Frodosweetstuff

When your notes make a perfect cat

"Yuna," he says, shifting his elbows on the table to point at it. "What is this on his hand? Was broken?"

Shane's head snaps up from across the table, where he's pretending that Photo Album Time is very boring to him and not worth paying attention to. He hasn't scrolled on the article he's pretending to read for over five minutes.

"I never broke a bone as a kid," he says, brows furrowed. "Not until U13, when that fucking kid from Guelph--"

Yuna and Shane both inhale quickly through their noses in what Ilya has learned to recognize as a moderative measure, lest they start yelling about something that everyone else on Earth has forgotten about.

"No," Yuna says, once her face looks a little less intense. "No, it wasn't broken. It was this...contraption that the dentist gave us to correct his thumb-sucking. He was so mad about it, we only put it on him a few times."

"Oh, Jesus," Shane mutters, eyes going back to his phone.

"Aw," Ilya says. "Poor baby Shane." He taps his finger against one little red cheek and laughs. "You really do look so mad, sweetheart. How did you make him stop?"

"Hmm...you know, I don't remember," Yuna sighs, tilting her head. "I guess he just stopped by himself eventually. Do you remember, Shane?"

"No," Shane says, shortly.

"Of course, that didn't get rid of the oral fixation," Yuna sighs, adjusting her reading glasses as she flips the page. "The things you used to chew on, Shane. Pens and straws and--"

"Mom," Shane snaps, while Ilya vibrates beside him. "Can we not?"

"I was afraid to give him popsicles because I thought he would gnaw on the sticks until he got a splinter in his stomach."

"Mom!"

"Well, honey, it's true! And you did outgrow it eventually, so it's not as if you have to be embarrassed."

"Oh, you did?" Ilya says, shoulders shaking. "You outgrew the, uh, oral fixation?"

"Stop," Shane hisses.

"Mm. Excuse me." Ilya stands from the table and sweeps out onto the back porch, though the sliding door does nothing to prevent the sound of his guffaws from floating back into the kitchen.

"You know," Yuna says, "I'm just going to assume that this is some kind of language barrier thing--"

I personally hate any kind morality thought policing. I'm not Catholic or religious and I do not feel guilty over my thoughts. You are not an inherently evil person because you saw two athletes in an interview and went "Hmmm...... what if...." The Feds are not going to come banging down your door because you wrote about one band member dicking down the other and sent it to your friend.

Wondering about other people's lives is very human. Being nosy about their personal lives is very normal. People have been writing fiction about other people's lives since the dawn of time. Some people even manage to write New York Times Bestselling Books that are "historical fiction" or "alternate reality." It does not make you inherently bad to be curious about the details of someone's personal life. That's being human. Being nosy is kind of fun.

The problem, however, comes with the ways in which people engage with it, and involve the real people in this. Harassing an musician's real girlfriend because it doesn't fit into the RPF ship. Showing up at real sporting events holding signs about how certain teammates should kiss. Trying to get actors to sign art of them fucking their coworker. Flooding social media with comments using the celebrity's full name and speculation. There's a line, there's a fourth wall, and there's fandom etiquette.

I hate the question of "Is RPF ethical" because it feels like morality thought policing. Post your fics on locked accounts, censor someone's name when you tweet about it, blow up your groupchat with hundreds of "DID YOU SEE THE WAY THEY LOOKED AT EACH OTHER??" texts. It's not inherently evil to wonder what other people are doing when they're out of the spotlight. Kill the cop in your mind.