When is Violence Too Much?

[Stella_Omega]

I bet someone else has already said this and I didn't notice it in the thread.

But-- Violence is too much for a story when it drags the story away from its intended theme, when the reader derails into reading about violence instead of reading about the plot, when it becomes pornographic...

Don't turn violence into a Mary Sue, I guess.

Sex, though-- you can let the sex take over, I'm fine with that

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I bet someone else has already said this and I didn't notice it in the thread.

But-- Violence is too much for a story when it drags the story away from its intended theme, when the reader derails into reading about violence instead of reading about the plot, when it becomes pornographic...

Don't turn violence into a Mary Sue, I guess.

Sex, though-- you can let the sex take over, I'm fine with that

True. Joseph M.Williams says pretty much the same. If it aint part of the train or the track or the stations or crossings, leave it out. No cows, no barns, no silos, no steel mills, no fruited plains.

 

[MichaelWest]

On another site is a story that takes the prize, a woman hires a man to fuck her and rough her up, to make it look like rape. Well, he roughs her up to the extreme, then cuts her up with a knife. I think its excessive.

Oddly I am drafting a detective story based on a true story wherein a woman attempts to frame her ex-boyfriend of rape to get sole custody of their child. I am still trying to write her describing the violent rape that turns out to have been staged.

I personally do not like violence much at all. Blood and gore and sadism do not excite me. Yet we live in times that have given too many a jaded eye to human depravity. So I sit and write the "realism" that seems demanded by such a non-erotic story. It is fun writing detective fiction though.

 

[JackLuis]

An antagonist can be a evil as you like, as long as he gets repaid for it in the end.

 

[slyc_willie]

It's precisely "it was being done to arouse" that will get violence kicked out by this Web site. Just saying.

As long as they don't blend together, violence in sex for titillation can get you the boot.

I think it pretty much does for those of us who realize we're on a porn site.

I probably wasn't too clear in an earlier response. I never intend to blend violence and sex in the same scene, and on the one occasion in which I did write a rape scene, it was told from the woman's point of view and I put more emphasis on the thoughts going through her head.

So, no, I keep them separate.

 

[slyc_willie]

I bet someone else has already said this and I didn't notice it in the thread.

But-- Violence is too much for a story when it drags the story away from its intended theme, when the reader derails into reading about violence instead of reading about the plot, when it becomes pornographic...

Don't turn violence into a Mary Sue, I guess.

Sex, though-- you can let the sex take over, I'm fine with that

True. Joseph M.Williams says pretty much the same. If it aint part of the train or the track or the stations or crossings, leave it out. No cows, no barns, no silos, no steel mills, no fruited plains.

These both pretty much nail it down, in their own ways. It's just not always easy to find that borderline. But then, isn't that why we have editors (or, in my cases, spouses)?

 

[Saxon_Hart]

These both pretty much nail it down, in their own ways. It's just not always easy to find that borderline. But then, isn't that why we have editors (or, in my cases, spouses)?

As long as the violence makes sense and fits into the tale go with it. Some commentor will lose their mind and want to try you for your characters' crimes though. I had a character kill another and you would have thought I shot someone's gramma.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Oddly I am drafting a detective story based on a true story wherein a woman attempts to frame her ex-boyfriend of rape to get sole custody of their child. I am still trying to write her describing the violent rape that turns out to have been staged.

I personally do not like violence much at all. Blood and gore and sadism do not excite me. Yet we live in times that have given too many a jaded eye to human depravity. So I sit and write the "realism" that seems demanded by such a non-erotic story. It is fun writing detective fiction though.

I had a case where a 17 year old athlete claimed that mama run her over with a Cadillac and daddy fucked her since she was born. The whole fucking world sided with the teen but there wasnt any evidence of anything. I mean, if your mama runs you over with a Caddy you'd think there would be injuries or marks or something. Nothing. Daddy had a pot possession arrest in 1968 (the detective characterized the dad as a DRUG LORD), and 5 siblings called the sex abuse bull shit, plus he was on oxygen and impotent. The REAL issue was the girl was gay and wanted to move in with one of her teachers. Momma and daddy said NO, and the school started shit rolling against the homophobic parents. The judge threw it out as baseless bullshit.

 

[MichaelWest]

The judge threw it out as baseless bullshit.

Luckily for this individual, the investigator hired by his Defense Attorney and the Police Detectives unravelled her story. Ultimately he was saved by his chance use of an ATM, timing the movements he had to make to commit the crime and other little facts. But the Prosecution pursued it even after the lead Detective refused to testify because he no longer believed a crime was committed. Shamefully she was never charged with perjury or filing a false police report.

I like it because it is a good detective story, like old fashioned ones before CSI, and no miracle science, no DNA, just gum-shoe walking it, talking to witnesses and piecing the truth out of the patch work evidence. When do you get a real case that could be solved by a Sam Spade anymore?

 

[Tx Tall Tales]

Recent experience on a couple of stories told me one thing about violence.

If it's not in a normally violent category, you probably want to mention the violence in the initial comment or tags. Otherwise the readers will definitely ding you on it.

In my recent story, Gamer Goddess Ch.03, I had a scene very similar to yours, except instead of shooting the guy, he was brutally tortured, pissed on, and wrapped up in plastic for disposal while still breathing. Pretty harsh, but intended that way.

Didn't stop the story from scoring extremely high, but I got a lot of complaints in the comments about the sudden violence in a previously non-violent story, with no warning.

In my continuation of Agena's A Joke, there was a lot of violence but at least they couldn't say I didn't warn them.

 

[damppanties]

In the scene I described from my story, I wanted something that would explain just how vindictive and cruel the main antagonist is. He's not the kind of man to simply kill someone, he wants to let them know to the very end what he thinks of them. I know I don't have to be as descriptive as I am in the scene, but I want to be.

The way I'd think about it is: what reaction do I want to get from the reader? And then write to that specification. After all, the same murder + urinating scene can be described in a way that can shock, disgust or simply be blah to the reader. It's not the violence, per se, or the level it goes to but the way you write it and the way the reader reacts to it. And as the author, you can tailor that to what you want out of it.

I still remember a story I read here that made me scared of houseplants for several months afterwards. Houseplants, for God's sake! Everything has the potential to be scary/disgusting/insert adjective. It's up to the author to make it that way.

 

[TE999]

I've written violent scenes aplenty in many stories, but it wasn't ever what I'd call 'gratuitous'; it was part of the plot.

Violence in movies and videogames is totally gratuitous to the point where it's cartoon like and desensitizes the viewers to actual violence. That's the dangerous aspect of over the top blood and gore.

In the old Universal horror flicks of the 30's, 40's and 50's the menace sufficed and violence was implied rather than seen very often. The viewers imaginations filled in the blanks.

 

[sr71plt]

I probably wasn't too clear in an earlier response. I never intend to blend violence and sex in the same scene, and on the one occasion in which I did write a rape scene, it was told from the woman's point of view and I put more emphasis on the thoughts going through her head.

So, no, I keep them separate.

I wasn't thinking of your posts when I posted those quotes--these were dealing with bits and pieces of what I saw in what others were posting.

I've blended sex and violence together a few times. But they were Vampire bits where the point was that the Vampire fucks his victims to death and they are prepared to think that's just glorious. For some strange reason it's determined to be OK if some alien being does it. I push a lot of edges--not because I'm turned on by a steady diet of such stuff, but because I'm a writer--looking for where the edges are and experimenting.

I write a good deal of rough sex, though. Because in RL I rather enjoyed it--or at least the threat of it. Extra adrenaline flow (among other emotions I saw connected with it).

 

[slyc_willie]

As long as the violence makes sense and fits into the tale go with it. Some commentor will lose their mind and want to try you for your characters' crimes though. I had a character kill another and you would have thought I shot someone's gramma.

After my Halloween story, Shock Radio, went up, I received numerous emails from anonymous commenters about how disgusting and vile my main character was, having sacrificed both his wife and daughter to save his own life. A lot of it was damn near death-threat material. One that I saved just because of the amazing amount of vitriol included numerous Bible verses and other "proof" that I was going to hell for what I had written.

I wish that person had left me their email, so I could have pointed out where they misquoted Leviticus

The way I'd think about it is: what reaction do I want to get from the reader? And then write to that specification. After all, the same murder + urinating scene can be described in a way that can shock, disgust or simply be blah to the reader. It's not the violence, per se, or the level it goes to but the way you write it and the way the reader reacts to it. And as the author, you can tailor that to what you want out of it.

I was just going back over the scene, and other than describing it from the dying man's point of view, most of what is happening is actually implied. I don't think the reader will misconstrue anything at all from what I've written, but it is not as explicitly detailed as I originally thought it was. Funny how that happens.

I wasn't thinking of your posts when I posted those quotes--these were dealing with bits and pieces of what I saw in what others were posting.

I've blended sex and violence together a few times. But they were Vampire bits where the point was that the Vampire fucks his victims to death and they are prepared to think that's just glorious. For some strange reason it's determined to be OK if some alien being does it. I push a lot of edges--not because I'm turned on by a steady diet of such stuff, but because I'm a writer--looking for where the edges are and experimenting.

I write a good deal of rough sex, though. Because in RL I rather enjoyed it--or at least the threat of it. Extra adrenaline flow (among other emotions I saw connected with it).

Reading this just reminded me of my Wizard of Oz take-off series here. I had completely forgotten that the Wicked Witch in my story was literally fucked to death by her own broomstick.

 

[myrionomos]

I wrote a story in which the protagonist castrates the man who cuckolded him. I thought it would be scarier if I portrayed the protagonist as a sinister, man utterly devoid of emotion, a man who thinks of himself as the acme of respectability, who inflicts the injury coldly, clinically, dispassionately, as a punishment.

However, my editor disagreed strongly, claiming that it would have to be brutal and bloody and filled with graphic hate. I don't want to change my non-emotional character because it would be inconsistent with the rest of the story - but I now begin to doubt whether it will work for the readers either way.

 

[slyc_willie]

I wrote a story in which the protagonist castrates the man who cuckolded him. I thought it would be scarier if I portrayed the protagonist as a sinister, man utterly devoid of emotion, a man who thinks of himself as the acme of respectability, who inflicts the injury coldly, clinically, dispassionately, as a punishment.

However, my editor disagreed strongly, claiming that it would have to be brutal and bloody and filled with graphic hate. I don't want to change my non-emotional character because it would be inconsistent with the rest of the story - but I now begin to doubt whether it will work for the readers either way.

I think telling you to change a character's demeanor was a big mistake on your editor's part. The story is yours, the characters are yours. If you want a cold, clinical, diabolical surgeon as your castrator, that's what you write. There are plenty of good examples of unemotional antagonists out there. Stephen King's Alexis Machine in The Dark Half, for instance.

I would think the idea of an almost mechanical-minded person, acting like a medical examiner dissecting a corpse, would be an incredibly chilling character. It all depends on how you write the scene, and the character. The raw emotion of one character being castrated being balanced by the lack of emotion in the castrator could be a very effective scene. Here is something that is monumentally personally violating for one person, and it is being handled by another as something little more than a series of mechanical events, as if the victim's fears and pain were nothing.

I'd stick with it the way you had it.

 

[Stella_Omega]

You always have to be careful of editors trying to change your story into the one they want to read.

Something I've been guilty of, myself-- so I say it as who should know.

(trying, that is. The author was the one who pointed it out to me)

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Luckily for this individual, the investigator hired by his Defense Attorney and the Police Detectives unravelled her story. Ultimately he was saved by his chance use of an ATM, timing the movements he had to make to commit the crime and other little facts. But the Prosecution pursued it even after the lead Detective refused to testify because he no longer believed a crime was committed. Shamefully she was never charged with perjury or filing a false police report.

I like it because it is a good detective story, like old fashioned ones before CSI, and no miracle science, no DNA, just gum-shoe walking it, talking to witnesses and piecing the truth out of the patch work evidence. When do you get a real case that could be solved by a Sam Spade anymore?

I admire the experience and attitude you express here. IRL Sam Spade competence is no more. These days, if you wanna kill your career, be fair, balanced, and objective. And if you wanna depart like right now challenge an expert's fuckup or A VIPs agenda.

 

[MichaelWest]

I admire the experience and attitude you express here. IRL Sam Spade competence is no more. These days, if you wanna kill your career, be fair, balanced, and objective. And if you wanna depart like right now challenge an expert's fuckup or A VIPs agenda.

Sadly "fair, balanced, and objective" are no longer real muscle. I came to accept the crapsack world and went melancoly for a time. Then I retired from the fiction. If I want moral certainty, happy endings or truth, justice and the good guys winning, I can write it!

 

[MichaelWest]

However, my editor disagreed strongly, claiming that it would have to be brutal and bloody and filled with graphic hate. I don't want to change my non-emotional character because it would be inconsistent with the rest of the story - but I now begin to doubt whether it will work for the readers either way.

That may say more about your editor than the story or the character. A man who commits violence out of rage sparked by extreme stress is a man we can pity, we can stand in those shoes or at least understand how he broke bad. But the pure heart of evil, the cold, calculated, sytematic killer? We may want to peek into that world but hope we never do fathom where that brand malevolence roots from.

I think the current trend is to show guts and gory and pass it off as horror. It is effects instead of substance. Simply reading the thoughts of a depraved man planning the crime you wrote, never seeing the commission, that can be deeply horrifying without resort to graphic trickery.
or short cutting. That is my opinion.