unpopular opinion?? morality is not necessarily flexible or subjective. causing unnecessary suffering is wrong period. the reason im pro-freedom of speech is not because i think ‘this is okay under these circumstances’, its because fictional things dont… exist. abuse is always fucking bad. abusing fictional characters doesnt fucking matter because they arent sentient or alive, and thus they are indifferent to the concepts of pain and death send ask

shipping-isnt-morality:

Morality is….. complicated, and has no easy answers. This is one of the things that is actually getting less clear the older I get.

First of all: yes, if we’re basing morality on the actual harm or benefit caused by an action, then the overwhelming majority of fiction is morally neutral.

Second of all: in regards to actual actions, harm is subjective.

That’s not to say we shouldn’t try to draw distinctions when distinctions are hard to draw. It’s kind of our responsibility as humans to try to figure this shit out. What are the limits on a human’s ability to consent? What mental and/or physical states render them unable? What if nobody involved was capable of giving consent? Are their some actions that cannot be consented to under any circumstances? If a capable person asks another person to kill them can they do it? What if that capable person is in severe and permanent pain? What if it’s an alternative to a far more painful natural death or suicide?

These are extreme cases, but they’re not exactly rare. “Abuse is always bad” is an easy thing to say and an extremely hard thing to narrow down. Can abuse be consented to? If it’s consented to, is it not abuse? Or does the very nature of abuse (especially emotional abuse) render it something that cannot be consented to? If a capable person willingly hands over control of their finances, social and personal lives over to another person, is that person just as abused as someone who has those things taken away? What about circumstances where those things are expected in a marriage? What about circumstances where people are HAPPY in those marriages? Is there still harm if neither party feels they’ve been harmed? What is our place, as outside observers, to tell someone when they have been harmed; or is harm a completely subjective experience? And if so, what does that mean that we are judging the morality of people’s actions by the subjective experiences of the people around them?

These ARENT easy questions, and part of the beauty of fiction is we can explore them WITHOUT dealing with the fallout of each action. Somewhat like Dr Strange going through a million different timelines to find one where something works, we can explore potential actions and reactions and even totally disregard all the rules and see what happens in fiction.

IMO, fiction is like a reality test chamber: you can change all the rules, reverse all the consequences, and see what happens. That’s kind of fundamentally different from how we interact with reality.

@lesbian-ochako