Writing to provoke reaction?

[Quiet_Cool]

Okay, so I was skimming through the Are some stories immoral? Should we observe some boundaries? and while I can't say for certain exactly what brought this thread about (there are references in the thread, but I won't go into all that; I was just skimming, afterall).

Someone made the point that we shouldn't, as authors, hold ourselves responsibile for the actions others partake in unless we intentionally provoke those actions. This started a train of thought (yes, I have those now and again, and they don't always involved breasts and Twinkies). I thought back and wondered if I'd ever written something with the intention of persuading people to believe something, or to act on something.

I don't believe I ever have. I don't believe I've ever had the arrogance (okay, that kind of arrogance) to think it was my place to convince others to follow my example, or believe my beliefs. Those beliefs and example are apparent in my work, but I don't feel they're there for the sake of motivating the reader, simply because they motivate me to write.

What about you? Do you feel that you write to motivate? Do you feel it's our job to motivate, or is it our job to illustrate, and to allow others to interpret in their own right?

Q_C

 

[LadyJeanne]

Hmm, most of my Lit stories are intended to provoke a reaction, but usually just of the wanking variety. Other than that, no, I don't think I try to sway anyone into believing in my particular point of view.

My personal porn, the stuff I write for special someones in my life, might have more intentions along those lines. I think I try to convey my attitude toward sex and how it should be, how I like it, what turns me on, and how I see it - all with the intention of provoking more of those actions...

 

[yui]

What about you? Do you feel that you write to motivate? Do you feel it's our job to motivate, or is it our job to illustrate, and to allow others to interpret in their own right?

Q_C

Hey Q_C, you're back the Berserk AV.

Regarding your questions; no, I don't write to motivate so much as to stimulate, and I simply illustrate a moment, to the best of my ability, and allow people to take from it what they will. That being said, I don't write the extreme stuff either; simply because it doesn't appeal to me. My personal kink to write is sibling incest, but as incest goes, it's a dreamy, consensual sort of perversion, more about forbidden lovers than anything.

There seems to be an assumption on some of these threads that their readers are either children or mentally challenged adults who are incapable of differentiating between reality and fiction. There are certainly exceptions, but that assumption that the reader, on average, is somehow too "stupid", to know the difference seems colossally pretensions, but that's just my opinion.

Peace,

Yui

 

[zeb1094]

Hey Q_C, you're back the Berserk AV.
There seems to be an assumption on some of these threads that their readers are either children or mentally challenged adults who are incapable of differentiating between reality and fiction. There are certainly exceptions, but that assumption that the reader, on average, is somehow too "stupid", to know the difference seems colossally pretensions, but that's just my opinion.

You just aren't whistling Dixie, try writing in the LW cat. There is a faction there that think the stories are all real and try and shame you for writing crap that will suck some poor married couple into a lifestyle that will ruin their marriage.

My belief is if they don't have a propensity toward that life style they won't dive into the life style nor read the story.

And if they do lean toward that life style then they would whether they read my story or not.

I don't not write to provoke, as Yui has stated I write to induce a feeling, if that feeling it to wank then so be it. If it is to go out and emulate the characters in the story that's their business. I didn't put a gun to thier heads and force them out into the cold naked and say 'Go forth and fuck whoever you find.'

 

[elsol]

I don't write to provoke or stimulate.

I write to make the voices stop... blame it on them.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[rgraham666]

I can think of a number of cases where I put in something to make people think.

Once, a character worked at a food bank, something her single parent family often had to do when she was growing up. Not because the mom didn't work, but because the mom couldn't make enough to make ends meet. It was a definite 'in your face' to the people who sneer at the poor.

Another, the sequel to the one above, another character makes a statement about how businesses can piss in their pool by asking for something from governments and getting it.

The same story was centered around the main character's lover being in a coma for most of it. I tried to educate people on the difficulty, emotionally, of dealing with such an event and what happened to the person in the coma.

My Halloween story was a contrast in the use of power. Both the antagonist and the protagonist had a lot. The antagonist was very careful about using his power, until he lost it. The protagonist saw no reason to restrain themselves.

Now that I think of it, all my longer stories are written to get some reaction other than to arouse.

My short pieces of smut have no other purpose.

OK. Done bragging.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

I can think of a number of cases where I put in something to make people think.

Once, a character worked at a food bank, something her single parent family often had to do when she was growing up. Not because the mom didn't work, but because the mom couldn't make enough to make ends meet. It was a definite 'in your face' to the people who sneer at the poor.

Another, the sequel to the one above, another character makes a statement about how businesses can piss in their pool by asking for something from governments and getting it.

The same story was centered around the main character's lover being in a coma for most of it. I tried to educate people on the difficulty, emotionally, of dealing with such an event and what happened to the person in the coma.

My Halloween story was a contrast in the use of power. Both the antagonist and the protagonist had a lot. The antagonist was very careful about using his power, until he lost it. The protagonist saw no reason to restrain themselves.

Now that I think of it, all my longer stories are written to get some reaction other than to arouse.

My short pieces of smut have no other purpose.

OK. Done bragging.

Nice post rgraham, and everyone else. I think rgraham hit my point much more strongly than everyone else. I'm not referring to provoking arousal. I know, on a porn board, that's a bit unfair. But my intention was directed at writing in general, the parts to apply to any for of the art. Whether or not it's your main intention for writing is beside the point. I referring to things like characterization, backstory, plot, anything that can present a point above and beyond sexual arousal.

Again, unfair on a porn board, but porn or not, we're writers here.

rgraham, I see what you're saying, but do you believe those things you've mentioned were intentional, or did they simply come with the flow of the story. When I was writign "Frankenstein," I knew the point was going to be the children in the end, but I didn't really write the story to persuade people to look at their lives differently, or to motivate them to call their children or whatever. Simply because the story in my head demanded that it be about that. I wasn't thinking outside the lines, wasn't writing for an audience at all.

I was wondering if I was mostly alone in this here, or if it were more common than I'm hearing about. We're always saying here that we write for ourselves. My question mostly is, does that include our desire to motivate people? Or are we simply writing what the story demands we write?

Q_C

 

[Quiet_Cool]

I don't write to provoke or stimulate.

I write to make the voices stop... blame it on them.

Sincerely,
ElSol

Not sure if this is an honest post, or you just screwing around, but I agree with it whole-heartedly.

Q_C

 

[BlackShanglan]

I don't personally believe that the story demands I write. That is, I can "feel" the story unfolding in certain ways, and I can feel that the characters feel best to me doing certain things or acting in certain fashions. But I believe that these things feel right or wrong to me because of who I am, not solely because of the story's inherent qualities. Yes, there is a writerly craft, and an un-rooted ending of any sort will always dissapoint. But if one wishes to root it and make it bring the themes to a fruitful conclusion, one must deal with what one thinks of those themes and how they ought to end given the actions of the characters. It's quite possible to do this on instinct; I generally think that that is what "letting the story write itself" means. That is, it's not the story writing, but the author going with what feels right to gut instinct. I only wish to enunciate more explicitly those gut-instinct driven goals, examine and question them, and decide why I feel that way and whether it's what I care to say.

Shanglan

 

[Quiet_Cool]

I don't personally believe that the story demands I write. That is, I can "feel" the story unfolding in certain ways, and I can feel that the characters feel best to me doing certain things or acting in certain fashions. But I believe that these things feel right or wrong to me because of who I am, not solely because of the story's inherent qualities. Yes, there is a writerly craft, and an un-rooted ending of any sort will always dissapoint. But if one wishes to root it and make it bring the themes to a fruitful conclusion, one must deal with what one thinks of those themes and how they ought to end given the actions of the characters. It's quite possible to do this on instinct; I generally think that that is what "letting the story write itself" means. That is, it's not the story writing, but the author going with what feels right to gut instinct. I only wish to enunciate more explicitly those gut-instinct driven goals, examine and question them, and decide why I feel that way and whether it's what I care to say.

Shanglan

I can agree here to a point. I think I simply view the process with more reverence than you. I don't examine the idea and wonder if it's what I want to say. I realize full well that I'm a key component in what is being said, and how the story flows from me. I don't stop to wonder if it's what I want to say. I think that I want to say it is inherent in the fact that I've just sat down and written it. The question for me is in why I wrote it; what does it mean that that story came from me if I didn't know it was coming?

Maybe I'm simply too introspective?

Q_C

 

[elsol]

Not sure if this is an honest post, or you just screwing around, but I agree with it whole-heartedly.

Q_C

I have a story IN my head; but it's NEVER going to be the story you read. So I'm not out to stimulate or provoke or make you think something I do... I just want to tell the story.

So people talk about this stuff... and it's beyond and well-past me.

Story not in my head anymore... I'm cool.

If someone miraculously gets something from it, awesome... but it wasn't my goal.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[yui]

I have a story IN my head; but it's NEVER going to be the story you read. So I'm not out to stimulate or provoke or make you think something I do... I just want to tell the story.

So people talk about this stuff... and it's beyond and well-past me.

Story not in my head anymore... I'm cool.

If someone miraculously gets something from it, awesome... but it wasn't my goal.

Sincerely,
ElSol

Jayne.

No, I do understand. It's not voices with me so much as movies that play in my head.

 

[zeb1094]

Jayne.

No, I do understand. It's not voices with me so much as movies that play in my head.

Yes, that's it, *light going on over my puny brain* a movie. I see this movie and I have to write it, it may evolve overtime as I write and replay it over and over while I write. But it's in the from of a movie, not voices. It sometimes even follows me into my dreams where it may get refined and mutated into the final form which I wined up submitting.

Thank you Yui, for turning on the light.

 

[Guest]

 

[cantdog]

"clearly a metaphor..."



I love it when that stuff happens. It makes me wonder for a second if they're actually right, somehow. I mean, what if deep in my sub-psyche someplace I was Thinking Deep Thoughts and Puttin Down the DHM For the World To See?

Then I dismiss it. Nah. I actively detest allegories, though, and it pisses me off to be accused of one.

That said, I do indeed shove in some wisdom and some observation. What's the fun of being a writer, else?



edited to add footnote: DHM means Deep Hidden Meaning. It was an in-joke in Senior English class.

 

[SeaCat]

It all depends on the story I am writing. (I know, I know, I say that a lot. Tough cookies.)

All of my stories have a message in them, they have something of me and my beliefs. If someone can pick that message out and maybe even stop to think about it great.

Only one of the stories I have posted so far has a definate message in it. One that I wrote the story around. In that case I had something I wanted to say and found a way to say it that others could enjoy.

Cat

 

[cantdog]

That's good that you 'fessed up, Cat. You do that because you're a writer.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Hmm, most of my Lit stories are intended to provoke a reaction, but usually just of the wanking variety. Other than that, no, I don't think I try to sway anyone into believing in my particular point of view.

My personal porn, the stuff I write for special someones in my life, might have more intentions along those lines. I think I try to convey my attitude toward sex and how it should be, how I like it, what turns me on, and how I see it - all with the intention of provoking more of those actions...

Like the lady, I am just trying to provoke somebody to wank or frig or fuck or perform some other sexual action. However, I also like to think that I am doing other things, usually good, such as promoting safe sex because my characters all use condoms. I also like to think that I encourage people to enjoy sex and have no guilt about it. I don't know just how much of this happens but at least I believe I produce no negative occurrences.

 

[matriarch]

It doesn't matter what intention you had when you wrote your story/poem, as soon as its out there in the public doman, the reader will make of it what they want. They can read into it what they want, interpret it how they want.

What you intend it to mean, ends the minute you hit the submit button.

 

[Boxlicker101]

It doesn't matter what intention you had when you wrote your story/poem, as soon as its out there in the public doman, the reader will make of it what they want. They can read into it what they want, interpret it how they want.

What you intend it to mean, ends the minute you hit the submit button.

Not entirely. If the author realizes he or she has mada mistake, the story can be withdrawn, and either replaced by an edited version or taken completely off the site.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

It doesn't matter what intention you had when you wrote your story/poem, as soon as its out there in the public doman, the reader will make of it what they want. They can read into it what they want, interpret it how they want.

What you intend it to mean, ends the minute you hit the submit button.

Yes. All art is open to interpretation, and it doesn't mean what you intend any more than it means what they read into it. But the question remains: Do you intentionally these things ito the story? Do you hope to pursuade the reader, meaning consciously intend to try to persuade the reader, in any way?

Mostly, it's just curiosity.

Q_C

BTW, good answers guys.