Stewardess Fanfiction

The problems I had with this story are not really the ones that you have outlined above. In fact I agree with most of your points entirely. I totally agree with the characterization of John as "John may be a wily rule-breaker but he's still a good man". That is exactly how I see him in canon and how I prefer to see him in fic. What I also see is a man who is quite capable of making errors in judgement and dealing with it. And I certainly would never think that anything written in fic has ANY bearing on reality at all. That implies a certain level of stupidity on my part that I would hope is far from the truth. I also agree with your definitions of "bring down hard" and "heavy pain". The kissing of the knife etc was something that in a BDSM scene would be entirely appropriate and not abusive at all. I have been active in the BDSM community for going on twenty years now and all these things are very familiar to me. It was not the actions in the fic that I had issue with but rather the characterisations, and really more specifically the REactions of RODNEY than of John. I can totally see John acting like that (in the context of the fic). Doesn't make what he did "right" but as I stated before, I don't need or want characters to always be paragons of virtue. In fact, "perfect" characters are one of the things that would stop me reading a fic. What I could not see was Rodney accepting it without any repercussions for John. This is probably because I am more interested in the characterization issues than the "OMG hot sex!!!" side of things (although the hot sex side is pretty terrific in of itself).

Thats what put me off your fic basically, not any misconceptions over what BDSM is, or disagreement as to who canon John is. It's the Rodney side of things that put me off. I personally would rather see a BDSM scene go realistically off the rails and have the characters deal with it than for it to carry straight on to the hot sex part(and how weird does that make me!) Maybe I should just lighten up and enjoy the porn :)

I reread wolfshark's story after seeing your comment, and I personally could never have a problem with it, really enjoyed it in fact. I've called more people "slut" over the years than I've had hot dinners, as you say, it's not uncommon in BDSM circles. The very wording of the prompt gives away the fact that this will not be a light and fluffy fic, and to be honest I've read far more down and dirty stories than that one without seeing any dissention.

RE warnings, I read the metafandom discussion back when it was current, it was quite interesting as I recall. I also agree that warnings are a bit of a hot button in fandom, there will never be total agreement as to what needs a warning and what doesn't. Some people don't even warn for death and rape, which a lot of readers would consider essential. I can see why some people would have a problem, but for me the only thing that actually "bothers" me is bad writing and/or wonky characterization, and again, it's all subjective so you (again, general you, not you specifically) can't really warn for it. What I think is appalling OOC dreck will probably have dozens of glowing "OMG rite more!!!" reviews at fanfiction.net.

At the end of the day it's your fic and your comm, you can do what the hell you like with it :)

Finally (I promise!) I would just like to apologise for droning on at you at length. I don't even feel that strongly about the subject, but I've got some rare free time and once I start talking about something I can't seem to shut up about it. Combined with all the spelling and grammar mistakes I've just found with spellcheck... Let's just say that thank god I've got a secretary with excellent editing skills IRL or I would never get anything finished!

Fitz