Voting against a genre rather than against a story

thebullet

Rebel without applause
Joined
Feb 25, 2003
Posts
1,247
The Literotica category that generates the most controversy is ‘Loving Wives’. We have a problem because the category can be taken to mean several things.

When a story is submitted in this category which has a cuckolded husband who submits to his cheating wife, this invariably evokes one of two reactions from readers. Either they are all for the husband’s humiliation, or they are adamantly opposed to the concept.

I’ll reveal my personal prejudices. I was in the position many years ago of discovering my wife’s cheating by getting ‘sloppy seconds’ – a most unpleasant experience, let me assure you. (She was too drunk and/or too stupid to hide her infidelity.) My response was to throw the bitch out.

Okay, so I have a very visceral personal reaction to the ‘cheating wife/wimp husband’ genre. That has nothing to do with the quality of the writing, the logic of the storyline, or the fullness of the characterizations drawn in a story. When I come across such a story, I never vote on it. It would be unfair to the author for me to weigh her down with my gut reaction to her story.

It seems to me that we have voting that is in essence rejecting the entire genre rather than the particular story, not just in the ‘Loving Wives’ category. As Harry Truman said, ‘if you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen’.

I avoid several of the genres like the plague. I’ve never been in the BDSM section, or in the incest section, or in the gay section, or in the fetish section. I’ll admit I’m guy enough to occasionally peruse the lesbian section. I sometimes hang around the non-English section, just trying to figure out what those words mean. (Can you say ‘pussy’ in Hindi?)

I wrote a non-consent story a while back and got a few emails that threatened my livelihood. I’m like, ‘Hey, babe, if you don’t like rape fantasies, then DON’T READ rape fantasies’. And mine was a mild one.

If a reader is uncomfortable with a certain kind of erotica, then the reader should avoid that kind of erotica. It isn’t fair to the authors who write for those categories and obviously have an audience who wishes to read these stories. Their scores are lower only because the reader doesn’t like the genre. How fair is that?

Finally, why doesn’t Literotica split the ‘loving wives’ category in two, creating a new section just for the wimp husbands among us who like to wallow in their own humiliation, leaving ‘loving wives’ for wives who actually are loving.
 
thebullet said:



Finally, why doesn’t Literotica split the ‘loving wives’ category in two, creating a new section just for the wimp husbands among us who like to wallow in their own humiliation, leaving ‘loving wives’ for wives who actually are loving.

I have to agree with what you say; if you don't like a type of story, don't read them.

I also think that there should be two categories as you propose: One labeled "Cheating Wives" (or maybe "Cheating Spouses") and the other labeled "Loving Couples". At one time I saw the category "Loving Wives" and thought, "That's nice. A category devoted to loving wives. It probably should be called "Loving Couples" though." I then wrote and posted a story about a loving newlywed couple and posted it to the category. That was when I found out the title of the category was actually sarcastic and it was really about cheating wives. I got complimentary feedback and PC's on the story but it isn't rated very highly.
 
Well, damn, Boxlicker, I followed your link and you are one prolific S.O.B.! Getting a little long in the tooth and now it's easier to write about it than do it, huh?:D

Just kidding. I agree with your assessment. Break "Loving Wives" into "Cheating Spouses" and "Loving Couples".





thebullet's stories - none of which are 'Loving Wifes'
 
Lime:
Yeah, I agree that changing the voting patterns of readers is difficult, if not impossible. Still, if Literotica lets people know (perhaps as a phrase on the voting form at the end of a story) that the voting should be on the quality of the story rather than the genre of the story, maybe some readers might take that advice to heart.

I know I'm a dreamer.




thebullet's semi-porn
 
thebullet said:
Well, damn, Boxlicker, I followed your link and you are one prolific S.O.B.! Getting a little long in the tooth and now it's easier to write about it than do it, huh?:D


[]

Unfortunately, that is true. Now I spend all night writing about what I used to do all night. Writing about it is fun but it was and is a lot more fun doing it.
 
I have just posted 8 chapters of a Loving Wives story. I have got similar negative and of course anonymous feedback for every chapter. These morons did not comment on the writing; not surprising since they can hardly string a coherent sentence together; no their beef is the concept itself.

They are most unlikely to heed any advice to judge a story on its merits. I mean if they were rational in the first place, they would not read stories that clearly distress them.

Octavian

My Stories
 
I think lots of genres have their detractors--gay, and incest, for instance. So if you write husband humiliation/cuckold stories you're going to get it from a certain crowd. There are actually at least three categories in 'loving wives':

husband humiliation by unfaithful wife.
husband prostituting a wife
wife prostituting herself, perhaps to reach the husband.
husband and wife have an arrangement for her to 'swing' and
(and possibly him too) tell hubby, for his arousal.

There is simply no avoiding critics of the 'topic', not the writing, of a story. Hence gov't actions against James Joyce, DH Lawrence, etc.
 
Octavian said:
I have just posted 8 chapters of a Loving Wives story. I have got similar negative and of course anonymous feedback for every chapter. These morons did not comment on the writing; not surprising since they can hardly string a coherent sentence together; no their beef is the concept itself.

They are most unlikely to heed any advice to judge a story on its merits. I mean if they were rational in the first place, they would not read stories that clearly distress them.

Octavian

My Stories

Generally speaking, I would agree that if people don't like a type of story, they shouldn't read stories that are that type. I have no interest in reading about bondage or S & M so I avoid that category. If people don't like reading about incest, they should avoid stories in that category.

"Loving Wives", however is something of an exception. I am sure that people go to the category expecting to read nice, romantic stories of married or otherwise committed couples who enjoy making love and these people are dismayed when they find out the category is actually mostly the exact opposite, of what they are expecting. This, I think, is what this thread is about.
 
I agree with what all have to say about the voting procedure. but I also think that people who come to this site are in search of Porn and are confused as to what Erotica is exactly.
They are either ignorant or apathetic to the writing process and how involved it can become.

As for those who complain about content...this is still a bee in my britches. It's not like things are'nt labled clearly, they are supposed literate adults, do we need red flashing warnings that state the content? "Attention: if you are a dumbass, do not pass Go."

I do like the idea of catagory separation, eg. Cheating spouses, loving spouses, is probably a happy medium.

Perhaps this should be put to a poll to see if others are in agreement.

~A~
 
Pure said:
I think lots of genres have their detractors--gay, and incest, for instance. So if you write husband humiliation/cuckold stories you're going to get it from a certain crowd. There are actually at least three categories in 'loving wives':

husband humiliation by unfaithful wife.
husband prostituting a wife
wife prostituting herself, perhaps to reach the husband.
husband and wife have an arrangement for her to 'swing' and
(and possibly him too) tell hubby, for his arousal.

There is simply no avoiding critics of the 'topic', not the writing, of a story. Hence gov't actions against James Joyce, DH Lawrence, etc.


There's another one that you omitted: Honest-to-goodness loving couples in a committed relationship.
 
Boxlicker
You may be right in some instances
BUT I was getting feedback from the same anonymous people. I began to recognise their style! and the way one person spelled 'anymoore'.
Now ask yourself if the first chapter of a story is not what you expected, is it a reasonable assumption that the second may be similarly disappointing?

And if the first five have all disappointed you, why bother to read chapters 6,7 and 8?

No you've got to be fairly stupid to do that, and sending similar feedback about every chapter is pretty conclusive evidence.

These people are morons; there is no escaping the fact.

Octavian
 
Another category is interracial. Lots of feedback that is racist although they all seem to come from the same peson. I guess his/he screen name is 'anonymous':rolleyes:
 
Boxlicker101 said:
There's another one that you omitted: Honest-to-goodness loving couples in a committed relationship.
Isn't that the "Erotic Couplings" category?

I agree with the category problem for "Loving Wives" which is why I do not post stories into it.

I am working on a cheating spouse story and I wish there was a "Cheating Spouse" category. Maybe I'll ask someone to do an audio file so it can go into the "Text with Audio" category.
 
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thebullet said:
I sometimes hang around the non-English section, just trying to figure out what those words mean. (Can you say ‘pussy’ in Hindi?)

Went through this entire awhile ago and I don't know if anybody answered this. Can I say it-no. My handy online Hindi-English dictionary doesn't even list it, but I found 'fuck' and 'hole' and I can't pronouce this either: maithun KandraA. I should have been a teacher:D
 
I posted a story in the interracial category. I received some really venomous feedback on it. The bad feedback was never about my writing, it was about what I had chose to write about.

At the same time I received some very positive feedback that commented on the writing as much as the story.

I guess it just goes to prove that you can't please everyone.
 
Octavian said:
Boxlicker
You may be right in some instances
BUT I was getting feedback from the same anonymous people. I began to recognise their style! and the way one person spelled 'anymoore'.
Now ask yourself if the first chapter of a story is not what you expected, is it a reasonable assumption that the second may be similarly disappointing?

And if the first five have all disappointed you, why bother to read chapters 6,7 and 8?

No you've got to be fairly stupid to do that, and sending similar feedback about every chapter is pretty conclusive evidence.

These people are morons; there is no escaping the fact.

Octavian

I must concede you are right. By the way, I NEVER defend people who send nasty feedback or PC, especially if they are known as anon. I read the thread where you mentioned that before and I agreed with you there. If somebody starts reading a story and the subject matter is distressing, the reader should stop and go elsewhere. To do anything else is pretty stupid.

Angela, I think of "erotic coupling" as being just that, not necessarily in a committed relationship. A plurality of my stories are E/C and none of them involve a committed couple.

Earlier this year I suggested a category of "Loving Spouses" but it went nowhere. Maybe it is too fine a division from E/C.
 
There are men who will have sex with a woman and then castigate her for being a whore. They thus get their rocks off while maintaining their own feeling of moral superiority: she's the sick, perverted bitch who made me do it.

In the same way, I think there's a certain number of readers here who actually seek out stories that will offend (and arouse) them, and then take out their shame and guilt on the author. The reader thus again gets his rocks off, while convincing himself that he's above such disgusting and abominable behavior.

---dr.M.
 
dr_mabeuse said:
There are men who will have sex with a woman and then castigate her for being a whore. They thus get their rocks off while maintaining their own feeling of moral superiority: she's the sick, perverted bitch who made me do it.

In the same way, I think there's a certain number of readers here who actually seek out stories that will offend (and arouse) them, and then take out their shame and guilt on the author. The reader thus again gets his rocks off, while convincing himself that he's above such disgusting and abominable behavior.

---dr.M.

Good analogy! From what some authors say about their feedback, I think you are probably right. Many people who look for stroke material online are probably ashamed of doing so, however odd that may seem to most of us degenerates. :)

MM
 
thebullet said:
The Literotica category that generates the most controversy is ‘Loving Wives’. We have a problem because the category can be taken to mean several things.

When a story is submitted in this category which has a cuckolded husband who submits to his cheating wife, this invariably evokes one of two reactions from readers. Either they are all for the husband’s humiliation, or they are adamantly opposed to the concept.

I’ll reveal my personal prejudices. I was in the position many years ago of discovering my wife’s cheating by getting ‘sloppy seconds’ – a most unpleasant experience, let me assure you. (She was too drunk and/or too stupid to hide her infidelity.) My response was to throw the bitch out.

Okay, so I have a very visceral personal reaction to the ‘cheating wife/wimp husband’ genre. That has nothing to do with the quality of the writing, the logic of the storyline, or the fullness of the characterizations drawn in a story. When I come across such a story, I never vote on it. It would be unfair to the author for me to weigh her down with my gut reaction to her story.

It seems to me that we have voting that is in essence rejecting the entire genre rather than the particular story, not just in the ‘Loving Wives’ category. As Harry Truman said, ‘if you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen’.

I avoid several of the genres like the plague. I’ve never been in the BDSM section, or in the incest section, or in the gay section, or in the fetish section. I’ll admit I’m guy enough to occasionally peruse the lesbian section. I sometimes hang around the non-English section, just trying to figure out what those words mean. (Can you say ‘pussy’ in Hindi?)

I wrote a non-consent story a while back and got a few emails that threatened my livelihood. I’m like, ‘Hey, babe, if you don’t like rape fantasies, then DON’T READ rape fantasies’. And mine was a mild one.

If a reader is uncomfortable with a certain kind of erotica, then the reader should avoid that kind of erotica. It isn’t fair to the authors who write for those categories and obviously have an audience who wishes to read these stories. Their scores are lower only because the reader doesn’t like the genre. How fair is that?

Finally, why doesn’t Literotica split the ‘loving wives’ category in two, creating a new section just for the wimp husbands among us who like to wallow in their own humiliation, leaving ‘loving wives’ for wives who actually are loving.

I fully agree mate, there's nothing 'loving' about a cheating slut, this category causes more concern than any other I think, why the hell the site admin won't listen when this subject is dragged up virtually every week is beyond me. Erotic couplings should be modified for this type of cheating stuff, or group if she fucks them more than one at a time. It doesn't need a new category.

I feel sympathy for you and your dilema, and experience with your wife friend, but there are a lot of guys who don't object to the genre, or for that matter to their own wife getting it elsewhere. It takes all sorts to make a world, some of us find the idea, and at times the reality, of our good ladies enjoying a good seeing to before we sample the aftermath a hell of a turn on. It's fun if you can drop the possessive jealousy.

Wimp husbands know their wife is at it, they hate it, but don't have the guts to do anything about it. You don't sound as though you were a wimp hubby, you kicked her out, you did something about it.

Women will always take advantage of the male weaknesses, just as men will do likewise with women. It's all a fact of life and all a big game.

I personally strongly dislike some categories, but would never read them given a choice, if I accidentally came across one badly categorised, I would 'never' vote on my dislike of the subject matter, it wouldn't be fair to the author or to my integrity.

If swinging wives and hubby's offend, steer clear of the genre my friend.
 
This has been gone over about a trillian times, and I don't think that they are ever going to change it. Vote or no vote.

For one thing, the categories of "Romance" and "Erotic Couplings" exist for 'loving spouses' stories.

For another, the loving wives category, I believe was orriginally intended for wives who are 'willing to do anything for hubby' Cheating Wives as a name category doesnt' fit some of the non-menogomous stories that fall under 'loving wives' and that is the intent. Maybe they should change it to 'non-manogomous relationships' but that doesnt' have much pazazz.

Although people may be confused at first, they should be able to figure it out pretty quickly. Those who post 'hate letters' to authors under the category are not 'confused' They know exactly what they are reading- they just want to preach and moralize.

ABSTRUSE said:


I do like the idea of catagory separation, eg. Cheating spouses, loving spouses, is probably a happy medium.

Perhaps this should be put to a poll to see if others are in agreement.

~A~
 
This has been gone over about a trillian times

What is different now is the existence of public comments. Perusing the public comments of "Loving Wifes" one will probably find that any 'cuckold-wimp husband' story is getting multiple negative comments merely because of its genre.

These stories that in the past have perhaps suffered in silence, are now being publicly pillaged.




thebullet's stories
 
(Can you say ‘pussy’ in Hindi?)

I think it's choot--unless that's really Pashtun. Everyone in that part of the world needs to be conversant in at least 3 languages including English, to conduct ordinary business. We need to get Hornypaki, who makes extensive use of all kinds of words in his language, to settle this.

As I said earlier, if a story is about something that's incomprensible to me, I don't vote on it. Therefore, there are whole categories that I frequent far less often than others. I don't understand why people will come into a genre that they inherently dislike, and then low-vote the stories. Hey--if you come into a delicatessen, you're sure to find liverwurst, pastrami and salami. Don't burn the place down because there wasn't any produce in there.

I have a cyberfriend who's posted a few stories in Lit who read my latest offering and then did not vote on it because it culminated in M/M action, and that didn't grab him personally, as much as he liked my writing. To me that's the right course of action.
 
It's probably a good idea to turn off public comments to stories posted in "Loving Wives" unless you either

1. are a masochist.

or

2. think that any 'publicity' is good publicity, and figure negative attention is better than being ignored.

thebullet said:
What is different now is the existence of public comments. Perusing the public comments of "Loving Wifes" one will probably find that any 'cuckold-wimp husband' story is getting multiple negative comments merely because of its genre.

These stories that in the past have perhaps suffered in silence, are now being publicly pillaged.




thebullet's stories
 
It's probably a good idea to turn off public comments to stories posted in "Loving Wives"

sweetnpetite:
That makes a lot of sense. The majority of negative comments that one sees on Literotica are knee-jerk responses to the Loving Wives category. The quality of the story has nothing to do with it.


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Ninety Percent of Everything is Crap - Sturgeon's Law

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity - Hanlon's (Heinlein's?) Law
 
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