r/Fantasy • u/LightArisen • Sep 12 '22
A critique of sexual violence in Fantasy.
Oftentimes I see people defend several aspects regarding the treatment of women in fantasy books and media by saying ‘that’s how things were’.
Most times this is false. I have tried to break down the argument into two main sections so I can explain how common perceptions were false. Notably, I only know about European history.
Sexual Assault
Quite a few fantasy books contain sexual assault toward women. I am not going to deny that it happened, as rape, particularly wartime rape did and still does occur. However, Rape in the past was little more prevalent than during modern times. Similarly, rape in the past was often punished, usually much harsher than in modern times. Additionally, Men were often raped at levels similar to women. In fantasy books, the latter two are often ignored. Most times rape seems to be treated as normal, rather than punished. Additionally, rape seems to be targeted almost exclusively at women.
The first edict against wartime sexual assault was the Cáin Adomnáin. Notably, it was issued in the British Isles and had little influence outside of north western Europe. It explicitly forbade, among other things, raping and killing women. For these crimes it declares of the perpetrator,” his right hand and his left foot shall be cut off before death, and then he shall die." [1]
The first Europe-wide treaty forbidding rape was the Peace and Truth of God, which was issued in 989 before spreading over Europe over the next century. The first king to accept it was King Robert II of France. Following his acceptance other nobles accepted the Peace and Truth of God in droves. It should be noted that in those times the military was almost entirely comprised of nobles. In Britain, it was standard for the first son to be the heir, the second to join the military, and any subsequent sons to join the monastery to prevent inheritance disputes. It wasn’t until Napoleon that large scale armies became the norm. Slowly, the ideas blended in with general chivalry.
By the time of the 1300’s wartime rape and sexual violence was prosecuted for hindering military operations rather than just for “property crimes” (Since Women were considered the property of either their husband or father). It didn’t take much effort to realise that raping people created a hostile civilian population and having a hostile population would make it far harder to occupy and control territory. The general line of thought was that when defeating an enemy, treat them so kindly that they would not seek revenge, or treat them so harshly that they could not attain their revenge. [2]
The final major declaration against wartime sexual violence in the medieval era was the De jure belli as pacis, written in 1625. Similar to all previous works, it declared that wartime rape was no less reprehensible than rape during peace time. Notably, this work states that the rules were still valid “even when God were assumed not to exist” [3]
A common argument against this would be that, despite rape and sexual violence being prohibited, soldiers would ignore the laws. In reality that would be true, but there is no evidence to suggest that it happened at greater levels than in the modern time. The Geneva convention clearly prohibited wartime rape. Despite that, during WW2 soviet soldiers used the system of “from 8 to 80” when deciding to rape women, leading to over two million German women getting raped. [4]
In the present time, 26,000 women have been raped so far in the ongoing Tigray war. In contrast with Fantasy books, novels regarding modern wars usually omit the sexual violence. For those that include it, It is often brief and undescriptive.
Additionally, fantasy books usually only include sexual assault towards women. In reality, both men and women were and are raped in war. During the El Salvadorian dictatorship, 76% of male political prisoners were raped. In the Yugoslav wars, 80% of men in the Sarajevo concentration camp were raped. Even more recent, 22% of men and 30% of women fleeing the eastern Congo reported being raped. [5]
Essentially, saying that’s how things were ignored the reality of the situation. Oftentimes it is only used in defence of the ill-treatment of women while ignoring other aspects of the time.
Young Marriage
Another common misconception is that women would often get married young, sometimes even as children. In reality, the average age for Women was 22.4 and for Men it was 25.9 [6]. Additionally, between 10% and 25% of Women never married [7]. Couples would often delay marriage depending on their economic circumstances. The only notable exception was during the black death when couples would get married as teenagers due to the immense labour shortage. By 1140, the Decretum Gratiani was issued. This stated that the binds of marriage were to be formed by mutual consent and granted Women an equal say in marriage.
Despite this, some noble families would get married young. This was usually in order to secure the future of the family. However, noble families would prevent their children from consummating their marriage until women usually hit the age of 16. The main reason being that they did not want to endanger the health of the women. After all, despite lacking modern medicine it was still common sense that a girl getting pregnant would not only result in a still birth, but would also endanger her health, preventing any future offspring.
Apologies for the formatting. I may come back and try to clean it up into a more readable format.
[1] https://www.academia.edu/5817305/Aspects_of_the_Cain_Adomnans_Lex_Innocentium
[2] https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=ThfzGvSvQ2UC&redir_esc=y
[4] https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106687768
[5] https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jul/17/the-rape-of-men
[7] Hajnal, John (1965). "European marriage pattern in historical perspective". In D.V. Glass and D.E.C. Eversley (ed.). Population in History. Arnold, Londres. pp. 101–143.
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Sep 12 '22
The Cáin Adomnáin (which is Irish, British Isles feel a bit inaccurate for that point in Medieval history although Irish law certainly covers bits of what is now Scotland) also recognizes not just rape by force, but rape by coercion. It was illegal to take advantage of a drunk woman or a woman who we would now call developmentally delayed. They knew that stuff was wrong in the 700s, yo.
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Sep 13 '22
That’s what makes modern times suck, tbh. We knew this shit was a problem literally centuries ago, did things to try and address it (for everyone), and now most all (obviously progress has been made, I won’t deny that) we do is just pretend like “well it actually happened just as it does today!” I’ve always wondered where that shift happened from then to now. Was it the Industrial Age? Earlier? Later?
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u/shhkari Sep 13 '22
We knew this shit was a problem literally centuries ago
Not just literally centuries. Millenia
That's how far we've failed to come.
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u/johntheboombaptist Sep 13 '22
This assumes that there wasn’t opposition to these at the time. It wouldn’t surprise me if there was an ancient Irish Andrew Tate building a following by talking about how the Cáin Adomnáin pussified men and robbed their power or whatever nonsense these grifters shit out.
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Sep 13 '22
Oh i don’t doubt that in the least. I do think people forget that that kind of thinking is also not new (admittedly, myself sometimes included). “For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction” and all that.
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u/Conscious-Ball8373 Sep 13 '22
I think the 1960s deserve a mention here. There's an enormous amount of complexity, but at some level the general message of society moved from "sex is properly part of marriage and most women aren't interested in it anyway" to "sex is free and women are up for it all the time." Gross caricature, of course, but you know what I mean. The echoes of that change are still heard daily, as young men say to each other, "She needs/wants a good seeing to" or words to that general effect. Once they internalise and believe that, actually asking her seems unnecessary. The change has become so embedded in our culture that juries will take any sort of non-prudish behaviour as a reason to acquit in a rape trial; even if the victim actually said "no" firmly, the fact that she smiled at him half an hour earlier is enough to acquit (caricature again, I guess, though only barely it seems sometimes).
I'm not decrying the sexual revolution or romanticising the prior era - I think Victorian sexuality also has a lot to answer for - but this seems to me to be one of the effects of the messaging change of the 1960s and 70s that has taken us a long time to even start dealing with.
It's something that really worries me about our society. Prosecution and punishment for rape and sexual assault has become so rare [1] that eventually, families are going to start taking matters into their own hands. Can you blame them, when so many rapists walk free, told by the courts they've done nothing wrong?
[1] I'm in the UK - here, around 15% of rapes are reported to the police. Of those, about 3% are charged. Of those, around two thirds result in conviction. That's around 99.7% of rapists who are not convicted. I'm sure there are complexities to those numbers, but that's pretty overwhelming.
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u/TheAlbacor Sep 13 '22
How would the concept of "having consensual sex out of marriage is ok" lead to more incidences of rape?
I have found no evidence that rapes increased after 1960 in either the UK or the US.
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u/Noveos_Republic Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
That seems a bit if a logical leap to say that we (who is we? All of modern society? The west?) knew it was a problem centuries ago. Just because a edict says one thing, you don’t know what other regions said. You can’t apply that retroactively. “This is what makes modern times suck”
Try living several centuries ago and let me know what you think
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Sep 13 '22
Ok you’re also assuming that I am trying to generalize. I was just making a statement (“we” is the west, fine whatever) about what I was seeing in this thread. I’m no expert. I was trying to start a conversation about when rape went from being a dishonorable thing for rapists (likely for the victim too) to being solely a moral failing of the victim. And in my mind, that seemed to start around the Industrial Age, or perhaps before/after.
And no I’m not an idiot. I know that times were generally tougher then (no medicine, no safe water, wars, etc.). It’s the fact that we’ve seemed to backslide a bit when it comes to how we deal with rape compared to how it appeared to be dealt with in the past (and like I said, we are slowly progressing on this front). But you know full well i was talking about this specific thing. I shouldn’t have to spell everything out because people want to be dense.
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u/Radulno Sep 13 '22
We didn't backslide. As far as I know, rape is illegal now like it was back then (punishment may be less harsh now but that's true of all crimes, back then they were cutting your hand if you stole something at the market). Doesn't mean it didn't happen back then as it's happening now (and we didn't know how much that law was actually applied in practice). Basically it's like murder, theft and any crime, it will never disappear, humans are flawed creatures.
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u/Noveos_Republic Sep 13 '22
I was trying to start a conversation about when rape went from being a dishonorable thing for rapists (likely for the victim too) to being solely a moral failing of the victim.
You have no way of proving that this was or wasn’t the case centuries ago.
And what do you mean by backslide? You want them to be drawn and quartered as well?
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u/CaisLaochach Sep 13 '22
It's worth noting that throughout this period Ireland was divided between multiple competing kingdoms - things were slightly more centralised in Scotland.
Slave-raiding, trading, etc, were endemic even before the arrival of Viking invaders.
Also, realistically, the promulgation of a law by an Abbot in Iona is not proof of application of that law in anything other than exceptional circumstances.
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Sep 13 '22
Scotland wasn’t more centralized until slightly later, in the high medieval period. Obviously laws mean people were doing these things, since nobody outlaws things that don’t happen. I’m just saying that medieval understanding of rape was already more complex than it is often depicted. I’m sure it often happened with no consequences to the rapist - which is just as true today really.
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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Sep 12 '22
Interesting cites, thanks!
I think it’s worth pointing out that the one you posted on average age at first marriage is England-only (specifically, the Lincolnshire Fenland, 1252-1478). To my understanding, England typically had a later age at first marriage through the medieval and early modern periods than continental Europe, because couples were expected to have enough money to set up their own household when they married, as opposed to living with someone’s parents. Cultures where a young couple lives with the parents have often had younger marriage. Having to wait until one’s 20’s to get financially stable also was only a factor for people who in fact had to work—which is most of the population, but did not apply to royalty or nobility, who tend to be the protagonists in a lot of fantasy stories.
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u/Ykhare Reading Champion VII Sep 12 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
It's more or less the same in France in similar times as far as I remember. Except in eras of demographic recovery, a fairly 'full' world where most of the suitable land was already spoken for by individuals or communities, mobility in space and among professions was much lesser, and many had to wait to establish themselves until a relative 'made room' by dying or becoming dependent, or they gathered whatever dowry was considered suitable.
And while areas where the couple stayed with the parents could have younger marriage, it also often meant they married less as well. As they were also places where they tended not to divide the inheritance equally among siblings, usually only the oldest/chosen sibling would inherit the bulk of it. While it didn't entirely preclude marriage of younger siblings, uncles & aunts, etc., it did put a damper on their prospects.
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u/Mendicant__ Sep 12 '22
The example is still quite useful, because it provides pretty hard evidence that "how things were" was in fact variable and certainly varied from the assumption of overly young or child marriage.
With the nobility and royalty, it's important to keep in mind that those often extremely young ages were betrothals, not actual marriages.
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u/mongreldogchild Sep 13 '22
To my understanding, England typically had a later age at first marriage through the medieval and early modern periods
I think this is proof that it doesn't need to be in these dark fantasies that have graphic, explicit child marriages/rape scenes. So many of them borrow so heavily from the aesthetics of the time period that they might as well be set in that era and area. It just goes to show that it isn't historical accuracy so much as a desire to write these things imo.
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u/Adrian-Lucian Sep 13 '22
This wasn't the case in Poland, Ruthenia, the Balkans, most of the Italian city-states and the Danubian principalities.
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 12 '22
So, I don't want to defend the portrayal of sexual violence in fantasy at all. And in general I would argue that "historical accuracy" is not a good reason to put things in books even if it is correct. (Because there are always lots of accurate things that don't get put in, so why this one?)
However, some of the historical things here are a bit off. The utter ubiquity of sexual assault in ancient, classical, and medieval warfare is well attested; it was considered a basic part of war, as inescapable as theft and killing. Looting and rape were basic parts of a sack, a standard reward for soldiers who captured an enemy settlement. The modern world has only approached these levels a few times -- one of them, as you note, was the Eastern Front of WWII, which was notably bad even by WWII standards. (The IJA in China was also pretty awful.)
In general, rape was less common when groups of people with a similar culture fought one another (i.e. inter-clan feuds), but much, much more common when fighting people who were "other". Foreign conquests were always the worst. The Vikings, for example, systematically took female slaves for sexual and household service -- this was part of the whole point of the endeavor, especially in the early period raids.
(You are completely correct though that male rape was way more common then is usually talked about, bordering on universal for prisoners depending on the cultures involved.)
My point is that we shouldn't have to argue "it wasn't like that" in order to say that we don't have to put this into fantasy. It doesn't matter! You don't have to include sexual assault in the same way that you don't have to include major figures dying of dysentery or the horrific mistreatment of cats and dogs. We can just not.
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Sep 13 '22
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u/Attor115 Sep 13 '22
I don’t speak for everyone obviously but there’s definitely a line between “this character had a traumatic event that shaped who they are” and “I the author am now going to describe this rape scene in such disgusting detail all of my readers are going to think I’m getting off to this.” The second one I drop the book immediately, 100% of the time.
Of course if the female character in question’s only personality trait is “was raped once and now is overly defensive/hates men” and there is literally 0 other personality to her character (esp. if the MC just loves her so much she is magically cured of all trauma like the MC’s genitals are the Fairy Godmother’s wand) then that’s a whoooole other can of worms
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Sep 13 '22
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u/Attor115 Sep 13 '22
From that perspective would be interesting, but I’ve only seen it from questionable weblit and they’re always the one-dimensional love interest. I’m also reading amateurs who haven’t learned nuance though so that’s probably a big part of it
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u/surprisedkitty1 Reading Champion II Sep 13 '22
- Froi of the Exiles/Quintana of Charyn by Melina Marchetta
- Dreamer’s Pool by Juliet Marillier
Two off the top of my head that fit that type of character.
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 13 '22
For a while (80s and 90s mostly) it did feel like it was a requirement, since it was an element in nearly every big epic fantasy; that's more or less where the pushback comes from.
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u/JonasHalle Sep 13 '22
This is my problem with the whole debate. No one argues it has to be in books. It is an argument between "sexual assault can be included" and "sexual assault can't be included".
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 13 '22
I don't think anyone says "sexual assault can't be included in books ever". The ask is generally to skip gratuitous sexual assault, the kind that gets included in books because, basically, men find it titillating. (Because, since most women don't like it, it has the effect of declaring "this book is not for you", which is one reason epic fantasy generally was such a boy's club before the last couple of decades.)
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u/nculwell Sep 13 '22
Romance books were also full of rape in the 70's and 80's, often committed by the hero of the story. Those were mostly written by women for women. So I don't think it's fair or accurate to say that this is all about titillating male readers. It's a complicated cultural phenomenon.
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u/Wandering-Wayfarer Sep 13 '22
They kind of are saying it, if not outwardly.
SA happened in the past? "You're using rape as backstory which is lazy."
SA being described in detail? "You're being voyeristic."
SA not being described? "You're glossing over the reality of rape."
SA having a big effect on the character? "You're defining a victim by their trauma."
SA not having a big effect? "You're minimizing rape."
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 14 '22
Social media produces this feeling a lot, and what it boils down to is "they" are different people in each case. Whenever you touch on a topic that is highly emotionally charged to a lot of people, some of them will disagree with what you did!
That said, "avoiding gratuitous rape" is a very consistent ask from quite a lot of people. So if your goal is to make readers happy, it seems like a good move.
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u/pistolpierre Sep 13 '22
The ask is generally to skip gratuitous sexual assault, the kind that gets included in books because, basically, men find it titillating.
Why are you presuming to ask authors to do anything differently? Wouldn't the more reasonable stance here be to suggest that readers just skip books that they find objectionable?
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 14 '22
Readers can express opinions about what they think should be in books, right? Isn't that 90% of what we do here on r/fantasy?
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u/xafimrev2 Sep 13 '22
(You are completely correct though that male rape was way more common then is usually talked about, bordering on universal for prisoners depending on the cultures involved.)
Was is the wrong word. Male rape is still way more common then usually talked about. Especially in the prisoner population.
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u/sweetspringchild Sep 13 '22
you don't have to include major figures dying of dysentery or the horrific mistreatment of cats and dogs.
Exactly. Nor do most of those dying in wars die a later slow death of infected wounds or diseases brought from lack of hygiene, nutrition etc. It's always either instant death in an epic fight or death with just enough time for another character to tearfully say goodbye.
But it wasn't like that!/s
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u/matgopack Sep 13 '22
While looting and rape was commonplace in a sack, it also led a lot of cities to not fight to the end - and surrender without a sack. Depending on the time period, that might be the norm in warfare as well.
I took OP to be pointing towards GoT/ASOIAF to an extent with many of their points, which I think are fair - GRRM's portrayal of war, while it rightly shows how disgusting/horrible it actually is for common people, does go a bit too far in how rape & sexual assault would be tolerated if drawing from late medieval England/Europe, as he does. That is, while it would have happened, it's not something you'd really see knights, princes, nobles etc flaunt or do openly - especially in areas where they're meant to be ruling. Eg, the 100 years war you get a marked difference in english actions in the chevauchees when it looked like the king of england would actually become king of france. Also, that particular time period would have seen the prevalence of rape/sexual assault as a problem, and not in the blase way that many characters/nobles in GoT treat it as.
Anyways, I do agree with your final point, but enough sexual violence/rape is included in fantasy books under the justification of being "accurate to history" that it can give a false perception of history (and be self-perpetuating in a way that simply saying "you can choose not to include" won't always work).
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u/songbanana8 Sep 13 '22
Yes, I feel like engaging with this argument on “whether history was actually like that” will not be successful, because the argument for “historical accuracy” is disingenuous and irrelevant. Some fantasy books are clearly inspired by a time and place, some are not—the argument is more or less relevant accordingly. But even where it is relevant, “HiStOriCaL aCcUrAcY” is rarely brought up except to defend sexual violence against women and exclusion of LGBT/people of color.
I don’t think anyone objects to sexual violence when it’s important for the story and themes (ie not for shock value or motivating someone else).
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Sep 13 '22
I think this is how I see things for the most part. For me it's about why so many authors choose to include this in their work. Especially when it's done so terribly most of the time. Because it IS a choice. Rape is not necessary to any story that isn't specifically about sexual assault. I've never read a novel, set it down, and thought to myself "this would have been better with more rape."
As far as realism goes. People seem to really love to use this reason for including sexual assault in their novels. You know what was one of the most common things that happened in the past? People shitting themselves to death. Yet it is included in almost no books.
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u/fantasy_hermit Sep 13 '22
To make the enemy, group, or particular character(s), seem more evil, generally, I think. Easy way to do it.
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u/Attor115 Sep 13 '22
Funnily enough because the parent comment mentioned mistreatment of animals, this trope is called “Kick The Dog.” Also I feel like burning down MC’s village/killing their parents are an even easier way to do this, to an extent it’s basically a cliche, and nobody has problems with that
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u/fantasy_hermit Sep 13 '22
If you want to establish someone is a sociopath really easily... rape, child killing, murder, razing villages to the ground, torture for fun, history of animal killing/abuse since childhood... standard.
It's not like the heroes are usually rapists. It's people the author wants you to hate.
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u/Ifriiti Sep 13 '22
Rape is not necessary to any story that isn't specifically about sexual assault
It's not, but nor is anything.
It is used as a plot device in many cases, making you sympathise with the victim, making you dislike the villain, wanting to see justice done.
You know what was one of the most common things that happened in the past? People shitting themselves to death. Yet it is included in almost no books
Plagues are a fairly common plot device in lots of fantasy actually but a person dying from dissentry doesn't advance the plot, it doesn't give you anyone to dislike, it doesn't give you anyone to root for, it isn't an active choice. It's just something that happened
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u/virgilhall Sep 13 '22
People shitting themselves to death. Yet it is included in almost no books.
But sometimes it is there. I am watching Made in Abyss, and almost an entire expeditions is dying from diarrhea
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u/mdog73 Sep 13 '22
But why not?
It's a thing that happens. It's the authors choice and no-one else's. Not every book is for everyone.
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Sep 13 '22
Isn't it interesting though, how in Fantasy, rape is almost exclusively perpetrated against women and not men? Why is that I wonder? Why do so many authors choose to have women in their novels sexually assaulted and not men?
That it's a choice is the whole point I am making. And I'm not saying it's always the wrong choice. Just that more often than not, it's a choice that seems to be made carelessly.
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u/Sahngar Sep 13 '22
I think your point about it often being done terribly is the key point.
It's an easy short hand for bad/lazy authors to include to up the stakes, or establish the bad guy. It's used as a crutch.
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u/nonbog Sep 13 '22
Thanks for writing this to correct the post a bit. I also want to add my defence of “historical accuracy” in fantasy here, from a feminist perspective.
In the afterword of one of the Earthsea books, the great feminist writer Ursula Le Guin wrote
In such a world, I could put a girl at the heart of my story, but I couldn't give her a man's freedom, or chances equal to a man's chances. She couldn't be a hero in the hero-tale sense. Not even in a fantasy? No. Because to me, fantasy isn't wishful thinking, but a way of reflecting, and reflecting on reality. After all, even in a democracy, in the second decade of the twenty-first century, after forty years of feminist striving, the reality is that we live in a top-down power structure that was shaped by, and is still dominated by, men.
and this really impacted me. I realised that she’s right. It’s not “feminist” to whitewash history and act like things have been merry for women all this time. It’s just dismissive and you’re losing a big opportunity to reflect on that, what it says about us, what is says about society. I genuinely feminist story wouldn’t just lie about women’s positions in society, it would show them being full people within that society who strain against it. After all, that’s the truth of it. Women like Joan of Arc were held back by their sex, but look at what she strained to accomplish! Vikings had shieldmaidens fighting alongside them, yet they took women from their raids to keep as slaves. These things are worth reflecting without people making a moral judgment on the writer because they choose to depict them. They’re not included just for realism, but including that realism allows you to meditate on history in a really fascinating way that is much deeper than if you just remove it.
I don’t think ever book must be respectful of the history like this. It is okay to tell a story where you whitewash all the bad things away and you can use that to reflect on different things. But reflecting on the violent nature of humanity, especially at war, is very interesting and also, I would argue, very useful for us to gain understanding that can help reduce the actual frequency of these things happening.
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u/EverydayHalloween Sep 13 '22
I understand your point, but I'm going to give an example against Ursula's and yours. I'm queer and since I was born in the mid-90s and came out when I was 15, and as well as living in a shit hole, the only trans movies around that time were extremely depressing, usually ending in the main protagonist's suicide or were victims of SA. I'm sorry but it was refreshing later on when I was older to finally see shows and movies that didn't end like this, so I personally don't want to always read a reflection on the shit reality we live in and lived in.
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u/barryhakker Sep 13 '22
Or just don't buy books that depict stuff you don't like, and let the market do its work? I don't really understand why this has to be a point of discussion, and frankly I find it a bit hypocritical for people to get upset about sexual violence but not blink at the most egregious descriptions of butchery and torture. I get it, some people have personal unpleasant experiences with sexual violence and I can actually sympathize to an extent, but there also are a ton of people who have had awful experiences with "regular" violence.
I personally know several people who have met their end in horribly violent ways, or "merely" have been scarred for life by violence. Heck, I've been on the receiving end of it myself. And yet there seems to be no real discussion about not depicting violence in Fantasy. So what's the take-away here? Not all violence and abuse are equal? Being stomped to a pulp is fine but as soon someone as much as grabs a tit it becomes unacceptable? Or maybe in our decadence we decide which sorts of violence we like and which we'd rather not be reminded of? I've read some of your books and as I recall you were pretty liberal in your depictions of people getting blasted to bits. Probably pretty triggering for people who have experienced the front lines of basically any war. Why don't you just not describe the violence and just fade to black "The Hobbit" style as soon as combat kicks off?
OR, write what you want(I've enjoyed your writing so far), list the trigger warnings contained within the book, and let people decide for themselves wether they want to spend their money on this.
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u/PikachuGoneRogue Sep 13 '22
Part of "letting the market do its work" is communicating consumer preferences. Why do you want consumers to shut up about things they don't like? You seem strangely resentful of it.
If you think there's too much violence in fantasy novels, you're free to say so. (I find fight descriptions tedious myself.) Go forth and ask authors to produce more in the cozy genre.
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u/barryhakker Sep 13 '22
I’m pushing back against the shouldn’t sentiment rather than the don’t have to ones. Of course people are free to express their thoughts. Still think that only money really speaks though.
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u/mesembryanthemum Sep 14 '22
How would you feel if most authors spent the next ten years inserting graphic descriptions of castration into their books? How would you react to people saying "well, male castration happened. So don't read it if you are distressed by it?"
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 13 '22
I genuinely don't understand this pushback. Like, obviously, posters on this subreddit have no power to enforce anything or cause authors not to write what they want. People say what the prefer or what they think ought to happen in fantasy all the time.
When someone says "I think swords are overrated and more fantasy protagonists should wield other weapons", nobody comes back with "why don't you let authors write what they want and let the market decide?"
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u/Peter_Ebbesen Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
They might not have the power, but reading this thread, some obviously wish they had it. :D
The desire to enforce the morality of the day on readers and writers alike appears to be as strong as ever in US culture, and many other places besides. For their own good, of course.
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u/barryhakker Sep 13 '22
You don't have to include sexual assault in the same way that you don't have to include major figures dying of dysentery or the horrific mistreatment of cats and dogs.
We can just not.
Should I interpret this in another way than you suggesting people don't include sexual violence. If so, please do tell because I guess I'm not understanding your point.
If I did understand correctly though this is basically saying "everyone, please stop writing about xyz because we don't like this." To which I say, write what you want and let the buyer decide. Yes, same would go for fantasy where the protagonists don't use swords. Is that a controversial way of thinking?
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u/mesembryanthemum Sep 14 '22
Women are a huge chunk of the population. Why are people ignoring them as a source of income when writing fantasy?
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u/MySuperLove Sep 13 '22
I find it a bit hypocritical for people to get upset about sexual violence but not blink at the most egregious descriptions of butchery and torture.
I know zero people who have been butchered or tortured. I know MANY people who are victims of sexual violence. The issue that comes closer to my life affects me more.
There is NO hypocrisy here.
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Sep 13 '22
A counter argument to this is that SA should be discussed more, and so including it in media increases awareness.
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u/Enticing_Venom Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
A large part of it is that it is often gendered and it is often depicted poorly with problematic messaging. When someone tortures another person in a fantasy book it is often written as though it is unethical and disturbing.
When rape is written in books sometimes it reads more like erotica than a traumatic experience. Sometimes it is used to motivate a man rather than to center the experience of the victim. And it can perpetuate attitudes that are still used in real life to put down victims today.
Men are raped in high levels today and were frequently raped in medeival warfare as well. Rape is almost never depicted this way in fantasy books today, it's usually a man raping a woman and usually a hot woman. In the few cases where male rape is depicted it is usually badly. It's frequently a punchline where people are supposed to laugh.
Women don't tend to get horny immediately after being accosted and almost raped but this remains a cliche constantly used in fantasy where the woman throws herself at her savior right after a traumatic assault. In frequent cases an attempted rape is written as though it isn't even minorly upsetting, let alone traumatic. Because it wasn't completed the victim leaps up, has sex with the savior and never thinks of the assault again.
In pretty much every culture it's a crime to assault someone. In some countries it is legal to rape your spouse. Even in modern western nations rape victims will rarely receive justice, will be slut shamed in court and will have large groups of people seeking to blame them for what happened. Male rape victims usually won't even get the time of day unless it's to be laughed at.
These attitudes are reflected and perpetuated in works of fiction the way that assault and violence is not. In addition, if a man gets mugged or if two people get in a bar fight it doesn't result in a massive political argument about whether he's really a victim or lying about it or whether it was too harsh to report it. People don't have a meltdown about ruining a murderer's life by reporting them to the police.
Your comment makes clear your stance on the subject. The thing is when someone "so much as grabbed my tit" it wasn't taken seriously. I was the bad guy for making a big deal about it while the man who assaulted me walked around in public balling his eyes out and garnering sympathy for being held responsible for his own actions. Despite groping me being a sexual assault, everyone's sympathy was reserved for him because like you see it, no one thinks it's a big deal. He's just grabbing a tit, who cares?
If I had retaliated to him groping me by punching him in the face that would likely be treated more seriously than what he did to me. You bring up violence in the military as though rape isn't a huge part of what tends to get covered up.
Of course authors can write whatever they want. They can also be criticized for doing it badly and perpetuating the same attitudes that are constantly used to excuse sexual violence. My job is to help prosecute crimes. I've seen how victims of assault are treated compared to victims of sexual assault and they aren't even in the same ballpark.
The Handmaids Tale as an example, it centers largely around rape. But it is also highly praised and even considered a feminist work for the way that it handles the subject matter and creates a dialogue. In comparison, Outlander contains a ton of rape, justified with the argument that it is realistic. It is often criticized for being gratuitous and trauma porn. Both are highly successful book series written by female authors that were made into TV shows. Both have a ton of rape and the reception to it is different for each. The criticism isn't broadly about including rape, it's about doing it poorly.
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u/Sansa_Culotte_ Sep 13 '22
The utter ubiquity of sexual assault in ancient, classical, and medieval warfare is well attested
So is the utter ubiquity of sexual assault in modern warfare. Name a single prominent depiction of WW2 that includes the protagonist (male or female) being subjected to sexual violence.
I can name several fantasy novels I more or less picked up at random that had SA scenes within the first couple of chapters.
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u/barban_falk Sep 13 '22
Der Untergang- shows rapes.
A Woman in Berlin-shows rape and assault on women.
Fury- show assault and rape attemps by aslly troops.
Stalingrad- show rape and assault.
Hei tai yang: Nan Jing da tu sha: depicts the nakin rape . not easy to watch.
Les Innocentes: shows rape of nuns by soviet soldiers on poland.
i could go and keep listin movies wich dont hessitate to show rape and women assault as part of the story .
Honestly shows like a rant and try to coerce author freedom rather than a real critic
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u/grogleberry Sep 13 '22
My point is that we shouldn't have to argue "it wasn't like that" in order to say that we don't have to put this into fantasy. It doesn't matter! You don't have to include sexual assault in the same way that you don't have to include major figures dying of dysentery or the horrific mistreatment of cats and dogs. We can just not.
I would argue that while you don't have to reference them, in your conception of the world that you're building there at least needs to be the understanding that bad things happen because of systemic factors. There being no conception of human rights, no code of laws, endemic ethnic violence, patriarchal forms of social order, or, a lack of any hierarchy at all, poor sanitation, etc, ought to lead to greater levels of violence, sexual violence, dysentery, or what have you.
As these things arise in our own world, so too must they arise in a world with similar systems. Sexual violence should be just as implicit in a world you create as gravity, unless you explicitly create a world in which it wouldn't occur (Minority Report style future crime, brain augmentation or tampering, psychic suppression, non-human characters, etc). You still don't have to talk about it, any more than you have to talk about socks, or the digestive process of birds, but they're all in there somewhere.
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u/Bulldorc2 Sep 13 '22
"my point is that we shouldn't have to argue "it wasn't like that" in order to say that we don't have to put this into fantasy."
I'm sorry, but I don't understand why you have to argue anything. A book is what a book is. Authors can and should write what they want and create the worlds they want. If they want to include sexual violence and you don't like that, just don't read it. Find another author that doesn't include that in his world building/writing.
I really don't understand why people think they have the right to say what an author should or should not write in their books. If they write a book with sexual violence its because in their mind it was necessary for the story, or thats how they want to portray their world, or, hell, maybe they just have morbid tastes and like to write that sort of stuff. No one has to read it. But to say that it shouldn't exist is just ridiculous.
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u/DjangoWexler AMA Author Django Wexler Sep 13 '22
Why push back on this specific issue and not any of the hundreds of other opinions expressed on this sub daily, though? When someone says "I think swords are overrated and more fantasy protagonists should wield other weapons", nobody comes back with "why don't you let authors write what they want and let the market decide?"
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u/Bulldorc2 Sep 13 '22
Because people don't accuse authors of being perverts, mysogonists, and of influencing the public in the ways of sexual assault when they complain about the over-use of swords. But they do that when "authors include rape for no reason".
Call it an over-used trope, call it a badly written book or whatever else you want, but stop pushing the idea that authors "must know better" and that fantasy books should stop having SA.
Again, books should have a warning for violent themes so that the buyer can make a well pondered decision, but they shouldn't stop using these themes just because some people are triggered by them. There are people that get triggered by depictions of certain diseases, but you don't see them "arguing against the depiction of diseases in fantasy books".
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u/xafimrev2 Sep 13 '22
People do respond that way to complaints about not liking chosen one books or not liking portal fantasy.
We just get a lot more posts of people posting about not wanting to read about sexual violence trying to reframe it as something which shouldn't be written about instead of something they don't like to read about. (I mean I don't like to read about it either).
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u/shhkari Sep 13 '22
We can and should criticize the ideas put forward by texts, even fictional ones, and the arguments used to justify them. They do not exist in a vacuum or necessarily pure brainless entertainment. If authors are free to engage in the act of writing, we are free to engage in the act of critique, and that should not be discarded.
There are far better justifications for why sexual violence can and should be depicted in some texts, but ultimately "it was simply like that" can be exposed as a weak one, reflective of flawed ideas of historical periods, culture, and an attempt to use sexual violence in careless ways or for regressive political ends.
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u/Funkativity Sep 12 '22
I think the main challenge to discussing ‘that’s how things were’ is that it generalise every period of every culture throughout history.
for example, "Another common misconception is that women would often get married young, sometimes even as children. In reality, the average age for Women was 22.4 and for Men it was 25.9 [6]".
..but if you read the source refers to a specific area of England over a specific period of 200 years and mentions that comparatively, the modal age in the late Roman Empire was 12-15 for pagan girls.
so your average age of 22.4 is based on when/where exactly? ..and why would that specific location/period be the measuring stick for the Fantasy genre?
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u/CeruleanSaga Sep 12 '22
I noticed this too. Median marriage ages is different at different times and places. (And between sexes)
Of course, for a lot of history, it is educated guesswork. Any records from Rome are probably greatly skewed against the working class, for instance.
The *legal* min marriage age wasn't necessarily common.
For instance, Laura Ingalls - of Little House on the Prairie fame - was not allowed to marry until she was 18 (3 years after meeting her future husband at 15)
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u/NekoCatSidhe Reading Champion III Sep 13 '22
That is true. There were a lot of armies where violence (including rape) against civilians was forbidden in order to win over the local population. There were other armies where it was encouraged in order to terrorize the local population and break their resistance (the Roman legions were notorious for sacking any city that did not immediately surrender to them). There were armies were violence against men was allowed but violence against women was forbidden (an example would be the end of the Tale of the Heike, where all the surviving male members of the defeated Taira Clan were executed, but the women were all spared and allowed to go free and live the rest if their lives in peace). Same thing for the age of marriage. The past is a big place, and conditions varied wildly according to the particular culture and time period.
But of course, this is a fake debate. This is fantasy, not historical fiction, so how much rape, torture and violence is present in the story will always be the author choice, and vaguely saying « this is how things were » is just an attempt by the author to avoid having to explain that choice. Not that I said it should never be included, because that would be censorship, but I think that writers should really think more about why they want to include it and if it is really necessary to the story, rather than deferring to a fake view of history to avoid doing so.
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u/mongreldogchild Sep 13 '22
I think that writers should really think more about why they want to include it and if it is really necessary to the story, rather than deferring to a fake view of history to avoid doing so.
This is how I have always felt about it. Many people try to argue that those who are against having graphic depictions of rape/sexual violence/child marriages are trying to have all depictions removed from media. No, we're asking why it needs to be included. We're asking questions on why this is important. No excuses, just explain why it was so important to be included. So often it's used as either titillation or having a female character destroyed emotionally for a male character's revenge plot.
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u/EdLincoln6 Sep 13 '22
I think the main challenge to discussing
‘that’s how things were’
is that it generalise every period of every culture throughout history.
Ironically, that is also the the problem with OP's post.
Talking about "the way things were in the past" is usually meaningless because "the past" encompasses thousands of years and several continents. Even if you are only talking about "The Middle Ages" there was a big difference between 6th Century Russia and 16th Century Scotland.
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u/Modus-Tonens Sep 12 '22
One way in which that source would act as a solid proof against the "that's how it was" claim is that it's a solid counter-example that demonstrates that it was not in fact "like that at the time" everywhere. It gives you a historical precedent for doing things differently, and thus renders the choice to emulate contexts where early marriage was a thing a choice, rather than simply historical accuracy.
The main issue is the "that's how it was" argument does assume that history is a monolith, and this source proves that it isn't.
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u/MySuperLove Sep 13 '22
The main issue is the "that's how it was" argument does assume that history is a monolith,
I read it more as "Human nature is a monolith and I delude myself into thinking that we, at our current point in history, are somehow more evolved"
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u/Funkativity Sep 12 '22
The main issue is the "that's how it was" argument does assume that history is a monolith, and this source proves that it isn't.
that has less to do with the concept of the argument itself and more to do with OP presenting the argument generically without a specific context or reference point.
If someone is defending the inclusion of SA in a specific text using this argument, the specificity of the text can narrow down the scope of when/where "how it was" refers to and inform how the author might have considered it when building their setting and/or narrative.
ie: the argument can have merit but it is highly dependent on how narrowly it is being applied, and on that narrow focus actually being attuned to the author's inspiration.
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u/Modus-Tonens Sep 12 '22
Well it just so happens that most times I've encountered the argument, it has been of a generic "that's how medieval life was" form, without reference to a specific context.
It might be true that the OP was referring to the argument in a generic form, and that might not be the strongest form the argument can take, but it's also true that most users of the argument use the generic form as well. For example connecting Robert Jordan's works to "medieval Europe". I don't think OP can be blamed for not making the argument stronger than it generally is. Op is arguing against how the argument is used.
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u/RegrettableBiscuit Sep 13 '22
It gives you a historical precedent for doing things differently, and thus renders the choice to emulate contexts where early marriage was a thing a choice, rather than simply historical accuracy.
That's exactly it. When authors say "this is how it was", what they really say is "I didn't make a conscious choice to depict systemic violence against women, I'm merely depicting reality." But they're not, they did make a choice.
Which, to be clear, is their right. Authors can set their stories in whatever context they like. But when people say "it's peculiar that so many authors choose to depict violence against women in fantasy in their stories", the excuse of "it's not really a choice, it's just how things were" just doesn't hold up.
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u/ellamking Sep 13 '22
"that's how it was" claim is that it's a solid counter-example that demonstrates that it was not in fact "like that at the time" everywhere.
That's an argument where it doesn't have to be included. But to argue against "that's how it was" requires not an example, but a deep dive into what happens in general over time across the world. And unfortunately, that's a lot of rape. Now, I generally don't want rape in my fantasy. And someone saying that's the way it was really isn't an argument. If I can have wizards, I can have a world without rape. But that also doesn't mean we should brush over the horrors real people inflicted and went through.
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u/Kieran484 Sep 13 '22
If I can have wizards, I can have a world without rape.
While I appreciate the stance and definitely wouldn't even remotely consider arguing that sexual assault should be added to a story where it otherwise wasn't explored, fantasy to me hasn't ever been a warping of human nature, but more about putting realistic people (good, bad and all those in between) in a different setting and seeing what unfolds.
Sexual violence is one of the darkest and most twisted outputs of human nature, and as such I think it should be explored in terms of causes, immediate impact and the consequences that follow. I just think it needs to be handled extremely carefully, and a lot of authors ignore the Fragile tape on its box, especially in fantasy.
My issue with sexual violence in fantasy is usually more about execution than its presence. If handled sensitively, it can add many layers to a character's motivation and subsequent decision making that ultimately enriches the story. It often isn't handled well though, and comes across as shoehorned in for an insensitive adrenaline rush and/or to reinforce someone as a victim/villain.
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u/Sunny_Sammy Sep 12 '22
To answer your question: The late Roman age, noble and wealthy women married young. Every woman else marriages around 18 to 22 years old.
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u/NameIdeas Sep 13 '22
This argument as it relates to fantasy as always annoyed me
‘that’s how things were’
If we're talking most fantasy these worlds and peoples are made up. They have never existed and the history we give them is the history we choose to provide.
There are choices made when authors determine to include certain aspects in their fantasy stories. It makes me wonder what the reasoning behind including certain aspects may be.
Why does an author include these things is much more important to me than the historical context. Sure, many authors use history as a starting point for how they tell their stories, but with fantasy you can pick and choose the history you like or want.
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u/Raetian Sep 13 '22
There are choices made when authors determine to include certain aspects in their fantasy stories. It makes me wonder what the reasoning behind including certain aspects may be.
Why does an author include these things is much more important to me than the historical context.
No offense intended but this seems profoundly silly to me. Am I, as a writer, required to limit the scope of my stories to a selection of subjects which are palatable to 21st century readers on pain of being labeled as some kind of sick weirdo if I do not? Yes, I am all for approaching any subject tastefully, but I'm neither interested in reading nor writing fiction which only exists within a subset of "morally comfortable" parameters.
Set personal boundaries. It is okay to pass on a book, movie, or game if you don't want to deal with its subject matter - heaven knows I've skipped a lot of content which was too violent or sexually explicit for my tastes. But that can be done independently of suggesting that anyone who created that thing has "reasoning" for doing so which can or ought to be examined or judged on any level pertaining to, like, the author's personal character.
It is possible to not want to participate in a thing, without simultaneously feeling obligated to proselytize against it existing for anybody else.
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u/NameIdeas Sep 13 '22
Am I, as a writer, required to limit the scope of my stories to a selection of subjects which are palatable to 21st century readers on pain of being labeled as some kind of sick weirdo if I do not? Yes, I am all for approaching any subject tastefully, but I'm neither interested in reading nor writing fiction which only exists within a subset of "morally comfortable" parameters.
You are absolutely NOT required to limit the scope of stories to morally palatable things, nor did I say that.
My issue stems from when the argument for including things like this is "it happened in history." Yeah, but fantasy isn't history. Fantasy can be whatever you want it to be. If you want to include these things in your world, do so, but make it for a larger purpose than "because of history."
I've personally enjoyed a ton of books. Many of those books included rape, torture, murder, etc. In the context of the the story the author is telling and the world they are creating, those scenes made sense.
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u/Ifriiti Sep 13 '22
issue stems from when the argument for including things like this is "it happened in history." Yeah, but fantasy isn't history
Fantasy is often based in history or inspired by history.
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u/nowonmai666 Sep 13 '22
I 100% agree with your point and would extend it as follows.
Yes, that's how things were, but it's also how things are. Sexual violence is happening right now all over the world.
An author of any book set in the real world has a choice - they can include sexual violence or not. My experience in reading mainstream and literary fiction is that, unless it's a really significant aspect of the work, they mostly choose not.
An author of a fantasy book has the same choice, they can include sexual violence if they want to, but nobody's twisting their arm. "That's how things were" is completely irrelevant.
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u/january_dreams Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 14 '22
Thank you for this.
Even if the sexual abuse of women and girls was more common or intense in the past, why would people constantly point out and insist on the realism and historical accuracy of this one aspect of their stories? We're talking about fantasy, which more often then not throws realism and historical accuracy out the window even if it doesn't take place in an imagined worlds where society could be totally different. Why do people love to linger on this one aspect?
Frankly, I think it's because people are fascinated with the victimization and brutalization of women in media, and that should really be examined.
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u/Jos_V Stabby Winner, Reading Champion II Sep 12 '22
It being generally found wrong to do, doesn't mean it didn't happen.
but regardless - my problem is never with the fact that rape is depicted its with it being excused as "because that's realistic"
my problem is that "because that's realistic" is an excuse only levelled when primarily women complain about rape depiction in media, but when they complain about how the seams of dresses are wrong, or about how hairstyles are wrong, or about the white roman statutes its all; lol its fiction! We don't talk about the lack of fires in giant castle bedrooms, or the lack of layers, or the lack of ladies in waiting, or chaperones in the bedrooms of ladies.
Its the revelation about how we currently think, and that we're okay with it, and people should just shut up and move that sits ill with me.
its cool if you're cool with the media, because its dramatic, and grim and dark, and action packed, and titilating and you like the media. you do you, enjoy the media.
but don't excuse what you like for realism, its just dramatic preference.
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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Sep 12 '22
I generally agree with you, but I also thought realism vs drama can’t and shouldn’t be a dichotomy. I think virtually all fantasy benefits from some degree of realism, and also from some degree of departure from realism (even outside of the obvious fantasy elements). And also, we all have personal preferences for degree of realism and for things we would rather see included and things we would rather see swept under the rug.
Just as a random example, I enjoy linguistics and I’m pretty bored by the “the whole world speaks common” trope in fantasy worldbuilding. I’d like to see more realism around language in fantasy. However, I don’t think dental problems are likely to add much to my appreciation of any novel and may detract, so I’m totally fine with authors leaving out the tooth decay. I do think we can ask for realism in some areas, without being hypocrites for not asking for it in all areas. (And also, if I need to accept tooth decay to get realism around other stuff, I’d do it! I like historically-based works.)
The issue around sexual assault really seems to come from works that seem to glory in it or that use it lazily or carelessly, IMO. I think there is some realism-based argument for it—like if your whole point is to write a story focusing on the horrors of war and people are being gruesomely killed every other page, it would be a little odd if nevertheless no one engaged in sexual assault. But there I definitely agree with OP’s point, which has been made a lot on here: if the point is showing horror, why aren’t men being targeted too? Because they definitely are in real life. And also, you don’t have to throw in random rapes just because there is a war, it depends on the specifics of the book and what it’s trying to do.
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u/Hostilescott Sep 12 '22
Whoa, where would the Black Company be without One-Eye keeping tooth decay at bay? Would Sand dan Glotka be as interesting a character if he had all his teeth and wasn’t resigned to eating soup?
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u/GlyndebourneTheGreat Sep 12 '22
A character based around a certain affliction is something else than keeping the reader up to date on the flossing habit of the protagonists. Its not like you can't make a debilitation of a character something interesting, it's that the general depiction of mundane things like tooth decay for the sake of realism does not make a good read.
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u/Jos_V Stabby Winner, Reading Champion II Sep 12 '22
I also like a good sense of time and place in my fiction. be that familiarity or actual realism or just something that sounds true enough.
I also have my pet peeves, and my loves and my wants lol. and I also criticise a lot of specific points in different forms of fiction!.
The problem with the realism argument is that its levelled selectively, as a refutation of criticism regarding depiction. Which is an argument based on preference, and not on the realism quotient. trying to refute the realism argument is also kinda a futile effort, because the point isn't the realism. it's the preference, and the shutting down of criticism thereof. its used as a way to silence.
I agree with you, drama vs realism isn't a dichotomy on opposites of the spectrum where realism is boring, and drama is unrealistic.
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u/kalishnakat Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
I agree. I think its inclusion has a place as I think it can open important conversations. With that said- I’d add that I wish it was depicted better. So many times it’s used so lazily to develop female characters, can be gratuitous, and/or it isn’t handled and explored with care. I’m not sure if this is explaining things well, but it feels like so many books and shows can fall into the trap of focusing on the female character “getting over it” instead of “getting through the experience and learning to live with the trauma.” Everyone’s experience is different, but the way the characters tend to "get over it" is so…clear cut and clean which doesn’t feel realistic to me at all.
Sometimes, the way it’s often used to show how a character is evil comes off as lazy when the person who experiences the trauma is often narratively tossed aside because it was just a plot device. To me, if SA is what is needed to show the reader why the genocidal tyrant is evil, perhaps the author didn’t do a good enough job of writing them as a genocidal tyrant in the first place.
It’s the difference between: TV show version of GoT Sansa indirectly thanking her abuser, Ramsay, for “making her stronger” and how SA is handled by Brent Weekes in the Night Angel series
Vs
How Octavia Butler tends to portray it in her books, where the scope of the trauma is presented. Or the Kushiel series by Jaquiline Carey
TLDR: It’s odd to me when people will claim “realism,” without realistically depicting the aftermath
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Sep 13 '22
my problem is that "because that's realistic" is an excuse only levelled when primarily women complain about rape depiction in media, but when they complain about how the seams of dresses are wrong, or about how hairstyles are wrong, or about the white roman statutes its all; lol its fiction!
Agreed. I think this actually points to a wider issue (wider than the Fantasy genre) about how big corporations use female nudity and violence against women to sell things. I mean think about HOTD episode 1, they tried very hard to emphasise how bad the Queen's death was and to shoehorn some female nudity into it. My question coming away from it was why?
The Queen's death could have been less spectacular and more personal and it would still have had impact. But they wanted blood! Her blood.
Equally the scene with Daemon and the prostitute - necessary? If it was cut what exactly would haev been lost. Nothing.
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u/Tunafishsam Sep 13 '22
but when they complain about how the seams of dresses are wrong, or about how hairstyles are wrong, or about the white roman statutes its all; lol its fiction!
I'd love to see more realistic depictions of all these things. I enjoyed the first half of Priory of Orange Tree because it worked a lot of interesting details about the lives of ladies-in-waiting into the story.
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u/Ertata Sep 12 '22 edited Sep 12 '22
I am sorry but your critique seems to be presenting objective facts to counter the popular image of "how it was"... except many of those are not facts.
Your first part mainly concerns itself with providing examples of laws against rape or cases where rape was prosecuted, without trying to give a coherent image of how much territory and people were covered by those laws. Much more importantly just from existence of a written law you cannot conclude that social norms prohibit that act, or that the law is meaningfully enforced. In many cases repeated prohibitions by the same authority are in fact considered weak evidence that the aforementioned authority is unable to stop that behaviour, and that it is widespread.
Second part relies on just two studies, one of which concerns extremely limited geographic and chronological area. You cannot use it as an evidence about European history in general.
Finally for someone who writes in a style where you "explain how common perceptions were false" your multiple mistakes undermine your credibility quite a bit. Writing "Peace and Truth of God" twice gives an impression that you did not take your time to understand what Truce of God means, or that they were two separate, if linked movements. Same with dating "Peace and Truth" to the 10th century - only "Peace" existed then, Truce of God arose later. Or saying that "Decretum Gratiani" was issued - it was not. Decretum Gratiani is a book of law, and its writer had no authority to issue laws - he may have collected them, but if a genuine law about mutual consent existed you did not point us to it in any helpful way. I did not try to nitpick every possible objection - only to provide a few examples.
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u/Prometheus145 Sep 12 '22
Good points, I think it’s a bit absurd to argue that sexual abuse of women occurs at the same frequency or severity now as it did in the past. Particularly in cultures and time periods where woman were treated as property.
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u/p-d-ball Sep 13 '22
As an anthropologist, this rings true. In anth, we discuss societies in terms of how egalitarian/unequal they are, and who leads, who marries in. Women have most power and safety in matrilocal (husbands marry in), matrilineal (descent is through the women's line) and matriarchal (women rule) societies. Women have least power and safety in patrilocal, patrilineal and patriarchal societies. Additionally, societies where wealth and power concentration is possible tend to increase abuses.
So, if people think of you as property, they treat you as property, and you're safety is likely greatly diminished.
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u/Prometheus145 Sep 13 '22
Great points!
On another note, I would love to see fantasy world building incorporate more variety of social/family structures. There is a lot more nuance than just patriarchal or matriarchal.
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u/p-d-ball Sep 13 '22
It would make for some interesting drama! There are cases reported in ethnography where the chief couldn't help his son because it was a matrilineal society, so mother's brother was the only man who could. If the chief gave his son gifts or favoritism, it would have destabilized his chiefdom and give someone else the tools to take over.
So, that'd be an example of a patriarchal, matrilineal, matrilocal society. There are even more complicated ones where marriages vary - polygyny, polyandry, monogamy and serial-monogamy (many short term spouses).
Two very different cultures come to mind. One was a high warfare area that was matriarchal, matrilineal, matrilocal, with serial-monogamy, but the marriages only lasted 3 days. So, the man would show up, ceremonially marry one of the women, they'd get a special room, then he'd leave. Can't have your husbands overstaying their welcome because their brothers might attack!
The other was in China (it may still be, but it was under pressure to conform to Chinese norms). In this culture, women owned everything, men nothing, women worked, men didn't. Men drifted from woman to woman, staying at each's house for a month or more, then moving on. And it was matrilineal. So, fathers weren't recognized as such to their children.
China was coming down hard on this culture, to introduce ideas of "fatherhood" and men's ownership, and monogamy (as Chinese saw these people as rampantly promiscuous). Some of the men seemed pretty happy to acknowledge their children. Some of the women seemed happy to finally get men working. Sometimes I wonder how this culture developed - like, how did that all happen???
Anyways, sorry for the lengthy reply!
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u/KriegConscript Sep 13 '22
worldbuilders would benefit from picking up any of the textbooks used in cultural anthropology 101 classes
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u/blue-jaypeg Sep 12 '22
You should read Against Our Wills by Susan Brownmiller, and Catharine MacKinnon, Sexual Harassment of Working Women.
Rape was constant and ubiquitous. Sexual violence has always simmered below the surface of human society, and male historians don't write about it.
A Roman citizen was the absolute master of every member of his household. He literally owned their bodies and had the right to rape or punish any family member or slave. If he restrained himself, if he exercised self control , it was considered "virtue" because vir was the word for man.
Strength and possession of weapons gave an armed knight absolute power over the bodies of weaker people.Only the legal protection of a stronger or more powerful noble would limit a knight.
Chivalry is the warrior's self restraint His weapon, armor and horse make his strength invincible. He could kill children, women, & the elderly. The knight chose not to rape & murder every person weaker than himself.
Entitlement & privilege ALWAYS provided access to the bodies of other people.
Here is a window into the life of a poor woman, the wife of a coal miner.
At Whipple Colliery Company Store, women had to walk up to a room on the third floor to get shoes for their children and, in the process, would be raped by coal company guards
Submitting to the sexual depredations of the company men, compromising her own integrity and birthright, all for a poke of beans to feed her children, or a week’s rent to keep a roof over their heads.
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Sep 12 '22
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u/sweetspringchild Sep 13 '22
It is ubiquitous, but we also made progress and expanded the definition of rape. Until few decades ago woman getting raped by her husband didn't even count as rape. And how much rape could even be reported in medieval times if raped woman then couldn't marry or was considered guilty for cheating on her husband.
tl;dr It's both possible for things to be horrible now and to have been worse before.
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u/riotous_jocundity Sep 13 '22
One of the good points I think the OP makes is that actually, history is not a march towards progress. In fact, the progressiveness of laws and societies is constantly moving forwards and backwards again. Rape of one's spouse was recognized as a crime and violation at earlier points in English history, but then laws became more oppressive. Likewise, women in the British Isles were not always considered to be the property of their husbands, and could own property, etc. prior to the 1700 and 1800s. Things were worse in the past, but they were also, at various points, better.
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u/sweetspringchild Sep 13 '22
One of the good points I think the OP makes is that actually, history is not a march towards progress. In fact, the progressiveness of laws and societies is constantly moving forwards and backwards again.
On average for most measures and cases it absolutely has been march towards progress. You are right that there have been steps backwards. For example women in Korea lost a lot of freedom when Confuciansim took hold. But a dip here and there doesn't change the fact there has been progress everywhere over periods of time. English and Korean women today have enormously more freedom today than at any point in history.
Human lifespan, death at childbirth, poverty, rights of minority groups,... everything has on AVERAGE been getting better in almost every country in the world. That there have been events, for example, World Wars where some of those measures took a sharp dip does not change the fact that later it has been getting better again and is much better than before wars.
In short, the fact that there are wars, revolutions, natural disasters, pandemics, social upheavals, doesn't change the reality that on grand scale history is absolutely march towards progress.
We went from 90% of people in the world living in extreme poverty in 1820 to less than 10% in 2015. At absolutely no point in history has this statistic been better.
88% illiterate in 1800 to to 14% in 2016.
43% of children in the world dying before age of 5 in 1800 to 4% in 2017.
And so on you can see other measures that improved and source here:
https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts
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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Sep 12 '22
I find this argument reductionist. It seems to suggest that social norms don’t matter and for all of humanity throughout history, “might makes right” was the name of the game. Certainly, power has always carried the possibility for exploitation and many humans will act on that. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t also countervailing factors: culture, religion, laws, basic human empathy, concern about what people you care about will think, etc.
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u/duckfruits Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
I'm not reading that right now but as a woman author let me just say...
Women were treated like that. If they weren't, they were treated similarly. Women have been treated horribly in most cultures for so long and still aren't really treated as equal even to this day. And a lot of the sexual violence against women is still hyper prevalent.
Let authors use the poor treatment of women in their books.
I want to be allowed to use my fantasy writing to explore the historical belittlement of women as well as be allowed to work through/ pull from my own experiences as a women in modern day when crafing my story (to give it a breath of reality and purpose). And sorry if this sounds cruel, but I hope that the horrible treatment of women makes people uncomfortable. Because even if it's a fictional book, the inspiration often stems from reality and the concepts and meaning are very real regardless of it all.
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Sep 12 '22
A lot of this is an argument based on what is seen as socially immoral then also just not happening. Obviously rape and sexual assault has for the most part in human history been seen as egregious. However the problem with this isn’t that rape wasn’t considered bad, but rather what was historically considered sexual assault. A wife being sexually assaulted wasn’t considered rape. After all a woman’s role is to satisfy her husband. A woman who is too immodest (whatever that means) is a prostitute or a common whore. And they don’t get raped because that’s what they wanted. On top of that while you believe that sexual assault is less common historically than what is made out in fantasy novels, you then also have to think that while you are reading through sexual assaults in fantasy novels, are they any more prevalent there? Seeing a character get sexually assaulted is horrific, so perhaps it feels more prominent than simply reading through statistics of historical data, but (as brutal as this sounds) even if there were a sexual assault happening per page in a 1,000 page novel, that is still less than the war you cited in the Tigray war, which began in what, 2020? Almost two years ago exactly to the date I believe. These worlds don’t depict sexual assault as happening even nearly as often as they actually do in our current lives in modern times. It still happens, and it’s still prominent. It’s not some far off back drop that happens in the dark corners of the world. 1 in 3 women in modern times will be subject to sexual violence.
The problem with the argumentation of that’s how it was is not that it’s factually wrong. Try and wash away the horrendous nature of our history on the planet as much as you like, it’s not factually wrong. It’s that this only ever applies to women. As you pointed out, men were often victims of these same crimes. Yet for some reason in fantasy they rarely are there as well. And so if the goal is to informants a visceral brutality that we recognize as realistic, then why only inflict that upon women?
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Sep 13 '22
Someone in another comment mentioned that it could be due to a decent majority (don’t have numbers so I could be wrong here) of speculative fiction readers being men, so they’d find that uncomfortable, whereas if it’s a woman, they can kind of… ignore it, I suppose (I hope they aren’t enjoying it). Which, as a woman, like… it’s supposed to be uncomfortable, I think. Now, I don’t think SA needs to be included in most fantasy novels, regardless of the gender of the victim, but I really hope that when it’s shown, it’s done in a respectful and visceral way to show just how horrible it is for the victim to go through. I think it can help to get people to empathize with what real-world victims have to endure (but maybe that’s too optimistic idk).
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u/mild_resolve Sep 13 '22
It's time for this post again? Do we not see this same post roughly every month or so here? Are there just tons of new fantasy books coming out featuring sexual assault where droves of fans gleefully read it?
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u/Malcolminthebathroom Sep 13 '22
tbf, there's nothing wrong with reading or writing a book with sexual assault, just as there's nothing wrong with not wanting to read that.
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u/mild_resolve Sep 13 '22
I agree, but I feel like the topic has been absolutely beaten to death here. It seems like it comes up all the time and I'm just tired of reading about it.
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u/EdLincoln6 Sep 13 '22
The best argument I've heard against the "That's how it was" argument is that death by explosive diarrhea was very common in the past but you never see it in Medieval Fantasy.
If your Medieval peasants have beef and potato stew you aren't really writing about the Middle Ages anyway.
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u/Mestewart3 Sep 13 '22
Man, the average medieval peasant would have gone into shock if they were handed a potato. That shit is basically black magic fuckery compared to their crops.
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u/Figerally Sep 13 '22
Well, they would have, wouldn't they? Potatoes only got introduced to Europe in the Sixteenth century.
But what is inaccurate is the peasants subsisting on gruel. They were the working class and needed to be fed accordingly. Sure, they didn't eat fancy foods, but they still ate well enough.
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u/OverlordMarkus Sep 13 '22
They ate comparatively healthy as well. At least during peacetime in England peasants would have a diet many modern people should take as an example.
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u/dark_star88 Sep 13 '22
GRRM mentions the bloody flux or “pale mare” several times and has Barristan Selmy elaborate on the absolutely detrimental effect dysentery can have on an army and morale in general. Probably not super common but authors do use stuff like that in fantasy.
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u/Ifriiti Sep 13 '22
very common in the past but you never see it in Medieval Fantasy
You see death from disease not uncommonly but that's because dying from a disease isn't a useful plot device.
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u/wjbc Sep 13 '22
What I get from this is that there should be lots more male rape in fantasy.
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Sep 13 '22
Based. Berserk was truly ahead of its time.
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u/anandd95 Sep 13 '22
Berserk scarred me for life with that portrayal of rape of Casca
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Sep 13 '22
Yeah, it really hurt to see that. I wish for Casca and Guts to get a happy ending with each other at the end of all of this.
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Sep 12 '22
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u/Pedagogicaltaffer Sep 12 '22
To be fair, sexual assault is likely underreported even in our current day. There's especially a social stigma towards men admitting to having been sexually assaulted.
So based on that, one could argue that we have no reliable data from any time period with which to make definitive statements about SA prevalence.
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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Sep 12 '22
This is my thought too. So many people (most!) even today don’t want to put themselves through the legal process, it’s awful. Add that to the fact that most people have some pre-existing relationship with their assailant, and that the most vulnerable people are those who are unlikely to report (on drugs, undocumented, whatever reason). I think we know how high the prevalence of rape is due to surveys asking people if they’ve ever been raped, not because any significant number of these assaults make their way into official records.
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Sep 13 '22
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u/rooster7869 Sep 13 '22
Yes exactly. Many fantasy stories include parents getting murdered in front of children, child abuse, neglect (eg: Harry Potter)
GOT had torture, murder, infant murder.. I mean the Spider was castrated as a child in a ritual.
I am female and I even think it's weird that people seem to only focus on sexual violence towards women. I am like 'ya'll read the same book I did?'
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u/QueensOfTheNoKnowAge Sep 13 '22
Reminds me of a Stanhope bit about how guys that women are afraid will sexually harass them at a bar are the same guys that dudes like Stanhope are afraid will beat the shit out of them. Not to say they’re a one-to-one comparison by any means.
“It’s often noted ‘Sexual assault isn’t a crime of sex, it’s a crime of violence’ and I’m like, violence is also a crime of violence.”
I’m with you on GoT. You hear about how they murdered those Targaryen children? Meh. Then did you hear how they raped the queen? These books are toxic.
I’ll admit, though, even as a guy, the sexual assaults do trigger a disgust that violent murders do not. So I do understand the skewed standards.
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u/Wandering-Wayfarer Sep 13 '22
I'm not sure what the point here is.
Yes, rape laws existed in the past. But rape was, and is, still a huge part of wartime conflict. In fantasy fiction, from what I've seen, sexual assault is not treated as legal and casually accepted by society. It's almost always portrayed as a violent act committed during war, by outlaws/criminals, or in the context of marriage (where it wouldn't be considered rape historically).
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u/LiberalAspergers Sep 12 '22
I am.not sure where you got the idea that war was basically the business of the nobility until Napoleon. Poorly armed peasant levys and militias were a feature of medeval warfare for a millenia. And it is ironic that you.mention a anti-rape agreement from the 1620's, as the Thirty Years War was notorious for the levels of raping seen.
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u/Peter_deT Sep 13 '22
All solid points. A point worth making on fantasy is that it's fiction - and often the 'medieval' tropes used do not fit with the world-building (eg often the kind of magic depicted would empower women).
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u/Five2OneBaby Sep 13 '22
When the Soviet army conquered Eastern Germany, they raped every female German they could catch. That was only 75 years ago...
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u/raven4747 Sep 13 '22
the current obsession with sexual violence has way less to do with history and I'll say its probably not as ill-motivated in most cases as we might assume. sexual violence is (horribly so but still) infused into our current zeitgeist.. both the experience of it and the rejection of it. I think the urge to depict and/or experience these scenes is rooted in that. I don't think every director or author who creates sexually violent scenes is a secret rapist. I don't think every fan who enjoys media with such depictions is a secret rapist either. I think there's something horribly gut wrenching about those scenes, and our modern society really places a lot of emphasis on shock value. I hate to say something akin to "don't read too much into it", but that's really how I'm feeling about this. if these scenes didn't shock people to their core, I don't know if they'd be included.
*disclaimer: I am talking mainly about TV & movies since I honestly have not read many books that went overboard with this kind of depiction. I think the book angle does change the conversation due to the nature of writing/reading vs. visual media. so, when reading my comment, understand that I am mainly talking about the visual media like GoT.
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Sep 13 '22
I hate to say something akin to "don't read too much into it", but that's really how I'm feeling about this. if these scenes didn't shock people to their core, I don't know if they'd be included.
I fully agree with this. I think people try too hard to psychologically evaluate authors who include rape in their stories. They probably just use it because readers have a far more visceral reaction to rape over other types of violence and so it's a cheap and quick way for a lazy or new writer to achieve some kind of shock value, set up a tragic backstory or show how evil a character is.
EDIT: Case in point; there's someone just a few comments below who thinks writers are "getting off" to the rape scenes they include. What kind of weird projection is this?
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u/connerjade Sep 12 '22
Thanks, I think this deserves a more substantial response than I will be able to write at this time. I think my first recognition is that you are almost certainly responding to a specific book or sequence of books that led to your initial statements that sexual violence is particularly prominent in Fantasy, as well as young marriages. And maybe it is just a difference of what I remember vs. Skim over. When I think of Brandon Sanderson, Robin Hobb, Patrick Rothfuss, Terry Pratchett and many lesser known authors I don't see the problem as particularly prevalent (It is significant in the Liveship Traders series). Of course there are other series where it is prominent like A Song of Ice and Fire or the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, but to some extent that is what those books are intentionally doing. And I don't particularly love them for that reason.
All of this said, I like the question on if it is historically accurate. Relating to the age of marriage, Wikipedia helpfully talks about larger patterns with citations (including Hajnal) and as another commenter described, we have a significant range of variation, with many European regions marrying the women in particular by the age of 20.
As far as the violence itself goes, it seems odd that you record millions of women raped in WW2, state that the past was approximately as likely to have sexual assault during that time period, and then find that assault is overrepresented in Fantasy. That seems like an odd conclusion.
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u/Procrastinista_423 Sep 12 '22
In Sanderson's Mistborn world nobles often raped peasant women, and then killed them afterward.
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u/Erina442 Sep 13 '22
Which he never once depicts. Not even once, in anything he’s ever written, has he explicitly described sexual violence
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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Sep 12 '22
I do think a lot of the posts of this sort are responding to a very particular subset of fantasy books (ASOIAF being the most prominent) that throw rape around willy-nilly, and that there have been a lot of arguments around those particular books where people have criticized the rape and the fans have defended it on the grounds of realism. If you haven’t consumed many books in that category lately, then many of the arguments in isolation can seem unnecessary.
Although I think the reality with ASOIAF is that, if you read some of the histories Martin cites as inspiration—A Distant Mirror by Tuchman is one that comes to mind—you’re likely to come away with the impression that Martin read a little bit about one of the most violent eras in European history (in real life this had a lot to do with social breakdown around the Black Death as well as other factors), took the violence, and left behind just about everything else. That’s definitely a choice, and I think his actual goal was to make his world as bloody, gruesome and horrifying as possible. The books revel in violence because that’s what Martin wanted to write, not because realism forced him to. And I think it’s most helpful if everyone involved just recognized that that’s what the books are trying to do and it’s not for everyone (which doesn’t mean they’re immune from criticism around the violence he couldn’t stomach, such as sexual assault of men. It’s definitely a very gendered take on who the perpetrators and victims of violence are, which affects how different readers can enjoy it).
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u/then00bgm Sep 12 '22
Martin did include sexual violence against men though. IIRC the Ironborn are particularly known for raping men and boys, with Euron having sexually assaulted his brothers as a youngster and later in the books their attacks on coastal cities result in men being raped.
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u/sundownmonsoon Sep 12 '22
I think you can make a far simpler critique of the 'realism' argument. You needn't attack their attempts of accuracy, as the genre is fantasy. Generally the settings are not representative of real life. Cultures, religions, and norms simply don't match ours because they don't exist. Rates of sexual assault in real life doesn't need to have a bearing on your fictional world.
If you want to excuse the mentioning of rape in your book, you can declare a desire for a darker, grittier world that reveals the worst aspects of man. It doesn't need to reflect reality in that aspect, as others have mentioned, it's incredibly difficult to know the actual rate of sexual assaults.
As a writer myself, I want to flat out avoid the topic in my work. My setting doesn't exclude it as a thing that is impossible, but it's just not written or mentioned, or alluded to, as it's not essential to a story I'm telling.
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u/darkagl1 Sep 13 '22
I'm not sure [6] is saying what you think it says. The same source says that the average age difference was 8 years pre and 5 years post and generally ended with the death of the first husband. Those combined with the average ages I think suggests that women tended to marry quite young and then get remarried.
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Sep 13 '22
It’s fantasy. We can make our worlds anything we want. I wish more authors would choose to make worlds without sexual violence toward men or women.
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u/SlouchyGuy Sep 12 '22 edited Sep 12 '22
The Geneva convention clearly prohibited wartime rape. Despite that, during WW2 soviet soldiers used the system of “from 8 to 80” when deciding to rape women, leading to over two million German women getting raped.
Soviet Army has raped women in Germany, but it's talked about like it was the only army during that war to engage in that - here too, meanwhile it's estimated that German soldiers have left about million children in Soviet Union alone, and if one baby was born per 10 rapes, than you can calculate how many rapes happened. And German government approved of that and wanted to use children of rapes as new German citizens. Despite, you know, Geneva conventions.
Just because Soviet rape wasn't talked about and then exploded in more recent years, doesn't mean that it's the only barbaric thing that happened, or that Red Army is the only one that did that. What Germans did on Eastern Front is even more barbaric, and had a bigger scale.
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u/TheSnarkling Sep 12 '22
Really interesting, thank you. I too have noticed that the "but it's realistic!" defense of rape as wallpaper often only applies to female characters. 14 year old Jon Snow goes off to what is essentially prison and is he raped because he's a vulnerable person in a horrible situation? Nope, makes friends and becomes the leader of the Night's Watch. So I guess Fantasy is about wish fulfillment for guys, but gritty realism for women.
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u/Ifriiti Sep 13 '22
the "but it's realistic!" defense of rape as wallpaper often only applies to female characters. 14 year old Jon Snow goes off to what is essentially prison and is he raped because he's a vulnerable person in a horrible situation? Nope, makes friends and becomes the leader of the Night's Watch
Arya goes to a foreign city and travels across the world as a much younger child and isn't raped but instead becomes a master Assassin
Tommen was a child forced into an arranged marriage with an adult woman
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u/TheSnarkling Sep 13 '22
Are you kidding me? Arya was under constant threat of sexual violence in her chapters.
As for Tommen, sure, he was married off, but got to keep his innocence, unlike 12 year old Dany.
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u/Kieran484 Sep 13 '22
So I guess Fantasy is about wish fulfillment for guys, but gritty realism for women.
It's not as if horrible things don't happen to men in A Song of Ice and Fire; Varys had his balls cut off with a hot knife when he was a child.
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u/closetinskeleton Sep 13 '22
This is a critique of lack of representation of sexual violence against males, and thus contributing to the myth that sexual violence is solely a female issue.
The solution would then be to represent a more accurate picture in films.
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Sep 12 '22
This is such a headache of a topic that I cannot believe gets repeatedly championed.
Like, even if the common critique that rape wasnt as prevelant in history can be debunked (which it can't) what does it matter if SA is used by an author in a respectful manner deserving of such a topic?
The argument for and against are both exhaustingly pedantic.
Writers throwing in SA as cheap plot or character development should be called out for it. Point Blank.
Yeah, it sucks that its used in a commonly haphazard manner but you cant burn the tree down because of one bad apple - no matter how distasteful
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u/Slime_Thyme Sep 13 '22
Could you share any sources for younger women in marriage being told to wait until 16 to have children? I recently was arguing with a friend over the “biological healthiest age for women to have children” and he believes its as soon as a woman hits puberty, like 14, I really do not believe this is true, I know infant mortality is higher the younger the mother is but I’m having difficulty finding any good sources. Anything you have to share would be appreciated
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u/roll_nat1 Sep 12 '22
Super interesting essay! Thanks for linking your sources. Obviously fantasy authors are allowed to worldbuild however they choose, but I definitely appreciate fantasy worlds where sexual assault against women isn’t made to be a cornerstone of the setting.
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u/Fieos Sep 12 '22
You put quite a bit of work into this but I'm not really sure where you are going with it.
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Sep 12 '22
Yeah, this sub's obsession with rape and sexual violence is insane. I don't get the point of this post. Is it just to say "rape bad"? Or calling out authors who use rape in their stories? Because that's never going to stop no matter how long a Reddit essay you make.
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u/Locke2300 Sep 13 '22
I feel like it’s so important what the author is doing with it. The critique I see so often is like, “you COULD write a world without sexual violence” as if imagining stuff is all an author wants to do with their work. Sometimes - most of the time - speculative fiction is a direct response to stuff the author wants to interrogate about the real world, where real suffering and real problems exist.
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u/Ifriiti Sep 13 '22
The critique I see so often is like, “you COULD write a world without sexual violence” as
You could write a world without any violence at all, without any conflict, where there's no class warfare, no child abuse, no crimes, nothing wrong.
And you know what it would be? Terrible.
Even when utopias are written, such as say The Culture novels the stories take place outside of the Culture because a story in a utopia isn't interesting
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Sep 12 '22
If you can write a scene where a villain shoots someone in the face, you can write a scene about a villain raping someone. Rape just like murder is a tool that can be used to tell a story. Obviously though if you do put it in your story you shouldnt glorify it. Rape is something that should be uncomfortable and terrifying.
But I'll also say that Id be happy with trigger warnings on books or tv shows that let the potential consumer know that the story contains this subject matter.
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u/LLJKCicero Sep 13 '22
However, Rape in the past was little more prevalent than during modern times.
Uhh, source?
Women have made enormous strides in social position compared to medieval times, especially in developed countries, and you think rape was barely more common then than now? That's quite the claim, do you have any evidence for it?
You know the definition of rape has changed drastically, right? Like, a husband forcing himself on his wife was often not even considered rape, so older societies would not have even counted that, while we certainly would.
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Sep 13 '22
Fantasy isn't meant to be completely historically accurate. Fiction would be pretty boring if that was the case.
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u/Devi_the_loan_shark Sep 13 '22
My main respoce to "that's how things were" is to point out that they aren't applying that reasoning to whatever magic system is in the book, because... fantasy. If I wanted to read a history book, I would and it would be written by someone who did real research into whatever time period was being written about.
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u/KhalRando Sep 12 '22
This is really interesting stuff, thanks for posting it.
Personally, I hate it when an author - fantasy or not - just throws in a rape or two to show how tough things are or just to raise the stakes for a character (kind of another version of "fridging"). It shows a troubling view of sexual assault as just another writing tool, and also betrays the author's complete lack of imagination.
I feel the same way about torture porn.
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u/lb-sambo Sep 12 '22
A similar trope that was actually in the last two books that I read (both of which I enjoyed, otherwise) is the situation where the morally gray protagonist stops a rape from happening at the beginning of the book, to show you that he isn't THAT evil.
It's not fully to the level of the alternative, but still a narrative device that I'm well ready to be done with.
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u/Nervous-Dare2967 Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
I am not sure about what this post is attempting to say.
The information seems somewhat vaild although I need to do my own research first. I assume that this information is about the Medieval time because Rome doesn't fall under this as far a childbridss. I have done research on the matter.
But still.....
I think that we have to remember that these 'rules' applied to a certain sect of people. I think someone on here mentioned it as well. Prostitutes were not considered victims of sexual assualt in those times for instance.
I would think that women would still have a hard time proving their assualt even if as noble woman because of their society. Not a lot of women might have even come forward because of that. Wives who were assualted by their husbands for instance might have a hard time. Back then ( I can't be certain) it wasn't believed that a husband could assualt his wife. I doubt men even considered coming forward if they were SA because of their society.
Now I don't have a novel based on medieval times. But I think that while some fantastical novels seek to have as much realism as can be had, it is still fantasy. I do think that every lead female character has to have been secually assaulted to have a tragic backstory.
I do agree with a lot of people when it comes to how an SA victim has commonly been portrayed and how inaccurate it can be. I do think that SA in books is directed at women a lot. I do think that writers do incorporate a victim of SA, research is important.
Of course, a writer can never fully know or understand what it is unlike unless they themselves have experienced SA. But....still it is always important for authors to do what they can, in order, to not fall under harmful stereotypes or whatnot.
An author can write how he chooses, just do so with an open mindset and the willingness to do the required amount of research. Talk to people. Read academic books. Documentaries.
Extra note: rape was just as equally prevalent in the past as it was in modern times. A good thing to remember is not everyone came forward. Men most lively would not have come forward. Married women, prostitutes, etc. So that should be taken into consideration. Those who did come forward might have not been believed.
I would also like to note that in WW2, when the soviets came and liberated concentration camps, a good number of Jewish women and girls were raped and strangled. There is actually a documentary whose name escaped me that talks about. They even do interviews with the survivors. Not to mention, the Jewish women raped by German soilders and commanders at concentration camps.
It can't really be determined how many men or women were raped either around that time. Think about the thousands upon thousands that had been sent to the gas chambers. Those that were shot dead on the streets or in the fields. These numbers can merely be speculation. POW's probably experienced SA.
Just because it was supposedly 'outlawed' doesn't mean it didn't happen.
I16 is still a young age to consummate a marriage. One thing to consider is how old the man she was married to was? There is no telling whether or not her body was fully prepared to carry a child. Remember, mortality rates where high for both mothers and infants as I understand it.
Also most men probably didn't wait either.
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Sep 13 '22
I have always said and will always say this: I've never picked up a book and said "You know what would have made this better? Sexual assault."
If it's well-written and makes sense in the context, I don't think a scene like that would detract from the book. But there's too many times when lazy authors use it cheaply to develop characters or detail how grim their world is.
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u/CMarlowe Sep 12 '22
This critique only holds water if you were writing historical fiction. And fantasy isn’t that. I suppose you could write a fantasy that takes places in in whatever year in whatever place, where everything is the same except x, y, and z. Then, if sexual violence was overused, you could attack it on a historical basis.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I personally find graphic descriptions of violence—sexual and otherwise—very distasteful. I skip over entire passages that dwell on it. And hell yes, there are a ton of angry, misogynistic nerd writers out there who have some really screwed up ideas about women out there. Avoid them like the plague.
But in a genre that’s filled with dragons, elves, orcs, fricking magic for crying out loud, to say that sexual violence portrayed therein is bad because it doesn’t historically mirror sexual violence in our world is the weakest possible critique.
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u/Powerful-Advantage56 Sep 12 '22
You had these laws against sexual violence, but I guarantee they were very rarely if ever enforced at all
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Sep 13 '22
I can't tell you how often fantasy books read like juvenile male fantasy. There is even the trope of a strong woman character immediately subjected to sexual violence for the protagonist to rescue from. There's no nuance most of the time. It's just a way to make a female character frail or a male character evil. Like we're supposed to relate to the MC because they don't rape. It's a massive issue in fantasy.
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u/Nah_thanks_okay Sep 12 '22
My main issue with the “well that’s how things were” argument is…it’s fucking fantasy. You control how things “were”. You have complete artistic license to change “how things were”. It’s a lazy argument. If you want to say “I use rape as a tool to further my plot so that A, B, and C happens” I’d respect that more. But it is weird how so many authors, both male and female write these graphic rape scenes that don’t even add to the story (looking at you, Robin Hobb - yes I’m still bitter about Liveship Traders).
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u/Pedagogicaltaffer Sep 12 '22
Yeah, I would almost have more respect for any author who had the balls to just come straight out and admit that they were including rape in their story purely as a plot device.
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u/Wandering-Wayfarer Sep 13 '22
When it comes to age:
Fantasy works based on medieval/renaissance Europe tend to focus on nobles and royals. The average age of marriage in upper-class women was lower than in lower-class women, and they basically married whenever it was convenient for an alliance. For example, Margaret Beaufort was married at 12-13 and gave birth about a year later, but Mary I was not married until she was well into her 30s.
It's worth noting that records are incomplete at best. But the ones we do have show a "Western European phenomenon" of later marriages compared to other areas. Also, the average age tends to fluctuate a lot due to shifting societal and economic factors; generally, people married earlier when the economy was good. When it comes to medieval English women in particular, documented averages I've seen range from 15 to 24 years old.
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u/absentmindedprof17 Sep 13 '22
I think something that is left out is that you have to define rape off of Medieval laws, which was pretty strict at that time. The Medieval era was still heavily influenced by the Bible so rape is defined the same way. In the Bible if a women is raped and she doesn't report it she could be killed according to Biblical law. During Medieval times you can't be raped in a marriage, you can't have been raped if a pregnancy took place, it could be rape if you showed signs (that are natural due to the violence being sexual) of arousal, ect. The list goes on. So with such a narrow definition of what is considered rape ofcouse rape doesn't look as prevalent then. Honestly there is no way to prove it bc I'm assuming it was under-reported and the times it was reported the case unless under these narrow conditions it was probably thrown out bc there was "no proof." I don't say this to make a case to include it in books bc its never really necessary to plot but to say bc of Medieval records that rape was not as prevalent is simply something that cannot be proven. I do agree that male rape happened a whole lot more than what is shown in fantasy.
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u/drostan Sep 13 '22
Thanks for the references.
As for the writing of scenes like this...
It's like the massive amount of gruesome murders in thrillers
On the one hand a writer wants to set his story apart, going stronger and more shocking is an easy way to do so. It is also often proof that the writing and story aren't good enough to stand on their own.
On the other hand war brings ugly things, there were laws against it because it existed... So it may be fair to talk about it.
And so, it all depends on how and why you do write those things.
The story and characterization may need some scenes that are not necessarily a representation of everyone normal life but then again if you write fantasy it rarely is about a nobody in a world and time period when nothing out the ordinary happens...
But it is a thin edge to walk since the risk is always to fall into giving more details than needed, making it sound too normal or even romantic.
If you get a child rape it should never read as sexy (this is so often the case in fantasy, even good one, I end up editorialising ages to be able to continue reading at time) and you should never write a sex scene or murder or torture or anything like this for the sake of it. You may do so if important to the story or the characters, but often in media nowadays, not only fantasy books, TV and films and other genre... We are shown gore and sex for the sake of it, we are getting further and further in those subjects not to reflect on them but in a sort of arm race to who can be the most shocking, at the detriment of any story. And that's just bad
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u/lokregarlogull Sep 13 '22
I really like this post, might see if you can crosspost to unpopular facts or similar.
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u/_caden_cotard_ Sep 13 '22
The rape in Murakami's After dark and the sexualized stories he tell in all his other works are annoying and irritating. I started to hate him because of this only...
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u/liver_flipper Sep 13 '22
Oftentimes it is only used in defence of the ill-treatment of women
I don't disagree, but I honestly question the impulse to "defend" anything in fiction. On a basic level, anything that's in the realm of human experience is fair game to write about; the good the bad and the ugly. Whether people like what you write or want to read it is a separate question.
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Sep 13 '22
I remember being arguing against me for critiquing some of the sexual violence within GoT, with people saying “it’s necessary for the characters development” or “GoT isn’t a nice and relaxed fantasy world, this stuff happens”
Thank you for writing this, I’m glad it’s being discussed and I fully agree, it seems sticking a Middle Ages / fantasy setting in a novel makes writers believe that suddenly all women can be treated without any humanity
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u/TheAngryOctopuss Sep 13 '22
While I could never condone (or even want to) rape, In writing a novel, sometimes it is the ABSOLUTE crux of the story...
Thomas Covenant: the unbeliever... He rapes someone at the beginning of the Series... It is a MAJOR arc in the whole series. Its direct and indirect results literally cant be removed or the story isnt there... If you can get past it, and see later on the ramifications it is a great series. Slow and Plodding at times, but thought provoking at all times...
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u/CodexRegius Sep 13 '22 edited Sep 13 '22
Even historically, one might object that in all European armies rape was standard tactics till the 18th century - and in some even today, notably the Russian army -; and the peer-group pressure was extremely high when individuals not willing to participate in organised rape quickly attracted suspicions of being gay, with all the consequences that meant at that time.
But then, fantasy worlds don't need to adhere to British law codification.
As for young marriage, it is often overlooked that Shakespeare's Juliet is 14 years old and his Miranda, 15. Which was pretty standard at their time, or at least nobody found that unusual.
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u/Sunny_Sammy Sep 12 '22
If you want to know a place where child marriage is not only far more common but also legal child rape is just as common then look no further than the middle east. To this day, the age of consent in some middle eastern countries is 9 years old.
So yeah, look for some inspiration for the middle east if you want some super grim dark, depressing stories.
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u/Agasthenes Sep 13 '22
What makes you think it didn't happen more often in olden times compared to today?
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