'Push' by Ardra in word doc?

[yvonnereid.livejournal.com]

Hi folks,its me again ;)

I am looking for a fic called 'Push' by Ardra which is in the wayback machine in the links in the sidebar here. The problem is I can't stop getting distracted by that ugly white box that stays at the top of the page in there and I can't read the fic in...shall we call it comfort? Because im distracted. Does any of you lovely folks know if its posted anywhere else or maybe one of you has in word doc or pdf?

Please help if you can,as soon as you can because I am wanting to get back to reading it asap :)

Thanks in advance,Vonnie xoxox

Edited~sent to me by delvalmom,thanks alot xx

Note to mods,I want to say sorry if I opened up a can of worms on this topic.I swear to god that was not my intention.I just wanted to find the story.

Comments

[xie-xie-xie.livejournal.com]

Well, that was quite a walk down memory lane, LOL.

Yes, that was one of the scenes that really bothered me. But the entire premise of the story was troubling to me. Brian was working out his psychological issues both with physical violence and also with sexual behavior HE HIMSELF DEPLORED but felt a compulsion to perform.

BDSM is not about working out your shit by harming others, it's about exploring different sexual dynamics in a consensual way. That's not even remotely what the Brian character is doing in this story. Not even close.

As to Justin, he allows Brian to potentially take his life -- knew Brian was not in control of himself -- and still wouldn't use a safe word or withdraw consent, no matter what happened. This isn't about trust or submission, it's about being stupid and thinking that letting your lover abuse and kill you is a way of showing him you love him.

Let's not even get into the whole twisted dynamic of their supposed "love."

Now, at the time I hadn't thought about what I'm about to say, so this is new. It's something I've thought about in all the wank about "Fifty Shades of Gray," which apparently has the same problem. And I have no doubt it's something the BDSM community has long ago explored in great depth, even if it just occurred to me recently.

Is a fictional work supposed to be held to the standard of consent between the characters, or between the author and the reader? In other words, if I told my lover I wanted to explore a rape fantasy, and she and I worked that out and set parameters, and then we enacted that scene, the consent would be between her and me, right?

So, what if instead of the two of us enacting the scene, I wrote it instead? And I didn't include the parameter setting and the consent and the safeword and so on, but just the fantasy, the scene, itself. And I gave it to her to read.

In this case, the consent agreement exists, right? I wrote the story, she can just stop reading it if she doesn't want to continue with it. I'm not "forcing" anything on her; it's all fictional.

So, if you look at this fic and "Fifty Shades" (and setting aside any discussion of the quality of the works, as I'm not talking about that here), is it really accurate to say, "This is a story about an out-of-control, deeply troubled man who is acting out sexual abuse on his lover, who seems to believe that allowing him to beat him and kill him is a sign of love, and thus, the issue of consent and maturity and boundary-setting is important and the story and its characters repellant"....

OR do we instead say, "This is a fantasy in which the boundary setting and consent are taking place 'off stage,' and take place between the writer and the reader, and this is not meant to be taken as a depiction of BDSM but instead, of the fantasy itself"?

Now, personally I don't have, enjoy, or appreciate this particular fantasy. I think this story is repugnant, and it makes me sick. I wish I had never read it, and I'm feeling squicked just remembering it now.

I also have some issues with the way a lot of fans just gobble up everything about Brian and Justin without discrimination or thought, and don't really ask themselves if what they're reading is in character or well-crafted or emotionally healthy or anything else, they just accept it unquestioningly. I sometimes see people recommending certain fics as being particularly in character when they are so OOC a four year old would know it.

But it's only when I believe people are unquestioningly consuming damanging messages, when overt or veiled sexism and homophobia and other forms of bias are present, when the relationships being depicted are unhealthy but the author clearly doesn't present them as unhealthy -- then I do often feel like I want to say something, even though I almost never do.

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