Real person fiction: Encyclopedia II - Real person fiction - Controversy

Real person fiction - Controversy

The legality of Real Person Fiction is debated, as is that of all types of fan fiction. To date, unlike traditional fan fiction, only one cease and desist letter is known to have been issued: FanDomination.Net received the letter on March 17, 2003 from a representative of one of the members of the Atlanta Braves baseball team.

In an attempt to avert possible legal action, websites which host stories involving real people include a piece of disclaiming text, which can also be found on many other fan fiction websites. Some authors also include these disclaimers in the header of their stories.

Aside from legal questions, most communities continue to wrestle with the ethics of writing about real people, but no consensus appears to be developing. RPF authors will point out, however, that there is usually no intent to claim these fictional portrayals reflect the real activities of the "source figure" in any way.

Some authors of traditional fan fiction view real person fiction with suspicion, disdain, or outright disgust. Some feel that fanfic based on fictional characters is on shaky enough legal ground, barely tolerated by "the powers that be" (authors, producers, copyright owners) and that RPF, especially real person slash, may turn corporate and public opinion against fan fiction as a whole. However, it should be noted that while RPF is only under danger of being called slander, FPF is under the danger of being considered copyright infringement.

Real person fiction - Real Person Slash

Real Person Slash (RPS), also known in some circles as real-life slash (RLS), is a form of real person fiction involving relationships between two people of the same sex. (See slash fiction for more on the subtleties and variations in definition.) These are usually totally fictional relationships, not based on any real-life indications of the subject's sexual preference, but on the fantasies of the author and the desire to play with perceived or invented gay or lesbian subtext between the idols in question. Slash is roughly equal in popularity to less controversial types of real person fiction.

The content of the stories can range from the mildly romantic, involving deep friendships and innocent boyhood or girlhood crushes, to carefully written homosexual love stories, all the way to profoundly explicit erotica.

RPS began to become popular and accepted with the advent of boy bands, when fans wrote an explosion of fictional stories about male members being involved in romantic relations with another male member of the band (and sometimes more than one). In the 1990s, early online RPS communities were devoted to *NSYNC, 98 Degrees and Hanson, while on the website "Fanfiction Log" -- before it was closed due to financial issues in 2004 -- the largest categories were Linkin Park and Good Charlotte, much of which was slash. Older RPF communties such as Duran Duran also began to see a rise in slash content, in contrast to earlier stories which generally featured original (non-"canon") female characters as partners for band members.

After the barriers to slash itself fell, the amount of explicit sexual content in the stories also began to rise. Erotic fan stories have certainly been around for as long as other types of fanfic, but they were often a closed-door affair, circulated only in private among friends, and it's unclear whether homosexual content was a common theme. With the advent of the Internet (allowing easy distribution of stories and relative anonymity for authors), these sorts of stories suddenly became much more widespread. The acceptability and popularity of this form of fanfic has since grown into other areas of RPF -- actorfic, sportsfic, and more.

Due to the potentially libelous nature of some stories, and the knowledge or fear that some celebrities dislike slash fiction involving themselves, there has been extensive denunciation of RPS fiction among certain fan fiction communities. However, as of 2005, no legal action has been taken against archive sites or authors.

Real person fiction - Reaction to Real Person Fic

For the most part, celebrities have had little problem with Real Person Fic and benign to its existence. Problems begin to develop when fans of the celebrities try to bring the celebrity into the community or show their adoration for that celebrity by giving them this material. This can lead to some uncomfortable moments as happened with Paul Darrow, Elijah Wood, Ian McKellan, who were both given real person fic featuring them and their signifigant others in sexually explicit situations. Both Elijah Wood and Ian McKellan, as well as Karl Urban, have stated that they do not mind RPF being written about them. There are also some celebrities, like Franz Ferdinand or Apocalyptica, who like to act out on the gay part as soon as they recognize a writer of RPS centering around them.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Controversy", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki