Would anyone consider writing a casual sex scene in which the participants did not use condoms? Thanks in advance for any feedback.
In order for fiction to be at all realistic and believable, the characters have to make some mistakes and use poor judgment now and then, just like real people do. You're an irresponsible author only if your main characters never suffer any consequences from making mistakes.
Every time, unless the act of wearing a condom has some kind of thematic import - to illustrate a character's 'responsibility' or, more probably, their psychological reluctance to go 'all the way' i.e. bare. Because as any adult will tell you, sex minus the exchange of bodily fluids isn't full-on sex at all. It's diet sex, sex light. Not to mention that characters who consign their behavior to what is considered good and responsible, will tend to be utterly uninteresting drips - what's far more interesting psychologically is, say, a bright, intelligent young woman who nonetheless insists on fucking every guy she meets bare, because that's just where she's at in life, driven by desire more than common sense, and willing (or so she thinks) to accept the consequences. And Karen J, are you serious? Do you read anything outside of the Christian moral fiction section? So-called 'irresponsible' behavior goes unpunished all the time. In fiction and in life. Ever seen a film or read a book where someone smokes a cigarette - without getting cancer? Maybe a character runs a red light. Is the author 'irresponsible' for not having this bad decision result in an accident, or at the very least a ticket, a fine? Seriously. I mean really, seriously, there's nothing 'realistic' or 'believable' about punishing your character for having unprotected sex with a STD or pregnancy. Moreover, there's no room for puerile moralism in serious fiction or life in general.
I never read any of that worthless shit. It's a percentage. You can look it up on medical websites. In unrealistic fiction, the consequences of any action only reflect the author's personal views and preferences, not reality. This is like the sitcoms of the 1970's. Every problem is always solved in a half hour, no matter how big or complicated. A better label for that kind of writing is fantasy. Ever see one where the character does get cancer?
That's good. Realistic fiction isn't extinct; it's just rare. Too rare. Over-simplified crap is easier to follow, and write. It's uncreative, self-serving, and a waste of time.
Well, I'd be curious to learn what you do read then, because most serious fiction I've read is chock full of people committing petty sin - and getting away with it! Admittedly, it's not just Christian didactic literature dealing out instant moral justice - much genre fiction follows the same pattern, as in e.g. horror films, which despite their superficially 'evil' subject matter appeal to audiences moral values, by mercilessly killing off the 'bad' i.e. sexually adventurous teens early on. Speaking of percentages, I'm not sure which 'medical websites' you consult, but let's just take as an example the statistical chance of you contracting the HIV virus from unprotected vaginal sex. This has been established at something around a 5 in 10.000 chance. There are numerous ways to read such figures, and kids, when in doubt by all means cover up, but it hardly bears out, from a medical perspective, that a single 'indiscretion' should necessarily result in a health condition. Same with inadvertently making babies - there's too many factors that come into play here to boil it down to a single conception to unprotected fornication ratio. While I believe there's a psychological truth to the often used dramatic device of having a single tryst lead to pregnancy, and while first swing homeruns aren't unheard of in reality, for MOST people who actually want a child lots and lots of unprotected fornication is required before they finally conceive. But statistical realism aside, why should the author of a work of fiction even care if its laws correspond with the (moral) laws of the so-called real world? Why should, in a work of fiction, immoral actions always go punished? More generally, how is it 'irresponsible' to show real human beings doing things which might be less than virtuous, maybe even stupid - but recognizably human? Surely a lot less irresponsible than partaking in the mayhem that is organized religion, and all the suffering its adherents have caused over the centuries insisting their fairy tale of choice was The Truth.
I don't care. That's not the point I was making. I've said nothing about what most authors do. A lot of shit writing gets published, and some of it makes money. That's not what the OP asked about. Now add all the risk factors together from all possible STD's, and tell me what you get. If several different characters in a book have unprotected sex multiple times, somebody should definitely get something, unless you're writing a fantasy that isn't intended to have any connection to real life, and this is made clear to readers in the first chapter. No, it's been done. The historical number, per vaginal event, is 5% for a typical, healthy, young woman. Individual results will vary, but that's the average for a large group. No reason, if you have no ethics and no respect for your readers, and only want their money. People will pay to be told what they want to hear. Fuck science. You haven't read or understood a word I've said, so I'm done talking to you.
GTFO with that 5% per 'vaginal event' figure (but props for the very pervy euphemism for the ol' up and down). There's a myriad of factors which increase or decrease one's chances of intentionally conceiving. You have to be ovulating for one, so just to say that there's a 5 % chance of getting pregnant from unprotected sex is, statistically, borderline meaningless. And yes, there are social diseases that are more prevalent and easier to contract than HIV, some of which you can catch even while wearing a condom, like Herpes. Rampant promiscuity with other rampantly promiscuous people will definitely up your chances, STD-wise. But being as due to good healthcare and education it's only a fraction of the entire sexually active population who are carrying something nasty between their legs, those odds go down considerably again when you begin to use discretion and add a tad of selectivity to who you choose to engage in unprotected 'vaginal events' with. I'm not saying it's good form, but objectively, statistically, it's rather more a case of extreme bad luck to contract something from an isolated instance of casual sex than good luck not to. Yes, actions have consequences, often unforeseen at the moment itself. But not all in equal measure, and most certainly not in the way you seem to have a stake in believing they ought to. In fiction, the 'actions have consequences' trope gets used because it appeals to readers' moral preconceptions, not to mention it's a handy way of developing/revealing character. In reality, though, people are surprisingly reluctant to learn from experiences, if through a spell of bad luck they do get their just deserts. The major crimes of the age go unpunished, as do the comparatively petty transgressions that are the stuff of adult life. It's only a narrowly defined slice of the full spectrum of 'bad' behavior that gets punished by rule of law - that is, if the law even gets around to solving the crime in the first place, which forensic advancements notwithstanding, is hardly always the case. If you're really so big on 'realism', you might have caught on to this, either via fiction or scrupulous observation of the world. But you and I both know you are anything but a realist, and that what you're really decrying in all this modern 'shit' that gets published 'just for the money' isn't its lack of realism - how life/the world 'is' - but its authors' lack of 'values' - how life/the world 'ought' to be. To be perfectly blunt, you come across as a pathologically defensive, humorless, all-round resentful person with neurotic tendencies. Just what you're doing on a hippie forum is beyond me. Your problem is decidedly un-literary: you need to open up to the vaginal event that is life.
Thank you all for your feedback - even when this went a little off-topic, it was highly entertaining; educational, even ;-) And ROLLINGALONG, thank you for your reply, which is exactly what my reply was to this exact same question, which was recently asked in a writing group I belong to. Guess what, not one person agreed with me! Anyway, thanks to all - much appreciated.
The fact that erotica IS fiction means by default that it is fantasy (not in high fantasy as a genre) and writers are not responsible for anything you take away from that. Just like the guy that makes the fast car movies is not responsible for people breaking the speed limit. Bareback erotica owes nothing to the real world and if you're dumb enough to use it as a guide, then that's more on the person and that person's idiocy or naivity and certainly has nothing to do with the writer.
I agree. If you are reading a romance or erotica novel, having a character stop to put on a condom interrupts the flow. It's a fantasy, so nothing bad can happen unless the author wants it to happen. Perhaps the author is leaving an opening to have a baby in the future. (later in the novel or in a sequel.) I read to escape. I don't want to read about someone who has an STD and has to wear condoms. Personally, I enjoy sex without condoms, so to read about condom free sex is more enjoyable. If it was a book about sex (as in teaching), then absolutely, you should include condoms. Should fiction authors educate people about sex? Or is it up to the individual to learn what's appropriate? I've noticed in romance novels, most characters never use the bathroom, brush their teeth etc. Not very hygienic, but then again, I don't really want to read about someone brushing their teeth or going.
