weeeeoooo I swear I could hear this post calling to me lol
Yes. I assume they are occurring at an equal rate amongst a lot of less popular stories as well, but we probably don’t notice. With the popular stories that are promoted and / or purchased by Episode, it’s a lot easier to notice them.
I’ve been trying (and failing) to come up with a catchall term for these tropes besides “toxic” and “problematic” because there’s been a larger cultural shift where both those terms have become buzzwords, and therefore their intended meaning has been diluted. “Toxic” has come to mean “doesn’t agree with or enable me,” so those of us who criticize this type of content get told we’re being toxic lol. And “problematic” has become a stand-in for “thats how the world works, honey, everyone is problematic,” so those of us who criticize this type of content can be painted as irrational and “overly sensitive.” There are plenty of things that are problematic and can be addressed / corrected with a deeper analysis. But there are also plenty of things where people should just fxckin know better!! And the tropes were talking about here generally fall into the latter category.
One of the worst parts is the response from authors when you criticize these things. Even if you give them the benefit of the doubt and try to point out how harmful these tropes are, the response usually rangers from ignoring to “it’s just a story” to straight up mocking people for their concerns. If someone truly didn’t know better (and this is probably the case sometimes) and said, “thanks for pointing that out to me. I acknowledge that I’ve caused harm by using this trope and I am sorry. I will correct it and do better in the future” and actually does do better in the future, that’s a lot different than dismissing people’s concerns.
I think some of these tropes, especially SA used as a plot device, are used because the LIs are actually…not very likeable. If your LI is always a douche and demeaning the MC, you have to have some kind of “redeeming quality” right? So if the LI saves the MC from some random (always ugly) creep sexually assaulting her, you’re now supposed to believe deep down that he’s a good guy. While you should intervene as a passerby if you see someone being assaulted or harassed, it shouldn’t be the first time you’ve done the right thing or the first “nice” thing you do. These LIs also give off the impression that they only intervened because it was the MC & any other woman (who never compares to the MC lol) would have been left on their own.
Piggybacking off of that, I think a lot of the tropes you mention go hand in hand. LI is controlling and jealous - he doesn’t want MC but no one else can “have” her (ick); LI blackmails MC or kidnaps her, etc. all those things could make the LI not likeable, so that’s where the SA plot device comes in. Then the LI and MC bone and were supposed to believe that some major character development has happened even though a) the LI acts exactly the same except now he calls the MC “baby” and b) no one should be traumatized for the sake of some manbaby’s half-a$$ed character development. Also, not everyone needs to be a damn hero. Most of us go our whole lives without ever directly saving someone from immediate danger and we’re still capable of having healthy relationships and growing as people. If you do want someone to be a hero, have them get MC’s cat down from a tree or catch their coffee before it spills on the ground. Now you have a fun circumstance where the LI and MC have a shared memory to reflect on & you can show the characters actually connecting to each other while no one is traumatized in the process.
There’s a popular K&T winner with 2 separate instances of sexual assault / attempted SA within a few chapters of each other and the impact is brushed off as either “well, that’s just what happens” or “I didn’t actually get raped so let’s just forget about it” and it’s very disappointing. Which leads me to…
I mean, yeah. I think some of the language like “promotes” and “uses excessive” is kind of vague and as long as authors say “well, no one is specifically saying (for example) sexual assault is a good thing, actually” they can include a lot of harmful content. But I think the biggest thing is enforcing the guidelines equilaterally. There are definitely things I’ve seen in stories where I’m like ??? How did that pass review??? I don’t know the thought process there. But I don’t have any control over what any episode team does. So I agree with @amberose that a lot of probably will just come down to the community continuing to speak out and hope that people will listen.