As I work on the moderation end of the Clitorides Awards site, I’ve become aware of something. Many of the nominated stories are no-sex stories. As in not a bit of sex in them.
The clitorides awards were created to promote the erotica writing community; even the name ‘clitorides’ is a reminder of that.
So my question to the community is: Should no-sex stories be eligible for the awards?
71 responses to “Poll for the Clitorides Awards”
as long as a story is excepted for posting on SOL then it should be voted on. you might have to open a new catagore for the stories with no sex but what is one more anyway
I’ve noticed that authors use the “no-sex” code differently. Some use it to denote stories that truly contain no sex (even “off-screen”), while others use it to denote stories where the sex is not the focus of the story. Consider AutumnWriter’s story “The Blameless Bystander,” which is marked as “no-sex” (I pick this story as an example because it happened to be the random selection when I first saw your blog post, as well as being a quality story). This story (IMO) is definitely erotic, and in fact is marked with other “sex” codes. I definitely think that particular story should be eligible for a Clitoride award.
Accordingly I would not suggest excluding “no-sex” stories. If people are willing to nominate and eventually vote for a “no-sex” story for a Clitoride award, then I see no problem in allowing it. Perhaps it should be up to the authors themselves as to whether they should be excluded.
You should be looking at other sites as well. You won’t find many sex stories on assm anymore.jhrhncd
To clarify. I wasn’t asking about any story using the ‘no-sex’ code on storiesonline. I’m talking about any story on any site that is not erotic nor contains any kind of sex.
In my opinion, the Clitoride awards are about erotica. As such, unless there are going to be categories for non-erotica, they should be for erotica only.
I’m not in favor of the politics of exclusion. If the work is nominated I think it is better to let the voters decide whether it belonged or didn’t. As long as it is freely available I can’t think of a reason for excluding it, unless it was nominated without the author’s approval or knowledge.
cmsix
I would say that all stories accepted on any adult site should be considered for the award.
Lazeez wrote
> Many of the nominated stories are
> no-sex stories. As in not a bit
> of sex in them.
About eight years ago, the president and the congresscritters here in the U. S. of A. had something of a disagreement about just exactly what SEXUAL RELATIONS meant and didn’t mean.
Many stories will be “NO SEX” simply because there is no interaction of the plumbing systems, and sometimes not even one system of plumbing is involved. That doesn’t mean it isn’t erotic, or that it isn’t adult.
One of the justices of the United States Supreme Court once said something along the line of ‘he didn’t know what pornography was, but that he’d surely recognize it when he saw it.’
I feel the same way about erotica and adult topics.
Lazeez further said:
> The clitorides awards were
> created to promote the erotica
> writing community; even the name
> ‘clitorides’ is a reminder of
> that.
You don’t want to get too hung up on ‘clitorides’ in your definition. That is a female term, yet the golden clits have always been available to Male/Male stories too.
If a story has ANY element within it which makes it unsuitable for the broad general reading population because of age, mainstream interests, prudism or anything else which places it within what is generally considered the ‘adults only’ spectrum, than it is eligible for a golden clit in my opinion.
That doesn’t mean I’ll necessarily vote for it, but that’s not my point.
Roxanne
I comment from the readers standpoint and only my opinion is stated (I think it is the right one though). I like a story with a developed plot and characters that support sex activity included in the story and a story does not require sex to be good.
Only two catagorys would be excluded in my consideration; (1) No sex or erotica included or (2) Nothing but sexual activity included, stories nominated for a Clitorides Award.
LET THE VOTORS DECIDE!
I can’t phrase my opinion any better than cmsix did.
“If the work is nominated I think it is better to let the voters decide whether it belonged or didn’t. As long as it is freely available I can’t think of a reason for excluding it, unless it was nominated without the author’s approval or knowledge.”
Roxanne sez: ‘You don’t want to get too hung up on ‘clitorides’ in your definition. That is a female term, yet the golden clits have always been available to Male/Male stories too.’
I am in agreement with Roxanne, don’t get too hung up on ‘… clitorides’. If that’s going to be a problem, rename them.
Now define ‘erotica’ and if you can make a good case with your definition I might reconsider my saying that all stories appearing should be considered…just let your voters decide. I’ll be most of them have a pretty good idea of what’s eligible for an award.
Well, if the story really has no sex, then which category will it be nominated into ?
I agree with not specifically excluding no-sex stories, but maybe they need their own category, since most of the existing ones don’t make sense for stories without sexual content.
I can understand the reluctance to exclude stories that are nominated but there are many awards available to stories that are not erotic in nature. I recall that Asa Strong opened his own site because of the negative feedback he was getting from posting no-sex stories on SOL and other erotic sites.
If you want to offer a GC for the best no-sex story then that would be fine, a contradiction in terms, but fine. I don’t think that the story should dilute the votes in the other categories though. A great science fiction story without any sex could win a Hugo but a great sexually explicit story that is science fiction could only win a GC and would never even be nominated for a Hugo.
I vote that we either have a special category or not allow the nomination.
I say let the stories be nominated and see how people vote on them. If you start excluding stories on the basis of lack of sex/erotica, you’ll open up a big can of worms. People will debate with you over what constitutes “erotic.” Don’t fall into that trap and cause yourself a lot of headaches. Most likely any story that is NOT erotica will just get voted down anyway.
Sounds like a separate category for “Non-Sex” should be added.
Given the precedents, I’d say that no-sex stories should be eligible. After all, one (GMW’s ‘Hannah Sawyer’) won one last year. Of course, one could argue that just because the sex occurs ‘off-screen’ doesn’t make it not erotica.
cmsix had it right: leave it up to the voters. If enough find a story worthy (or unworthy) of inclusion, that will show up in the final voting.
I agree, let ‘No Sex’ stories be nominated and create a separate category if possible. Thanks.
co2
Lazeez,
Good Writing is good writing. Who among us cannot appreciate a well written story whether erotic or non- erotic. Inclusion seems appropriate.
“If a man does not keep pace with his companions perhaps it’s because he hears a different drummer…Let him step to the music which he hears however measured or far away.
Inclusion of non-erotic stories seems appropriate.
I think the clitorides awards are, or should be, erotica awards.
Sex is not a required component of erotica, and I would be opposed to a “sex required” rule. On the other hand, it would seem to me to be a bit silly to have a non-erotic category for an erotica award. Best erotica with no sex may be a possibility, but then you have to clearly define sex.
I would prefer to let anything be nominated, the voters will choose what they like. If completely non-erotic stories get nominated, they’re not likely to garner many votes, and nobody has to be judge-and-jury.
I’m writing as an author who has published both in the erotic and non-erotic genres. I’ve delayed weighing in on the subject because I am of two minds on it.
Unfortunately, this will be a lengthy post. Sorry about that.
First, let me say “thanks” to p-squared for mentioning and complimenting my story. Anyone else so inclined is encouraged to do so as often as possible.
As any author, I am eager to expand my readership and receive recognition for my work. Expanding the Clitoride program would serve this purpose for the nominees and winners,and also expand interest in the non-erotic genre and that would benefit all of us who work in it. It would also have the potential of demonstrating that erotica authors may possess other dimensions in their literary arsenals. All this would be to the good.
P-squared’s comment about the codes brings up one of the difficulties in assigning genres to stories. Sexual feelings are so intertwined in the human condition that many stories are not at all about sex, but some aspect of it might appear in them. I have written two such stories.
Let me assure everyone that the skills and process necessary to bring together erotica is in many ways similar, but in others quite different, from non-erotic work.
I believe that what might begin as a non-erotic category might evolve into a category for stories that are erotic, or sexual in theme, but without depictions of explicit sex in them. That might be a good category to have, but if it is to be that, let’s do it on purpose.
It might be difficult getting a good cross section of mainstream author participation in an award program centered on erotic fiction.
I am certain that many would not allow their names or works to be so associated. It would also be difficult to attract enough mainstream voters for the same purpose. We could debate whether they’re right or wrong to feel that way, but it’s beside the point.
If an award is given for best of anything, it should be done with the understanding that the winning entry stood out as the best of many excellent entries. If the award is really “Best Story Written by an Author Who Also Writes Erotica”, then the limited scope makes the award less meaningful.
Another concern is the potential of drawing in authors who are underage to the program. There are sites that feature general amateur fiction and many of the authors are high school students. In this day and age, great care has to be taken by erotic enterprises in this regard. Although there may no technical violations of law or ethics, the appearance and proximity are just too close for comfort, in my view.
I also have a fear of potential dissociation of past participants and winners who established the Clitoride program for the specific purpose of encouraging erotic authors. They might feel that the traditional purpose is diluted.
I have to reluctantly conclude that it would be better to leave to basics of the program in place, especially in this transitional year. That’s the short part of the long story.
I have no idea if I’ve even been nominated-probably not. My comments in no way mean that I wouldn’t appreciate the best wishes of readers who might have, or plan to do so.
Thanks for taking the time to read my views.
AW
I’d have to say no. If there is no erotica in it, then I don’t think it should be considered. There are plenty of ways to celebrate non-erotic writing, and very, very few to give praise for good erotic writing.
Dark Pen
Maybe it’s time for a new category… If it is a non-erotic story, then it shouldn’t be in the same competition as the erotic stories that are the main focus of the awards. I have nothing against either type of story, and do read both, but they shouldn’t be competing against each other.
Harry The Hermit
I support the cmsix solution, assuming that authors have the right to withdraw any title of theirs from the race. Perhaps authors should have some say in whether their nominated story better fits another category?
When we vote, we will recognize if a story is nominated for a category where it does not belong and we won’t vote for it in that category. Simple enough, I think.
I have to agree with another poster and say, that if you try and rule-out non-erotic stories, or Non-sex stories, or if they are to be given their own category, I think a definition of erotic would be useful if not absolutely necessary. Where is the cut-off between what is allowed to be nominated and what isn’t? If the story is erotic, let’s say the main character is NAKED the entire story, is that erotic? What if there’s sex, but everything happens “off-screen?” Is that erotic? Is Intercourse required to be erotic? What about masturbation, does that count as sex?
The Congress and the Supreme Court of the United States have been arguing about the definition of “Pornography” since the sixties. They haven’t come to a good answer yet. I don’t think we’re going to get a good answer here.
Let the voters decide what gets nominated, what makes it to the finals and what wins. It’s the easiest, least controversial idea out there.
Just my opinion.
-Jeff
I’m of the opinion that informing persons at the nomination and voting stages of the process that the awards are for “Erotic Stories” without attempting to define the term “erotic” is perfectly feasable. Let the nominations come, let the voters vote and define it for themselves. But I just like to giggle anyway, so…Not making something absolutely positively foolproof for the safety of the masses sounds like a barrel of fun to me!
IMO, if it’s nominated (or gets enough nominations) let the voters decide.
Iam not an author, but a mere reader. I hope my opinion carries weight. If a story is nominated, it should be judged. Whether or not ther is sex in the story. Some of the best stories I have read in the past year have had no sex.
I have written what most people would describe as graphic erotica with some success. But I found that reader response was obviously focused on character and plot not gynecological descriptions of the plumbing. I also found that writing and reading graphic physical descriptions of sex activity tends to be both formulaic and repetitive. The available vocabulary is just not rich enough to support endless variation.
As a result I’ve changed my writing to cater to the large and seemingly growing audience of grownups who are pretty well up to speed on how to physically bump your uglies and are more interested in what’s going on between the ears than what’s going on between the legs. Am I still writing material that contains, though is not limited to erotic acts. I think I am. Is a seduction described in terms of what the characters are feeling, thinking and experiencing which assumes that the reader already knows how the various parts fit together sexual, even hot. I think so and enthusiastic reader response seems to agree. I have yet to receive a single feedback that complains or even mentions the lack of graphic description.
I’m no prude and I enjoy an occasional stroke story myself but I wouldn’t describe most of them as great literature. But to each his own; as sexual pleasure is created more in the mind than in the groin anyway. Given the huge variety of what we find erotic or arousing; it seems to me difficult to find a better method than letting the voters define for themselves what is eligible and worthy of recognition. I wouldn’t object to a new category but I think as a practical matter we will find ourselves back here next year squabbling over gray areas and nuances.
If the awards are meant to reflect the taste and response of the writers and readers, then let their votes represent them without trying to pre-screen or define the material for them.
As a reader I believe that the voters should decide a stories worth; assuming, of course, that the author does not disagree with the stories inclusion or categorization.
I would like to see a new category for no sex or low/no erotic content stories.
Bill H
There are stories that do not contain graphic descriptions of sexual acts, but which are erotic. I suggest including those types in the Clitorides as they stand now.
There are other stories that contain no graphic descriptions of sex and are not erotic. I suggest a new category: Non-Erotic Stories.
Yep. Create YAC (Yet Another Category) for actual no/little sex. There’s plenty of PG-13 on SOL (for one place) as well as on GMW’s site, etc.
Flash, short, novella, etc. would fit in just fine. There’s several drama pieces which would fit into these categories.
Consider changing the Name of the existing categories to add the word erotic where it is missing.
For example “Best Erotic Long Story of the Year”. Somehow, the missing erotic in some category title may lead to confusion.
Once the site is completely operational and functional, register some appropriate domain name like readers-awards.org and let’s expand.
Perhaps the guidance for nominations and voting should include words like stories in which sex or sexuality is a theme. Then if stories that skirt the edges of that guidance get nominated, voters can make up their own minds whether it qualifies or not.
I prefer to think of the awards as being for adult literature as opposed to erotic literature. By the way, I can write you an erotic passage that will leave your pants soaking wet, whichever sex you are, without resorting to sex.
OF
A seperate catagory should be the path. There are to many excellent stories on the site that contain no sex (such as those by Tony Stevens) to ignore them.
Well, in my opinion, eliminating all the ‘No Sex” stories seems like a cop-out to me. I thought the idea of the Clitorides was to encourage writers to improve by rewarding the best story in various genres. Perhaps a new ‘No Sex” award or two would be more appropriate?
I do have one other comment that ties into this subject, Lazeez. I feel you brought on the plethora of “No Sex” stories when you set up your new classification system. If there is little or no blatant sex in his tale, a writer now has two choices for classification, between “Some sex” and “No sex.” I remember that I asked then if a classification of “Little sex” or even “Titillation” could be included, but I don’t recall your exact response.
.B
We could count the number of words in the story, then the number of words that have some sexual connotation and come up with a sexual percentage – call it the X score. Then we determine the number of people likely to cheat on the voting and prorate it accordingly.
Or we could just count the votes.
OF
I, for one, am not in favour of including stories without erotic content into the general runnings. The problem is, however, how to define ‘erotic’ and ‘non-erotic’ writing. After all, our most important sexual organ (hopefully) is located between our ears.
Thus, a story can be erotic without descriptions of overt sexual acts. We’ll have to leave the decision to the voters, perhaps with a short reminder that the awards are intended for erotic writing.
I think, after reading what I wrote late last night, a further comment may be warranted. Lazeez and SoL are great, and SoL is his baby, to do with as he pleases.
However, I feel that the Clitorides are a facet of ASSTR. THe fact that Lazeez has jumped in and offered to help out is a very ‘neighbourly’ action, but I have to say that it could also be read wrong. It might almost seem as if he was trying to ‘control’ the awards. Personally, I doubt it, I’ve had dealings with Lazeez by e-mail and my read on him just doesn’t suit that scenario. Where I am going with this, is the idea, that it might be an idea to go slow with changes and if anything, broaden the scope of the awards, rather than lessen them.
Hey, I’m not against writing stories that verge on porn, heck I started out writing stories that were blatantly pornographic. I even made money by writing and selling porn to purely pornographic sites, under a different alias of course. However, when I ‘grew’ as a writer I became bored with the minimal plots and characters. I think that happens to all writers who are trying to improve, but writers are also creatures of habit. We keep posting where we are comfortable, so SoL and ASSTR now get more stories with less and less blatant sex, but with better plots, better characters and better editing.
I think writers who are improving should be encouraged. Now might not be the time, but eventually, I think it will have to happen, or the writers will find somewhere else to post.
.B
In my opinion, which I seem to share with others posting here, any story that is nominated and meets the criteria of being freely available should be included.
I am also with those that think there should be a separate category for non-sexual stories, but this should not preclude them from being entered in topic categories. For example, a story with codes “FF Sci-Fi Rom” can be nominated in the romance, science fiction and same-sex categories. A “Sci-Fi Rom No-sex” story should be eligible for the sci-fi, romance and no-sex categories.
If you are uncomfortable with the no-sex award being a “clitoride” award then make it a separate award awarded at the same time, perhaps the “World Literature Corporation award” or something.
In general, I agree with let the voters decide if there is even a question whether the story is erotica (inclusion of sexuality aside).
However, a clearly non-erotic story should not clear nominations (for example, a retelling of an epic baseball game to go to extremes). The Clitorides are at heart an erotica award, therefore the stories should lean towards an erotic nature.
As a reader, I like a good mix. I tend to go with the more story with sex the sex with some story. So I would say yes. As said by other they should be judge on their own as romance and s&m; should not be judged together.
I can’t imagine why you’d even consider trying to exclude stories for lack of sex. The headache of trying to determine if a story meets someone’s definition of erotica – and dealing with the people who have a different definition of such a subjective term – would suggest that it’s folly. Let the voters decide.
As a returning member and occassional author (not SOL), I am interested in this discussion.
There is no clear-cut, absolute right or wrong answer (as evidenced by the comments); however, my personal preference would be to keep the GC’s oriented toward sexual/erotic fiction.
Any creative field finds there are many grey areas in categorizing (look at the music, movie, and book industries). They seem to recognize the value of taking the trouble to perform the exercise, in order to ensure that the award is properly credited and to encourage diversity.
I believe that their solution is to create a board or selection committee. This certainly doesn’t eliminate criticism or conflicting opinion, but I think it is as close to a fair system as we are likely to find.
As CMSIX and others have said…”leave it to the voters”
I have been reading this and have thought long and hard about whether to comment on this or not but I think some one needs to. Having a set of rules about what is eligible needs to nailed down, the award is for erotic works from what I understand so set up the categories to reflect that. Someone mentioned the Hugo Awards they have rules about what can and cannot be nominated, see their rules here:
http://www.wsfs.org/bm/const-2006.html#hugo
the rules do not have to be iron clad but if you set up a base line most of us can figure out what does and does not belong such as nominating Daniel steel for a hugo and Ragnar Benson for a romance award. As far as just letting whatever be nominated and voted on I think that is a mistake it will give the voters nothing to go by,
insert sarcasm here
“Best Long novel – should I go with the romance, or the sci-fi or that detective novel” all three are novels but do not belong in the same category. Sorry if this sounds like it is rambling will get off of here and go crash for the night
I agree with theoldsarge , create a separate category for the no sex stories. The authors obviously made a distinction when they posted the codes for it. So should we. I find that i skip no-sex stories many times depending on my mood that day, but i don’t exclude them from reading consideration completely.
The name makes it clear that they’re erotica awards – you’re not going to get a huge crowd of English profs and literary reviewers flocking to a page for the “Clitoride Awards”. Maybe stick some extra commentary in about how they’re awards for erotic writing, but leave the definitions up to the voters.
I’d say if someone liked it enough to bother to nominate it, and other people like it enough to vote on it, that should pretty much answer your question.
Greetings
I’m torn about this issue.
On one hand ALL good writing should be recognized and appreciated but by the same token the highest quality erotic writing needs to be celebrated and particularly encouraged.
Given the paucity of awards and recognition for good erotic writing I’m leaning toward “NO” for a Gold Clit no-sex category award…
Recognize quality writing that happens with or without sex but call it something else and use the GC to encourage writers in that genre to improve.
As the community of readers and writers expands,matures, and writers stretch their imaginations and hone their skills I expect this will be an ongoing issue but finding a way to reward excellence hardly the worst problem to have when such exists
Not so BTW, thanx for taking on this task.
Enjoy the journey
WarLord
OK, I’ve read all the comments here and I’ve received many comments by private communications and few on ASSD.
There are few points that I need to clarify.
* The Clitorides Awards are not mine, they’re the erotica writing community’s. I don’t want control of them and I clearly stated that I prefer to have a hands off approach. I’m creating the site for them and I offered to handle them because I had a feeling that Souvie didn’t have time for them this year and I care about the erotica writing community too much to let them die. The awards are good for the erotica writing community.
* The Clitorides Awards are not from storiesonline. They started with an author that posted on ASSTR and ASSM. Maria laid out the rules in a way to include all free sites. So for those who commented that anything that is accepted on SOL should be eligible. That’s not true. I encourage every type of stories on storiesonline. I named the site storiesonline instead of sexstoriesonline for a reason. So because the clitorides awards were created for sex stories, that means not everything that gets posted on SOL is automatically eligible. And I really want to keep them separate from storiesonline.
* Most writing awards specifically exclude adult stories, so it’s only logical that awards created for erotica/sex stories exclude the other stories.
So far, from the comments that I’ve received and were posted here and on ASSD, the opinions are split almost down the middle, but there is a slight edge to keeping them restricted to erotic/sex related stories.
Since the awards were originally created for sex/erotica stories, and since the opinions lean that way, I will change the categories name to reflect erotica.
However, I do realize that there is a lot of subjectivity in deciding what’s erotic and what’s not, I’m sure that some people will differ on some stories that get nominated. The moderators should do their best to be as fair and as objective as possible.
And to report on the progress, I’m still working on the site. The time of the holidays is my busiest of the whole year and I don’t have as much time as I would like to dedicate to the project. After the new year I should be able to find enough time to finish, hopefully on time.
PS: .B, there is a sex content classification on SOL as ‘Minimal Sex’, which makes the sex categories:
– No Sex
– Minimal Sex
– Some Sex
– Much Sex
– Stroke Story
The minimal sex category has been available for a while on the site. Only one story is using it so far.
I like Roxanne’s comment works for me but I also understand what Lazeez is saying, perhaps we could have an award just for SOL. Is that off the charts?
I’m not that worried about it since which ever the way the wind blows, I’m not likely to be in consideration, lol.
Be well;
Zaffen
Lazeez, I apologize for not noticing the new classification of “Minimal Sex” and agree it’s my fault for not noticing it. That’s what I get for not being able to write, nor post much for a while.
Now I have another task – to go to your site and change some of the designations on my stories.
Another night though, when I’m not so sleepy!
.B
I started reading this great long set of posts sitting firmly on the fence.
Like Warlord, what I feel is that stories with no erotic content should be discouraged from the awards.
As well as posting on SOL and ASSTR I write poetry, which is occasionally arousing (I hope!) but is never pornographic. This I post on other sites, where people are looking for that sort of thing. I feel we should make clear what readers can expect, simply out of politeness and in order to avoid frustration, as much as from any feeling of propriety or any need to defend erotic writing as such.
However, like Tendertouch, what I think is; how on earth do you define the boundary? Is it worth the hassle?
In the end, I would cheerfully go with setting up a separate category, and letting people vote. I do have to say that I previously found multiple entries under different categories confusing, and on principle I never voted for any one story in more than one category.
Without wishing to hijack the comments thread too far, the issue of a story appearing in multiple categories doesn’t seem to really be defined.
At present on the GC site, nominations are handled in batches of one or more stories. You can nominate multiple stories per category (e.g. two romance stories), but you can only nominate each story for one category per batch.
If you want to nominate Story A for “Best Sci Fi Story” and “Best Romance Story” then you must nominate it for one category, submit the nomination, and then nominate it for the second category as (part of) a second batch of nominations.
Whether the original intention of the awards was to allow stories to be in multiple categories I can’t say, however it is allowed – I remember a couple of years ago Nick Sciopio’s Summer Camp got an armful of awards.
If stories are to be restricted to one category, then I can think of at least three ways of doing it.
1) A story is nominated in 3 categories. The author and/or moderators decide which category it fits in best.
2) A story is nominated in 3 categories, it is placed in the category it receives the most nominations for, with moderators having a casting vote if needed.
3) A story is nominated, but the nominators don’t get to decide which category it is nominated in. The moderators (possibly in conjunction with the authors) decide which category each story is placed in.
If the stories conform to SOL guidelines then I say let them in with maybe a sub category of no sex. After all I have read some good stories there with out sex!
JP
Having been the beneficiary of a GC for a story without sex I have my own opinions on the subject.
For one thing, reading these comments it is clear a lot of people think that sex is erotic and no sex isn’t erotic. I’m sorry, I totally disagree. Anyone who saw the original “Thomas Crown Affair” and saw Faye Dunaway sucking that particular chess piece should be able to distinguish between sex and erotic.
You do readers a vast disservice by suggesting that they can’t decide for themselves whether or not a story is erotic or not. Yes, a story without sex can be erotic and it would be best I think to just let readers decide for themselves.
If you absolutely positively have to add a category, have Lazeez add one on SOL to the SOL catergories along with no sex — erotic.
i thing you need a catagory for no-sex but i thibk you need to clear up what no sex means if it would get you kicked out of a highschool engilsh creative writing class it probaly counts as sex but if it just talk about a kid lisenting to his parents at night fr 5 minites before sleeping thats not sex unless he heres explicite wording yell through the house
Erotica is in the eye [or mind] of the beholder, and the Clitorides are awards for erotic writing. The readers/voters should decide whether a story is erotic or not.
Since clitorides is the plural of clitoris, a single award should be a Golden Clitoris, not a clitoride.
I think there is a difference between a no-sex and not-erotica.
Erotica as a literary genre is not just in the eye of the beholder and author. The elements and intent of a story in the erotica should be fairly clear to most readers. That I might not find the story erotic for my personal tastes is irrelevant; I can take a step and say “Clearly, intended to eroticize.”
If these awards are about erotica’ then the stories can’t be ‘straight’ examples of other genres.
Either we get away from the Clits being ‘erotica’ awards or we have a subsection of the Clits for non-erotica… (Like the Academy awards have the technical awards.).
After a LONG discussion on this topic with a fellow writer, we came to the mutual conclusion that possibly the best answer is to state CLEARLY on the GC website that the awards are meant for EROTIC stories only. Remind voters of this on the front page, on the nominating page and on the voting page. Then allow the voters to come to their own conclusion on what is or is not erotic.
This keeps the management from having to come up with some kind of definition of what is erotic while hopefully, giving the voters to opportunity to have their say and allow the votes to make the final call.
I am whole heartily against excluding due to “no-sex” in them. There are some VERY good stories that have no sex in them. If it is written and someone took the time to write it, it should be “voted on” if someone nominated it.
I think authors use the “no-sex” differently. Some it has no sex in them and others all the sex is “off” screen. I wish I could recall names and authors, but I read stories that listed “no-sex” and it didn’t have any explicit sex on screen, but had very erotic scenes. Some were so hot that it steamed up my glasses. :o) With that being said, if story is nominated, then is should be put to the “people” to decide if it should have been included.
I’m kind of divided on the issue. On the one hand there is some good writing that doesn’t have any sex in it. And the authors do contribute to the community. On the other hand, those stories are eligible for contests and awards that “sex” stories are not. So it seems a bit unfair to have them possibly taking one of the few awards that a sex story writer can win.
Just because it may have an “erotic” scene, or even several scenes, does NOT make it the same as a sex story in my opinion. It is also true that these “nonsex” stories sometimes have a disproportionate popularity. I would really hate to see sex stories become the redheaded stepchildren in their own awards.
If a story is erotic, it should be allowed. If a story is not erotic, it should not be allowed. You all are making this more complicated than it has to be!
The Clitorides Awards are for erotic stories. Period. The Clitorides should only go to EROTIC stories.
So what is erotic? The people commenting in this post seem to be debating “what is erotic?”. Some here might think the Bible is erotic. Some might think the latest Clancy novel is erotic. That’s a matter of opinion, just like I might think the latest Dan Brown novel is comedy (he meant to make it that bad, right? That has to be a joke! :P)
But I think that an erotic story should be considered any story that focuses on sex as its primary theme. Even a story with few if any sex scenes described: if sex is the dominant theme, the story is erotic.
Let me ask you this. The Godfather. Great book, right? Even better movies. And in the book especially, there’s a lot of sex. Does that make it qualify as an erotic novel? No. Because the primary theme is violence/criminality. That book falls into the genre of “mafia” or “crime” or “thriller”. Maybe something else. But erotica? With sex as the theme? Never.
Let’s look at Braveheart, another book turned movie. Again, there is sex. But would you describe either the movie or the book as erotica? Was sex the theme of either? No.
And bookstores and libraries are dominated with “Romance” sections that don’t always include erotic novels. When Romance is the predominant theme, it is no longer an erotic novel, necessarily. Just like when a sci-fi story is dominated with sex, it is no longer considered a sci-fi story, but an erotic one. There a TON of stories on SOL like this: great sci-fi tales that would NEVER be considered as science fiction by the sci-fi community; they would consider those stories as “smut”. Or “romance”. Or “tawdry”. In other words: erotica.
Stories that are erotica can be mysteries. Or science fiction. Or fantasy, or contemporary, or literature (O?), or romance. Whatever. What makes a novel erotic is its theme. When sex is the theme, a story is erotica.
So should non-sex stories be allowed to receive the Clitorides Award? No. Absolutely not. A comedy should not be allowed to win Best Drama at the Academy Awards, even if the movie in question had a dramatic element. And I highly doubt you’ll find a romance-themed story in the “Best Mystery Stories 2008” anthology. I buy and read all of those, btw, every year: the Best Mystery one, the best Romance one, the Best Sci-Fi one. They’re always what I expect: amazing compilations of amazing works by amazing writers… and all of them with the themes I expect from the title.
If there was a “Best Erotica 2008” I would be really mad to discover that non-erotic stories were included in such an anthology. Even if the editor said in the forward, “We consider erotica to be any story that has sex in it…”
The Clitorides Awards should go to erotic stories. Only.
Erotic stories have sex as the theme. Only these should qualify. If your favorite SOL.net story is focused more on romance, or sci-fi, or mystery? Great! Nominate the story to relevant sites. But if the Clitorides Awards are supposed to promote erotica, then the theme of all winners should be erotic.
When a sex is an afterthought in a story it is not an erotic story. Goodfellas was not a romance just because the main character fell in love and got married.
shannon
As an author, and one who has had his work nominated in the past, I would hate to think that suddenly my work, in which the sex tends to be peripheral at best, would no longer be eligible for nomination.
At the same time, it is tricky explaining to people who I would like to share my successes with what a ‘Clitorides’ is…
In the end, I write because I need to, and the emails I get from readers are all the recognition I need, but it would feel odd being excluded because someone decided that these awards couldn’t outgrow their origins, as the site itself obviously has.
I think that since the nominating period is halfway over we should move on and let Lazeez and the other chosen moderators decide what to do for this year. I think any further delay will make any decision they reach moot anyway unless they decided to purge existing nominations.
I think the decision to keep the clitoride awards as awards for erotic literature is best. Let the readers define what is erotic. Jefferson had some good comments as did Autumn Writer and others. A story should only be accepted for nomination in one category. If a story is nominated in more than one category then the author should be given the privilege of deciding which category it should remain in.
I think in future years we as a community might want to tighten up the categories. Wizard made an excellent observation as to there being a “Coming of Age” category. I think some categories that we have are not categories of erotic literature but categories of literature and need to be dropped or combined. But again, these are projects for the future. Maybe Lazeez could form a committee of some past winners to oversee this.
What’s the problem, the author has already desided for us. If the story is listed as no-sex by the author, then respect their choice for it to be concidered a non erotic story. Being no-sex or non erotic means that it is not eligable for the GC Award. That is the authors choice and not ours. Respect it.
Should there be an award for the non erotic writer? I think there should be. Put that is something that has to be worked on in the future. As for now…
No-Sex stories as desided by the author should not be concidered.
Now that I have put my two cents in I will leave.
John Q
From Aidan McGill
Basically, you’re asking whether we approve of a form of censorship – whether we think that your judgement (or that of a faceless committee) should determine whether stories gain access to these awards.
There are two major questions here.
The first is “what is erotic”? Is it the same as sexy? Is it the same as pornographic? Is a first kiss erotic? What about cuddling or putting on sunscreen lotion? What about a solo description of a young woman shaving her legs, or getting dressed? Well, my opinion is it can all be erotic. In my personal opinion, I’d much rather read those types of stories than ones about sadism, rape, torture and snuff – which I do not find at all arousing, but which are certainly eligible by your classifications. Erotica is not necessarily the same as pornography, and there’s a huge gradation between. Erotica need not be explicit – it can be implicit, and acts other than the sex act can still involve the senses in an erotic manner.
The second point is that many authors write some stores involving sex and some that don’t. Do you want to try to handicap them by banning some of their work from consideration in some areas (best author, best new author, etc.)?
I know I’m stretching terms just a little by using the term “censorship”, but not by much. The erotic literature movement has been asking to be considered equally as valid as mainstream literature. Now you want to introduce reverse discrimination? It’s just as ethically and morally slippery as reverse discrimination in employment, child custody, or any other field.
I say let the readers vote. If an author of a story that could qualify as mainstream literature wins, and is happy to have his or her story bear the “Clitorides” imprimatur, then good could come of it in many ways, and I can think of no harm it would do.
so long as there is *SOME* sexual and/or erotic (they are not necessarily the same thing) content in a story it should be allowed. purely NONSEXUAL and NON EROTIC stories should be excluded from these particular awards.
with that being said, how about a practical example: “greenies” by al steiner is typically regarded as a purely science fiction story with “no sex”, however it it would be “eligible” according to the previous paragraph as it does contain *SOME*.. not much, but enough, IMHO, to be considered.
johnq said… “What’s the problem, the author has already desided for us. If the story is listed as no-sex by the author, then respect their choice for it to be concidered a non erotic story.”
The problem is a “no-sex” tag does not equal a “non-erotic” story. Another detail is the Golden Clitorides are not limited to stories on StoriesOnline.net but open to any freely available work. Many venues do not require a “no-sex” tag or even any tag at all.
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