So much damn incest

[darkride]

About a decade ago there was a big sex survey done... and most certainly when you went down the list of people's fantasies, you had some real popular ones that were also very vanilla, and as you went down, obviously then they became more and more 'extreme'. (Not real keen on that word... In many cases they weren't so extreme as just different)

As (Western) society moves further away from the organised religion that has attempted to control sexuality for 2 thousand years or so, so to we start to relax our views on sex and what we are willing to do.

And the internet did a lot too.

 

[SmokingFap]

People are allowed to discuss things they don't like, and to question why things are or aren't popular. Starting a thread asking "why are people so into this?" is nowhere near as odd as, say, getting aggressive about it, or claiming that OP must be secretly into it, or going on tangents about eighteen year olds jacking it to their mom's underwear (that is. Not normal).

And let's be real here, Lit's incest focus is unusual. Even by porn standards, this site is heavily focused on incest. Pornhub might have a load of 'MILF bangs stepson!' videos but you literally cannot browse these forums without running into more incest than you can shake a stick at. People here will sagely tell you that 'a mom-son story' is the most popular type of content. There are slang terms and standards and cliche plotlines: 'Mom's Hot Why Not', 'a standard mom-on-my-lap plot', no-go rules for the I/T category, etc. When I was new I found a thread wailing about how the genre was dying and mourning the 'glory days' of mother-son incest, only to glance at Story Ideas and seeing almost every other thread being incest-themed. It was like being in the Twilight Zone.

Now, I'm not the sort to make a thread about such things, and since it's not my fetish I usually just go elsewhere, but I totally get the complaint? Like, this is December; every ad, every TV channel, every storefront window is going to be blaring about Christmas from now until the 25th. Spare a thought for the millions of people who're going to be working retail this season, because after hearing enough repeats of 'Wonderful Christmastime' on the store's only holiday album, it's hard to escape the conclusion that they shot the wrong Beatle. People get annoyed by endless repitition; people hate pop stars when they're all that's on the radio, people will refuse to read a popular books if all their friends recommend them it, so of course they'll get a bit tired when, quick glance, more than a third of all page-one titles in Story Ideas mention incest.


Nah, things have always been extreme. The extreme stuff is just filtering into the mainstream more. Let me quote James Joyce for the class:


EDIT: Moments after posting this I got an alert for a thread I'd posted in. Someone posted an excerpt from their new story. It was about incest.

Nice thesis. Dismissed.

 

[TheF1x3r]

(Not real keen on that word... In many cases they weren't so extreme as just different)

Yeah; I was struggling for a better one.

It's like the example of foot fetish I gave.. what would you say... it became more... elaborate?

As (Western) society moves further away from the organised religion that has attempted to control sexuality for 2 thousand years or so, so to we start to relax our views on sex and what we are willing to do.

I don't know that it's religion, at least not on heterosexual subjects. I mean god never said don't let your husband/wife leave bruises on your bottom.

Depends *where* you are though.

In the UK, even on homosexual subjects, often you'd find that it was illegal/proclaimed immoral but also everyone knew where it was happening and nobody really cared. Famously, in one of the UKs more violent cities, some thugs did start turning up to where the gay guys met and did assault a number of people until one time they turned up and ... ehh... well they turned out not to be that tough.

And the internet did a lot too.

100% agree. I think the internet is absolutely the root cause, more than anything else

 

[Unblemished]

Nice thesis. Dismissed.

Ooh, how edgy

Oh no I am aware of that, what I'm saying would be more like:

"On average, a person will use more extreme pornography and/or have gained more extreme fetishes than in previous decades"

However if you go back 10 years, if you remember the front pages of the most popular sites of the time, it was less extreme (and furthermore, companies went to great lengths to let you know the models were over 18).

Points for quoting James Joyce! When I was studying paraphilia I came across him being mentioned in relation to ass licking. I actually have a copy of the first novel known to have mentioned that topic (or maybe the first mention in a german novel, I can't remember): Der abenteuerliche Simplicissimus Teutsch

...Huh, fascinating. I think I've heard of that book before, looking it up; first German adventure novel. Might have to read it sometime.

I definitely think the more extreme stuff is bleeding into the mainstream a lot more. I don't think availability of porn is making the fetishes themselves more extreme, but you're probably right that it's definitely popularising them more amongst the population. Hardcore fetish fans decades ago were likely similar to ones today, but the difference is that people can easily access it now, so it's way more obvious.

Thinking on it, I think that sometimes incest works a bit like a...taboo sauce? A flavouring on something that wouldn't otherwise be very transgressive at all. Not always, obviously, since like any genre there'll be people being creative with it, and I know the transformation from platonic to romantic is a big draw.

But in some of the more simplistic ones, the ones people call strokers? Some of those are a way to have your cake and eat it, IMO. People have already mentioned how incest can provide a pre-packaged relationship and situation for your characters; rather than having to describe who they are and how they know each other, you can just plop down the family dynamic and there it all is. That's daddy, we live together. Etc. But it goes further, because taking away the taboo element renders some of these stories pretty vanilla.

Most fetishes will only appeal to the people who like that one very specific thing, and sometimes only a subset of them. Foot fetishes are maybe the most common of all, but within that category are people who see it in a dominance/submission kneel-before-your-partner way, and people obsessed with dirt and degradation and week-old gym socks and stuff, and people who aren't subs and don't want to suck filthy toes any more than they want to lick the arse of someone who doesn't wipe: They just think feet are attractive body parts, thank you very much. What appeals to one group doesn't necessarily ork for any of the others.

And that's probably the most widespread fetish of all. Other, less popular ones become exponentially more niche.

But incest? By having your characters be related you can get the spice of transgression without actually writing anything particularly transgressive. As people have said, a lot of readers see these characters as "fantasy moms" or "fantasy sisters". Most have no interest in their own real relatives, but they want to read about this not-real figure who happens to be called Daddy or whatever.

Stop calling that lady 'mom' and you just have an older woman/younger man story. That's a perfectly mainstream dynamic in a culture rife with cougar jokes. Daddy/daughter stories just become older man/younger woman, and that's so common in our culture that some weirdos try to claim its an inherent part of human nature. Hell, 'daddy' and 'mommy' are quickly becoming sexual terms used by non-incest fetishists to describe partners their own age. And brother/sister just becomes, uh, two young hetero adults fucking, which is about as basic as it gets.

But an incest framing provides a bit of taboo spice to what would otherwise, in terms of content alone, be a rather vanilla Erotic Coupling piece.

And that's not just me being insulting, I swear. I pretty much only write vanilla EC strokers. It's a perfectly noble pursuit

 

[StillStunned]

EDIT: Moments after posting this I got an alert for a thread I'd posted in. Someone posted an excerpt from their new story. It was about incest.

I'll go out on a limb and guess that someone was me.

In this case, there were particular reasons for making it about incest.

First, the story is a bit of an experiment, and I/T offers a larger audience than some of the lesser-frequented categories. In particular, the opening description and opening lines are intended to draw in the mother-son readers who'd be more inclined to read past the second person POV. A case of kink winning out over prejudice, I hope.

Second, the nature of the story calls for a taboo. It's about that voice inside you saying "this is wrong, but let's do it anyway." I could have done it in another category - a cheating wife, non-consent, lesbian or gay - but combined with the need to draw in the reader before they even click on the story, I/T seemed the best option.

 

[Unblemished]

I'll go out on a limb and guess that someone was me.

In this case, there were particular reasons for making it about incest.

First, the story is a bit of an experiment, and I/T offers a larger audience than some of the lesser-frequented categories. In particular, the opening description and opening lines are intended to draw in the mother-son readers who'd be more inclined to read past the second person POV. A case of kink winning out over prejudice, I hope.

Second, the nature of the story calls for a taboo. It's about that voice inside you saying "this is wrong, but let's do it anyway." I could have done it in another category - a cheating wife, non-consent, lesbian or gay - but combined with the need to draw in the reader before they even click on the story, I/T seemed the best option.

It was! I didn’t mean any offence, the switch was simply perfect. I wrote this whole big ‘yeah incest is basically everywhere on here, there’s no way to avoid it’ thing, hit post, saw I had an alert, clicked the button, and immediately read the words “You know you shouldn’t be standing here outside your mother’s bedroom.” Flawless timing, no notes.

It does make sense to use a popular category for an unpopular style. Get bums in seats to make up for the smaller audience. Another possibility could be to try one of the more second-person focused styles; roleplay stories where people vote on what ‘their’ character is going to do, imagine-yourself-with-this-person celeb fics and fanfiction, etc. But then, I don’t know if there’s many of those on Lit.

 

[TheF1x3r]

...Huh, fascinating. I think I've heard of that book before, looking it up; first German adventure novel. Might have to read it sometime.

I would recommend it, albeit that particular part is just a minor event in a long story

I definitely think the more extreme stuff is bleeding into the mainstream a lot more. I don't think availability of porn is making the fetishes themselves more extreme, but you're probably right that it's definitely popularising them more amongst the population. Hardcore fetish fans decades ago were likely similar to ones today, but the difference is that people can easily access it now, so it's way more obvious.

I agree

The fetishes themselves... I donno, I mean they've always existed (or always as far as modern man is concerned). But does anyone start with a fart fetish, or does that grow from the facesitting fetish? We know, because of James Joyce, that it certainly isn't a new thing. (they've removed the Eproctophilia entry from wikipedia, annoyingly)

There's consensus among psychologists on a theory that I can only explain in lay terms due to psychology not being my field of expertise.
The theory goes:

Every time a person "enjoys" some pornography they become just a little bit desensitised to the content. Eventually they need to add something to it, or they stumble upon something spicy, and that becomes the next "thing" until they reach a point of desensitisation.

This cycle continues over the length of the persons life from when they first started using pornography until they stop/expire.

This coincides with but is not the same thing as porn addiction (a type of sex addiction), where the user gets a little serotonin hit when they look at porn. The key difference in this bit is that the user is very often looking at porn without becoming aroused and/or reaching orgasm.

I *think* Huberman has a good video on youtube about this, from the perspective of a neuroscientist.

Thinking on it, I think that sometimes incest works a bit like a...taboo sauce? A flavouring on something that wouldn't otherwise be very transgressive at all. Not always, obviously, since like any genre there'll be people being creative with it, and I know the transformation from platonic to romantic is a big draw.

I agree again; I get the sexual appeal of *the idea* of it and how wrong it is.

But in some of the more simplistic ones, the ones people call strokers? Some of those are a way to have your cake and eat it, IMO. People have already mentioned how incest can provide a pre-packaged relationship and situation for your characters; rather than having to describe who they are and how they know each other, you can just plop down the family dynamic and there it all is. That's daddy, we live together. Etc. But it goes further, because taking away the taboo element renders some of these stories pretty vanilla.

I can't comment on those... as soon a realism gets too far away I can't maintain an interest. Also you know..

"Jenny started sucking her brothers cock" - shut the front door! there'd need to be a lot of prologue before I could buy into that *as an idea*.

Most fetishes will only appeal to the people who like that one very specific thing, and sometimes only a subset of them. Foot fetishes are maybe the most common of all, but within that category are people who see it in a dominance/submission kneel-before-your-partner way, and people obsessed with dirt and degradation and week-old gym socks and stuff, and people who aren't subs and don't want to suck filthy toes any more than they want to lick the arse of someone who doesn't wipe: They just think feet are attractive body parts, thank you very much. What appeals to one group doesn't necessarily ork for any of the others.

And that's probably the most widespread fetish of all. Other, less popular ones become exponentially more niche.

I agree with that - it's more common than homosexuality. Probably just as varied as any sexuality.

But incest? By having your characters be related you can get the spice of transgression without actually writing anything particularly transgressive. As people have said, a lot of readers see these characters as "fantasy moms" or "fantasy sisters". Most have no interest in their own real relatives, but they want to read about this not-real figure who happens to be called Daddy or whatever.

Stop calling that lady 'mom' and you just have an older woman/younger man story. That's a perfectly mainstream dynamic in a culture rife with cougar jokes. Daddy/daughter stories just become older man/younger woman, and that's so common in our culture that some weirdos try to claim its an inherent part of human nature. Hell, 'daddy' and 'mommy' are quickly becoming sexual terms used by non-incest fetishists to describe partners their own age. And brother/sister just becomes, uh, two young hetero adults fucking, which is about as basic as it gets.

Oh god... I hate being called daddy... that makes my skin crawl.

But an incest framing provides a bit of taboo spice to what would otherwise, in terms of content alone, be a rather vanilla Erotic Coupling piece.

And that's not just me being insulting, I swear. I pretty much only write vanilla EC strokers. It's a perfectly noble pursuit

I suppose it's just that the taboo of incest causes disgust in anyone who thinks about it too literally. I mean if you were in a close platonic relationship that crossed the line and you weren't supposed to be doing it... yeah I get that being hot. We could enter non-biological sister/brother territory without needing incest.

And hey... nothing wrong with vanilla... it's my favourite flavour

 

[FiveInch033]

What I find most disturbing about Incest stories is the stories are NOT more disturbing. What I mean is. As I've wrote in my incest story is how inappropriate it was. Didn't mean the characters didn't "get off" but shouldn't there be something disturbing about family members getting it on? Just saying. Not saying the stories shouldn't be written. I've written about this topic myself. I just find it disturbing that the stories aren't written from a point of being disturbing.

 

[StillStunned]

What I find most disturbing about Incest stories is the stories are NOT more disturbing. What I mean is. As I've wrote in my incest story is how inappropriate it was. Didn't mean the characters didn't "get off" but shouldn't there be something disturbing about family members getting it on? Just saying. Not saying the stories shouldn't be written. I've written about this topic myself. I just find it disturbing that the stories aren't written from a point of being disturbing.

For what it's worth, my newest story You Know You Shouldn't is all about knowing it's wrong, but doing it anyway. The ratings tell me that readers don't like being told their kink is disturbing. I expect a flood of comments to show up shortly, once they've gone through moderation.

 

[TheF1x3r]

For what it's worth, my newest story You Know You Shouldn't is all about knowing it's wrong, but doing it anyway. The ratings tell me that readers don't like being told their kink is disturbing. I expect a flood of comments to show up shortly, once they've gone through moderation.

Yeah I mean.. like @Unblemished sort of said... if it isn't disturbing then it's just a story about two people having sex... I donno, It's not my thing and I doubt anyone us actually committing incest after reading one

 

[StillStunned]

Yeah I mean.. like @Unblemished sort of said... if it isn't disturbing then it's just a story about two people having sex... I donno, It's not my thing and I doubt anyone us actually committing incest after reading one

It comes with a built-in, ready-made conflict. Without that, yeah, it's just two (or however many) people having sex.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

For what it's worth, my newest story You Know You Shouldn't is all about knowing it's wrong, but doing it anyway. The ratings tell me that readers don't like being told their kink is disturbing. I expect a flood of comments to show up shortly, once they've gone through moderation.

that's the 2nd POV you mentioned in the AH, eh?

are you concerned or bothered by comments? i've learned to not give much of a shit about offending sensibilities over the years. not every reader will like it. but some will.

 

[StillStunned]

that's the 2nd POV you mentioned in the AH, eh?

are you concerned or bothered by comments? i've learned to not give much of a shit about offending sensibilities over the years. not every reader will like it. but some will.

That's the one.

I don't care about comments saying the reader didn't like the story. Fair enough. They've done me the honour of reading my story, and no-one is forcing them to be nice about it. If they feel like they've wasted 10 minutes of their life, they're free to tell me - whether because of 2P POV, or because of the non-consent aspect, or because of the implied guilt. I'm assuming that anyone who reads it is OK with the I/T.

Unfortunately there does seem to a tendency for negative comments to turn nasty and personal, and I'm expecting at least a few of those.

The two comments so far have actually been very positive, but they're both from AH regulars. I expect writers to appreciate the story from a different angle.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

That's the one.

I don't care about comments saying the reader didn't like the story. Fair enough. They've done me the honour of reading my story, and no-one is forcing them to be nice about it. If they feel like they've wasted 10 minutes of their life, they're free to tell me - whether because of 2P POV, or because of the non-consent aspect, or because of the implied guilt. I'm assuming that anyone who reads it is OK with the I/T.

Unfortunately there does seem to a tendency for negative comments to turn nasty and personal, and I'm expecting at least a few of those.

The two comments so far have actually been very positive, but they're both from AH regulars. I expect writers to appreciate the story from a different angle.

ever done Loving Wives? nasty and personal doesn't touch the sides!

 

[StillStunned]

ever done Loving Wives? nasty and personal doesn't touch the sides!

I'm not going anywhere near LW, not with a 10-foot pole!

 

[geronimo_appleby]

I'm not going anywhere near LW, not with a 10-foot pole!

chicken?

 

[StillStunned]

chicken?

Discretion, as they say, is the better part of valour.

I actually did have an idea for LW, but it's at the bottom of the pile for me to actually write up.

 

[geronimo_appleby]

Discretion, as they say, is the better part of valour.

I actually did have an idea for LW, but it's at the bottom of the pile for me to actually write up.

i put this in Fetish... and they still fund me! 2nd POV too.

[/threadjack]

 

[StillStunned]

I'll check it out!

 

[TheF1x3r]

It comes with a built-in, ready-made conflict. Without that, yeah, it's just two (or however many) people having sex.

OOOoooooooo.......

Right... I get it now.

Thanks!

 

[MrHereWriting]

It comes with a built-in, ready-made conflict. Without that, yeah, it's just two (or however many) people having sex.

Every story, category, genre, etc., comes with a "built-in, ready-made conflict."

 

[nice90sguy]

If there was as much incest in real life as there is here, mankind would be extinct. Unfortnately, there isn't.

 

[nested456]

Locked up with Mommy

New mom/son incest story, set during lockdown.

I think this category is popular because of the closeness the characters have. This story, like my previous mother/daughter story, features a mother who has deep unconditional love for her child. That's not something you're not going to find easily with a stranger so as a story, it's going to resonate.

 

[Poet0730]

What's the deal with so much focus on incest? Don't people get turned on by people other than their sister and mother??? Geeze.

I know I hate it I wish it would stop

 

[RetroFan]

I've written a fair few incest stories for this site, and am curious myself about when it became so popular.

IT stories have been written on the site for years, for example when I posted a story in this category last year, a similar story was listed was published way back in 2005.

Incest often appears in fiction and has done so for years - sometimes played for drama like 'Flowers In The Attic' - or other times for comedy, like in the movies Euro Trip (2004) and Blades of Glory (2007). Using these two movies as they were comedies and the characters are aged 18 or older, in Euro Trip a set of brother/sister twins Jenny and Jamie get trashed on absinth in a nightclub in Eastern Europe, and begin making out, both so far out of it they don't realize who they are, to the horror of their friends and the brother and sister themselves in the sober, hung-over morning light the next day.

In Blades of Glory, the antagonists are Stranz and Fairchild Von Waldenberg, a twin brother and sister ice skating duo who share a creepy and uncomfortably close relationship (the characters were played by Will Arnett and Amy Pohler who were married at the time) and who kiss in an incestuous manner in the film's climax, confirming they are indeed way too close for comfort.

It is hard to imagine somebody watching Euro Trip or Blades of Glory at the cinema all those years ago hurrying home afterwards, only stopping to grab tissues before indulging in solitary fun over these scenes in the movies. Possibly they did, but it doesn't seem realistic. So when did attitudes change so much?