A pirate, a sociopath and a king walk into a bar ...

[linndechir]

I spent the entire day yesterday figuring out the assignments for the fic and art exchange on got_exchange. Why did I think this was a good idea again? No, to be fair, I really enjoy this whole mod business, it's fun. I just didn't expect 30 participants. Most assignments were really easy because many people like the same characters and pairings anyway, but in the end I was left with a handful of weirdos (including myself), who instead of shipping Jaime/Brienne and Robb/Jon like everyone else wanted fic about the Greyjoys, the Boltons and Stannis. I mentioned to outboxed that it sounds like the beginning of a really weird joke: "A pirate, a sociopath and a king walk into a bar ..." We couldn't find a punchline, though. The joke would probably end with everyone dead anyway.
But it's done now, everyone has their assignments. And so far I haven't had any angry "are you out of your mind, giving me these shit prompts?" mails yet.

Anyway, today, instead of focusing on the prompt I have to write like a good girl, I finally thought a bit about writing some Stannis/Sansa. Spreading the love for my insane pairings and all. But not only would I have to write het (which is, in itself, really hilarious because I usually don't like het and I've never written any in my life), but I realised that I would have to write het from the point of view of a 13-year-old virgin. JUST HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO DO THAT??? Or rather, how am I supposed not to laugh hysterically when Sansa thinks about his "manhood"? Really? I mean, the scene is supposed to be utterly awkward and weird, but I still don't want to laugh madly while writing it. And I do want to write from Sansa's POV. Omniscient POV wouldn't work, I think, and Stannis' POV ... I'm afraid it would make him look a bit emo, tbh. That man has so many issues, especially when marrying a gorgeous young girl, I'd probably just end up with several pages of self-loathing.

I have no idea what to do about this. Manhood. Who even invented that word? It's so ridiculous.

Comments

[viceindustrious.livejournal.com]

I was going to check the books out but I was worried if I didn't like them it would put me off the show, I actually can't remember if it was this series of the Wheel of Time series, but someone was saying something about, there's a lot of rape, or, misogynistic kind of stuff, and sexism in fantasy books is like RAMPANT and everywhere but it still bums me out.

Ahaha, you know I was watching this show with my mum and she rolls her eyes at HBOs inability not to have gratuitous lesbian scenes all over the place (and it was kind of silly at points) oh but she had no problem at all with Loras and Renly's whole thing. Even though it really bugged me that he left that armpit unshaved! I hope he went back and evened that out later. Keep your head in the game, Loras, geez.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

You can just start reading the books and stop if you dislike them.
Well, there definitely IS a lot of rape and characters treating women like shit (and characters treating men like shit, too, mind you), but that's because GRRM writes about a misogynistic world. I actually prefer that to fantasy worlds in which the heroine is so awesome that all the men accept her even though they usually think women should just stay at home. But I don't think GRRM's writing as such is all that sexist. Fact is, he writes some of the most epic female characters I've ever seen in any genre, and I'm saying that as someone who usually dislikes female characters because they're so badly written most of the time. There's this one quote by Sandor Clegane that, in my opinion, really applies well to all of ASOIAF: "I'm not awful, I'm honest. It's the world that's awful." So, yes, GRRM writes about an awful world. If that bothers you, you probably won't like the books.

God, that gratuitous lesbian scene was probably the unsexiest, most off-putting thing I've ever seen in my life. I almost skipped it. DNW. I'm okay with sex scenes if we see characters having sex with each other, but if we just have random people being naked in the background while something more interesting is going on?
I'm sure Loras shaved the second armpit later. The blowjob was just necessary for his whole "you would be a wonderful king" speech, and he couldn't think of more things to say while shaving the second armpit.

[viceindustrious.livejournal.com]

Why do so many fantasy writers feel like they have to write about a misogynistic world. Seems so . . . unimaginative. Like if they stray from medieval/feudal realism in this one aspect they will be so lost and bereft but dragons? Tsch, no problem. It is easier, I suppose and lots of fantasy is written by men and lots of men probably think, eh why bother creating a more complicated world with less misogyny when they don't have much to gain by doing that.

The lesbian scene was not as nonplussing as the naked exposition scene where that old dude was explaining the trouble with kings and naked mcnaked lady was just standing around and posing and being naked because I guess they think we'd get bored otherwise.

That scene made me REALLY worried for Renly though, because it seems that whenever a lover tries to prod their partner into getting more power it all goes horribly, horribly wrong.

[viceindustrious.livejournal.com]

Except, you can do great things with a misogynistic world, of course, which might be what ASOIAF is like, and I will have to check it out and judge it on it's own merits. etc. etc. :]

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

You know, I feel like most writers don't actually write about a misogynistic world. They state that the world is misogynistic, that there are certain gender roles, and then they go on to ignore that completely: either because there are no important female characters, or because the female characters are heroines who are just so beautiful and awesome that everyone accepts that they defy society's idea of what a woman should do.
So I really love that instead of either ignoring that problematic, or inventing a world in which there are NO predefined gender roles (boring), GRRM really thinks about what living in a world like that means, for the women and for the men (--> Sam, who is nothing like what a man SHOULD be in that world, i.e. a strong, brave warrior and all that). That's probably why I'm fine with all the rape scenes, all the insults and humiliations, because I prefer that to fantasy authors who just ignore that completely.

Those two scenes are both annoying, but with the naked girl I could just ignore her and listen to the guy. The lesbian scene included such loud fake moaning that even not looking didn't help.

I will not comment on the fate of any of the characters, if you haven't read the books yet. I think Ned's death at the end of season 1 has shown that people can die in this series, so I'm not going to run around dropping hints about who might die or not die.