people are wrong on the internet

I read this ask earlier yesterday and it's been sticking in my brain so, my dear anon and others who feel the same, let's please sit down and have a chat. ☕

I am not a therapist, what I am is someone who's been to therapy for nearing a decade and who hasn't had direct contact with eir abuser in almost as long (which is actually incredibly important, more on that later). It's been a rough and long journey, but I think I can provide some insight to help my fellow survivors of incest and CSA.

Before we start please take a moment to check in with how you're feeling. Do you need anything? Water, a snack, warmer clothes? When you're comfortable relax your shoulders and unclench your jaw, a progressive muscle relaxation exercise can help with that. Take a few deep belly breaths, you can lie flat on your front or interlocking your fingers behind your head to make it easier.

When/if you're ready please continue reading.

Especially since I followed this whacked out rabbit hole down to the ‘incest’ in question, only to find out that they are... adult stepsiblings? And their romance route is warned for up front and entirely avoidable if anyone doesn’t want to read it? And even if it hadn’t been, your entire diatribe disregards the fact that a) what is a healthy coping mechanism for one person may not be healthy for another, but that doesn’t mean it is never healthy (and it is very clear that you are not an actual therapist, and I’m sorry, but going to therapy and finding out what doesn’t work for you and is not healthy for you does not make you an authority on what would be healthy and what would work for literally anyone else so please climb down off your high horse before you slip and hurt yourself), and b) people who enjoy these things in fiction are not always survivors themselves and that is ok.

I’m gonna bring this around to something I have personal experience with, because evidently that’s the only way you people will allow anyone a voice in this shitstorm. I have a rape kink. This means I am in fairly good company with the 62% of women (which is roughly 200% of the amount of women who have or will be likely to experience rape in their lifetime, at 20%) who have similar fantasies. This does not mean I enjoyed the actual rape I experienced, nor does it mean I was asking for it, nor does it mean that if it were to happen in the future it would be ‘ok’ because I have this kink and enjoy exploring it both in fiction and with trusted partners who I allow into my bedroom for these scenes.

It also doesn’t mean that I am somehow in some state of arrested development because I enjoy reading rape fantasies and engaging in CNC in the bedroom. What I like in fiction and what I approve of in real life are two completely separate concepts, and it is not your job (nor do you have the right) to determine for people who are not you what is healthy for them to engage in, in fiction or in the bedroom.

I am literally begging you, and everyone in your circle who apparently thinks it is ok to make these wide, sweeping judgments about what people enjoy in fiction (judgments that I notice to not seem to include, oh, murder, which is quite prevalent in IFs with nary a peep from people like you, gee I wonder why), to understand that what someone enjoys and consumes in fiction is not at all indicative of what they approve of in real life, or what their moral compass is like outside of the fiction they consume or the play they engage in. If someone wants to read about childhood friends to lovers with a little extra spice (which is usually what stepsibling romance boils down to, and oh my god it is so evident how very young and out of touch you people are because I remember when Life with Derek was airing and, to this day, the most popular ship in that fandom is Derek and Casey, up to and including the actors of those characters, who ship it and have read Derek/Casey fics and done dramatic reenactments for their fans), then they can, and it doesn’t mean they were victims of incest or survivors of CSA, nor should they have to justify their interest to you in order to enjoy things in fiction. (And the fact that the route is stated up front is just the icing on this particular cake. Anyone who would find a stepsibling romance harmful to read can avoid it entirely, or just not play the game! It is literally hurting no one just by its existence!)

Get. A. Grip. Please! Please understand that just because you don’t like something in fiction or would find it harmful does not mean that this is a universal truth! It does not mean that people who enjoy it are sick or traumatized, and it does not mean their moral compasses don’t point just as north as yours! It is perfectly ok to like things in fiction that you would find reprehensible in real life! This is why no one thinks that Dexter or Hannibal fans are budding serial killers, or that Breaking Bad fans think that it’s perfectly ok to cook up meth and kill people over it in their spare time.