The current list is as follows:
folder: Everything I know about BDSM, I learned from Comic Books and Fan Fiction
- BDSM practioners are all cookie-cutter cardboard characters. No need to consider individual differences in needs, preferences and opinions: If something works for one person or couple, it works for everyone - and vice versa, if one thing doesn't work for a certain person then it doesn't work for anyone.
- Communication, bah, who needs it? Real masters are telepaths who know their submissive's needs & limits better then they know them themselves, and a real submissive has no needs or limits beyond what his mistress tells him anyway. So she really shouldn't waste time checking if he has any relevant medical conditions, phobias or physical quirks, much less preferences. Right? Of course right.
- Since communication isn't needed in the first place, having a Safe Word is redundant. But if you do use one, you can safely assume it to be foolproof. Surely a person could never be too proud, scared, freaked out, high on endorphines or whatever to use one when she needs it, right? So just keep running full throttle, as long as you don't hear a Safe Word nothing could possibly be wrong.
- Bondage is not only cool, but so cool that gravity itself defers to it. Go ahead, tie your girlfriend just like that woman in the comic book - leaning forward, with the only rope supporting her also pulling forward. Surely it wouldn't make her fall?
- Speaking of bondage, did you know that blood circulation is optional and that a person's body weigh can easily rest on a thin rope that pulls the body in a really awkward position? Don't bother studying real shibari before trying suspension bondage, just see how easy it all looks in the comic books.
- If Bob is a bad person because he's into BDSM, then just why is it bad to be into BDSM? Well, obviously because a person like Bob is into it. We already know that he's a bad person, right?
- And if Bob is not a bad or evil person per se, he is at least crazy. Disregard the boring scientific studies showing that sadomasochists and fetishists don't have a higher percentage of mental unhealth then mainstream heterosexuals, just see to the average healthiness of fictional characters.
- BDSM and fetishism is the same thing: Everyone who is into BDSM loves leather & latex, and vice versa. If you are into one, you must be into the other. And these are the only kinky options, of course. You are either repressed and only ever have vanilla sex in the missionary position or you are into BDSM, painplay, and powerplay - other kinds of fetishes just don't exist.
- And if you are into BDSM, you must be into everything and anything that might be categorized as BDSM. If you like spanking, you must be into flogging too. Add all kinds of roleplaying, humiliation, et cetera to that list of mandatories. No such thing as individual preferences.
- ...And along the same line, pain is pain. Never mind that pretty much everyone has experienced in real life that there are different kinds of pain and different levels of pain. A masochist likes pain, period. No distinction between different kinds, or between different levels. Surely a suddenly sprained wrist must feel orgasmic?
- Maybe because "candles and rose petals" are so common in sex scenes, a lot of people who claim to be into BDSM or bondage feel the need to suggest some play with dripping candle wax - as a lot of people who know candles from Real Life can tell, the tactile sensation from dripping hot wax is almost nonexistent.
- And of course, it's not only about what you do, but also about who you do it with. A "real" submissive submits to anyone... extra bonus points if you make her choice for her.
- How to start a healthy kinky relationship? Well, just force the kinky stuff on a complete stranger. If you can keep him from running away, you can add the relationship part, and upgrade to healthy later. Building trust and earning confidence is the easiest part, right? (Naturally, this works just fine for Vanilla romances as well
!)
- Whether one is a dominant or a submissive is 100% fixed and completely rigid. Switchable persons, in the world of Hollywood Masochism, are given the same treatment as bisexuals. Whilst in Real Life some practicioners of BDSM do have an exclusive preference for one role alone, this isn't true for all of them.
Two more issues:
- Even with the BDSM list removed, the vanilla list that would remain is way to long to have there without a folder. This whole thing about splashing up the whole vanilla list without a folder to contain it really messes up the trope page.
- Both versions of the proposed bullet point about BDSM completely misses the point: Instead of explaining how comic books, fanfiction and other media gets core concepts wrong, well... the first version was about how everyone who read TV Tropes is vanilla anyway, and the second version claims that all works that use BDSM in a way that wouldn't work in real life are using the B Ondage Is Bad trope. Both these ideas are completely wrong, of course. Hollywood Masochism follow the same pattern as vanilla Hollywood Sex: It's about fantasies not having to be realistic, authors who chose to be urealistic because it's sexier, and in some cases authors actually don't knowing what they're talking about.
Also, note that both lists can be very useful checklists to amateur writers, just like teh Mary Sue trait list. The vanilla list is useful only for writing sex scenes, but the BDSM list can be useful for power dynamics and hostage situations and such in a wider sense.
So, should this list be moved into a new trope, "Hollywood Kink?" (And if so, how hard would it be to keep it from being NSFW?)
To my knowledge, "Kink" and "Sex" aren't synonyms, so I would say yes.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
The God of Man.
I'm reading through this article, and I just have to ask... What is the point?
I'm a virgin, and from the way real-life sex is described, it sounds like a horrible thing to experience. One big letdown after a lot of work. The ultimate consolation prize. So why even bother to try and have it unless you're planning on having children? Masturbation seems like it would be quicker, cheaper, less awkward, and you would get the same result(a messy and humiliating orgasm) for a lot less effort.
Why do people do this? Where is the logic behind spending so much time and money on something so awful and anticlimactic?
When did I become such a bleeding-heart? I'm the one who shouldn't be caring! Hide / Show Replies
No offense, but it's difficult to explain. Partly because any serious explanation basically drives right through NSFW territory, and partly because it's one of those things that's just hard to put into words. Safe version: it feels good for everyone participating (assuming it's done right), it can enhance a relationship, etc. (Like I said, it's hard to put into words.)
Hollywood Sex was renamed to Idealized Sex as per TRS thread
Even as a newbie, I'm reasonably sure a new trope is required under the Hollywood Sex one. I'd name it "Sex is Fast", or for fluency, "Fast Sex".
I'd call it "Sex is Fast and Clean", but other tropes already cover the latter ground, I think. It'd be a subtropee of this one, of course, since I report it here. But still...
On TV you can have sex in five minutes or less, *while* it's still passionate and fulfilling. Even on the very few occasions where the hastiness is depicted, the female protagonist just pulls up her skirt and goes along without any further sequelae, with a smile on her face, and quite without worrying about the fact that something invariably oozes down the thing In Real Life.
Thus, more generally, the real deal takes a whole lot longer. Starting with the fact that even the Girl might be Sweaty/Hairy (a trope that'd take a feminist revolution to realize in fiction). The guy might be instructed to brush his teeth. Then there's all of the not-family-nor-workplace-safe stuff of insertion, friction, please-change-attitude, altitude, whatnot... It takes a while.
Sex is not fast IRL, but quite apparently it is very much so on film. Always. Hence, trope. :)
What exactly happened to the bit explaining how if done badly enough, it can fail biology and be impossible/damaging? You know, the trope that was called You Fail Sex Ed Forever in the first place?
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Hmm, good question. A failed merger, perhaps, carried through only halfway?
I'm sorry but the new title Hollywood Sex is the god damn stupidest retitle. You Fail Sex ED fits much better especially since many of the examples are in-universe with the characters making stupid/uninformed comments intentionally by the writers.
Your gonna go far kid...
There's one guy who's trying to remove the entire list of "Hollywood" BDSM. I think he's entirely wrong, for several reasons.
1. For some reason, he want to keep the vanilla list, in spite of it being just as "redundant" as the BDSM list. He claim that BDSM is "a" sexual practice, but in reality it's a wide and very varied field of sexual practices. Both lists are there for the same reason: To point out the actual misconceptions, not merely to point out that misconceptions as such exists.
2. The lists are funny. Well, to some people. Obviously this particular person only find one of them funny, if even that. There is no such thing as a topic that interest exactly everyone.
3. The lists provide useful information, while being in a poking-fun-at-the-whole-thing format that does not suit a useful notes page. And again, the lists are on the same level. Either we keep both lists on the main page, which is what I strongly prefer, or we move both lists to an useful notes page. Moving only one of the lists makes no sense except to serve some guy's personal bias.
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