M/M vs. F/F

Meta
Title:	M/M vs. F/F
Creator:	tehlils
Date(s):	Jan. 11th, 2005
Medium:	online
Fandom:
Topic:	Fanfiction, Femslash, Slash
External Links:	M/M vs. F/F, Archived version
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M/M vs. F/F is an essay by tehlils on the discrepancy between the prevalence of femslash vs slash.

Essay

So, everyone is talking about why M/M is more prevalent than F/F.

I don't think its lack of relating to female characters or there not being enough strong female characters in various fandoms. What I think it comes down to is language, sexuality, media and comfort. There will be a lot of generalisations, but I can't help that. I don't intend to spend my day writing out an eight page essay on sexuality and the fandom as it relates to female/female fiction. I could, but I'd rather get back to writing some fiction.

I've watched a lot of HBO late night specials, specifically Pornucopia, a documentary series on the world of porn. They spent hours talking with porn stars and compiling the history of porn. From as far back as silent films have been made, there's been porn, all sorts of porn, and yes, gay porn. It of course wasn't as rampantly produced then as it is now with the advent of being able to view it at home as opposed to in the theater. Anyways, if you look at the majority of lesbian porn, with the exception of a few small independent companies owned by lesbians, its made for men. It caters to their tastes, to what would turn them on. Thus a large chunk of it tends to be women rubbing their breasts together and being pretty much as un-lesbian as you can get.

With the exception of Gay and Lesbian films and television series, you never really see a lesbian relationship portrayed realisitically, and even then it tends to be reduced to stereotypes and the background. Not in all cases, but in many. In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, do you ever really see Willow and Tara's relationship to the degree you see Xander and Anya, Xander and Cordelia, Willow and Oz? No. It doesn't get the same amount of screen time, and more often than not it comes across as a friendship like Buffy and Willow. I think the biggest reason we don't see as much f/f fiction is because we don't have as many solid, defined examples of it that are accessible to us growing up. Its always been looked at as this thing done to turn on men, rather than to turn women on. I don't think everyone knows how to handle the f/f relationship.

So, why is it so easy then to show the m/m relationship? Because I don't see much of a difference in the media between the way men are friends and the way they are lovers, whereas I do see the difference in that for women. We have a billion different male friendships shown throughout television, fiction, and the movies. Its everywhere. We see in the media the flirtations and homo-erotic tendencies. And its not just that we see these things, its that they are there. It hasn't always had the same reactions, but its been there. Women? Well, its always been okay for women to hug and touch, so the fact that they do that isn't enough to say, hey, maybe there's something there. But when men touch? Its a big thing, at least the way we've been brought up it is. It's much easier to jump from "Male A touched Male B's leg" to they're shagging than it is "Female A touched Female B's leg" to they're shagging. Sadly, its just the way it is.

We need more of a reason to bring two women together romantically than we do two men. This isn't always the case, but it often is. We're also faced with horrible examples of the romantic f/f relationship in the media. On the topic of comfort and sexuality, there's a certain amount of distance a female writer is able to put between her own sexuality and the m/m relationship. Because as a woman if you write two men having sex together, people aren't likely to question your sexuality. Same with a man and a woman together. But the second you put two women together, you must be bisexual or a lesbian. Why else would a oman be interested in pairing two women together?

We're faced with assumptions and a need to be comfortable with our sexuality in order to write f/f fiction. Not only might there be people on the outside questioning your sexuality, but a woman might question her own sexuality upon writing two females together. "Does this make me a lesbian?" No, it doesn't. It makes you comfortable with your sexuality and being able to express the sexuality of others via the written word. And I'm not so sure we're all so confident in or sexuality that we're comfortable writing something that is taboo and difficult to distance ourselves from.

And the seal the deal problem with writing female/female fiction? The language. Especially when it comes to smut. See, when you write male/female fiction, you can write from the woman's point of view and completely avoid using words for the female genitalia other than the clitoris or breasts and all parts thereof. You don't have to worry about lips, labia, vagina, and finding words for them. You can describe what the male is doing without using those words or any flowery purple prose substitutes or any slang terms. When you put two females together you lose that ability. You have to use those words or not describe the sex.

Once again we are drawn back to comfort. You have to be comfortable using the language associated with your genitalia. There's no distance you can put between your body and the character's body. You need to be willing to use the flowery purple prose or be comfortable using the slang, otherwise you are stuck with the scientific terms. Due to these reasons, it's much easier to write m/m sex in arousing language than it is to write f/f sex.

When you look at all of that, along with probably a hundred other things I've managed to overlook in trying to write this quickly, you'll see why there is so little f/f fiction as opposed to m/m fiction and m/f fiction.

Reactions

Small sample of responses to the post:

[meridian star]:

You've got your brain working today. And I must say I have to agree with everything you've said.

I was writing something the other day and suddenly realised that I needed to swap the characters gender from male to female. I never I had used he,his,him but then I realised that girls only have she/her... there is no female equiviliant for him, this stumped me for a while. One question why? or is my brain just refusing to remember one. either way I have discovered that I am out of practice from writing from a female viewpoint.

An interesting for thing for me is that when I write from a male viewpoint I'm less likely to write myself. I am not male and therefore it often seems like it gives me more freedom. Writing lets you be something your not, or would like to be. What girl has never considered what itwould be like to be a man?

[florahart]:

Also, I think the problem with slang terms is who came up with them. That would be: boys, I reckon. I mean, I think so, anyway. For both men and women's bodies. Like, boys came up with cock and the 23846853 other words for it, and they're comfortable with their own words, but they also created words *they* liked for women's bodies. I'm not that fond of any of them, not due to comfort level so much as they just don't...seem to fit. Someone ought to have a contest for girls to name their own bits. Not like, "Alice," but slang words that feel right and aren't stupid. (Though..."Jane" has a certain ring to it).

[tweedisgood]:

It has to do also with author and audience, which in the fanfic medium are overwhelmingly female. A lot of ship fic is written because the idea of the selected characters in a sexual context turns the writer and/or reader on. Since the majority of both are still straight themselves, it's the sexiness of the opposite sex which appeals. Writing f/f as a means of exploring female characters is rarer but probably a greater proportion of it is really well-written both for the reasons of being more comfortable with one's own sexuality (although a huge amount of het is written in which presumably that's useful too insofar as identification with the female half of the pair takes place)and greater concentration on purely character- and issue-driven elements.