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Maybe it’s just my perception, but it appears to me that recently there have been more stories on this site which seem to revolve around forced fem, rape, and other objectionable topics and actions.
I recently read a story in which one of the main characters attended a party in drag with his wife, left early after an argument, and was raped by two men in a park while walking home. The two men then extorted money and more sex from him by threatening to release video of the rape to his wife and friends. In the story, the man who was raped got enjoyment out of the sex, and was happy to keep it secret - even looking forward to a rematch.
But the point here is that the story glorified an act of violence against a cross-dressed man. And readers applauded it!
I spent a large portion of my life pretending to be someone who I am not. I also spent a large portion of my early life in some pretty shitty parts of the world in service to my country fighting against people who think nothing of using, even abusing, their fellow man.
Now that I am finally able to be my true self, I have to put up with stares and little comments behind my back from ignorant people. To see those self-same people that I deal with in real life, the same type of people I fought to stop, being glorified and applauded here is too much.
What ever happened to the authors who wrote stories about people like me finding a way to be themselves against all odds? Finding a way to triumph over whatever and whoever was holding them back? Whatever happened to stories that don’t include one person taking advantage of another? Of people being forced to do things against their own will? Especially when it is supposedly done “Because I love you”?
Yeah……….
Is this where our society is headed? I had always thought that this site in particular was a place I could find some refuge from the ugliness of the real world, but I guess it has even seeped into here.
Comments
No content warning?
Did the story you are discussing fail to include a warning under the ‘CAUTION’ category? That’s a shame. Perhaps it could be added?
There’s always the ‘ignore user’ function, I suppose, for those who feel that a certain author’s work is objectionable to them. Attempting to define what is and isn’t appropriate for the site as a whole sounds impractical.
Sugar and Spiiice – TG Fiction by Bryony Marsh
labeling
I agree this isnt about proper labeling this is about the theme itself . forced used to be in the minority but not anymore .a lot of us been around for a very long time even being around during the original big closet and i miss the non abusive type of stories.
The story in question…..
Was labeled “explicit content” and there was a tag about “bad girls” as well as one for “promiscuity” - none of which implies rape or anything close to it.
But the point is not the lack of labeling - it is that violence and abuse seems to be a rising theme, and the fact that there are those who applaud those acts is simply sickening to me.
What have we become? Are we becoming that which a particular portion of society has always accused us of being?
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
I think that it comes in waves
one week we have forced fem (which I hate), the next we have 10 stories about cheerleaders or proms (can't see the point of either but I'm just a grumpy old git) and so on.
I hate any violence against members of the LGBT community. I have written about the aftermaths of forced fem and people trafficking but those stories are more about the after effects rather than glorifying it.
To write about causing the maximum amount of embarrassment to the victims needs IMHO, quite a warped psyche. They are not for me.
Much like anything involving under 16's. That is my personal preference.
I would like better tagging of those sort of stories so I can avoid even opening them in the first place. I don't want my short access to count as a read.
I have written some stories that are about getting even/redemption. They always begin after the bad stuff. Good begets evil.
I've also spent periods of my life in places that are very, very unfriendly towards LGBT people(Saudi Arabia for starters). Like you I've learned to hide the real me. Very few people know the real me. Many of us live a lie every day of the week. Yes, it eats us up inside but we learn to cope don't we?
I have found that there are less stories on the site these days that shout 'Read Me'. Why? I do know that my tastes have changed as I have developed as a writer. We all change over time.
Hang in there.
Samantha
I no longer hide the real me……
I did that for five decades. Now I celebrate who I truly am - I have wasted enough of my life.
But I do suffer the stares and slightly too loud comments. The laughs and fingers pointed.
I am not a terribly unattractive woman, and I don’t necessarily stand out in a crowd. I do not dress like a drag queen - I am very professional when working, and very well dressed even when not. But I am tall - 5’10” barefoot, so over 6’ in heels; my voice is deeper than most women, my hands somewhat larger, etc…….
So yes, I get looks and comments from some - but many people are wonderful to me.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Rape fantasies
Counterintuitive isn't it? That anyone would fantasize about or want to read stories about something that in real life would be a life shattering event. I don't know why some of us have fantasies of being violated or enslaved and treated like an object but having these sorts of fantasies isn't limited to kinky transgender women, cis women have fantasies like this too, or even engage in role play games with a partner that simulate being overpowered and unwillingly violated. Sexuality can be fucking weird and there's no logical "why" to people's kinks or fetishes (theories that ascribe some root cause to them are like the "reasons" TERFs give for us being transgender, they tidily reinforce their political biases but have so little to do with our reality it isn't even funny...). But I guarantee not one person who enjoys such dark fantasies would want it to happen in real life. In fantasies the fantasizer is always in control of the situation, or least knows the parameters, so the fear is like the fear you get riding a roller coaster as opposed to having just fallen off a cliff and knowing you're seconds away from extinction. The humiliation and the look you see in your fantasy assailant's eyes, how he doesn't even regard you as human are as different from having it actually happen in real life as playing paintball is from getting gut-shot with a 50 caliber round.
I understand how people who have had to go through the real thing would be horrified and offended that someone could get a sick thrill from the fantasy version; but some of us do. Should stories that would repulse a majority of readers and titillate a few be allowed at a site like this? That's not up to me, and I wouldn't miss them if there were none; since my darker, more self-destructive fantasies aren't "trans" but start with my femaleness as a given; a subtle but crucial distinction that makes most TG fiction dealing with themes like Forced Feminization unappealing to me, since they seem to be born of notions like the "loss of manhood" or being "reduced to something LESS than a man", ideas that never enter into my own fantasies. I never had any essential manhood to lose and I sure don't feel "less than" because of it. And stumbling across that word "sissy" that's so prevalent in these forced fem stories and which some find so squirmy and exciting pulls me right out of my erotic reveries with its implications of my not being a real woman. So to the extent that I do enjoy tales of objectification, humiliation and abuse (not often but sometimes I get in a strange mood) I read stories written by and for submissive/masochistic women at Literotica or in those Black Cat paperbacks.
First Amendment fanatic that I am when it comes to fiction (not so much about deliberate misinformation or racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic rants or calls for genocide or civil war on Mr. Musk's lovely site) I tend to be in favor BCTS allowing stories that it might disgust me to read; but I think having APPROPRIATE TAGS and even TRIGGER WARNINGS at the top is vital, the only responsible way to post such stories. Some of us here have been hurt badly and reading something that brings the horror flooding back can be worse than experiencing a bit of disgust, it can actually be dangerous for them.
~hugs (or spanks for them that prefer them), Veronica
What borders on stupidity?
Canada and Mexico.
.
'Those' type of stories
Well, there is a reason sites like fictionmania has persisted for so long, likely due to the tawdry interests presented in those types of stories.
I basically just ignore them, not even clicking on them. The only silver lining I hope is that said readers who like that kind of stuff would kick in donations. The site needs donations.
It is too bad we can't downvote stories but I understand why.
Okay, I get we want to have a more positive view of what our community is all about and silo that away but the BC mission is just that: open to all. One possible way would be to channel stories of that class onto a sub-channel, kinda like Fictionmania for BC so that that kind of content can stayed platformed and accessible to those only interested in that type of thing, leaving the traditional BC mainstream content in place.
Your Point Is Well Made. . .Yet. . ..
For as long as I can recall, this site has included Femdom/Humiliation as one of the themes you could select when posting a story.
I object to stories with Femdom/Humiliation as a theme if the protagonist is not an adult. I've also written a few stories like that. . .which I object to, so go figure.
More importantly, I object to any censorship of stories on this site. As has been pointed out many times, almost every story on this site would be banned in a large percentage of high school libraries. We don't want to discourage any authors.
There was a time I hated to tag my stories because I thought it gave away too much of the plot. It could be others feel the same way. Over time I became more aware of the horrible trauma many of us have suffered and developed some sensitivity. I now tag every story.
I'm sorry those stories offended you. They sound like they would offend me as well. I once went so far as to take a particularly offensive story and rewrite it with the author's permission so that readers could see the story lost nothing by removing certain elements that caused pain to some readers. After a few months, I decided to unpublish that work because it still was too raw.
Sometimes the best way to have stories you like to read is to write them yourself. I'm still one of my favorite authors and will often read old stories, which at my age seem new and fresh to me.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
I am wary
Of stories that have no tags (also those that have a generic home page) precisely because I don't have any idea what I'm getting into. As an aside, I also don't care for the use of the same homepage for multiparty stories. Makes me think the author is so devoid of talent they can't come up with a one or two line page for each chapter.
Just my two cent's worth.
"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin
The mountain of material here
I don't read enough of the stories here to be able to comment about topical tendencies. It may be as you say, that there are more stories being posted of the type you describe.
Even though I've written that type of story myself, what I'm reading now and have been reading here at BCTS is nothing like that. I do look over the list of new postings, but there is so much by authors I enjoy, I'm trying to catch up with a great deal that I simply haven't gotten around to reading.
- iolanthe
I've noticed
I've noticed an upswing in stories that contain explicit sex scenes. This bothers me in that it perpetuates the false idea that cross-dress/transgender expression as being sexual in nature. I applaud the fact that an author adds a caution tag to warn us, but still deplore the devaluation of cross-gender expression to a fetish.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
Rough Stories
I've written some gritty, forced femm stories where the MC accepts their fate in order to survive. I don't fetishize the situation and I think that's the difference. The author here in question has posted before. I've never read their stories because they are obvious fetish content which is the very reason I started writing TG fiction; as an escape from the fetish stories. These kinds of stories are never going away and appeal to a segment of society. So I just ignore them.
Melanie
I avoid certain authors
just for that reason.
Evolution of fiction
I first got on the Internet about 25 years ago. And I did a lot of “research” around transsexual and transgender issues. Initially most of what I found revolved around porn and kinks and fetishes on the BDSM spectrum. Even the fiction back then was centered around those themes. In fact, most of what I found was delivered on mailing lists.
Back in the last few years of the last millennium the majority of the “published” fiction with any “trans” element were based on [fem]domination, humiliation, forced femenization and blackmail, as well as a lot of bullying and mobbing including a fair amount of non-consensual sex of the same-sex variety.
Around the turn of the century I discovered the “Nifty” website, that is still around to this day. Though the primary focus is on male-same-sex stories (79%), there are also stories around female-same-sex (4%), transgender (5%) and bisexual (11%) themes. Each category is further organized in sub-themed directories. Over 90% of the stories are just plain text files, so very fast to download and save locally.
Soon after I discovered “Fiction Mania” and “Crystal's Story Site”. As well as “Stardust” by Bob Arnold, that quickly became a favorite of mine. There were some very good stories and serials posted on Stardust that slowly weaned me of the whole non-consensual forced-fem, humiliation and blackmail streak. It is really sad that this website disappeared after Bob Arnold's untimely death.
But Bob Arnold was really promoting a new trans-fiction website called “Big Closet Top Shelf”. The spirit of community, tolerance and interaction has made BCTS pretty much my almost exclusive source of fiction reading material.
Initially I was able to read more than 90% of the stories posted on BCTS. But over time I have developed a preference for certain themes/genres and a list of favorite authors, as well as authors that I refuse to read anymore. And after being registered just over 13 years it is impossible to read every story that gets posted here.
Not much to add
I agree with a lot of what has been said in response to your post, Dallas. For myself, I find there aren’t enough hours in the day to read all the excellent stories here that really appeal to me, while still leaving time for writing and, well, real life. There are plenty of stories that aren’t my cuppa, so to speak, but it certainly hasn’t impinged on my ability to find what I’m looking for. We have a bunch of authors producing really amazing stories — solos and serials — every week. I can’t keep up.
Emma
I agree……
There are a lot of very good authors here - yourself included, and more content than I could possibly ever get through.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus