Worried about offending people; please critique?

I'm working on a story and I want to get input as to whether or not one piece of the premise will offend people. ‎It's a "Planetary Romance" style science fiction story (roughly equal parts John Carter of Mars and Norse Mythology) with a Harem Genre element, and that's where I'm concerned that I might offend.

In the fantastical low-gravity world where my earthling protagonist finds himself to possess superhuman strength, there are two cultural institutions which factor into the Harem Genre aspect of the story. The first is a tradition (borrowed from the Nietzscheans of "Andromeda") in which the woman proposes marriage to the man she wishes to have as the father of her children. And if that man is already married, it's seen as a calculated risk, weighing his value as a gene-source and provider against the handicap of him already having obligations to another woman and her children. But this is not the part I worry about offending people with...

In the various Norse Myths, there are frequent points where the character speaking pauses to re-introduce himself to the audience in terms of being close family of another person (in fact, the only attestation I know of for Meili is Thor stating that he and Meili are brothers), and I understand this to be a cultural mechanism for establishing credibility by way of reminding the listener that you have family whose credibility in this area is beyond reproach. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and all that.

From this, I drew the conclusion that in their culture, family ties are the basis for credibility; and this is where I worry about offending people. Because in such a cultural environment, for children to grow up and become successful, they require not only a loving supportive home, but recognized parents in their lives. Whose names can be invoked when calling for credibility to be lent to the speaker's words/purported deeds. A mother and a father both, given the sexism of the culture.

Let me emphasize. An in-character bias of the culture I've extrapolated from Norse myths, not to be confused with my own real-world beliefs on the subject.

Anyway, two of the characters in my main cast are an established lesbian couple, defined as such because they are genuinely in love with each other, and have been for years. And while one of them prefers to classify herself as a career-soldier first and a woman second, her wife is quite eager to have children of her own to raise...

And here's where I'm afraid of sounding like a monstrously intolerant neanderthal.

...But in their culture, those children have no opportunity at success or acclaim in so many areas of life, without a father in their lives. So the two of them actively went looking for a man worth proposing to, together. Not just a sperm donor, but a father for their children.

I don't want to give the impression that they're forced into this unwillingly; the Vanir Sorceress (and borderline fertility goddess) is quite enamored with the idea of having both her wife and their husband in bed with her, while the Valkyrie is less certainly less enthusiastic, but willing to try looking for a man they can both share with each other and share each other with. The latter being the trickiest issue, of course.

Nine months ago, the main protagonist got pulled into a portal from Earth to Asgard, and in short order he'd impressed the Valkyrie with both his combat prowess (as a naturally athletic heavy-gravity worlder strong enough to kill a regenerating troll by rupturing organs with his punches) and his otherworldly-accomodating view on the validity of homosexual romance (as a modern-day American who grew up learning about social values from Star Trek).

So she introduced him to her beloved (without the giantslayer having any idea of the additional layer of subtext at the time), and introductions proceeded to approval, to wooing, and to proposals. Now, the main protagonist wears the two (specially made) interlocked arm-rings given to him by his wives, and before the opening scene of the story proper, they've already had their honeymoon for three.

‎However, his wives know it's not fair to their husband, that he doesn't have anyone to be as fully in love with him as they are with one another. So when the beautiful neighbor enters the stage (during his visit back home to Earth at the start of the story proper), they recognize how she feels about their husband, and actively campaign for her to join their household as an equal partner. With her "happily heterosexual" orientation being somewhat of an obstacle to that plan, of course.

So in the story proper, in addition to the Planetary Romance and Norse Mythology elements, there's also a strange little Harem Genre thread. Leaving out several of the genre's standard-obligatory tropes: the highschool-type setting (because Planetary Romance), the assumption of "first girl wins" handing the majority of romantic "screentime", so to speak, to one haremette at the expense of everyone else's stories (because the others are already married to him/each other), the cute little kid whose only purpose is to forcibly derail the sexiness so as to ensure the status quo is preserved (because honeymoon for three), and the assumption that the main protagonist needs to be a spectacularly unimpressive loser who repeatedly wonders aloud how it is that grade-A hotties even want him in the first place (because he's going to grow into the role of Thor, although he hasn't figured that out yet).

So it won't be anything remotely similar to a normal Harem Romance tale. But I'm still worried about how I have one particular bisexual woman dragging her not-nearly-so-bi wife into a relationship with a man, in pursuit of happy healthy successful children.

Oh, and if anybody's wondering, Haremette #1 (the beautiful neighbor) is my story's Jarnsaxa (mother of Thor's son Magni), ‎while Haremette #3 (the Vanir Sorceress) is Sif (mother of Thor's son Modi), while Haremette #2 (the Valkyrie) is Hnoss (daughter of Freyja and Odin, following in her father's footsteps as an Aesir warrior, thus her husband being claimed as a son of Odin despite his otherworldly origin).

So, is anyone offended? And if so, what would you ask me to change?

Here's my critique: Stop worrying about offending people. It's not the premise that matters, it's the skill with which you write it. So write an actual passage with these elements in it, and we can all critique that.

deleted

edited 7th Mar '17 6:12:34 AM by hellomoto

The legitimacy of a child were a big deal back then and the kid neded an official father. Otherwize were both the kid and its mother considered to be (borderline) social outcasts. However, as far as I see it is there no big problem here. The kid has an mother and an father, so society ought be accepting.

I do not think this story would offend people. In fact, the most offendable wouldn't even read it. Most people can accept a story with some moraly questionable content if it makes sense in context and is well-explained

I'll be blunt; as someone who is a big fan of the Yuri Genre, a story where a lesbian couple is told that they "need a man in their life" rubs me the wrong way. I've never read a story where it was done well, and it always kind of reeked of homophobia. So I'll admit that I'm reading this premise with a bit of bias, but I will still do what I can to provide constructive criticism.

Now, I'm not saying that you using that plot point is you being homophobic, but I do think it's important to consider why you absolutely have to use a lesbian couple for this particular plot point. If it's meant to explore "interesting territory," I can assure you that it's not a particular interesting story hook and it's been done to death. Hell, it would probably be more interesting to explore the struggles of the children that have to deal with not having a "father" in their life.

If you absolutely have to use this particular plot about a lesbian couple that is forced by society to have a man in their life, here's something you might want to consider. You mention your protagonist is an earthling. What era and setting does he come from? Would he be okay with their children being denied opportunities simply because they have two mothers, especially if he comes from a more progressive world? Or would he be more like "Two lesbians in a relationship with me? Hot!" Be aware that the latter will run the risk of not being very endearing to LGBTQ readers, since it kind of reeks of heterosexual people fetishizing LGBTQ people.

There's also the risk of sending a message that people should embrace narrow-minded traditions. It may not be the message you intended, but you should be aware that it will be how some people view it. If you're fine with that, then you have nothing to worry about other than those people not wanting to read your story.

All in all, I think you should ask yourself if it absolutely has to be a lesbian couple forced to have a man in their life due to societal pressures, and what sort of message your story might send if you have them cave in to the pressure, intentional or unintentional.

I wish you luck in your writing, regardless of what decision you make with your storytelling.

As asked above, is Hnoss and Sif required to be an couple? Two single women could fulfill their roles just as well.

• Hnoss could still want a kid, but that requires a marriage and a husband in this culture.
• Sif is the "friend" of theirs that kind of join the family. Why? Hnoss is a warrior and I kind of expect her wanting an nanny for the kid as she don't have all the time she wants for both fighting and caring for the kid..
• Jarnsaxa. It is simple. She thinks the guy next door is hot...

To Dragonfire 5000, please do be blunt. I want to do as much as I can to self-police the writing of the story to avoid the badness, and your concerns help me shine a light on what needs elucidation.

Regarding where the Yuri element came from, once I saw that this story outline had drifted away from being a "John Carter Of Mars" emulation and into being a Norse Mythology reinterpretation, I realized that my heavy gravity worlder main protagonist simply had to be Thor. And with two sons by different mothers, raised together simply as brothers, that meant that polygamous hareming was already on the table whether it was desired or not (and I do not deny the genre having an appeal for me when it's done well). So I absolutely needed Sif and Jarnsaxa to serve purposes in the story, while folding in Hnoss gave me the tie necessary for an offworlder version of Thor to be claimed as one of Odin's sons. And yes, I could have made Hnoss heterosexual, and yielded a sort of polygamy where each wife has a separate bedroom and the husband rotates between them... But that's always been the variety that creeps me the bleep out; even before I watched the season of American Horror Story which included a case of it to predictably disastrous results — predictable because it's AHS, where all love stories go invariably to disaster before each season ends, without regard to who is involved.

So I opted to make Hnoss and Sif a Yuri couple (within the larger and more complicated relationship dynamic of the Harem Genre element), in part because of the significant theme that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree... I probably should have mentioned this in my first post, but this story's version of Odin (Hnoss's father) will retain the folkloric element of his being a capable practitioner of the Seidr branch of the Vanir sorcerous arts (as his first wife Freyja taught him), and after his return from his quest for wisdom in the branches of the Yggdrasil worlds-web, he and her mother have become estranged, with Odin now spending day and night with Loki instead.

Thereby featuring the Yaoi and Yuri alike, with no intention of fetishizing either. And yes, Freyja will undoubtedly try to salvage her marriage by inserting herself back in to the bedroom antics. But Loki's got a lot less respect for Freyja than Hnoss does for Thor (because of both the scale of Freyja's ego, and my version of Thor having learned about homosexuality-acceptance parables from Will Riker and Jadzia Dax alike).

Now, because there seemed to be a touch of confusion on this in The Border Prince's last post, Sif wants children of her own, and Hnoss is entirely willing to let her sister Gersemi take care of the "Momma needs grandkids" responsibilities. And within the context of the "group marriage" dynamic, Hnoss is not going to be required to contradict her own natural orientation, any more than Jane (my "happily heterosexual" Jarnsaxa) will be required to get it on with her love interest's two wives. I'm sorry that I gave the impression that the "group marriage" dynamic was to be "hey porn over here" rather than mutual childrearing responsibility regardless of whose reproductive organs were directly involved in the conception-through-to-birth. In hindsight, "honeymoon for three" was not the best choice of phrase.

It's also worth noting that the main line of the story is Tony (my Thor) using his superhuman combat prowess (on a low-gravity world — he's nothing near superhuman on Earth) to put the fear of Asgard into the Jotnar during the succession crisis prompted by Tyr losing his hand, depriving the Aesir of their warrior-king (per the Classical Roman scholarship on Germanic Paganism), until the philosopher-king (Odin) secures the support of the various noble lords and ladies to replace Tyr on the throne. The Harem Genre element is a B-plot at best, until Odin's ascension is resolved, and the main villain of the larger story (likely an entirely original character, but I've got a hunch that she might turn out to be Angrboda when I get there) makes her move. But whenever a superhero gets kidnapped, that also shifts the focus to the hole left behind in their team.

Does that help at all to address your concerns?

edited 8th Mar '17 2:52:02 AM by OhGodItsHimRun

Write whatever you want, and if the Hurt Feelings Brigade comes a-knocking tell them to get off your lawn. If your art upsets people, you're doing it right.

edited 8th Mar '17 1:30:56 AM by dvorak

Still not really seeing why the two have to be a couple that has a man forced into their lives due to societal pressure, and still not seeing why it's essential. I get that you're using mythological inspirations, but again, consider the following:

Honestly, it may just be my personal bias talking, but I don't think LGBTQ people being forced by society to conform is a particularly interesting story, mythological inspiration or not. And even if you do insist on using that plot point, I do think that it should at least be used as a way to explore what your protagonist is like, especially since your protagonist comes from another world, presumably with different societal values that may or may not make him comfortable with the arrangement, especially one that throws unmerited prejudice on children simply because they don't have a 'father.'

That's another thing to consider too. The idea that their kids won't amount to anything without a family does sort of reek of guilt-tripping the lesbian couple. "Your kids aren't going to amount to anything because you don't have a man in your life! We don't care if you're attracted to women, you get a man in your life right now, or your kids will end up as worthless mongrels!" That's a pretty vile message to send, and while it does provide a good look into the culture you've created, it's also rife with unfortunate implications if the harmful message is not addressed.

If you insist on having the lesbian couple having a man forced into their lives, take advantage of the fact that your protagonist comes from another world to examine these issues and build up on his character. Is he comfortable with this couple being forced by societal pressure into having a man in their life? Does he not care and simply likes the fact that he gets to sleep with a lesbian couple? Does he think it's unfair that their children are denied such opportunities simply because one half of the couple isn't a man? If he does think it's unfair, does he do what he can to make society change their mind, or does he decide it's none of his business?

Again, I will admit that I am carrying a bit of bias when I say this. I get that you feel that "a sort of polygamy where each wife has a separate bedroom and the husband rotates between them" is creepy. I feel the same way about LGBTQ people being forced into sexual relationships outside of their orientation. If you insist on using the plot point, there's not much I can do to change your mind. I just ask that you at the very least use the opportunity to explore your made-up culture's societal values using your outsider protagonist.

So long as the lesbian couple is forced to have sexual relationships with a man, it's never going to escape the unfortunate implications, and it will offend some people. This isn't your fault; it's the fault of works that portray lesbian couples being forced to break up and ending up with men as a good thing. So I ask you again: just how essential is it that you pursue this particular plot point?

edited 7th Mar '17 10:45:14 PM by dragonfire5000

quite frankly, he should just do away with it to be honest.

I spent a good chunk of time (in tiny little increments during an utterly hellacious period at work this week) thinking about what dragonfire5000 has said, and what I've already said in the area of your points of contention, and it occurs to me that we're not on the same page here. And I see four potential points of a faulty assumption on your part (likely due in part to your admitted prior bias, in addition to my own admitted failure to elucidate my thoughts clearly enough the first time) which might have resulted in the two of us being on different pages before we ever started. So I shall once again attempt to answer your questions, while highlighting those four points of possible cognitive-disconnect (and I can't figure out any of the formatting tricks to bold or underline or italicize, so I fear that I have to use capslock for them) along the way. And I know that I have no particular insight into your thought processes, so maybe I'm wrong on all four counts. Let's find out, shall we?

To start with, I've been asked why I feel it necessary to include this contentious plot point, so I'll connect the dots longhand. All my cards on the table. This is going to get verbose, even for me...

Dot number one, in the tale of Ragnarok, Thor falls in battle to Jormangundr's venom, and his mantle as the protector of Midgard is passed down to his sons Magni and Modhi. Magni is explicitly the son of Thor and the giantess Jarnsaxa, while Modhi's mother is never directly attested to, and thus generally assumed to be Sif because she's Thor's wife of record in the main body of the sagas.

Dot number two, at no point have I ever found a single attestation to Magni and Modhi being referred to as anything but brothers to one another. Thus they clearly grew up together in their father's house despite having different mothers. Two possible explanations exist for this. Firstly, the mother of one died leaving the child behind, the child was taken into the father's house despite the father being married to another woman, and there we jump through hoops to explain the complete lack of friction with regard to the bastard stepchild in their midst. Secondly, the two of them were raised together in their father's house without friction because both their mothers lived together in that house, and we jump through hoops to explain that the mothers got along, in a time and a place where formalized polygamy was considered acceptable (largely due to so many a young idiot seeking glory in battle and getting himself killed before he had a chance to get married, resulting in a surplus of brides compared to grooms).

I believe that the second option there has much lower hoops for us to jump through. At which point polygamous hareming is taken into the story as an element of the mythic sagas, regardless of whether or not Tenchi Muyo appeals to the writer or reader. I'm not going to deny that I enjoy the Harem Genre when it's done well, but this is a decision based on scholarship rather than fetish.

Dot number three, this story started out as an emulation of Edgar Rice Burroughs' classic "John Carter of Mars" series, and thus Thor's giantblooded superhuman strength is a direct result of being an Earthling cast in the role of a heavy gravity worlder on a low gravity battlefield (which means he's not literally Odin's son, but rather claimed as such later on for a reason yet to be figured out at this dot-point). Jarnasaxa is also explicitly giantblooded in the sagas, and their son Magni is explicitly possessed of an even greater degree of superhuman strength and vitality. Therefore, Jarnsaxa must be an Earthling traveled to Asgard as well.

Dot number four, I am a Trekkie, with a particular interest in Klingon culture; it's what brought me to Norse Mythology in the first place. Therefore if I am to include both Earthlings and Asgard in a story, the Earthlings in question must be from a modern rather than ancient timeframe, so that they can be familiar with Star Trek as well (I'm particularly looking forward to reversing the "Martok is the Klingon Odin" gag by having Jane say that Odin is an Aesir Martok).

At which point I have another set of hoops to choose from; either my version of Jarnsaxa from modern-day Earth actively endorses the hareming, or she has to deal with the fact it's already in place (due to the societal standards of the story's fantastical backdrop) before she arrives on the stage. And once again, I presented second the set of hoops which I believe are much lower for us to jump through. Which means that Tony needs to already be involved in a groupsome relationship during the backstory, before the curtain rises on the story proper.

But there's no indication of a third mate for Thor in the sagas, which is easily accomplished by making the other wife in the mix starkly disinterested in bearing him children (sterility would also have been an option, but I prefer happy stories). And so my Sif became bisexual, and the other wife is her true love, who she's known she'd be marrying no matter who would be the man chosen to give Sif (but not her wife) the experience of motherhood which her primal instincts called out for. HOWEVER, IT'S A FAULTY ASSUMPTION THAT MY THOR IS IN THE POSITION OF MAXIMIZED BRAGGING RIGHTS IN THAT TRIANGLE. Using the diagram on the Triang Relations page (and only looking at the lust rather than the loyalty), this would be a case of a Type 11, with Sif as A, her husband as B, and her wife as C. B is attracted to C, but it's not reciprocated all that much (in terms of lust rather than loyalty), and so they can share their mutual wife A (in a same-bed-same-time context, not a rotating-bedrooms context) without the B-C side-play being on the menu. So the B in your LGBTQ gets to be B, while the L gets to be L. Nobody is actually "being forced into sexual relationships outside of their orientation", unless you count her wife being in the room when Sif is actively trying to conceive.

Dot number five, I need to have a backdrop for the story that brings everything together and provides a context for the giantslaying action. And I've always found it fascinating how Tyr is a minor figure in the recorded sagas but hugely present in the archaeological record from earlier centuries. There's a substantial block of Classical Roman scholarship on the Germanic tribes and their beliefs which indicates that their highest-esteemed god at the time was a swordsman. And the ancient prayers for deific favor in a swordfight are prayers to Tyr. Therefore I conclude that Tyr used to be the high-god of the pantheon, until the nomadic-warrior peoples settled down and became civilized enough for a philosopher-king to be more favored over a warrior-king, at which point a story was developed that Fenris bit off Tyr's hand, causing him to step down as king and allowing Odin's rise to power in his place.

And by the law of conservation of narrative detail, it behooves me to tie these two stories together, which is most elegantly done by making C into Freyja's daughter Hnoss (who is never attested to in the sagas as having had any particular story in her adulthood for me to have to contradict), on the principle that Freyja's lost husband for whom she weeps is the man Odin used to be before he went up onto the tree and saw things that changed him forever. Particularly because this option also readily explains how Odin would be claiming an offworlder as his son, because the man in question is married to his daughter.

...And that ends the longhand connecting of the dots.

Now, as a Trekkie who ran D&D campaigns growing up, I recognize that many elements of Klingon culture are extrapolated from ancient Norse / Germanic pagan culture. Not just the equivalency between Sto-vo-kor and Valhalla; there's also the song from TNG: "Birthright part 2", the translated potion of which was "Fire streaks the heavens; battle has begun" (Surtr's arrival on the stage at Ragnarok). And also the fighting-form for using a bath'leth, coupled with the classic image of Freyr, having long ago given away his magic sword as a dowry, going onto that battlefield armed only with a set of antlers (virtually identical patterns of motion between those two).

And so it is from Klingon culture that I am reverse-engineering the Asgardian culture in my story. Klingons hold it as a metaphysical truism that the crimes of the father are passed down to the son, while the child of an honorable House is obviously honorable until they prove themselves otherwise (to the shame of their entire House). The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, as I said above.

And this prejudice really isn't targeted at lesbians, or even women. Loki with all his vices, including a case of Ergi (perceived umanliness; presumably there was an equivalent sentiment for women) that went right into the hermaphroditic, was catastrophically handicapped in getting anyone to recognize the virtues he'd demonstrated on previous occasions when his legendary cunning had saved Asgard from a horrible threat that left all the other gods just stymied.

A man who does not take responsibility for the child he sires is a man without honor, and thus any child in these two cultures without a father that claims him/her is by definition without honor as well. Which means there isn't all that much of a societal need to drive technological innovation in the area of pregnancy via medical-intervention. The cultural bias stands in the way of the scientific development, just like the frighteningly minimal study of treatment for spinal injuries in Klingons. And therefore Asgard has no market for anonymous sperm donors.

THE SECOND POINT WHERE A FAULTY ASSUMPTION MIGHT BE IN PLAY IS THAT ASGARDIANS SHARE OUR WORLD'S ACCESS TO SPERM BANKS. Now, I know that conception and child-rearing are entirely different phenomena, but without sperm banks even being an option, it becomes fantastically more difficult for Sif to get the babies she wants without a man being in the room at the time. And even if she sets out on a mission for an ovulating one-night-stand, that would still leave her children facing an uphill battle to make something of themselves in the Asgardian culture. And I prefer happy stories.

Next, as to "you get a man in your life right now", the second paragraph in this thread made it very clear that marriage proposals are the woman's prerogative, when she has found the man she wants to have as the father of her children. And to paraphrase a classic rock song, if she chooses not to ever propose, then that is still her choice.

While in the sixth paragraph of that first post, I stated that Sif and Hnoss are an established couple, genuinely in love with each other, and they've been together for many years (possibly even decades, considering Hnoss's ready access to the golden apples of immortality). And nobody in-universe has the authority to demand that they get a husband (together or otherwise). Well, I suppose technically Sif could propose to the man she wanted to give her babies, and then force Hnoss to choose to either join them or be cut out from her love's future. But she's not a heartless bitch, so that would never even occur to her.

SO THE THIRD POINT OF A LIKELY FAULTY ASSUMPTION CAN BE FOUND IN THE ANSWER TO THE QUESTION: "FORCED BY WHOM EXACTLY?" Now, I recognize that they're forced by circumstance, but there's a world of difference between being forced to ride the bus because your car is in the shop and the dentist's office is too far to walk, and having Them (the ubiquitous unseen force somehow responsible for all of society's ills) force you to do something you don't want to do just because they're evil.

Sif and Hnoss are in love; partners in a mature, respectful, responsible, mutually-supportive relationship. They plan to spend the rest of their lives (which might be centuries, thanks to the golden apples) together. Sif also enjoys sex with men, and she wants a man to be her husband and the father of her children. Hnoss, not so much on either of those points, but being willing to make compromises is what makes relationship work. Which brings me to the final point where a potential faulty assumption might be in play. And I really hope that I'm wrong about this. I really hope it's one or more of the first three, and this is just an erroneous symptom. But in the interests of completeness...

THE FINAL POTENTIAL FAULTY ASSUMPTION IS THAT IT'S INAPPROPRIATE FOR SIF TO ASK HER WIFE HNOSS TO ALLOW FOR SIF'S BROADER ORIENTATION TO BE SATISFIED, BUT JUST FINE FOR HNOSS TO ASK SIF TO SACRIFICE HER DREAM OF MOTHERHOOD IN DEFERENCE TO HER WIFE'S NARROWER ORIENTATION. Maybe this is because I'm neither a woman nor a homosexual nor a parent, but I really can't understand how either of those options could be fundamentally more right or wrong than the other (rather than an intensely personal question of one's own values). And I admit to being quite frightened by the notion that being less-open-minded somehow makes Hnoss deserving of a unilateral resolution to the issue. But hopefully this isn't actually an assumption on anybody's part at all, just an erroneous symptom.

Now, without regard to the last paragraph, I'm very much of the opinion that the situation calls for a compromise between the two women in question, allowing for Sif's needs (in bed and in life) to be met in a manner respectful of her wife's lack of overlap on those interests. They know they want to be together for the rest of their lives, and that Sif wants to have a husband and children one day, so it's a simple matter for them to agree to propose to a man together, with the understanding that Hnoss really isn't interested in trying to ever get knocked up herself. This means inviting a man into their life together, and while Sif could be tempted to let her hormones decide, Hnoss doesn't have that distraction in this area.

So the first tenet of the compromise is obvious, that Hnoss's arm-ring being given to the man is a platonic gesture of mutual commitment to Sif's children, with no actual implication that she's going to be spreading her legs for him as well. And the second tenet is crucial, that Hnoss gets an absolute veto over any candidate for consideration as a potential husband. Only those guys she nominates are allowed to be considered, and if she decides at any point in the vetting / wooing process that he's not good enough for her wife, then he's done.

(Although regarding the spreading of legs, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that Freyja's eldest daughter might very rarely get so caught up in a groupsome moment that she's willing in that moment to do something she'd never even consider while clear-headed. And the same thing applies to the self-defined-heterosexual Jane, once she grows into the role of Jarnsaxa from the sagas.)

They've had this arrangement in place for years (maybe even decades – golden apples). Damned few candidates have been selected for consideration. None of them made it through the vetting process. Until the man from another world came. A young man with impossible strength that let him actually beat to death a dusk troll, which has a regenerative capability to grow replacement muscles and organs and bones in mere heartbeats, so that the only ways anyone's ever managed to kill one are through drowning, incineration, or just slicing it open repeatedly until it bled to death. But on his first day in their world, Hnoss watched this man killed a dusk troll with his fists, the force of each punch rupturing organs until the beast died from internal bleeding. She'd never seen anything like that before, in a career of being one of Asgard's most elite soldiers.

She felt compelled to meet this strange visitor from another world, and as she helped him figure out the world he'd found himself in, she also got to telling him about herself. Bear in mind, at this point in the timeline, her only interest in him is professional, one warrior to another. And when the subject of Sif and her dreams of motherhood came up, Tony just couldn't wrap his head around the idea of the double standard regarding child-rearing credibility. He'd grown up with Star Trek as a part of his life (although not nearly to the same degree as his best friend, who comes from a family of proper Trekkies), and he couldn't imagine anyone thinking that George Takei lacked some quality intrinsic to being able to properly raise children. And the fact that an anonymous biological-parent would be actively held against a child for their whole life was just... alien to him.

Now, Tony's not all that intellectual to be in a position to try to change the values of Asgardian society (fortunately, Jane is quite brilliant). Which also means that he never really noticed the subtext when Hnoss decided that he was worth introducing to Sif. But the worthiness of a giantslayer as a potential father was undeniable, and his "outsider" perspective made him actually viable as a husband as well. And after several months of working alongside the Valkyrie and the Vanir Sorceress, using his superhuman strength (and a huge axe he'd scavenged from a purely ceremonial 12-foot suit of armor in a ruined castle) to lay waste to giantkind all over Asgard, Tony found himself being proposed to.

Now, he is a young man, and lust was certainly a factor in his decision to accept their arm-rings. But at the time, they knew of no leads toward him ever being able to return to his own world. Hnoss's father could have helped, but he was gone on his expedition through the paths of the Yggdrasil worlds-web, and entirely unreachable until / unless he returned to Asgard. And with no hope of being able to return to his old life, it was the easiest thing in the world for Tony to embrace this new life as their husband. Making it possible for Sif to fulfill her dream of motherhood. And for Hnoss to become... "stepmother since conception" to those children.

Until the villain responsible for Tony accidentally being pulled through the portal to Asgard realized what little mistake he'd made, and allowed the heroes to find the means to send him back home, thereby giving the villain a much more likely second chance at his actual objective. But that's another plot entirely.

That's everything. Assuming anyone is still awake, am I making any sense at all in explaining myself?

After reading your reasoning, I'm sad to say that I still don't see why it's essential for the two to be a lesbian couple (though I can't really call them a lesbian couple anymore if a man's involved, can I?).

The problem with your idea is that, unfortunately for you, it is going to have Unfortunate Implications. I mean, the only lesbian couple mentioned in the story is shamed into having a man in their life by holding the welfare of their children hostage? That's going to come across as guilt-tripping gay people for being how they are and sends the unconscious message that a lesbian relationship is inherently worth less than a standard heterosexual relationship simply because the kids in a lesbian relationship are going to get screwed over by societal bias.

As for this part:

No one is assuming one is more appropriate than the other. Ideally, they would be able to come to a compromise where Sif can be a mother figure to some children and Hnoss isn't forced into a sexual relation outside of her sexuality. The problem is that you crafted a society that unconsciously sends the message that a lesbian relationship is worthless if the couple has any children due to the prejudice against children without both a father and a mother in their life.

Regardless of your intentions, it will carry a negative message if said prejudice remains unchallenged. I know it probably wasn't your intention, but if you don't have that prejudice challenged, the "Sif and Hnoss" plot point just reads like one of those really bad harem stories where lesbian characters only exist for the male main character to bonk.

While I still recommend that you drop this particular plot point because I really, really am not seeing it as being absolutely essential, I won't insist on it if you feel like you absolutely have to write it that way. I'm just saying that you better be aware and prepared to deal with the Unfortunate Implications, because regardless of your intentions, such a plot point will carry that baggage and will potentially color the work for those who don't like the idea of a lesbian couple being forced into a relationship with a man simply because one of them wants to have children.

The "forcing a man into a lesbian relationship by shaming them for being lesbians and implying that lesbian relationships are not as good as heterosexual ones" trope is a very old and nasty one, and I've never seen it add anything substantial to a story other than causing cheap drama or giving those who fantasize about screwing lesbians to make them bisexual or heterosexual something to get their jollies with. Again, if you insist on using that plot point, be aware that you're going to need to tread very carefully.

edited 12th Mar '17 10:16:19 AM by dragonfire5000

I'm coming in late to this but Reconsider the idea that a poly group needs to be "everyone bangs everyone else" Most don't work that way. Sorceress wants a child and to have that she has to have a husband. Valkyrie isn't interested in having sex with a man, so she doesn't.

Go dig up the Polyamory thread in OTC. Good stuff there.

Re Madrugada: Precisely what I had in mind from the start. Tony and Jane shall be a couple, well and truly in love with each other. Sif and Hnoss shall be a couple, well and truly in love with each other. And then there's the larger dynamic which my best friend calls a "committed swingers" thing, in which the ties of loyalty and affection bind all four of them into one marriage-relationship, with mutual identity of caregiver responsibility for all of their children. While the various expressions of the lust side of things are ubiquitous / commonplace / infrequent / absent specific to each combination of AB, AC, AD, BC, BD, CD, ABC, ABD, ACD, BCD, and ABCD. Nobody forced to put out in any way with any one that they don't want to.

And yes, I do plan there to be bed-sharing, but just because people enjoy sleeping amid the warmth and scent of a loved one doesn't mean that anybody's getting laid there. I know this for a fact because my best friend and I slept together last night, and both she and I have always kept our pants on the entire time, every time. Maybe this is proof that I'm crazy, but it's also proof that it's possible for unrelated adults to love each other without sexy-fun-time being involved.

Put simply: Four-way parenting, not to be confused with four-way sluttery. The term being used in a gender-neutral context, of course.

Re: dragonfire5000: I'm glad that the fourth potential faulty assumption point was just an erroneous symptom. And I don't intend to speak for you, but I am entirely comfortable calling Sif and Hnoss a couple of the lesbian variety, because I don't see their relationship to each other being invalidated or demeaned by the fact that Sif actively enjoys both sides of the menu, or that she shares the sentiment of many a Triang Relation's A, "why can't they just love each other even a little like how I love them both?". It's not a rational sentiment, but it is a very human one.

I suppose that's the essential difference in our worldviews here.

And rest assured that when Tony gets back to Earth for a visit in chapter one, and a building falls on him (long story), he will wake up in the hospital to a very emotionally-charged Jane. Who is rather forcefully flirting with him to make sure he knows how strongly she's come to feel about him during his absence, leaving Tony to have to deflect with vagueness about how he's not exactly available these days. But he can't just spit out the fact that he's involved in a polygamous relationship without some semblance of context, and unfortunately that context arrives when Hnoss and Sif track him down (interrupting his vacation) and Sif blurts out the phrase "our husband" before Jane is ready to hear anything remotely like it.

Cue Jane verbally ripping into Tony (in his hospital bed, with multiple broken bones at the time) accusing him of having taken advantage of two impressionable women. And him having to defend himself with the exposition of the relationship's backstory.

Now, I understand (or at least THINK that I understand) that you see Sif's relationship with Hnoss somehow being undermined in its lesbian-ness by the fact that Sif's life-goal of motherhood (apart from her other goals in life) includes a father in the mix. And I respect your right to disagree with me.

But I just don't see the victimization that you do. I don't see any shame being applied to Sif for having another woman be the great love of her life. I just don't see it.

Without the man being involved, there is no prospect for the woman to have children (and vice-versa of course), and thus there are no children whose welfare can be held hostage for the inclusion of both parents in the mix. This is biology, completely separate from culture.

Should I be claiming to change the laws of biology in order to avoid Unfortunate Implications? Wouldn't that just create even more of them by being so farcical? Or should I have an entire civilization consciously pretend to not know the laws of biology, in the interests of not ever asking the question of where Sif's children came from, when everyone knows that she's married to Hnoss?

Would either of those options be better than what I've been planning?

I take it adoption isn't an option? Does the culture believe that a child that is adopted is worth less than a child that has both parents?

Also, to address this bit:

My beef with this plot point is that I've read a couple really bad stories where lesbian characters had to deal with the following:

• Their being in a relationship with women was a sign of immaturity
• They needed to have children in their life, or they somehow failed as a woman
• The only reason they're in a relationship with women is that they haven't met "the right man" yet
• The idea that a man can "screw the lesbianism" out of them

Needless to say, none of those stories were very good, especially since the authors were playing those tropes straight and it came across as incredibly homophobic. I'm not saying you are homophobic, I'm just letting you know why I don't touch stories where lesbian couples are treated like they are worth less than a heterosexual couple, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

Finally, to address this bit:

The shame that I'm talking about is not applied to Sif specifically, but the idea that a child will not go anywhere in their life if they do not have a mother or father. That sort of belief, intentionally or not, treats same-sex couples as less than a heterosexual couple by implying that their children won't amount to anything in their life and that it's the parents' fault for not conforming to society.

I'll admit, I made the assumption that adoption was an option. Probably should've ask that before. Still, the fact that a same-sex couple has such a disadvantage over a heterosexual couple does give the impression that the culture ultimately sees such relationships as inferior.

An adopted child would be "properly" claimed by whatever parents they had, although I know that doesn't do anything for the double standard inherent in the Norse culture's sexism of social values education assumptions.

As to your four bullet points, I think I've made a pretty good case that the first and third are conspicuously absent from this scenario. The second definitely doesn't apply to Hnoss, while Sif actually wants the full experience of new life growing inside her (which is the one part she wouldn't get from adoption). And for the last, screwing motherhood into a woman is entirely possible, but getting the lesbianism out of her would be some heavy-duty brainwashing. And I prefer happy stories.

As for the indirect shaming of homosexual couples, I think I'm getting it now; the mother's wife getting caught in the splatter of the father's shame for having abandoned the child (or vice-versa of course).

But with Jane actively assuming the worst of the situation upon first meeting the women in question, and Tony being called upon to justify their cicumstances, I think I should be able to make it clear that I'm not at the bottom of the fetish barrel.

Back to primary-scripting I go. Hopefully I'll have some solid content to share in a couple days. And I'll still be checking in on the thread now and then in the meantime. Thank you.

Based on your explanations, I still don't see why it's essential for the two women to be a couple unless you're planning to have Sif's obsession with motherhood be a point of contention between the two. Honestly, if you're worried about offending people with Unfortunate Implications, I still recommend not making them a couple at all.

If you do insist on making them a couple, here are a few things I recommend and things you might want to consider:

• Make sure to explain why Sif is so obsessed that the baby has to grow inside her and why she doesn't feel adoption is enough. It'll be a great way to explore her character, though be aware that you'll need to come up with a very believable reason if you want people to sympathize with Sif over why she's acting like this.
• Do NOT paint Hnoss as selfish for being uncomfortable with Sif wanting to screw a man to get pregnant. Since you've established that Hnoss is not all that uncomfortable with the arrangement, there's a very good chance that people are going to find Sif to be the selfish one, since it didn't seem like she tried to compromise with her lover at all and used Hnoss's love for her to wheedle her into something Hnoss wasn't comfortable with. Personally, if I had to side with one of the two women, I personally would side with Hnoss not wanting Sif to screw a man since I'm not a fan of stories where they tried to guilt-trip a lesbian for being mad at her female lover for wanting to be a mother to the point that the lover would go behind the lesbian's back and screw some guy. I'm not saying this is what you're doing with your story, just that it's something to be very careful of.
• If Hnoss is uncomfortable with Sif wanting to screw a man for babies, it should be a point of conflict between the two. Don't just have Hnoss "suffer in silence," since there are some people who are sick and tired of lesbian characters serving the role of Love Martyr. It also makes the relationship between them seem unhealthy, since Hnoss might come across as the sort of person who gets dragged into situations she doesn't want to be in due to her lover's selfish whims. If that isn't what you're going for, don't have Hnoss come across as a Love Martyr. This should be something that makes their relationship more tense.
• Does Hnoss have to be "married" to Tony as well? Because if she's uncomfortable with it, you just wrote a story where a lesbian is manipulated into a marriage she's not comfortable with by a lover who's so obsessed with having a biological baby that she disregarded the lesbian's own feelings on the matter, or at the very least decided her desire for motherhood is more important than her lover's feelings on the matter. If she's uncomfortable with the marriage, it should be a conflict addressed in the story and not brushed aside with some excuse like "she loves Sif so much she's doing this to make her happy." Again, it will make her seem like a Love Martyr, and some people are sick of gay people being forced into that role.
• To add to the above bullet point, be careful if your story has Hnoss ultimately deciding that she's okay with being married to Tony as long as Sif is also happy. It'll be a sore point for anyone who's sick with the whole "lesbian resigns herself into a relationship with a man" plot point, and makes people wonder why you made Hnoss a lesbian in the first place and subjected her to this sort of plotline.

Again, I'm not saying that you're bad or wrong for writing this sort of plotline. I'm saying that if you want to avoid offending people, especially those who don't like seeing gay people forced into a plotline where they're forced into a relationship with someone outside of their sexuality, this is not a plotline you want to handle lightly.

edited 13th Mar '17 9:26:13 AM by dragonfire5000

From what I see, there's a lesbian couple, but one of the lesbians wants to bear a biological child, which for some reason means being forced into a relationship with a man (?? Even when All Lesbians Want Kids occurs, it's usually in the form of "give us some sperm"). The other lesbian intially objects, but eventually caves in.

If the base plot is "lesbians being forced to accept a man results in new relationship with said man", I can see why it's so much issue. I'm not certain why the plot has to be like that - even a typical Harem Genre plot is "two+ girls chase one boy, everyone ends up together" without having any of the girls in a relationship before the Marry Them All ending.

If even after a very long explanation of the characters, people are objecting to the basis of the story for renacting a long history of homophobia in the media, a serious rewrite is in order.

edited 14th Mar '17 6:59:46 AM by hellomoto

Screw worrying about offending people! It's YOUR STORY and the moment you start concerning yourself about sensitivity about what might offend someone (there are people who get offended over the color PINK FFS) it CEASES TO BE YOUR STORY. Do it well, there will be people who latch on.

Also keep in mind that offense is TAKEN not GIVEN.

Credits to nekomoon 14, who posted this in another thread:

@hellomoto : I'm SO glad you got here before me, because that's literally my response here.

@Oh God Its Him Run : I find this story seed SUPER compelling. You do not have to make the society these characters exist in into some kind of MOGII-friendly paradise. It's okay that the culture is a bit homophobic, because that's just what it is ; that's conflict right there.

I'll never tell anyone not to think about Unfortunate Implications, but your story could lose so much depth if these characters aren't connected in the way you've connected them. It could also lose some of its tension if you make the culture they come from too egalitarian ; this isn't about "historical accuracy", but about the strength of your story. I'm like seven generations of queer crammed into one person, and I'm a social justice warlock to boot, but I still think your story will lose so much if you don't plant this seed and water that fucker.

I'd read the HELL out of this story. I never get to read about loving lesbian couples, for one, or healthy polygamy, for two, and I love that you're brining Norse mythology into the A-plot the way you are. I cannot emphasize enough how refreshing your story is, and your concerns about possible UI makes me willing to experience it because too many creators are dicks who think offending people on purpose is edgy.

I assume this is a manga you're working on?

I disagree that the story would lose "so much" if Sif and Hnoss end up not starting off as a couple. Again, might be my bias talking, but right now all I'm seeing is Sif going "I want to be a mother, and it has to come from my body! Why are you denying me my dream just because you're not comfortable being married to a man?" and it's making her come across as quite selfish and the relationship between her and Hnoss as not very good.

If Sif and Hnoss absolutely have to be a couple, I feel it would be far more interesting if Sif and Hnoss are a couple, but don't get romantically involved with the protagonist at all. Instead, the story could help explore the struggles their children go through simply because one of the parents in their life isn't a man, and the protagonist can play the role of mentor while also helping the kids deal with the prejudice. I'll admit it's probably not the story the OP wanted to tell, but I personally feel there's more potential there.

Maybe it's because I've seen too many works where the male protagonist has a "lesbian" as part of his harem (and pretty much all of those works were crap), but I just don't see this particular plot point as compelling or adding anything to the story other than the unconscious unfortunate implication that forcing a lesbian to marry a man will eventually make her also love men romantically.

Again, I'll end by saying this: since your protagonist is from another world, you need to have him address some of the values dissonance he experiences. How he deals with different cultural values will help characterize him, for better or for worse, so if you want readers to see him in a certain way, you need to be careful with how he deals with the differences.

I'm not offended, but I DEFINITELY agree that Sif sounds like an ass with the whole "I WANT MAI BAYBEEEE AND I NEED TO POP IT OUT MYSELF AND I'LL MARRY A DUDE TO GET IT WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT" matter. She could be perfectly reasonable and considerate in the rest of her life with Hnoss, but on this particular point, she's a selfish bitch.

I really can't see why Hnoss would stay with her after two weeks of this obsession with breeding, let alone being dragged into a heterosexual marriage she explicitly doesn't want.

As for the need for social protection for the children? Women have bastard children ALL THE TIME in our world, and I find it hard to believe that EVERY bastard child or the mother of a bastard would face the exact same social torment. There was indeed a lot of social stigma towards bastards in ancient times, but fiction tends to play it up way too much and it's a lot more realistic to have others "notably disapprove and refuse to associate with you" than "physically/emotionally torment because YOU HAVE NO FATHER, DURHUR."

Like, who has all that ENERGY to bully a child or a woman for years if not decades? Maybe one or two really stuffed up idiots, but there's got to be more people who'd go "ehhhh, he's a bastard, but he's pretty damn good at carpentry," or "yeah, she got pregnant by some no-name, but she's also my best laundry-woman."

If Hnoss is a career soldier, why on earth wouldn't she use her physical and social clout to lessen the stigma towards her "best friend's" son? "Look, you don't have to like him, but if I find out you harmed him or his mother because he's a bastard, I will break the hand you did it with." There, you've got tolerance. Maybe not in an ideal way, but definitely in an easier manner than "forcing Hnoss to marry a man despite detesting the concept."

edited 20th Mar '17 1:25:03 PM by Sharysa

I think you're projecting. And assuming other readers will come to the same conclusions you've arrived at ( without even experiencing the story you're discussing ). And I don't mean to sound like I'm attacking you or invalidating your perspective, but what does THIS work have to do with those OTHER works that just happened to be somewhat similar?

OP has told you why specific choices were made, but you're just not accepting the reasoning behind them.

I think you're being more reactionary than critical. I see the implications you're talking about, but they can be addressed without changing the relationships between the characters.

Nobody is being forced or coerced.

The relationship between Hnoff and Tony doesn't appear to be sexual or romantic, so what's the problem? Even Ja-what's-her-name isn't being dragged into something against her will, so what's the problem?

Yes, these characters exist in a heteronormative homophobic culture. They can't help that. They can only deal with the situation as it exists and work with what they have. I think OP has solid reasons for making the choices that were made, I think this relationship is handled with care, and I think your bias is causing you to give advice that will weaken the story that is being created, and that's kind of a disservice to storytelling.

The problem is that what the author intends isn't what's coming across. We're told that Sif and Hnoss are a loving couple, yet the situation presented to us has very unfortunate implications due to Sif coming across as manipulative and selfish, using Hnoss's love for her to drag her into something Hnoss is uncomfortable with. It also gives us the implication that Hnoss is being unconsciously told that her relationship with Sif is inherently worth less than Sif's relationship with the protagonist, considering that Hnoss can't impregnate Sif with a biological baby.

The culture itself isn't exactly heteronormative and homophobic, considering that people seemed to be fine with Sif and Hnoss being a couple, with the caveat that any child of theirs would be shunned based solely on the fact that the kid doesn't have a dad with a penis. If the culture was homophobic, I fail to see how Sif and Hnoss could even be a couple in the first place. Which makes it all the more galling that Sif can get away with emotionally blackmailing Hnoss into being in a relationship that Hnoss is not comfortable with.

There's also the fact that a lesbian being forced into a relationship with a man is a trope that carries a lot of homophobic baggage. Again, I'll admit I'm far from an unbiased individual, but most of the time that trope has the lesbian admit that being with a man was the right decision and accept that her relationship with a woman is worth less. While the OP probably didn't intend for this message to be in their story, it's pretty unavoidable due to lousy writers that used the trope straight before.

In short, I don't think Sif and Hnoss being a couple adds anything to the story unless none of them become romantically involved with the protagonist. The only interesting thing I see about them being a couple is if they have to deal with the prejudice their children face, but still persevere in the end.