What is Your Pet Peeve?

[scottigrl]

Since we are NOT talking about religion, let me just say.. I believe that if one is a decent human being with compassion for all then religion need not apply. That being said, its all a matter of personal belief isn't it? Believe all you like, worship all you like, I hope it make you happy. Don't judge others by your religious belief as it should only apply to yourself and never use it as a reason to harm others. It's all good.. Of course this is just one tiny opinion in the vastness that is us, isn't it?

As to how religion relates to some stories, I too prefer not to read.. And guess what? I ain't gotta, isn't that cool? I could say my religion forbids it, but that would just be mean

It's a really big big world. Amazing how different we all are.

Peace Dude's

Scotti

Hay Bardeyes, you wouldn't happen to have "K's" address would ya??? It would sure help save a few steps in our research.. Although she did give us some Major clues..... You should come along on our visit once we figure out where she is.. Cold Beer, pretty girlz...soooo u in?

[Bardeyes]

Hay Bardeyes, you wouldn't happen to have "K's" address would ya??? It would sure help save a few steps in our research.. Although she did give us some Major clues..... You should come along on our visit once we figure out where she is.. Cold Beer, pretty girlz...soooo u in?

E-mail addy? Yep. You can look at her stories though for that though.

Other than that, your on your own. ...and I already have a beautiful woman sitting beside me. ...actually she's reading all the jokes from the meet and greet thread.

[Scotti]

Damn I'll take that as a really BIG no.. Oh well on to the research.. You and your beauty can still come along if you like. The more the merrier, It can be an unofficial "Let's indoctrinate" "K" to all things XWP. The girl needs to watch some eps of the show and I would love to visit South Africa. "K" says there is eye candy abound. I like candy..

Later Dude's

Scotti

[Norsebard]

Without wanting to go into a discussion about either religion or politics, I guess we're all 'guilty' to a certain extent of putting things in our stories that are important to us - unfortunately, some of those things work as a red rag to a bull for some of our readers.


Norsebard

[silverwriter01]

Damn I'll take that as a really BIG no.. Oh well on to the research.. You and your beauty can still come along if you like. The more the merrier, It can be an unofficial "Let's indoctrinate" "K" to all things XWP. The girl needs to watch some eps of the show and I would love to visit South Africa. "K" says there is eye candy abound. I like candy..

Later Dude's

Scotti

Valiant try, Scotti. We'll have to go back to the research board. Who else can we bribe?



I'm glad people are liking our jokes on the Meet and Greet board.

[k_alexander]

Without wanting to go into a discussion about either religion or politics, I guess we're all 'guilty' to a certain extent of putting things in our stories that are important to us - unfortunately, some of those things work as a red rag to a bull for some of our readers.

Never has a truer or more pacifying word been spoken. You're so very level-headed, Norse. It's delightful.

Since we are NOT talking about religion, let me just say.. I believe that if one is a decent human being with compassion for all then religion need not apply. That being said, its all a matter of personal belief isn't it? Believe all you like, worship all you like, I hope it make you happy. Don't judge others by your religious belief as it should only apply to yourself and never use it as a reason to harm others. It's all good.. Of course this is just one tiny opinion in the vastness that is us, isn't it?

Exactly. How can we fail to see that everyone believes in something?

I'm still not going to get into a discussion on religion, but the following seemed pertinent:
An uncle of mine who is a very staunch Christian has suddenly been bombarding me with religious spam lately. You know the type: I'm a sinner and I can still be saved. Other than being amazingly annoying, it's also rather painful as I have never treated this family member with anything other than love and respect. So, eventually I asked him to cease and desist. Nicely. He said that he would honour my wish, but that I couldn't stop him from praying for me as he loves me.
Um. That kind of love's not quite up to par in my book.
I had to curb the desire to tell him that it was okay, because I was going to ask my Wiccan friends to make up a spell for him too.

I tell it like it's funny, but it's not.

Damn I'll take that as a really BIG no.. Oh well on to the research.. You and your beauty can still come along if you like. The more the merrier, It can be an unofficial "Let's indoctrinate" "K" to all things XWP. The girl needs to watch some eps of the show and I would love to visit South Africa. "K" says there is eye candy abound. I like candy..

Later Dude's

Scotti

Valiant try, Scotti. We'll have to go back to the research board. Who else can we bribe?

Bribes? Well then, why not come straight to the source? What are you offering for the information? (remember, I like cheese and Diane Lane. But don't offer me a Diane Lane statue made of cheese.)

Oh... and money. I like money.

[Scotti]

Hey K,

I have an Uncle (Baptist Minister) that does basically the same thing to me as well, with his rhetoric and preaching. Although he couldn't send an email (The internet is evil and the work of the Devil, you know ) if all Souls depended on it. All in the name of love of course..

I asked him once if he was a happy Man. He said he would be happy when the Lord's work was done. My reply was, As I understand it the Lord's work is never done. Guess you are doomed to unhappiness in the name of the Lord and I am quite giddy in my Queer little world. Ah well Family what can you do?

Diane Lane, errrmmm ahhh if I could come up with Diane Lane, I wouldn't even be thinking about you in S.A. Because SHE would be MINE ALL MINE... (In a non stalker healthy kind of way)

Money on the other hand may be doable. How much we talking? Euro's, American? What's the price these days, for a Stayover in your part of the World? Remember the Economy sux so factor in the recession in your estimate.. I am off to my office, The Beach of course.

Later Dude's

Scotti

[silverwriter01]

Scotti do you every go to work or are you sell sea shells by the sea shore?

If I had Diane Lane I'd be the bigger woman and let you two have her. I sadly have no money to bribe with. Just a poor college student living on ramen noodles.

I don't have a preacher man Uncle but my roommate is a preacher's daughter who keeps her bible on the table. She doesn't believe in homosexuality but other then that, we actually get along pretty well. We just don't discuss religion and the origins of homosexuals often.

[Rio]

I've been reading fan fiction for quite a long time so I've accumulated a few pet peeves. Having said that I am so grateful to all the authors and hosting sites in the Xenaverse for providing me with countless hours of entertainment. I am truly astounded by the talent out there.

So, here they are, in no particular order:

Stories with no teaser. I don't like going into a story with absolutely no idea what it's about.

When, in the middle of a story, one character explains to another character (in detail) everything that's just happened in the story.

When a character is reading a letter and the author prefaces the italicized contents of the letter with the phrase "it read".

When a story is posted as finished but, in reality, it's a cliffhanger prequel to a published story. I even read one story where only the first chapter was posted followed by a link to buy the book. It turns out that I missed the "unfinished" label, and that happens occasionally but I felt that this was sneaky because there was no hint given that this would be the case. I don't have a problem with authors pulling a published story, but this really bothered me.

When a story is taken offline because it has been published, or there is a published sequel to a finished story, but it is no longer available for purchase.

When a story starts off with a figure doing something stealthily, then continues for paragraphs still referring to the character as "the figure" -- repeatedly. "The figure did this". "The figure did that". I think we're supposed to be surprised that the "figure" turns out to be a woman.

The occasional grammar and spelling mistakes are to be expected, but I cringe when the same mistake is repeated throughout the story. Sometimes I get really annoyed by it and then I remind myself that this story is free and it's actually pretty good, and I get over it.

That's pretty much it. There are some amazing stories out there that tick one or two of these boxes but, while they may interrupt the flow of the story for me, they are by no means deal breakers. Keep up the good work.

Rio

[Bardeyes]

New pet peeve...well, actually it's an really old one for me.

Broken links between chapters of a story.

...and...

Websites that refuse to fix broken links between chapters of a story. That goes double for websites that are still maintained on a regular basis, but never fix chapter links. I don’t know, maybe I’m just grousing about something meaningless, but to me that seems slightly disrespectful to the author of the story and anyone reading the story; but that's just me. We fix ‘em when you point them out to us though.

I suppose I could list my real life pet peeves… Like…oh, intolerance, religious extremism, the Republican Party, the general level of willful ignorance in America today…I could go on. I read a long-winded explanation of the insanity that is swirling around healthcare reform on a blog somewhere, when I was up in the wee hours of the morning because I couldn’t sleep. The gist was that the people who are nearly panicked about healthcare reform aren’t stupid - as they are often called on left leaning blogs – they are actually just scared.

Mmm…well…yeah. They are. But…what do YOU do when hear/read/see something that seems really scary? Do you panic? Do you tell all of your friends that they should be afraid as well, and encourage them to panic as well? Do you stockpile ammunition? Do you show up at political rallies with a .38 strapped to your hip? And yes, to all of our international visitors, that last really is legal in the America. OR, do you take some time to research what you heard/read/saw and find out if it’s true or not? And I don't mean research by watching Fix News. Do you take some to consider that what you may have heard is complete bullshit? A god-awful number of American’s skip the research and thought, and go right (far right) to panic and paranoia. That doesn’t make them stupid, it just makes them willfully ignorant, and of the two, willful ignorance is far, far worse than stupidity. You see, stupidity can sometimes be countered with facts and time, but it’s damn hard to convince someone who wants to believe in their fear, that they really don’t have anything to be afraid of at all.

It doesn’t matter if it’s health care, or intolerance, or global warming, or…well, you can fill in the blank. So, my biggest pet peeve, and I’ll admit it goes way beyond a pet peeve, is willful ignorance.

Hmmm…that was a really OT rant. I can’t say that I’m sorry. Blame it on a crushing headache and too many hours spent reading and watching the current insanity over health care reform.

What I need is a good short sweet sappy story to lighten my mood. My brain is too fried to think of any so...any recommendations?

[hickcrone]

Go reread Strings Attached by Inyx, on your site.

If you are willing to expand your reading to Voyager B'Elanna/Seven stories, go to

http://www.ralst.com/Turbolift.html

and read turbo lift stories. If you can't read fiction with aliens or part aliens, visit Roxann Dawson's wikipedia site first and then picture B'Elanna as human. She is just real cute...

[AJMArks]

A recent comment in another thread made me realize I have another big pet peeve. When reading Xena and Gabrielle fanfiction and they in ancient Greece it peeves me when modren values about gays and lesbians are put into that time period. Back then I doubt anyone would have cared if Xena and Gabrielle were lovers considering this was a time period where older men were encouraged to have younger men (boys actually) as lovers. I doubt it would have been seen as evil, immoral or anything else.

[L13]

A recent comment in another thread made me realize I have another big pet peeve. When reading Xena and Gabrielle fanfiction and they in ancient Greece it peeves me when modren values about gays and lesbians are put into that time period. Back then I doubt anyone would have cared if Xena and Gabrielle were lovers considering this was a time period where older men were encouraged to have younger men (boys actually) as lovers. I doubt it would have been seen as evil, immoral or anything else.

It's actually not that simple. In ancient Greece, the notion of "homosexuality" did not exist. What was important was the role -- "active" or "passive" -- people took during the sexual act. It had to fit with their social status. As you said an older man could have a "boy" as a lover but, but he had to be the "active" one for the relation to be deemed acceptable. ("Boy" means an adolescent and not a child in that case.)

The Oxford Classical Dictionary says:

"Any sexual relation that involved the penetration of a social inferior (whether inferior in age, gender, or status) qualified as sexually normal for a male, irrespective of the penetrated person's anatomical sex, whereas to be sexually penetrated was always potentially shaming, especially for a free male of citizen status (e.g. Tacitus Annales 11. 36). Roman custom accordingly placed the sons of Roman citizens off limits to men. In Classical Athens, by contrast, free boys could be openly courted, but a series of elaborate protocols served to shield them from the shame associated with bodily penetration, thereby enabling them to gratify their male suitors without compromising their future status as adult men.

(...) A boy on the threshold of manhood might assume the sexual role of a boy in relation to a man as well as the sexual role of a man in relation to another boy (e.g. Xenophon Symposium 8. 2), but he might not play both roles in relation to the same person.

(..) Whatever a boy might do in bed, it was crucial that he not seem to be motivated by passionate sexual desire for his lover, because sexual desire for an adult man signified the desire to be penetrated, to be subordinate—to be like a woman, whose pleasure in sexual submissiveness disqualified her from assuming a position of social and political mastery. A boy who indicated that he derived any enjoyment from being anally receptive risked identifying himself as a kinaidos, a pathic, a catamite: no modern English word can convey the full force of the ancient stigma attached to this now-defunct identity. Similarly, a man who retained as his beloved a boy on the threshold of manhood thereby cast doubt on his own masculinity, for if the grown boy was not himself a kinaidos, then the man who continued to love him must be.

(...) Not all expressions of same-sex eroticism were approved by the ancients. They did not have a concept of sexual perversion, but they did stigmatize forms of sexual behaviour which they considered shameful, unconventional, or unnatural."

Saying that homosexuality was accepted in ancient Greece is a stretch. As far as we know, it was ok for a man to penetrate a boy and, under certain conditions, the practice was not shaming for the boy. That's all, and other sexual behaviors were stigmatized. We know very little about feminine homosexuality at the time, and I think it's difficult to infer anything from what we know about masculine homosexuality since it's so focussed on who is the penetrator and who is the penetrated. In ancient Greece, women were considered as sexually submissive and socially inferior to men. I guess we could conclude that it probably didn't matter who a woman was submissive to or passive with... But we could as well conclude that in their conception of sexual relations someone had to be the active one, the penetrator, and therefore one of the women had to act as a man, which could have been considered as an abomination... And there are indeed wrintings that suggest the woman assuming the "male role" in a feminine same-sex relation was considered as mentally diseased. (However the writings I read of date back to the 2nd century AD in Rome...)

Personally, I think authors can write pretty much what they want, it's difficult to know if it is historically accurate. If anything, the depiction of masculine homosexuality as totally accepted would peeve me more because we know it was more complicated than that. Yet again, the show wasn't known for its historical accuracy

[The Fallen]

A recent comment in another thread made me realize I have another big pet peeve. When reading Xena and Gabrielle fanfiction and they in ancient Greece it peeves me when modren values about gays and lesbians are put into that time period. Back then I doubt anyone would have cared if Xena and Gabrielle were lovers considering this was a time period where older men were encouraged to have younger men (boys actually) as lovers. I doubt it would have been seen as evil, immoral or anything else.

Well, L13 has already stated my thoughts almost exactly, so I won't say much on that. But I will add that I seem to remember from my history classes back in college (it was a long time ago, so bear with me if I'm mistaken) that homosexuality (male, at least) wasn't even recognised in mediaeval England - people slept with who they wanted. And I believe the reason why there were laws against sodomy/male homosexuality in the UK for so long and not lesbiansim is because Queen Victoria could imagine two guys going at it but couldn't figure out what two women would get up to, and so dismissed it as an impossibilty. Or is that just a historical myth? And wasn't it supposed to be Vic herself who said she didn't care what two consenting adults got up to "so long as they don't do it in the streets and frighten the horses"? (Always loved that quote.)

But one a more serious note, one of my pet peeves is almost the complete reverse of yours, although I wouldn't phrase it in quite the same way. I dislike fanfic set in any historical era in which our heroines' sexuality is generally accepted but the setting indicates it shouldn't be. Mel/Janice stories are usually very guilty of this. It's not so bad in those eras which historically sexuality is accepted or ignored but in settings where it would be frowned upon or worse, to make everyone happy and okey-dokey with our heroines being together just seems like fantasy. One or two people accepting things is excusable; more than that just seems ridiculous. As always, I suppose it depends on the exact setting and the talent of the author.

The stupid thing is, this issue makes a perfect conflict and that's what all drama revolves around. It doesn't have to be the driving force of the conflict in the story, but it has to be there. It's kind of like the subplot of Fritz and Natalia in Cabaret: the main conflict is the rise of the Nazis and the problems that causes Sally (due to her 'decadent' lifestyle) and Brian (who is gaybisexual), but obviously Fritz and Natalia have to contend with their own religion and the danger that places them in.

And besides, aren't stolen kisses so much more appealing?

That's just MHO, of course. I know a lot (most?) of readers don't want to read about this prejudice and bigotry (there's enough of that in the real world, after all), and I understand that. It's just I want to read about real characters with real problems, not some two-dimensional cypher (there's enough of those on TV and in movies and published books, after all). It's my desire for realism (even in the fantastical), I guess. I can put up with this kind of thing in stories which are supposed to be lighthearted and fun romps, but not anywhere else.

The same goes for every single woman in every scene in the story being either gay or at least in the closet. And of course, immediately attracted to one or both of our heroines and practically throwing themselves at them. That just pisses me off.

A lot of people have mentioned names and the various reasons they annoy people. I dislike 'meaningful' names. Don't get me wrong, I think all names should be chosen for a reason and therefore have meaning, but it's that two-dimensional thing again. "My character is dark and broody, so I'll call her Raven" or "Our heroine is an enternal optimist so she's called Sunny" or... well, you get the idea.

You know something else that annoys me? People who post in forums and ramble on and on and on and on and on... Sorry guys, I just realised how long this post was. And I should be writing too. Shame on me.

[Jude]

I'm not going to even attempt to quote what L13 wrote, but it is my understanding that L13 hit it right on the money. This sexualized relationship between an older man and an adolescent was not purely about sex. The man took on the role of a teacher to the adolescent, teaching him how to be a man and educating him scholastically. It appears to have been a very complicated relationship, where sex was not necessarily the basis for it, but more of a mentoring role that included sex of some sort. Also, I believe catamites were a "Roman tradition," if you will. Catamites were basically young boy prostitutes who wore makeup like a woman.

[Katelyn]

I read many, many stories and ebooks. One of my biggest pet peeve is when an author completely changes scenes from one paragraph to another with absolutely nothing to indicate the change, i.e., no additional space between paragraphs, no graphical image to indicate a break in scene, NOTHING. I'm reading along and paragraph after paragraph flows then BAM, I go to the next paragraph and it is totally unrelated to the ongoing scene with no notice. Is it me or is this does this drive others crazy?

[k_alexander]

I've been chuckling about something for the last few days, and then I realised that this would be the perfect forum (if you will) to share my amusement. I was reading an uber a little while ago (and I can't remember what it was, but if I did I wouldn't embarrass the author by being specific) wherein one of the characters has quite a ... unique name. When she introduces herself to the other main character, she says something to the effect of "My name is *******. You pronounce it like ..." I couldn't read any further. It made my day!

Katelyn, re your comment below - it is rather frustrating, but I do have to explain that when stories are converted into HTML from .doc (which is the format I, and probably a lot of other people, use), the "page break" command doesn't translate, which means the formatting comes out roughly as you've described below. You only find this out after it's happened to you!

[AJMArks]

Recently read one story lately that annoyed me (it wasn't in the Xena fandom). The characters kept switching hair color and hair length. Got confusing a few times.

[Otter]

Hmm, so I was trawling through fanfiction.net, looking for things to read, and I came across a HEAP of stories that were written with net-speak (eg. 'Ur lik so hawt', she sed.)

Close window.

I have great respect for young authors, I was thirteen when I first started writing, but...net-speak does my head in. So I guess my pet-peeve is sheer laziness.

My other one is characters sounding like thirteen year old girls when they aren't thirteen year old girls. (eg. "OMG, I can't believe you did that, it's like totally not cool," said Eric, the 1000 viking vampire. [My one het pairing that I'm totally in love with is Eric/Sookie])

Anyhoo...I feel better for having ranted.
Otter.

[Norsebard]

Hmm, so I was trawling through fanfiction.net, looking for things to read, and I came across a HEAP of stories that were written with net-speak (eg. 'Ur lik so hawt', she sed.)

Eek! I'm about twenty years too old to even understand net-speak, so Close Window indeed


Norsebard