Thank you for this! xD
You're most welcome! :)
what about when the uke keeps his socks on? which btw i hate but seen in several mangas.. socks pulled up still on his feet..
If someone knows the reason for this or if I'm wrong, please feel free to correct me, but with the socks thing I think it's some kind of clothing kink? The idea of it being similar to boyfriend shirts, or naked aprons.
I thought that was to prevent cold feet and consequently, increasing pleasure. NOT SURE but I think that's what I've read or heard.
it's some kinda kink, honey
Had the same question before and I had the same conclusion, when I tried to answer it. I don't want to think about it too much because I feel bad about it. I feel it's unfair, though this is yaoi, I can't seem to brush away the fact that uke-s and women are deemed the same by Japanese society, lower in status, weak and inferior to men, well in yaoi, seme-s. And I am all for women empowerment, even to uke-s, I push for equality, so I'm offended, but to enjoy the genre, I avoid dwelling on the idea. This is why I'm easily attached to confident and strong female characters in Shoujo and uke-s, either in regular universe or omegaverse.
I will try to approach this from the logistics point of view:
It's easy if the only part you need to bonk each other is a dick. That is why even peeing, men don't have to drop their pants, and boxers even have a peep hole so they don't have to drop the pants.
But to be bonked, you need access to a hole, and you can't just drop a pants a little. Even to pee, women have to drop all of her panties or pants.
To pee and poo (both needs orifice), both men and women drop their pants completely.
The bonker only needs to lower the zipper and free Willy.
The bonkee needs to at least drop it to around the knee, but it is not very comfortable to have pants or waistband around your knee, it can be unduly restrictive. So, drop it down to ankle. But once it reaches the ankle, might as well just take it off.
Now, women sometimes have skirts, that she can hike up, but still she has to go bare bottoms even when the bonker don't have to go bare bottom if he doesn't want too.
But in real life, it is very hard to just zipper down, because your Willy and the hairs around your willy can easily get caught up in a zipper teeth and that is not very comfortable. It is not comfortable for the bonkee too, to have zipper teeth so close to your skin/crotch.
So, it is better for men to drop trou too before bonking actually.
But this is yaoi where many feats of physicality is ignored (I mean, in what planet is it easy to insert dick into butt? It is not only painful for the bonkee, try fitting a dick into a tight hole and tell me you don't fell like dying or being squeezed to hell and back, plus FRICTION goes both way, it hurts both seme and uke).
Bcz it's hot
Dude has toe fungus.
You and nocturnal fangirl are correct. It's a kink similar to the common one of naked woman keeping her stockings and high heels during sex, or "naked apron", etc.
You don't have to feel bad. The idealization of male dominance is indisputably rooted in patriarchal misogyny and Yaoi is a reflection of that; however, it is not the responsibility of fiction to serve as prescriptive morality or ethicality. Fiction lies in a separate dimension as a tool of escapism for the reader. Your moral or ethical stance does not need to be in conflict with your enjoyment of fiction. My feminist ideals are not in conflict with my enjoyment of Yaoi as it is not prescriptive of misogyny, but a reflection of specific female fantasies that appeal to many of us. Just like the fiction horror genre, which is also very misogynistic, is not prescriptive, it is not telling people to go out there and commit gruesome acts, or that it's ok to commit gruesome acts against women; those that enjoy the horror genre are not "psychopathic murders" at heart; therefore, those that enjoy Yaoi are not internalized misogynists; yaoi is not telling us that it's ok for women to be submissive or that romanticized rape is acceptable in real life. Fiction and Real Life lie in two separate dimensions where the former doesn't have to operate with the same moral or ethical values of the latter, even if real life is reflected in fiction. Unfortunately, it is difficult for a lot of people to understand this fundamental difference between fiction and real life.
Even though your logistic theory is wrong in relation to the idealization of male dominance, I have to say that I love love love love your inventiveness! LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But sometimes you can't help it. Once the idea comes, it would make you feel things and contemplate your morals and ethics. That's why I had to condition myself when I realize such subtleties to completely enjoy yaoi and go back to just "entertaining myself".
I understand that the Japanese society is highly patriarchal and their other cultures and ideals, which I don't completely agree, that reflects in fiction. I can't do anything about them so I don't let those ideas linger in my mind for too long, or else I'll spoil the genre/story for me. It's the same thing with Yaoi's rape culture/trope. If you can't accept it and keep on whining about it, you're attacking the country's culture, you can't win against that, I mean versus just trying to win an argument with someone, and that makes Yaoi, as a form of entertainment, bitter, even to me who's just reading the comments section.
There are stories that are easy to brush the "realism" part but some are just too structured close to real life that it is hard to separate fiction and reality. I get into disputes a lot of times because the way I analyze them is a mix of both and people who I would have arguments with are either on fiction or reality only, and it's hard to explain how I came up with my analyses. After all, individuals think differently, but come on can't they argue politely? LOL. Oops, sorry for ranting.
"but come on, can't they argue politely?"......hahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!! I feel the same way, but in my case, I'm in a type of catch 22 because most of the time I rub people the wrong way because I come off as too assertive, even though attacking people is the last thing on my mind! Not always of course, as I've lost my cool on several occasions here, especially when scanlators are unfairly criticized (that gets me fast). But I'm usually interested in just being silly along with everyone else in good fun, or engaging in intellectual exchange of ideas like we are doing right now.
And yes, you are absolutely right. There is no way we can absorb/appreciate/perceive/experience fiction purely from the perspective of fiction alone because our subjective perspectives derive from our real life experiences; therefore, our individual understanding and analysis of fiction must by force of nature be constructed from both; it cannot be just one or the other; that's impossible; so you are doing the right thing. Fiction elicits emotions from within us that we learn and experience in real life, but at the same time, fiction serves as our vehicle for escapism, so it doesn't have to conform 100% to the laws of our material reality; otherwise, it wouldn't be an effective form of escapism, right? It is a delicate balance that readers have to learn to maneuver/master to be able to objectively assess a piece of fiction and/or enjoy it. There are specific fiction tropes that have been predefined, where the reader knows beforehand suspension of disbelief is required, that real life morality (e.g. romanticized rape in Yaoi and romance genre in general) , the laws of physics (e.g. the ability to fly or use of magic) or logic (e.g. the typical deus ex machina) don't apply.
But I do understand when you say that there are stories framed too close to real life to easily brush them off, even if the author didn't mean to, the plot/trope may have been ineffectively executed. And to close on this I will give you two examples where I experienced exactly that. One of them was with Harada's Nii-chan. From my personal perspective, Nii-chan was too closely framed in the predatory psychology and methodology of pedophiles and I could never accept the romanticized aspect of the story when the child got older, and yes, their relationship ended up being romanticized. Nii-chan was too realistic for me and I could not suspend my disbelief. And second, I enjoy the romanticized rape trope when it's well executed. Meaning that the protagonists are physically beautiful, that there is mutual attraction, or better yet, that feelings already exist even if they haven't recognized them yet, that during the sexual act the uke is conspicuously feeling physical pleasure despite his protestations, etc. and then i read Harami Bara and it was moving smoothly until I came upon this scene:
http://www.mangago.zone/read-manga/harami_bara/mi/0786938ea21fb2910a8999fb94b6910c_chapter-1/18/
that scene made me extremely anxious, because the uke's terror and desperation felt palpable to me, too close to the brutality of real life rape, and I could never buy the romantic aspect of that story. Anyways, I think I went a bit too long. But thank you for sharing your perspective, I really really enjoyed it :)
I just remembered, you're my "Omegaverse-sensei", lol.
You just explained everything that I couldn't. DANG. The dilemma when my English vocabulary is not enough to convey exactly what I mean, （/TДT)/ . It fails me further when I'm really cornered and my anger is boiling up. I want to maintain as calm as possible but I'm still misunderstood, I'm already offended, then I can't help but phrase my words impolitely, making the situation worse, like (╯°Д °)╯╧╧ COME ON. HAHA. And yes, one of my peeves too is when people attack the scanlators and/or authors. They only think from their perspectives and not from the scanlators/authors'.
I primarily analyze characters by empathy, like empathizing with them COMPLETELY. But yes you are right, to feel that, you the reader must experience similar feelings in real life first then find them similar to what the character experiences, building that connection first. But after that stage, to understand how the character thinks and feels, I set myself like I am the character, imagining as if I experienced what the character did from birth to present and environment, setting aside my own morals, ethics and upbringing. In that way, I understand why the characters did what they did, but once I look it from my perspective with my morals and ethics, it does not mean that I would do the same, that I approve what the character did.
When people attack a character, I feel bad for the character because they can't stand up for themselves and only their respective authors can explain for their beloved characters. BUT it's not like the authors can comment here on mangago, can't they? Nor their social media accounts would be of any help. I mean like how JK Rowling treats her characters and talks about them, rather for them. And I end up speaking for the characters but most people don't understand where my perspective is coming from and they misunderstand, therefore clashing with their opinions and my lack of vocabulary and expression makes the situation worse.
It's actually the same situation when I talked about Yashiro of Saezuru Tori Wa Habatakanai, I think you've read that already, saw your name in the comments. I posted on tumblr about Yashiro, at least once in his life, must have thought that he loved his Stepdad, his rapist. And I sparked FIRE. Here on mangago, since someone posted it here. I admit, I didn't clearly state my assumptions when I wrote that post, that that idea was coming from a 10-year old Yashiro's perspective, which of course that idea, "love", is not true/incorrect and must be corrected. The concept of rape and love is different to a 10 year old Yashiro and to a 19-33 year old Yashiro. And oh man, the concept of association brought long discussions because of using the wrong words. Yashiro associates vanilla sex to his first rape, because of the similarities, thus him feeling nauseous every time he has painless sex. I realized I shouldn't have used "gentle sex" when it's already too late.
Shit this is long. LASTLY, on Nii-chan, hell yeah, I felt the same way. The ending pulled me back to reality, THAT THIS IS FICTION (wow that was ironic). Which I have to admit, I liked how it ended, Harada keeping it consistent that she is twisted AF. And I must say, we are the same on how I accept stories with rape, specially when romanticized. Some are digestible, some are just horrifying, I need to condition myself before I can proceed to the next chapter. It really depends on how the story is written and the tone set by the author.
Oh yeah, gosh still not finished. I enjoyed our conversation, too! Thank you. It's hard to find readers who think almost the same as I do.
Oh also I remembered that I also questioned before why semes always had bigger dicks than ukes but of course I also figured that out myself.
"Why do semes keep their pants on and ukes are usually naked during sex?"
This question surfaces a lot in Yaoi forums due that, surprisingly, a lot of people really don't know the reason for this standard in the genre; the reason for this is sociological symbolism; it is symbolic of the idealization of male dominance and female submissiveness due that nakedness symbolizes defeat, lower status, being conquered. We can refer to history where conquered people were usually stripped naked by their conquerors to emphasize their inferior defeated status. In Yaoi, the seme is representative of the dominant male and the uke representative of the submissive (conquered) female; hence, during sex, the Seme retains his clothes or some article of clothing as the male conqueror and the Uke is depicted naked as the conquered one, the "female" being dominated.