fic doesn't have that.
Second question: I often check out fanworks for canons I don't like/don't follow. If I like the fandom enough, I might familiarize myself with canon. Other times, I love canon, but don't feel the need to explore fandom at all. I like the remixy/transformative aspect of fanworks, and canon knowledge is necessary to enjoy that, but there are many other aspects I also like. Sometimes, there's nothing better than finding recs for novel length fic in fandoms I'm totally unfamiliar with, and reading them as stand-alones. I also like to read recaps and reviews of art I haven't seen/heard. Meta can also often stand alone, and be interesting in itself. I don't understand vids if I haven't seen canon, and often not even then. I'm not at all interested in filk or play lists. Drawings can be pretty to look at even if I don't know the context, but I never seek them out, and tend to ignore them except for a few favorite artists, or to help me decide whether I want to read a long fic they're illustrating.