Hi Anon, thank u for coming back! You’re welcome for that answer (so good to know you appreciated it), but gosh, I’m so sorry for misreading your intentions
*hugs*
It’s so easy to misread unintended emotions into text, especially when it’s such a short note. I apologize if my answer came off as crushing to you specifically.
I’ve seen so much Discourse from anti-shippers lately that I may be a little predisposed to seeing it in innocent asks, too. Engaging with the question itself could invite Discourse, so my response was more about supporting shippers as a general rule.
I absolutely never intend to shame other fans, I hope that much came through in my response and in my other posts. I do want my blog to be seen as something interesting and relatable, non-shaming and knowledgeable, but I’m absolutely not the authority on VC. Even the “Marges” of the fandom have every right to do what they do, I just choose not to engage with them. I wanted to make a point of identifying them for others, like you, so that you know that their way is not the only way, and they are not the authority on VC, either.
Your being fairly new and overwhelmed to this fandom, let me tell you, it’s a series about murderers, lovers, wacky shit, silliness, some religious stuff mixed in heavily, re-invention of the vampire origin story, etc. It’s not for the faint of heart but if you can manage not to take it too
seriously
you’ll probably have a better time. Please don’t let this one little interaction deter you from reading the books and/or making friends here, bc I’ve met some of my best friends through VC, honed my own writing, shared headcanons, etc., and I would wish all the good aspects of fandom on every new fan ❤
P.S. To answer your previous question a little more gently, Marius/Armand appeals to some fans bc of the taboo nature of it. It disgusts some fans bc of that, too. There’s no right or wrong. My opinion is that I like exploring scary things in fiction even if they’re dressed up to look good, so I would say it’s a perfectly decent ship to ship, even if Anne Rice holds it out as an ideal relationship.
Again, I’m not well-educated on the horror/goth lit aspect so I can’t fully address that, but I would think that Anne Rice had read some of those, and was inspired by them, that she felt her writing (especially in IWTV) was a natural update and/or extension of those characters/tropes/stories.
Marius himself is a character who is probably largely based on the benefactor characters in Dickens that Anne Rice has always loved. She mixed that in with some Daddy kink, some *healing dick* trope, and overall Father-knows-best sort of attitude, and that’s basically Marius. Is he a pedophile? That’s for the reader to decide. Again, I don’t want to make that distinction for you. I’m not interested in getting into a debate about it with the “Marges” of fandom, and tbh, I would recommend that you don’t try them, either, especially being fairly new and overwhelmed as it is.
Have an open mind, read the text yourself. Try to enjoy what you can. It’s a buffet, you don’t need to like all of it 😉
As @shippingisnotactivism put it so succinctly: Often times people aren’t actually interested in a debate, they are interested in making you do intellectual/emotional labour for no reason at all. [X]
I wrote this huge Wall of Text despite the above quote. If you’re a sealion, Anon, you’ve accomplished your mission to some extent, you’ve managed to get me to spend more time and effort on this response than I ever wanted to.
I didn’t write it for you, though. I wrote it for my 15 year old self who was able to read and enjoy all the fictional problematic content I wanted. My 15 year old self loved black comedy, dark humor. I was never criticized for it. I was bullied for other things, like my wonky teeth, my hair style, my (lack of) fashion sense, which, looking at pics of myself, I can see why I was an easy target!
Now, we have bullies who do it in a much more insidious way. They tell you that your interest in problematic content means that you endorse it in real life. I’d rather be bullied for my teeth again.
I actually did spend time crowdsourcing privately to respond to this ask, I got some good answers, but you know what? I don’t need to write a full dissertation on horror/gothic lit and/or Marius/Armand’s relationship and/or Ricean vampire sex/intimacy and/or Anne Rice’s motivations for writing what she writes and/or VC fandom’s reactions to VC ships, etc., for an anonymous person(s) on the internet. You said you’ve seen posts about it already. Being in the middle is an acceptable place to be. I’m not here to force you to one side or the other.
You’re looking for easy answers to complicated questions. It’s not my responsibility to feed you those answers. And I would hope that you would take anyone else’s response to your questions with a grain of salt, and not simply accept opinions as truth because they sound good and righteous.
These are issues with so much nuance, so many facets, and to write Marius/Armand off as simply “abusive” and “pedophilia” is extremely narrow-minded to me. To write off people who attempt to discuss these things in fiction as “abuse-apologists” and “pedophilia-apologists” is a form of bullying. If we cannot discuss problematic things in fiction in a civilized way, it won’t make these things A) disappear from fiction or B) stop happening in real life.
If you’ve been watching/following my blog for even a few weeks, or you check out my archive, you know that I’ve reblogged plenty of Marius/Armand fanart, some of it NSFW. So I think you can do the math on what my stance is on that.
I confess that I was never wildly into that ship, but I have always loved talent and skill in the fanart/fanfic of both of these characters, separately and together, and now my interest in it is A) to have some variety in my blog rather than always reblogging fanworks about L/L (my main ship and, arguably, the VC juggernaut ship), and B) to support anyone who loves those characters separately or ships them together, and let them know that I support them. They can like whatever fictional content they like.
There is no debate when it comes to my own permission to like whatever I like in fiction, and I extend that permission to everyone. It’s fictional. Period.
^Marge Simpson is against pro wrestling here. It was an actual debate, you can google it. I’m not interested in arguing with her. I’m not even interested in calling her “a Killjoy,” even though she’s asked the viewer to do so. Unlike Marge, I’m not interested in forcing anyone to agree with any of my opinions.
More importantly, why is she standing up there next to the TV? She wants to divert attention from it and onto herself. Marge wants the attention.
She is riding on it as a topic, and it’s an easy target, bc it is VIOLENCE. Scripted or not, we all generally agree that violence is bad. So she stands there concerned, but does she really think it’s so awful? I don’t remember the episode well enough to know if she says that pro wrestling is definitively a bad influence on its viewers. Her caption says enough: “BC THIS IS NOT TO MY TASTE, NO ONE ELSE SHOULD BE ABLE TO ENJOY IT.”
Would she take into account that it’s cathartic for fans of pro wrestling to watch the scripted violence played out? Would she care that we love rooting for our faves and we love watching them appear to beat the crap out of the other wrestlers for dominance? Would she care that we can watch it and know the difference between violence in media and in real life? I’m thinking that if she is truly committed to her crusade against violence in pro wrestling, she would be unable to cede an inch of ground, even a molecule of nuance could topple her from her soapbox. Acknowledging that her opinion is opinion and not fact would be acknowledging that she could be wrong, and that’s unacceptable to Marge.
It’s not enough for Marge to respect the old fandom rule of #Don’t Like, Don’t Read. When there is something as juicy as a topic with a buzzword that invokes an immediate reaction to get righteous about, the argument becomes: #I Don’t Like This Thing; No One Should Read/Write This Thing (Unless they Write it the Way I Want it Written).
The points I would make, if I were making points, would be these, listed below. You can do your own further research, bc I’m not being paid for this, and have no obligation to provide sources that will most likely fall on the deaf ears of the “Marges” of fandom who are unable to cede any ground. I am not obligated to respond to arguments against this post.
These points are for the Marius/Armand shippers and Marius fans to show my support for them by sharing some of my own thoughts.
“Vampires operate on a different moral code than human beings.” Anon, you wrote this yourself, and I think it’s a good point. An essay could be written on it.
^Some of the vampires may want to abide by human moral codes, but thosemay be codes from the era they were turned. I wouldn’t even say that moral codes have evolved, I would say that moral codes are on a pendulum swinging from moral to immoral, back and forth.
^Attitudes towards sex/intimacy also change during different eras. This includes the time periods during which the novels were written, what was expected in fiction then, what the cultural landscape was like, etc.
The ship itself occurred during a time period in history when underage/adult relationships mlm were socially acceptable. You can argue that she should not have chosen that time period, but she’s a writer, she can choose whatever time period she wants.
Given the content, I would suggest that these books were written for adults who know the difference between fiction and reality.
These books are fiction, they are not self-help manuals.
^If you use them as a self-help manual and are harmed, it is your misuse of them, not the author’s fault, and not the books’ fault. Like alcoholism. It’s not the alcohol’s fault if you drink it irresponsibly.
Shipping is not just for wish fulfillment/idealization, but it can be. Maybe Marius/Armand is wish fulfillment/idealization for Anne Rice.
^While it is a possibility, I highly doubt she’s intentionally trying to injure any of her readers, especially if she sees
Marius/Armand
and Marius himself as good and desirable.
I absolutely do not condone pedophilia, abuse, or grooming in real life, and in my 20+ years of fandom I have never met a Marius/Armand shipper or Marius fan who condones any of those things in real life, either.
I do not believe that an author is required to condemn problematic elements within the text.
^Which she definitely wouldn’t do anyway, if she sees Marius/Armand and Marius himself as good and desirable.
Anne Rice has similar ships with the underage/adult dynamic that don’t get the hate Marius/Armand does, oddly enough. Furthermore, she didn’t invent it, this is a fantasy that’s been around since before she was even born.
There are a bunch of other kinks mixed into that ship that I don’t need to list out here for you. Anne Rice/the fans/anyone is allowed to have/explore their kinks in fiction or in consensual spaces online/in real life with other adults.
It is my belief that underage people (including Anne Rice) can be curious about sex/intimacy before reaching the Age of Consent.
^Are we only allowed to be curious about it on the stroke of the first minute of our 18th birthday?? I believe Anne writes these ships setting herself as the underage character, spending decades rebelling against what she perceived was an overly repressive religious upbringing in which the adults in her life tried to convince her that her curiosity was EVIL and a disgusting form of Sinning. Making it the “forbidden fruit” just made it that much more desirable for underage!Anne. IMO, her underage/adult ships are a coping mechanism she does for her younger self.
I am not knowledgeable enough about horror/gothic lit to say how Marius/Armand compares to other ships in those stories, but as I understand it, the exploration of monsters of all kinds has been problematic since monster stories were invented.
^Horror/goth lit elevated these stories to a higher intellectual level, so they were criticized on a higher intellectual level than the older monster stories. However, the criticism of exploring these concepts has always been harsher to women writers bc PATRIARCHY and how dare women explore sexual fantasies without permission?!
Shippers of Marius/Armand are easy targets for bullying and harassment as that ship and character tick off plenty of boxes of things we know are wrong in real life.But as I’ve said in the past, creating/consuming problematic things =/= endorsement of them in real life. Thoughtcrimes are not crimes.
It’s easier to attack
Marius/Armand
shippers and Marius fans than attempting to attack Anne Rice. Anne Rice is a published author, insulated from anything she doesn’t want to hear/read. The shippers, like me, are humans behind their screens, and we all just want to get along with each other, so getting accused of endorsing real life problematic things bc of their ship preference is something shippers are very likely to respond to. Shipper attention, while not as juicy as attention from Anne Rice herself, is a reasonable substitute for the “Marges” feed on.
Ultimately I am a #Ship and let ship person and I support the shippers of problematic fictional ships and the fans of problematic fictional characters.
“It doesn’t matter who your problematic favorite character is. Even if they’re literally Satan (looking at you, Supernatural fandom), you don’t deserve to be harassed or bullied simply for liking them. Always remember that you’re just as entitled to your opinion as anyone else.
…There are a lot of don’ts when it comes to problematic characters… Navigating the minefield of fandom is tricky, but having a problematic fave is hardly the end of the world. As long as you’re considerate and respectful towards others, you can’t go wrong. So go on, get out there, and make the most of the experience!”
oh god I’m done I’m fucking. I’m done I’m sick and I’m exhausted and I’m done
Nobody here supports real life pedophilia and abuse.
Antis support bullying creators for depicting it in fiction in ways they don’t approve of. They harbor bullies because they would have no power otherwise.
What are you – I assume an anti – missing in your life that you need so badly to feel righteous about the fiction you consume? Why do you need to feel you have power over people? Antis openly admit that they go after smaller creators because they know that smaller creators will “listen” to them – except that what they’re doing is intimidation and bullying, so what they really mean is that smaller creators are afraid of them.
And you know what? It worked. It fucking worked. Small creators are terrified. Multiple artists have been driven into depression and suicide attempts by harassment that came from antis. Creators who never hurt anyone had their careers ruined over false accusations of pedophilia over a cartoon drawing. Someone got fed needles. Three artists that I know of at conventions have had their merch and displays damaged by people calling them pedophiles or abuse apologists or whatthefuckever because of the completely safe for work art they were displaying.
You’re bullies. You’re fucking bullies and you need to feel powerful so you gang up on fandom creators, who are almost all already marginalized young people, so that you can feel like you’re doing something. But you’re not. You’re fucking not. You can tear down all the queer artists you want, it won’t make a single goddamn bit of difference. YOU ARE NOT HELPING ANYONE.
You’re not. Helping. Anyone.
But you did it, I guess. Artists are scared. People are scared. Small, queer creators are more scared to release content now than they were 5 years ago, because their own community will almost certainly tear them apart like wild dogs.
As per your issue, the thing is: you can’t. You can’t convince them. Fandom wank would have already ended if antis were open to read sources, understand laws, understand nuance, understand the “mind yo business”, follow the “live and let live” rule etc. You’ll see discourse blogs go on infinite hiatus or downright step down from the wankery not because they have been ‘defeated’ but because they are exhausted of repeating the same thing over and over again.
Antis don’t listen.
Which is why the point for you is not to make sure antis can’t talk shit about you, the point is for you to build confidence and security so that you may roll your eyes at antis because you know you’re not doing anything harmful, you know yourself, you know the law of your country, and you know that fiction affects reality in every way but how antis say it does. Haters gonna hate, you can’t change this.
Be sure of yourself, and when you’re tired rest, and when you feel alone look around in your community, and believe in yourself.
I can’t advise you, as we all have our own ideas about the canon characters, and “how to get them right,” a phrase I disagree with. Have you read all of canon? Do you accept all of canon into your personal headcanon? I wouldn’t force you to accept it all, I don’t accept it all. If we’re working from different text acceptance, there can be no universal “getting the characters right” authority (not even Anne Rice herself “gets the characters right,” according to the opinion of some of her fans). As an example, if I accept everything in The Vampire Armand but you don’t (or you haven’t read it yet), your fic probably won’t include/address anything that happened in TVA. That’s your prerogative as a fic writer. You are not required to include/address anything that you don’t want to.
Since no one can decide definitively if you’ve “gotten them right,” don’t be afraid to get them WRONG! Get them however YOU see them, Anon. And it’s not really that black and white; I’ve read fics where there was characterization I loved, and some that seemed out-of-character to me in the next paragraph (but again, that’s just ONE PERSON’S opinion. Another reader might have loved/hated all of it). It could be that you struggle with dialogue in general, so it might be out-of-character now, but you’ll improve by writing more fics. And like a painting, it may not be your failure; you might purposely invest more attention/effort on some aspects of your fic than on others, again, that’s
^Here’re two paintings done in different styles, Morisot’s is Impressionist, and Sargent practiced his own form of Realism, with some obvious Impressionist influence. An essay could be written comparing/contrasting these but briefly: just between these two works, you can see that Morisot was less interested in capturing the details that Sargent has, but both portraits are evocative to me in their own way. There’s a breathless kind of anticipation in both. They both look like women I would love to get to know better! The Sargent one might have been painted on commission, idk about the Morisot one, but in the case of a commissioned work, there is a dialogue between the artist and the commissioner. When I’ve commissioned fanart, the artist will aim to meet my requirements, but ultimately, art is nebulous, and I’ve always been pleasantly surprised by the choices my commissioned artists make within the limitations of the request!
Bc here’s the thing, fanfic is for free. And no matter how you write them, even if you just copied text out of canon, there will be ppl who will tell you you’re getting the characters wrong. Again, the actual published author “gets them wrong,” according to some fans. So if she can’t write her own characters “right,” then, like Anne herself, you’re not obligated to appease anyone except yourself.
Here are a few “advice” pairings, with narrow-minded advice first and open-minded advice second.
“Make sure to include a paragraph about Armand’s physical appearance or else he’s not really in it!!!”– Dye Armand’s hair purple. Have Daniel comment about how striking the color is against his skin. Write Daniel as a POC. Write Armand as if he was able to age, make an AU so that Daniel is the vampire who approaches 50 year old Armand.
“Make sure to address Marius’ anger management issues!!!” – Write an AU where Marius didn’t turn Armand, maybe they met as vampires on more equal footing. Write that Marius gets angry about dumb inconsequential things like being stuck in transit and the other two tease him about being so impatient.
“Make sure that if there’s any dubious-consent or non-consensual sexual content at all, to condemn it in the narrative!!!!”– Have a PWP with BDSM with all 3 of them that fails laughably and one of them storms out, naked and angry. WHY NOT???
Fiction is a space where we can explore anything and everything and it does not harm anyone.
Inevitably, some ppl won’t like it no matter what you do, so please yourself.
Whatever you’re writing:Write the fic you want to read! Here’s your permit:
All that said, I do ask for specific and trusted ppl’s advice when I’m writing a fic if I think they’ve got good ideas bc they’re invested in those characters, maybe they’ve even written fics about those characters. I’m working on a fic that I had to ask a few ppl privately about bc I wanted to bounce my ideas off of them, and gain a little insight as to my specific fic situation, but I wasn’t looking for their permission to write what I’m writing.
Stuff I personally would like to see explored re: Armand, Daniel, and/or Marius:
some backstory on Daniel’s mortal life
some Difficult Conversations in any combination of those three characters discussing their past relationships
some closure on things, agreement/forgiveness may not be possible, but some closure would be great.
some fluff in any combination of those characters, they’ve had so much suffering already
I always like the fanon that Daniel has glasses even though he doesn’t need to wear them now, bc reasons
give them roles in a story that move the plot along substantively
One of the great things about fiction is that we can revisit how we feel about characters at different points in our lives. I know I felt differently about Claudia as I got older. I think I had an idea of what she felt when I first read IWTV, but as an adult I can better understand how devastating it must have been for her, and how frustrating for her ‘parents’ who were unable to help guide her in any significant way re: the fact that she would never physically age ;A;
With Daniel, I admit he’s not one of the characters I engaged with as much as others, so I can’t really speak specifically to your comments about him. You may change your opinion again as you get older, too. I always liked that he seemed to fly by the seat of his pants, and was ballsy enough to just keep asking for what he wanted, knowing Armand wouldn’t give it to him. That even in his darkest moments, he demonstrated an inquisitive nature, and was obviously capable of giving/receiving love. That’s inspiring, at least to me.
He’s one of the first VC characters (Jesse is another one) who we get to spend significant time with in canon as a mortal, and get an idea about what it’s like to get involved with vampires; it can’t be easy to just sit down and be quiet when you have one of these supernatural beings fixated on you!
We’re always here for crossover fanart/fanfic whenever anyone’s willing to make it, btw… lookit these 2 idiots they’d get into so much trouble together
(2/2) Besides, I found this crazy place in Paris where people just love each other and are good to one another and never pressure anyone to do anything or judge them for their identities and sometimes I feel like I accidentally ended up in some sort of beautiful coven. And I’m the only human amongst non-humans there and now one’s telling me. :’D Sadly I’m moving out of Europe next month and I can’t stop crying over it. But I am lucky I got to experience this magic at all, if only for a short time.
So, by the way, did, like, everyone who at some point was heavily obsessed with the Vampire Chronicles end up being polyamorous?
I’m not sure about that correlation, I’m a heavily obsessed fan of the series and didn’t turn out poly, myself. But I wouldn’t rule it out as a possibility for me in the future. You’re the first that’s suggested a correlation between VC and heavily obsessed fans ending up poly, that I’ve seen. I’ve only known of a few VC fans who are poly, and I don’t know if VC was an influence before they identified as poly.
I come from this shithole of a small town in what is my country’s very own version of the ‘conservative south’ and I ended up both queer and polya (and critical of compulsory sexuality / amatonormativity) and sometimes I just can’t help wonder if it’s because of all the VC that I read. :‘D
I’m not sure about the affect of fiction on reality, do you think you might have
ended up either/both queer and polya without the influence of VC? Were there other influences? I know of several other fans who related to the characters (especially during formative years) and felt like their feelings and orientation were being represented in VC, they felt a sense of relief at seeing characters like themselves. I’m not sure if VC therefore turned them queer/LGBT+/etc, I get the impression that they already were what they were and VC gave them the confidence to embrace it and even officially come out to their friends/family.
I’m sorry you had to grow up in your country’s version of the conservative south, I can’t imagine how hard that must have been :[
(can you still use the word shithole or is that Trump-vocab now?)
Idk, I can see it w/o thinking of him, but I’m pretty thrilled about the ads reclaiming the word (I actually squealed with joy when I saw this one on a bus the other day!):
Besides, I found this crazy place in Paris where people just love each other and are good to one another and never pressure anyone to do anything or judge them for their identities and sometimes I feel like I accidentally ended up in some sort of beautiful coven. And I’m the only human amongst non-humans there and now one’s telling me. :’D
That’s wonderful, I’m so happy you found this beautiful coven! Where in Paris? Are some of them VC fans, too?
Sadly I’m moving out of Europe next month and I can’t stop crying over it. But I am lucky I got to experience this magic at all, if only for a short time.
Awwww that sucks :,( Well, “better to have loved and lost,” as they say. Maybe you can be the coven leader and create your own beautiful coven like the one you found in Paris! ❤
I don’t watch Supernatural so I can’t really compare Dean and Lestat, but from the gifs I’ve seen, they both have a kind of flippant and bubbly nature, and they both have a lot of bravado to shield their vulnerability. So you might like Lestat for being like Dean, and if so, I would suggest you start with the Vampire Lestat rather than Interview.
VC is basically id fic, it could even be considered porn. To my mind, VC is a more elevated version of the bodice-ripper trashy romance novels that you see at supermarkets, with some substantive stuff mixed in. Anne Rice writes the books she wants to read. It’s the AR lollercoaster.
The idea is that Id Fic panders to the Id, or that part of us that likes things that aren’t always moral or ‘correct’ and bypasses a lot of our moral constraints and strictures. So they might just have like a lot of rape in them, or non-con, or ‘dub-con where the character eventually enjoys it.’ They might have things that we *know* are wrong in real life, but really dig in fiction: like captive/captor, or magical healing cock, or really dangerous powerplay, whump that is just extreme, or even just really unsafe kinks (like no signs of safewording ever). Id Fics used to be considered a ‘guilty’ pleasure, but there’s been a lot of work to reclaim them…. The Id is the Loki of our minds, and nothing’s gonna change that. *g* And indulging it in fantasy and fiction is both normal, healthy, and fun. 🙂
^So that would be what I’d want ppl to know going into the series, that if that bothers you, then you might not like it.
As Tom Cruise put it so eloquently, “The movie is not for everyone.” No value judgement there; the movie and the books are just not everyone’s cup of tea, which is totes fine.
I-want-my-IWTV 