Toxic and Problematic Themes In Popular Stories

And yes I did write on this thread first of all because I have seen a lot like it and the very reason why these threads were made In the first place. To help authors and readers see what they are doing wrong, not to be made to feel like my story is glorifying mental health, or that I have known all along there is a problem with my story I just haven’t fixed it. Because I haven’t.

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I really like them too. I feel like a decent amount of his pop culture analyses can apply to issues within popular Episode stories. I’ll link a couple others for people who haven’t seen them.

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With all due respect, I don’t think you get to decide what other people find triggering. There are MANY people on this thread who are in unanimous agreement with some topics and/or portrayals of themes they find problematic or disrespectful and it’s really not your place to tell them they’re “stifling” an author’s creative license when the concerns they have are beyond legitimate.

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I’m sorry but your story is triggering for me. That doesn’t mean something’s necessarily wrong with it, because as we said, Episode approved every chapter so that must mean it’s ok. It’s just that I have my triggers and I feel very uncomfortable reading SA scenes and stories of domestic violence. I don’t expect you, or any other author, to change their entire story just because it includes something that triggers me.

However…

Whilst I am not able to help you because of the severity of your subject matter, I would like to add that someone earlier in this thread did PM out of concern for their own story idea and wanted my opinion on whether I thought it was problematic. I just wanted to mention this because it shows that this thread did make at least one person more aware about how their story might have had potential to be viewed in a different way to what they intended. They didn’t say this thread made them feel like crap. They simply grew a concern that their story might be viewed in a problematic way and reached out to get some feedback/advice from me. I really respect anyone who can understand why this is important and who can take that step. As much as you say we should message authors privately, it can - and does - work both ways.

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Thank you for your reply, Yes I do believe as well it works both ways as well, Im really glad that someone else had reached out to you privately. Ok Im sorry about being paranoid. I do get like this especially when I have people sending me fan mail saying It should be taken down, Or I shouldn’t do this or that. It make me question it all.
Or for example if someone doesn’t want to review my story.

Yes! I found the comment. I don’t want to add fuel to the fire because I’m late with my response. However, I very much agree with this statement right here. I think this is where the problem starts with popular stories not including trigger warnings.

E.g: You decide that you want to write about an almost sexual assault scene, yeah? So, you ask some people that you know who’s been almost sexually assaulted. They tell you it’s fine, you don’t need a trigger warning. But, what happens when a SA survivor reads this content and it triggers them?

So, like Wiles said, nobody gets to dictate what is triggering to some and what isn’t triggering to others.


I’m not trying to attack.

But, I agree with Amber. I also agree with her not messaging you because of you how responded when people gave you constructive criticism. Certain content may not be triggering to you at all, but it doesn’t mean the next person who reads won’t be triggered.

One last thing: These topics especially one that address pivotal information about problematic stories are very much needed here in the episode community. Too many things are getting by in stories that shouldn’t be. So, if episode won’t do anything about it? Then it’s up for us (the vocal ones) to bring and spread awareness. We don’t call out stories by name unless the story is just downright ridiculous problematic.

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Toxic relationship /abuse it’s something I personally like to write about and I have a story which revolve around it, but I’d never show it in a positive way and the abuser would never be a love interest. If you decide to write about this you have to do a shitton of research because this thing is important to a lot of ppl. You can’t just display it as something “hot” or “steamy” because it’s really not. Everytime I see something like this is p*sses me off. I remember reading an old story and the LI told the MC she’s wearing revealing clothes only to tease him and I almost wrote an angry fanmail about it 🤦 sometimes ppl are writing about sensitive topics without knowing the facts and it’s hella annoying.

Regarding domestic violence, again, in my story I don’t try to make it look less bad then what it is simply because I don’t want to make these women’s reality seem more “light” and less difficult. So when you’re reading this type of stories before attacking the author pay attention to the trigger warnings. One of the reasons why I’m so scared to publish this story although I did a lot of research, one of my projects in English class was legit about it, and still, I’m afraid that people will say I’m ‘problematic’ because I’m writing about it. I think as long as you don’t show it as something good and the way relationship should look like, it’s fine.

Then again, people sometimes ignore trigger warning and then complain about it. Read them before you read the actual story. That’s all I have to say. Authors like to write about ‘dark’ things and real problems and the fact that some people are triggered by it shouldn’t stop them. Some of the comments here make it look like EVERY story that writes about toxic relationship and violence and contains triggering scenes is problematic. It’s really not. And not everyone are triggered by it.

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I agree with what you’re saying. I think that writers should be mindful of what they’re writing and put necessary warnings. If a reader chooses to read the scene still, then that would be on them because they proceeded out of their own volition.

I’m kind of confused about what this thread is about. Is it about addressing toxic and problematic themes or behavior in stories? Is it complaining about these type of things? Or is it about spreading awareness and showing why it’s toxic and a problem.

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Lmao I think it’s all xD I didn’t finish to read all of the comments here but I read some and I had to replay.

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A trope I don’t really like is forced drama. I can never understand why the MC goes back and listens to the person who made life harder. Like if this person was trying to take LI before, why would you listen to them now. This leads to scenes of where there’s conflict between LI and MC.

It’s a worthless conflict that’s built on misunderstandings. I get that some of things might happen, but it doesn’t feel realistic. If you don’t trust your partner and vice versa, is there even going to be any sort of healthy relationship? If your relationship isn’t healthy, it’ll affect your health and you might make unhealthy choices.

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In the OP, there are some questions about whether we’ve noticed these themes on stories and what, if anything, we think Episode should do about it. Part of that larger discussion is about the Episode guidelines banning promotion of certain topics while understanding that an author or reader doesn’t have to say explicitly “abuse is good” in order to send subliminal messages about what kind of problematic behaviors should be acceptable.

Most of us agreed that we have no control over what Episode does so we have to keep speaking about why it’s important to consider the impact a story or theme may have on people, regardless of one’s intentions. Since then, it’s been a larger discussion of trends and tropes that, at best, excuse and, at worst, glamorize dangerous and harmful behaviors, relationships, and viewpoints. So you could look at is as just discussion and raising awareness since at the end of the day, we’re just a bunch of people typing stuff on the internet.

But I will say many of the comments here do offer a well-developed analysis of why something is toxic or harmful, especially if it’s something that may not be obvious. Because while we do have a lot of valid frustration, we also do want people to recognise why these themes and tropes are so harmful and reconsider how they’re being portrayed in stories.

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That makes more sense. It was kind of confusing because of what happened above. Thank you though.

Hibiscus is on the money.

Part of the problem is that a lot of stories (sometimes for a handful of scenes, sometimes for the entire story) need to ask themselves: is what I’m showing really necessary?

We’ve all heard of trauma porn, right? Nothing to do with actual pornography; it’s essentially just talking about the commodification of pain, though there’s layers to the term. Going off the idea that just about anything that handles dark themes is supposedly spreading awareness, it could be overlooked, but neither of them really should be. And I think people writing dark subjects often write what comes down to trauma porn on Episode - regardless of good intent or bad intent.

In that case, trigger warnings aren’t enough. I’m not against darker themes, but the thing is: I also haven’t seen more than a handful of stories on Episode (and that’s being generous) that can handle dark subject matter being their main plot well or that actually seem to spread awareness. Not even close. And the ones I’m thinking of don’t actually advertise themselves as x mental health story or as spreading awareness of y. So it’s worth bringing up that a lot of stories broaching dark subjects can be more harmful than anyone likes to admit and that critics aren’t just being hypersensitive or painting everything with the “toxic” brush willy-nilly.

If what’s been brought up throughout the thread hits a sore spot in you as an author, you really need to take a step back as to why that is. I can’t help if someone takes my criticisms of various tropes as a personal attack against them, and I won’t refrain just because somebody might either. Even with stories I hate and am indeed thinking of while writing analysis, it still isn’t just any one story doing these things. Anything I’ve brought up in this thread, I’ve seen many times over.

This is more of a pet peeve, but I don’t understand why people at various points assume we ignore trigger warnings and then come here to complain: if you actually read the replies given, I’m sure we mention how we won’t read x stories if we believe it will cause that kind of harm to ourselves. I personally will actually read something potentially harmful if I feel I need to report it, but that’s about it. The thing is: a lot of the problematic themes that have been discussed so far have to do with themes that are harmful but don’t get a trigger warning - either out of author negligence or simply because it’s not blatantly harmful. And at least half of the tropes don’t need a trigger warning; it’s more that they’re harmful in culturally influential ways.

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I wanted to respond to this point because last week I reviewed a story for someone. They had a lot of violence/torture scenes in several episodes and I told them it would be a good idea to add a TW. In a later episode, at the very beginning, they actually did have one. It read:

Trigger warning for this episode

That was literally all it said. And so I told them that in addition to adding a warning for earlier episodes, they should actually explain what that particular warning is for. They replied and told me that they felt like it was obvious when they scene came up (it was a flashback where the MC got bullied) that the bullying scene was what the TW was for and that they didn’t want to say what the TW was for earlier because it would be a spoiler :neutral_face: In your post, you say to pay attention to the TWs before attacking the author. These scenes didn’t trigger me, but I don’t think it’s fair to imply people who are triggered by something must just not have read the trigger warnings. If that’s not what you meant then I’m sorry for misunderstanding but that’s how I interpreted your post. As I said to someone else earlier, it does work both ways. Whilst there are readers who simply don’t read a TW, there are also authors who think TWs will spoil the plot and so don’t include one at all.

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I won’t mention the name of this story because it’s very popular but basically the main characters were using their mind control powers to get people to sleep with them. When I saw this I was shocked tbh and I was surprised that it hadn’t been talked about. It gave me bad vibes and I haven’t really been able to read the story since.

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God… horrible. I assume it isn’t done by someone we’re supposed to view as a villain? Violation of consent done by main characters is such a kick to the stomach.

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Oh… I didn’t know authors simply write just “trigger warning” I assumed everyone explain what the trigger warning is about because that’s what I saw in most stories. It’s not okay not to include trigger warning, but I know people sometimes complain about stories that contain sensitive / violence scene simply because they don’t like it. So they just call the story “problematic” and that’s it… but yeah I agree not explaining the exact triggers is messed up as well.

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Well, you’re not really solving the problem here. It’d be better to say the name and report it than allowing it to stay up and allow other authors to use this an inspiration. I also belive you worded that incorrectly, you won’t report it because it’s popular is just implyinh you would report it if it wasn’t, that was a slip-up, I believe you needed to catch. Why allow such a foul story to stay on the app? Is it because you don’t want to discredit the author. Popular stories with problematic themes need to be checked the most.

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I agree. Readers here and there want something that’s a little out there. I’m not saying that authors that use some of these themes are bad, trust me there’s authors out there that have skyrocketed for their amazing writing. Most of the time it’s just taken to a different level that’s just out of this world. Episode should consider being a bit stricter in managing them but not too much. This is my personal opinion, you don’t have to agree if you don’t want to.

About trigger warnings, please please add them! And also please explain what they’re for, since if you just say “trigger warning,” that could mean so many things. It being a spoiler/interruption/whatever isn’t an excuse. Though I will say I’ve been seeing a lot more trigger warnings (when needed, of course) than I have ever before in many types of media, including Episode of course, which is great :slightly_smiling_face:

If you’re portraying a serious issue in your story, do it with care, respect, and do not just use it as a plot device for characters to fall in love or whatever. And make sure to indicate to your readers that whatever problematic behaviors you included are not okay.

I definitely think Episode should do a better job at dealing with these kinds of stories. I was excited about the new guidelines because they felt like progress, but they could be enforced a lot more. I don’t read featured stories often, but I go through the forum threads and I see so much problematic content in a lot of them, too, which is even worse in a way because it makes it seem almost like Episode is promoting these kinds of storylines.

Didn’t proofread this so I hope what I wrote is understandable;;

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