Erotica as Commentary

[MrPixel]

Social commentary in erotica? I do it every once in a while, though it's softened by burying the issues in the characters living their lives.

To wit:

• Libertine FC's birth control fails in a rowdy dare game with two casual male acquaintances. Much difficulty seeking an abortion in a state that recently passed restrictions. Plus the procedure goes awry, almost killing her.
• Hotel bar commissions nude statue for public display. Company owner and his lawyer brace themselves for community outrage at the "art".
• A polyamory situation goes viral, eliciting positive and especially negative public response, including national press.
• Café/bar employee is pressured by conservative church leader into pursuing sexual harassment charges over "revealing" waitress uniforms. He is discovered to be a pedophile.
• Hotel employee seeks bosses' counsel over a suspected father/daughter incest situation.

Only once did I get pushback in comments, over an overt comment by the MMC to his female friends proximate to the abortion scenario, "Be careful who you vote for, as there is misogyny at the highest levels now."

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

All right y'all, I figured I'd just ask, since I've been thinking about this all weekend. Do you ever - or do you think it's possible - for good erotica to also be good commentary or satire on society? If so, what does that look like?

I don't know if it counts as commentary, bit in the face of all the negativity the transgender community faces in todays society, I go out of my way to write stories full of love and acceptance, offering, I hope, a vision of how the world should, could, and someday will be.

 

[AwkwardMD]

Everything I've published in the last 5+ years is saying something about something. Pushback is not uncommon.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

Do you ever - or do you think it's possible - for good erotica to also be good commentary or satire on society? If so, what does that look like?

I had that very same question too, and then I realized I've been doing it to an extent. Now, I pulled the curtain and decided to actually do social commentary.

If Marquis de Sade used erotica to satirize the French society of his lifetime, why wouldn't you? Erotica might be the best genre for it.