Question for you fine folk...

[chatastic]

What's the appeal of "real person" fics?

I'm not being rhetorical or a smart ass-- I honestly am curious, because there's obviously an appeal, and I'm not sure I understand it.  Is it sort of like having a god complex?  That is, if you write/ read about real people, it's as if you are able to control the world in a way that you will never have the opportunity to do?

Any opinions on this are welcome and hoped for.  I like knowing why people write/read what they do.

C

Comments

[my_daroga]

They don't really bother me; maybe because I have no empathy (?!) or maybe because it seems to me that they come out of the idea that public figures are just as much *characters* (to us) as the people they play. That's how the media sells them to us, after all: everything's scripted, airbrushed, and larger than life. I definitely feel, also, that it "comes out of" popslash and other areas where the "need" for fanfic was there, without the framework of a fictional world. The music videos, the selling of that image, stood in for the fictional world, and we just happened to acquire "characters" like Nick and Justin and Britney--they're not real in the sense that they are at all like real people. So in fanfic, they're treated like characters, but with that label of "real person fic."

Then, of course, the genre gets transferred over to other things. Sometimes, very rarely, that's a metatastic impulse and cool stuff can happen if you're really playing with the intersection of character and performer. Other times, yeah, it's just porn.

For the record, I don't ever specifically read RPF, though if someone I know and like writes some, I do. Because I personally don't find it disrespectful, even if I don't particuarly dig it.

[chatastic.livejournal.com]

Mmm, I like the way you articulate that: Brit and Nick and Justin become characters, not people.

Okay, that makes sense to me. Thanks!

[my_daroga]

You're welcome! I'm glad.