Hello everyone, this may come out as a rant but I figure I go ahead and started on what needs to be said and clarified on my intentions as a writer. I have received some emails and messages on both sides of the spectrum that needs to be addressed when it comes to my stories.
I want to make things clear that being a writer is not an easy task. It gets into the social media where it is easily picked apart piece by piece. Things can get easily manipulated and distorted by others with various opinions. I can give praise to all the writers here that we all have our different genres that we cover from those that have been here the shortest or the longest of time spans.
Among one of the disturbing messages that I received about me is one that says that I promote rape or encourage it, with the message outright even accusing me as a rapist due to the content of my stories (or few stories that even have it). I believe I know what the culprit is and what has happened to have led that person to make that accusation, but it is only speculation. On the other side of the spectrum, I have received messages in which they want me to write stories where characters are being raped with complex descriptions of how it should be done. Both sides have indicated to me warning signs of what is happening with either the fanbase in general or possible newcomers, that force me to write this post.
I want to make things perfectly clear. I find the concept of rape to be disgusting in real life. The accusations are also taken way out of proportion so much that it I often believe that tags are actually to be the true blame on this. A perfect example of this is the story of Gabatrix: The Violet Wave. In the story and only for the smallest of sections, a male officer (the main character) that has been taken prisoner gets assaulted by a female alien that is much stronger than him. The alien wants revenge for being shot by him during a battle. She tries to attack him and he is knocked out during the ensuing fight. It is later indicated to him that he was sexually assaulted by this woman while he was unconscious. Later on, the same alien tries to attack him, but he wins the fight and the alien woman leaves him alone.
Because of this tiny scene out of a large story, I do believe that this is the culprit that led to the messages. I am very sure that many newcomers that browse the stories here on Storiesonline come to look at the descriptions and tags and make up their mind of the writer at the very spot. They don't bother to read the story because they already imagine the worst that can ever be brought from the writer.
The same argument can be made on Gabatrix: The Violet Wave. This story has implied rape……so the misconstrued viewer must conclude the writer must enjoy rape right? The moral crusaders will dawn their flags and wave it at me and say that I am a horrible person. They feel that I should be sent to the psychiatric ward or be burned at the stake on the spot for even mentioning it with others wanting me to remove it. Meanwhile, I write stories of a war where no rules apply. They don't have an issue with me writing the next story where an alien monster can devour people, possess them, or be outright violent and gorey, but the moment that I write a story where rape is even mentioned then I must be a danger to society and dangerous to every human being on the face of the planet.
I find the idea to be utterly repulsive of what rape is and I do not enjoy writing it. I love and try to find balance in life where political extremism (at least where I live) is on the rise on all sides. COVID-19 has not helped at all and helps create this form of madness that we are all struggling to fight. It doesn't take much for a person to point a finger at somebody, label them as a person because of something, and walk away not knowing what they have done that can hurt or defame the person as a result. Trolling also has many forms both wicked and with utter disgust. I have to take the messages that I receive with considerable question at times.
Because of this, I have to put my foot down on all sides. I do have a couple more stories in the far future where a character may end up getting sexually assaulted to help drive the main plot forward. However, when it arrives to that scene, it will fade to black and I won't describe it, but only the lingering impact that it had on the characters (somewhat like The Violet Wave did). Basically, it is me having to censor my own future stories. Do not come to me or try to commission me to write a rape scene for you. For the moral crusaders however, please understand that there is nothing gained by harassing me further. If I receive any further messages that I am a horrible writer for having rape in my stories or a scene that even leads to it, I will consider it as trolling or harassment in which I will send it to the webmasters to deal with.
Among one of the other things that I also have found disturbing is how my story of Ayida Weddo is paraded on something that I found on the most repulsive of websites…..sites that I can't even mention on this posting at all. Once again, I fear the worst in that people read the tags, don't even bother with what was intended of the story, and think I am terrible person for even having it in the first place. Meanwhile, they don't even know what it is about.
I want to clarify that Ayida Weddo and the Tales of Heroes is one that does have a story based in an actual environment. It takes place during the Liberian Civil War where people not only killed each other, but ate each other. This happened over twenty years ago and the people still suffer to this day from the brutality of such a conflict. The goal of my story was to bring awareness of such an event besides having the main story of the characters. History is a strong suite of mine and I enjoy writing it. While magic, fantasy, and even eroticism can exist in Tales of Heroes, there is a clear division between the travesty and horrors that Liberia went through and the love, romance, and sex between the main characters in one book alone. I believe that the tags that I have were gravely misaligned and the story is due for a massive overhaul/revision since my writing skills continue to improve along with Grammarly to even assist along the way. I believe it is in the best interests to go ahead and take it down for a few months. From there, I will do all the things that need to be fixed to it. I even have plans to turn Ayida-Weddo and the Tales of Heroes into a fundraising project to help provide relief to African nations. I don't know about you, but I think it is one that will be very interesting and worthwhile, right? :)
With all that said, I do appreciate the positive comments that I do receive. A positive or even a constructive comment to me is worth more than anything in these trying times. Take care and thank you for enjoying my stories.