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Author: Christie Gordon

Making men pregnant(MPREG) – good fiction, funny or just twisted revenge?

Okay let’s weigh in on this one. It seems in fanfiction and slash, making a male character get pregnant is a common occurance (if not, then why is there a category for it and whole communities devoted to it, hmmm?). It’s so prevalent, I’ve even seen an episode of Grey’s Anatomy where a guy came into the hospital because he was “pregnant”. I have to admit, it was hilarious. But did you know that there is actually a procedure for making a man pregnant with In Vitro Fertilization and  a man named Lee Mingwei did become pregnant? There’s even a website for it: www.malepregnancy.com.  Unfortunately for Lee, the chances of him surviving birth with all his abdominal organs intact are pretty low (if he doesn’t hemorrhage to death).

Enough with the gory details of reality and on to why in the world we want to make our male characters pregnant. Is it because we have some revenge vendetta against men and want to make them experience the pains of pregnancy? I have been pregnant and have kids, so I know all about the poking, prodding, testing and pains that go along with pregnancy. Okay, and the wonderful little moments like the first ultra sound where you get to see your baby inside you and the first time you actually feel them move. It’s pretty cool, all in all. But men…pregnant? The concept lends itself to a host of hilarious situations. So do we enjoy this facet of the M/M genre because of its comedic value? Or how about this, maybe we have a need for our male heroes to have all that hetero couples have – marriage and children. So we let one of them somehow get pregnant and off they go into the world of raising kids and living a “normal” life.

Now I’ve read a few of these mpreg fanfictions and I must say, overall I’m not impressed. And now I’ll admit that I find the concept ridiculous and somewhat retarded, but that’s just me. So in my quest to find out what this is all about, I did do some more reading and I actually found a story that I must say, was believable, had a good plot, was handled very well and had some hilarious moments in it. It was an FMA story on www.fanfiction.net and Roy Mustang, as a result of an alchemy experiment gone awry, ended up pregnant. I wish I could find it again so I could share, but alas, I can’t >.<  What was so great about this story, is the situation of a man being pregnant and also being an officer in the military was handled realistically. And when Roy had to tell Edward his predicament, comedy ensues;)

 

 

 

 

 

 

So I couldn’t find much with Roy getting pregnant, but OMG, Naraku and Sesshoumoru with Sesshy getting pregnant? Priceless:) And it looks like they already have one baby.

So maybe the bottom line here is, it’s all of the above. We like to see men “tortured” in the way women have over the eons of time, we like to read about funny situations and let’s face it, men dealing with pregnancy is funny and some of these stories, when handled properly, are really good fiction. It’s a difficult thing to write properly, which is why I think there are so many stinkers out there story-wise and why it sometimes gets a bad rap. What do you think?

Does Yaoi exploit gay men and do we care?

Wow, what a question to start off with when I’ve been absent pretty much all summer, huh? From what I’ve seen out there in author-land, there seems to be some polarizing views on what Yaoi and M/M romance written by and for a female audience (yes, I know many men like it, too, and I think I’ve already covered this ground in “Yaoi versus M/M Romance: What’s the Difference“) should be and how it may or may not affect the gay community.

Let’s take the first part of this, shall we? Does Yaoi exploit gay men? Our characters in Yaoi fall into seme and uke and in many instances, let’s face it, the uke is a chick with a dick. Are there real gay men out there like that? I’d say certainly. While many lesbians (and yep, I do know quite a few) can sometimes bend their female gender to imitate a man quite well, I’ve seen it done just as well with the opposite sex. Wait, what did I just say? Some lesbians act more like guys than guys and some gay men act more like women than women do;) (Just like in the hetero world, LOL) OMG, I think I’ve just started a topic for another day – gender bending and men in dresses, LOL. So, if there are real gay men out there that act like cute little ukes, by having characters like this are we exploiting them? Hell no. Am I exploiting dogs when I have one in a story and it barks and wags it’s tail? Okay, maybe that’s a bit extreme. Even if there weren’t any gay men who behave like a typical uke, does this mean we shouldn’t write about them? Again, do dragons and unicorns exist? And there are stories written about them all the time.

Yes, this is Mana, a guy. I have no idea if he's really gay. Care to take bets?

But on a deeper level, are we female readers and writers of Yaoi and M/M romance  exploiting gay men because we’re turning them into some twisted fantasy we have about gay men and them getting it on? Personally, I find this ridiculous, too. We may make them and like them to be a bit more emotional than a real guy and we may want them to fall in love more than real gay men do, but I’ve also heard from real gay men that these stories can be inspirational to them. And about the emotional part? Boys and girls are born pretty much the same, it’s our culture that forces boys to repress their emotions. Studies show that our culture is finally changing and it’s getting more and more acceptable for men to shed a tear or two. What’s the big deal anyway?

What I’d really like to know is why it seems to be okay with the lesbian community and especially our culture at large for straight men to watch lesbian porn, but, OMG, you’re a straight woman and you write gay romance stories??? It seems like every time I see some stupid ad for porn aimed at men, it’s two hot chicks getting it on. And have you seen late night HBO and such? The soft porn ALWAYS has two hot chicks getting it on. Not that there is anything wrong with that – just to be clear. I’d just like to see more, well you all know what I want to see, wink, wink.

So no, I don’t think Yaoi or M/M romance exploits anyone (maybe the fangirls, LOL). And for that last part – do we care? Of course we do, don’t be stupid. Reading and writing Yaoi and M/M romance has helped me to understand the trials of being gay and lesbian throughout history and today. My first book, A Summer without Rain, was critiqued by a man whose son is gay. He told me reading my manuscript actually helped him to understand and empathize better with his son. And guess what? I’m proud of that.

Are Anime Stories Better Than Hollywood? + Comments and Contest Winner;)

I’ll just get the “business” part over before hitting on today’s topic, if you don’t mind.

Yay!!! My comments finally work! I freakin reuploaded everything only to find out I did some disastrous boo-boo in setting up my page links, causing my comment dilemma. I’m over it. Moving on…

Congratulations to Lakisha for being the ebook winner at my “Grand Opening”! If you all are interested, I wrote everyone’s name down on a folded peice of paper and then had my younger son pick from a hat. Yep, that’s how it’s done.

Now on to the topic of the day:

Are anime stories better than Hollywood?

I just purchased and watched Avatar for the second time and I’m telling you, if there weren’t some MAJOR anime themes in that movie, well, slap me silly if you can find me.

I think to start off this discussion, we need to look at what anime stories have made it to Hollywood (and I may not list them all, I’m a bit delirious from figuring out my comment problem, LOL)

 

 

  • Astro Boy
  • Speed Racer
  • Transformers
  • DragonBall Z
  • Avatar – The Last Airbender (due out this summer, I believe)

Ooo, who slipped that Dragon Ball Z Yaoi pic in there???

There are talks of bringing more over here for live action film every day (take a look at some of my recent tweets…). I can think of “Ghost in the Shell” and I’ve recently heard something about “Bleach”! Yeah, that’s right.

Though I’d really like to see them try and do Full Metal Alchemist – who’d play Edward Elric? Hmmm, maybe that dude who played Jasper in Twilight? Oh, Oh, kinky thoughts…Roy could be Gackt with his new black hair;)

So why are all these big Hollywood film makers turning to anime? Is it that they’ve run our of murder mystery with cops, alien invasion, cutesy romantic comedy ideas? I think so. And I also think the story lines in anime are quite well developed and out of the box, so to speak. Maybe it’s the Japanese culture  and the exotic background that makes for such great story fodder. Now if we could only avoid some of the Hollywood gone anime disasters, like Dragon Ball Z… If only Hollywood would find a way to keep what’s so special in our anime special and not glam up the characters or reduce the intensity of the plot and let us in America see the drama, the heartache, the loyalty exhibited by our anime characters and not water them down for our namby-pamby American audience. Let’s show them what real anime is about and take it out of the “comic book geek” realm into the real worlds the anime depict. I do have a lot of hope for Avatar – The Last Airbender. But so help me God if they make that movie in any way cartoonish – and you know what I mean (*cough*, Speed Racer), I’ll shave my head. Okay, maybe I won’t, but I’ll do something rash, like write yet another blog about how Hollywood sucks. So there. Make it like Avatar, the movie, please…