Date Rape vs. Science Fiction Story Idea

Hi folks

I'd particularly like to hear from women authors on this.

I am toying with the idea of a science fiction style story where the results of a top secret CIA study on the use pheromones to seduce women falls into the wrong hands.

There is a part of me that feels that there is a bit of a date rape drug element to this. One thing I strive for when I write is to make everything consensual. I may make a character pushy - mostly a woman pushing herself on a man - but in the end everyone consents to everything.

Putting an element into a story that robs a character, particularly a woman, of her free will strikes me as too close to rape for comfort. On the other hand, how many of us have the fantasy of just dabbing on some scent and having the person we desire fall at out feet.

What do you all think?

thanks

GandalfTheGeek said:

I am toying with the idea of a science fiction style story where the results of a top secret CIA study on the use pheromones to seduce women falls into the wrong hands.

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Human pheromones are science fiction, so the category is right.

I'm not a girl, but two things:

1) Human pheromones, if they exist, are thought to be produced by women for various reasons. It's a stretch to think that they could be used to seduce a woman. Maybe in a Lesbian story. It's more likely they would be used to manipulate men.

2) Human's aren't insects. It's hard to imagine any realistic condition in which a pheromone will be so overpowering that it could create a noncon situation.

But then, if you're writing in SciFi you really only have to write what people want to think.

I write stories (and books) about a CIA "Candy Store" unit that combines the world's two oldest professions--spying and prostitution--in which this unit is used to seduce "whoever" to serve spying operations. I've included the existence of pills that counteract STDs and that also provide more effective contraceptives (both female and male) than can be gotten on the market, or exist in the public realm. I could see that this could be pushed to enhance an agent's allure (pheromones, for instance). Anything to help seduction and making the agent desirable to the mark. At the base, though, the mark has been looking for what the agent provides to fulfill the mark's desires and, when the goods are delivered, is blackmailed into providing what's needed by the CIA. (This isn't science fiction, by the way. This is long-existing technique.)

So, as long as you write it as the Agency finding out what the mark wants and will be willingly seduced to, with help, you aren't into rape territory. You're manipulating the mark's existing preferences, willingness, weaknesses, and vulnerabilities. You can write it with them being the initiator.


LATER: I'm proofing a CIA Candy Store book tonight, and this, which might help you as you approach your writing, starts off the book's introduction:

The world’s two oldest professions are said to be prostitution and spying. Which one of those was first is still being hotly debated. When the intelligence organizations of countries put these two together in their operations, they are able to realize significant useful results in intelligence gathering and operations. Assurance that you are getting good information or service from suborned targets comes not from subjecting them to torture but in giving them what they desire the most, the more taboo the better, and then withholding it if they don’t deliver trustworthy goods and services. In the world of espionage the two greatest motivators are money and sex. Of these, sex provides the greater control, as money is harder to hide.

Sounds like the Mind Control category would be the best fit for this story.

Would this be unethical IRL? Definitely. Does that make it unethical to write fiction about it? That's between you and your conscience.

It was done by the marvellous RD - https://www.scentedpages.com/pdf/dahl.pdf

What saves it from being rape is the sheer preposterousness of the situation, as well as the absolute delight the women experience.

Really, imagine it this way; you're stupendously horny all of a sudden. Hormones are going wild! And you have wild, hot, satisfying sex. How much do the how's and why's really matter in the aftermath?

Orgasms at the end don't change whether consent was given in the first place. It doesn't matter how world-shattering they are.

Yes, this would be best categorized as Mind Control (where even stated consent is utterly dubious), but I don't think the Sci Fi category would be a bad fit either.

Demonstrate that it's not absolute. Maybe the guy tries to pick up a golddigger, and the boost from the pheromones aren't enough to overcome her "not rich" instinct. Maybe things are going well with a woman, when another passes by, and he checks her out. His conquest in motion slaps the shit out of him and leaves. Maybe he tries to pick up a lesbian, and that doesn't work out so well.

The pheromones cause all the happy and horny chemicals to percolate rapidly, but acting the ass or approaching a woman who has absolutely zero attraction to him is a no-go. He's probably getting someone else laid when he strikes out, though.

Your protagonist can't be butt ugly or a jackass in this scenario — unless you want to have him learn Groundhog Day style by trial and error how to not be a jackass, or catch her attention with conversation/thoughtful gestures if he's no George Clooney.

Best suited to the nice, average looking, but socially awkward protagonist who is making as much progress from the confidence boost as from the chemical persuasion.

Ah, yes, it just got through to me that the question was about the technology getting into the wrong hands and that's what the story would be about. If the technology is attraction pheromones, the story might be about overachieving the attraction intent--having multiple women coming on more aggressively than the protagonist is prepared for and can handle.

If you want to avoid questions of consent, make the drug work the other way. Have it affect the man and give him mental clarity, or confidence, or something like that. The CIA developed it to aid undercover agents in bluffing their way through some deep bullshit and being able to turn on a serious amount of charisma and charm gives your protagonist the boost to talk their way into a promotion or bed a love interest that is otherwise out of their league.

AwkwardMD said:

If you want to avoid questions of consent, make the drug work the other way. Have it affect the man and give him mental clarity, or confidence, or something like that. The CIA developed it to aid undercover agents in bluffing their way through some deep bullshit and being able to turn on a serious amount of charisma and charm gives your protagonist the boost to talk their way into a promotion or bed a love interest that is otherwise out of their league.

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The James Bond drug?

NotWise said:

The James Bond drug?

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I think a story would be more compelling if the protagonist didn't start off suave and debonair, and was more of an everyman (or even an overlooked geek/nerd), but yes. The James Bond drug.

KeithD said:

having multiple women coming on more aggressively than the protagonist is prepared for and can handle.

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A very common theme in Japanese anime - albeit of the non-erotic version, targeting school kids - they even have a genre for it: harem. One shy guy, a bunch of pretty girls vying for his attention. the difference with stories on this site is of course that they usually don't even get as far as kissing.

Back to the pheromone idea. I like it. I don't know whether pheromones exist in humans, though I've heard a lot about how smell is a great factor in sexual attraction. I've once read about how deodorants for men are made with smells that women tend to like, and the other way around - indeed the conclusion being that gay men should wear deodorant for women, and gay women deodorant for men.

Smell is also a recurring thing in lots of erotic fiction where the smell of a (potential) partner is described as arousing. I'm sure that part is not fiction at all, though in the real world this smell is just an extra factor adding to a desire that is there already. So it's not that crazy a stretch to imagine someone develops a smell that makes another person fall for him/her immediately, losing inhibitions, and (of course) consenting to sex. It's what SF does all the time: take the current state of development and extrapolate/exaggerate it.

For the category: well, that's an interesting one.
SF? Maybe - though that tends to be more about the future, space travel, etc.
Mind control? Then I'd expect it's turned into something that can target a specific person, or maybe turn a whole population crazy.
Non-consent? Definitely not, as the whole purpose of the pheromone is to get the other party to want to engage in sex, not to force anything against their will. Sure, they may regret later for whatever reason, but that doesn't negate the fact that consent was given and had not been withdrawn during the act.
Group sex? Would be a good one if it's a story on how a mad scientist creates some pheromone to gather himself a harem of willing women.
Erotic Couplings? A great catch-all for "everything else".

I think your premise is similar to the rom-com Love Potion No. 9, in which a dorky pair of scientists become irresistible to the opposite sex (though it has the opposite effect on their own gender) and hilarity ensues.
Pheromones are very real in humans. There's been research to show that we are particularly attracted to people who complement our immunities and help produce the most genetically viable offspring.

i_would said:

Non-consent? Definitely not, as the whole purpose of the pheromone is to get the other party to want to engage in sex, not to force anything against their will. Sure, they may regret later for whatever reason, but that doesn't negate the fact that consent was given and had not been withdrawn during the act.

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Consent cannot be given with diminished mental capacity.

If you want to write a date rape story, write a date rape story, but don't fool yourself into thinking it's not rapey because you fooled the girl into saying yes with pseudoscience. Or actual science, for that matter.

NOTE: in this context, dimished should be understood to also mean 'altered', 'compliant', and/or 'reduced'.

AwkwardMD said:

Consent cannot be given with diminished mental capacity.

If you want to write a date rape story, write a date rape story, but don't fool yourself into thinking it's not rapey because you fooled the girl into saying yes with pseudoscience. Or actual science, for that matter.

NOTE: in this context, dimished should be understood to also mean 'altered', 'compliant', and/or 'reduced'.

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Sure it can. If you have a few drinks or smoke pot before having sex, your capacity may be diminished, but if you consent it's still consent, generally speaking. It's not a simple matter of either/or. If on the other hand a man gives a drug or offers drinks to a woman to the point that she doesn't know what's going on and they have sex, that's not consensual. But it's not the case that any diminishment in capacity renders consent void. It's complicated. It's a matter of the degree of the diminishment and the intent of the parties to the sex.

There are many things about a person that might exert a strong influence on another to make the other want to have sex. At what point does the exertion become so great that the response is no longer consensual? It's an interesting question for a court of law, but in erotic fantasy, who cares?

Your story is not the real world. Don't get too hung up on the labels to attach to the story and to what happens in it.

i_would said:

For the category: well, that's an interesting one.
SF? Maybe - though that tends to be more about the future, space travel, etc.
Mind control? Then I'd expect it's turned into something that can target a specific person, or maybe turn a whole population crazy.
Non-consent? Definitely not, as the whole purpose of the pheromone is to get the other party to want to engage in sex, not to force anything against their will. Sure, they may regret later for whatever reason, but that doesn't negate the fact that consent was given and had not been withdrawn during the act.
Group sex? Would be a good one if it's a story on how a mad scientist creates some pheromone to gather himself a harem of willing women.
Erotic Couplings? A great catch-all for "everything else".

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I wrote a story (Modern Biology) for last year's Summer Lovin' contest that had a similar theme. Four biologists working on a botanical survey in a remote area discovered that the resin from an unusual bush had an arousing effect, but only when shared by a couple who were so-inclined.

My story went into Mature because of the age differences in the two biologist couples. The general readership seemed to like it more than the Mature crowd liked it.

SimonDoom said:

Sure it can. If you have a few drinks or smoke pot before having sex, your capacity may be diminished, but if you consent it's still consent, generally speaking. It's not a simple matter of either/or. If on the other hand a man gives a drug or offers drinks to a woman to the point that she doesn't know what's going on and they have sex, that's not consensual. But it's not the case that any diminishment in capacity renders consent void. It's complicated. It's a matter of the degree of the diminishment and the intent of the parties to the sex.

There are many things about a person that might exert a strong influence on another to make the other want to have sex. At what point does the exertion become so great that the response is no longer consensual? It's an interesting question for a court of law, but in erotic fantasy, who cares?

Your story is not the real world. Don't get too hung up on the labels to attach to the story and to what happens in it.

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Your answer is out of context with this thread. The OP is asking about a drug that seduces women. That's not a gray area of consent.

Also, on a related note, a wise writer once said that it is only through characters that a story comes alive. Don't underestimate the power of writing real people reacting to real things, even if your setting is fantastic.

AwkwardMD said:

Your answer is out of context with this thread. The OP is asking about a drug that seduces women. That's not a gray area of consent.

Also, on a related note, a wise writer once said that it is only through characters that a story comes alive. Don't underestimate the power of writing real people reacting to real things, even if your setting is fantastic.

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I don't quite agree. The OP wrote about a pheromone that a man would emit to seduce women. It's not the same as drugging a woman. It depends on the degree of effect it has. One can imagine a scale of effect. At one end it just entices, like a nice cologne. At the other end it overpowers the woman's ability to resist. There are lots of points in between on the scale where the ethics are murkier.

But my main point is I think people here worry too much what label one should put on something and what the ethical implications are. My recommendation would be to write the story first and see how it goes without worrying too much about those things.

GandalfTheGeek said:

I am toying with the idea of a science fiction style story where the results of a top secret CIA study on the use pheromones to seduce women falls into the wrong hands.

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This is the stated intent of the author's antagonist. It is clearly someone with ill intent.

GandalfTheGeek said:

Putting an element into a story that robs a character, particularly a woman, of her free will strikes me as too close to rape for comfort. On the other hand, how many of us have the fantasy of just dabbing on some scent and having the person we desire fall at out feet.

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This is the stated effect of the author's pheromone drug. It is not cologne, it is a mind-altering drug.

Stop making this argument more complex to suit your agenda. There are no degrees of murk, gray, or uncertainty. This is rape.

That being said, if your fantasy is to write a rape fantasy, then by all means do so. You do you, boo. I've written some pretty dark shit myself, but I didn't lie to myself and argue that the characters deserved their fate or that they were truly enjoying themselves, or that they had any real say in the matter.

You may want to check out The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive. I believe they are still an active community, and they are the experts on this sort of thing.

Own up to the undertones of your story: a chemical agent that vitiates consent is a date-rape drug. Those Axe Body Spray commercials were creepy.

But even the Ancient Greeks were writing curse tablets to get the objects of their desire to fall in love with them. It is a deeply imbedded power fantasy, and thus, in my opinion, worthy of exploration in fiction. As long as one maintains a healthy appreciation of the distinction between reality and fantasy, and understanding the primacy of reality over fantasy, getting turned on by an Axe Body Spray scenario is harmless, again IMO.