Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Fun with Polls WHAM warnings - would you be happy with this?

In the 'Would Alt-Clark kill himself' thread, the conversation strayed a little off-topic, as it frequently does, to the subject of warnings for WHAMmy stories. We have some authors who are reluctant to post what they feel are spoilers for their stories, believing that these reduce the dramatic impact, although they are willing to do it for the sake of those readers who are unhappy with the idea of encountering serious WHAMs without a warning. There are readers who prefer not to read, or are wary of, stories with serious WHAMs, and appreciate being given a warning so that they can choose whether to read the story or not, or wait until it's complete. And then there are readers who are happy to take what comes and hate being spoiled in any way.

How can these different views be accommodated? Thus far, the practice - out of courtesy - has been for authors to include a WHAM warning, and sometimes a 'fixing the toys' promise, at the start of their story. But this, while seen as a much-appreciated courtesy by some, is a clear spoiler to others.

(I should add that, while this practice is far from mandatory - though I suspect some readers wish it were - it is customary on the Archive for deathfics - stories where either Lois or Clark dies - to be labelled as such).

Once, Tank used a separate thread for his WHAM warning, simply telling readers that it was there and they could read or not read as they wished. That was less of a spoiler for those readers who didn't want to be spoiled, though the mere existence of that thread told them that there was something WHAMmy in the story.

So here's a different idea. You may be aware that there is already a Tank Warning thread stickied to the top of the fanfic folder. What if we created a WHAM warning thread in both Fanfic and nFanfic, and authors posting stories with WHAMs could post their WHAM warning in there - or ask someone else to post it for them, so that their name appearing in that thread didn't offer a spoiler for any reader who didn't want to be spoiled. I'm sure a means could be worked out, too, whereby the story title didn't need to be in the subject-line.

The question is, of course, whether readers would actually check warnings threads like these. So please vote, and post to tell us what you think!


Wendy

I've checked the 'hate' option, although that is putting things a bit strongly.

As a courtesy, I would put warnings on a story for others, but I have to say that I don't like doing so. Equally, overall I think I'd prefer not to be warned about content in other people's stories.

So, yes, a WHAM thread sounds like a very good idea to me.

Chris

I think other applies to me. I may be out of the loop, but I'm not sure that there's such a problem with the current way of doing things that this is a necessary addition. It seems like an unneeded encumbrance to me.

But I could be entirely misreading the situation as, admittedly, I don't often visit the fanfic folder these days and so I'm not really up to speed with current trends. So, really, my opinion isn't worth much on this one.

There's also the matter of TOCs, as mentioned in one of the options. I don't mind updating/making TOCs for stories - but having to check WHAM warning threads and add them in - I'm not sure I'd have the necessary time for that addition to the workload. Although, I guess it would depend on how many stories it affected each week.


LabRat

Ah, but I can't see any reason why the WHAM warning would have to be added to the ToC, Rat - after all, that would kind of defeat the object. If there's a link to the WHAM warning thread in the ToC, then a reader who didn't want to be spoiled... would end up spoiled.

As to whether it's a problem or not, a few people did raise it as a kind of niggle in the previous poll thread. Readers and authors said they'd accepted the status quo because some readers needed it and they felt it was a small price to pay for courtesy to those readers - but they still wished there was another way around it which would please everyone.


Wendy

Excellent idea.

IMHO, this "wham thread" option accomodates both reader types.

Those among us who don't want to be spoilt by a warning can enjoy unbidden.

Those among us who prefer a warning can always check the thread before taking on a new story.

Just my thoughts,
Ankit

EDIT: Also, I think, if and when this policy is implemented, everyone should be informed via email or something one is bound to notice (if possible)...

I was referring to the first option in your poll, Wendy:

So..this isn't an option on the table, then?

LabRat

Ah! Sorry, I misunderstood! At the moment, some authors also put their WHAM warnings in the ToC, which is why I included that. If you look at the ToC for Yvonne's Clark Kent, This Is Your Life, you'll see the warning included there.

But with the proposal of a WHAM warning thread there would be no need for a WHAM warning to be included anywhere other than in the warning thread. Readers could check there to see whether a story they were about to start reading had a warning posted about it or not. So, again, readers who didn't want a warning wouldn't be spoiled by the ToC or the start of the story. In other words, no ToC would contain any mention of WHAM warnings.


Wendy

And, maybe the TOC folder can also have a copy of the wham warning thread STICKIE

Ah, I see. One of the few authors who does her own TOC these days. See? Out of the loop.

I think you've just hit the nail on the head of why I'm dubious about this one, Anks. Yes, it does suit the readers. But what about the authors? I think I'd find myself uncomfortable with a definite rule that says authors must provide warnings on their stories. Whether it's on the story itself or in a specific thread.

It's the idea of making this a fast and firm rule which authors must obey that's bothering me, I think. Rather than leaving it up to personal choice and the discretion of the author. There are authors who don't like providing warnings, as Wendy says in her introduction to the poll. But none of the options in the poll cater for this - i.e. "No, I don't want to have to post warnings - I want to make it my choice."

Actually, I think the real problem for me is that I just really don't believe in warnings. Period. They offend me deeply. <g>

I'm sure I'm in the minority on this one though - so you can safely ignore my rambling on it and work out a solution that best suits everyone else.

LabRat

Yeah, I think the reason some authors dislike the present convention, Rat, is that - like you - they don't like having to provide warnings or reassurances at all. But, over time, we've come to recognise that if we don't give WHAM warnings there'll be complaints.

For instance, when I posted For The Greater Good, I didn't want to include any comment about the way the story would turn out. But I knew very well that if I didn't offer a reassurance that Clark wouldn't die I'd lose lots of readers. So I included the reassurance - and was proved right by the number of readers who stated firmly that they wouldn't have read the story had I not provided that assurance. Likewise, just this last week when I started to post A Twist of Fates I had a specific question directed at me about the outcome I intended to offer - and I felt obliged to offer reassurance.

Likewise, I remember Lynn, when starting to post Haunting Eden, being pushed quite hard to be more specific about the general WHAM warning she'd decided voluntarily, out of courtesy, to include.

So, while these warnings are't mandatory, they seem to be expected, whether or not authors like the idea of giving spoilers for their stories. As Tank said in the other thread - quoting from a couple of separate posts here:


So I'm just wondering whether the idea of a separate warning thread might be a compromise wherein writers could still abide by convention but not give such a blatant spoiler. No-one is suggesting making it a firm rule, though! Posting a warning is and would remain voluntary - though, as Tank said, most of us do it, for the reasons he cites.


Wendy

I don't think that providing a thread to document wham warnings necessarily makes it mandatory for authors to post there. It still remains optional, so far as I can see.

Yvonne

I kind of like WHAM warnings when the authors post simply because I think of them as reading a book jacket or the back of a movie box. When I open up a James Patterson book, I like knowing beforehand, okay this one's about a serial killer, and this one's about bombing cities...etc.

I'm not so much a fan of the reassurance lines telling me that everything's going to get 'fixed' in the end. I think that's a bigger spoiler than anything else. The whole point of reading is to find out whether or not something's going to turn out the way I expect. Otherwise, if you tell me, for example, someone's getting shot in this story, but everything will be okay in the end...it kind of defeats the purpose of me reading it, other than just enjoying the author's writing style and characters. It's like watching the movie Titanic. The boat sinks.

That being said, I think a thread for WHAM warnings is fine.

JD

JD, for people like you, a reassurance ruins the story because you read to find out what happens. That reminds me of my husband, who feels cheated if someone tells him which team wins when he hasn't seen his videotape of the game yet.

OTOH, people like me read to find out how it happens. We're the ones who watch the videotape after we know who won because we want to find out how our team managed to snatch a win away from the other guys. But if I know we lost, I won't watch. I don't need to live through a depressing outcome--in a game or in a story.

However, knowing the outcome is good doesn't seem to stop me from being tense or frightened or heartbroken while I read through it, so I don't think authors should assume that a WHAM warning or a reassurance causes loss of suspense or dramatic impact for all readers. Maybe some of us stress over stories more than others do, and we need to know that things will eventually work out okay to bring the suspense down to a manageable level.

In any case, to accommodate readers like me who take depressing stories too much to heart as well as readers who feel that WHAM warnings or reassurances cause too much loss of suspense, a WHAM thread seems like a reasonable compromise.

Chris said it best for me.

A WHAM warning thread would a very good idea, Thanks for the idea, Wendy

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

Yes! A WHAM thread would be great. This would definitely get me reading installments again instead of waiting for the completed story at the archive. After several major disappointments I too stopped reading in the fanfic folder. My time is too precious to waste it on reading stories that make me go

I became a fan of a TV series that was witty and sassy and gave me a loving couple, slowly growing into friendship and true love. Something that is very rarely seen on screen these days. If I want promiscuity, beheadings and the likes I can tune in to a dozen series or just sit back and watch the news.

Personally, I don't mind reading death fics; depends on how well-written they are. Lois has to die sometime, so that is only a natural thing to happen. Or, the next encounter with Kryptonite can be fatal to Clark and Lois is left alone. Not a problem. It could happen. They can experience heartbreak e.g. stay childless, lose a child, whatever. As long as it's the normal disasters that can befall any other couple, I can take it.

I just don't want to read stories about our L&C universe where Lois is married to Luthor or Dan or Ching and Clark to Lana. I don't want to read stories where Lois beats her child to a pulp or AltClark commits suicide. Really, for me that is just one bridge too far.

Now, in an Elseworld, that's a different piece of cake. In an Elseworld I can stomach anything, as long as its a believable premise and the story is well written. Loises and Clarks in other Universes can marry Luthor, Lana and Scardino to their hearts content and have other professions too. I've read really great fics, full of Whams, doing just that and they are amongst my favorite stories.

As a writer, I can write whatever I want; as a reader, I must have the right to choose. That's why printed books have flaps and you can check the premise of a movie in your TV guide. Why deny FoLC that right? Some of us want to read only WAFFy, feel-good stories; others live for mayhem and disaster; some don't care about next-gen stories. So what? To each his/her own!

So, yes, please, give us saps a warning thread, please!

End of rant!

Ursie

It's interesting that a few people are comparing wham warnings to the blurb on book covers, because I never thought of them like that before. I can see where you're coming from; there are certainly parallels. However, I've always thought of a wham warning as a notice that bad or violent stuff is going to happen in this story, and that it will likely happen to one of the main characters. Book covers, on the other hand - and I've just checked a few at random from my bookshelves - appear to set the scene for the reader and pose a few unanswered questions to which you can only find the answers by reading the book. They're there as a teaser; as a sales tool, really. They don't, so far as I've seen, tell you specifically that a rape, murder, character death etc is going to happen.

I think the book cover parallel works best with writers' introductions; most of us give them, although we don't necessarily use them to set the scene for the reader. Often they're used to inject a personal note - why we wrote the story, for example, or to thank the people who assisted in the writing of the story.

Perhaps it would be nice to start a tradition of book cover style intros as well as wham warnings. Nothing obligatory, of course, although it's just occurred to me that the archive requires some sort of intro, so it's something most writers will have to do at some point anyway. What do people think?

Yvonne

I'm wondering if this dialog hasn't become somewhat of a 'tempest in a teapot'.

When I made mention of the board 'conventions' in the other thread it was mostly just to point out that there was more to consider in writing a story about altClark killing himself than just the character aspect of whether he could or not. There was also the consideration as to how such a story would be received. I never intended for it to become an issue in and of itself.

Like Labby I'm not a fan of warnings or labels because I see them as a form of censorship which is something I'm not generally for... but, as I also said, I can understand the desire for such and have become comfortable with wishes of the majority. And I do think that it is the wish of the majority.

I guess my real question is... is this really a big problem now?

Tank Endings were originally conceived as a joke. They were never intended to stand as the 'real' ending of a story (unless is was a short vignette designed to be 'evil fun'). They were merely a wink and a nod pause in a story put there to give the gentle reader a little tweak of the nose. Still, they engendered a great deal of negative responses from those who felt they spoiled their enjoyment of the story. So, the Tank Ending warnings were born.

But, nobody writes Tank Endings anymore. The concept has run it's course and don't seem to hold any interest for writers anymore, and that's fine. So, is this 'concern' over wham warnings a signal that there are suddenly some writers out there who want to explore darker themes? Is this just the beginning of another story fad?

Over the last year or so there have only been a handful of stories that have included wham warnings, and some of them probably didn't really need them. Are we looking at a sudden increase in stories that need warnings? As Wendy mentions, warnings aren't some hard and fast rule, but are merely an act of consideration for the general readership. I guess I have to wonder if the writers who have, or might wish to write stories to the left of 'happily ever after' really feel too constricted by the board conventions?

As a writer I don't necessarily like it idea of a pre-post warning on one of my stories, but one also has to 'know your audience'.

Truthfully I don't really care one way or the other whether or not a 'wham warning header' is brought into being or not. But is complicating the reading and writing process of fanfics by adding another step to the process needed? Maybe it is? I don't know how much work would be involved in such a move but I wouldn't want to burden some member of the board administration with creating something that would get very little use (ie: Tank Endings)

Tank (who probably should have spent this much time on a story rather than a response thread to a poll )

Tank, I have to say I agree with (most <G>) of what you say here.

Like you, I'm still less than sure that this is such a huge problem that it requires a solution. Of any kind. Rather than the status quo that's been working just fine up till now, far as I can tell.

I am a little sad to hear that authors feel constrained to provide warnings to avoid censure or 'complaints' from readers who want them. I know most of us want to make life easy for ourselves, but it just seems wrong somehow to be forced into it. And is it by a majority? I wonder about that too. I get the impression actually that the majority of readers don't care about warnings either way.

That said, thanks, Wendy, for the clarification that this wouldn't be mandatory. Bottom line, if we're talking here about a WHAM warning thread where authors who desire to warn readers can put a warning without feeling it's spoiling their story, then that's just fine and dandy with me. I probably wouldn't use it myself, but if it fills a need for other authors and readers, all to the good.

Any misgivings I'd have would be with making it a firm rule that it must be used. Since that doesn't seem to be what's being proposed here, I don't really have a problem with it.

I do wonder though...just as an philosophical aside...where do we draw the line here? I personally don't enjoy reading fanfic about Lois being pregnant or 'kid fic' - they just don't suit my tastes. Should we have a Pregnancy/Children warning thread to warn me that a story might contain these elements so that I can avoid them?

I'm sure there must be other examples.

I'm just tossing this out for debate, but really when you consider it, such a warning thread would be just as valid as one for WHAMs. So, where do you stop? Do we fill the mbs completely with warnings for everything under the sun?

Or do others believe that there is a fundamental difference that makes WHAMs somehow separate and distinct from all other genres? Perhaps there is and I'm just missing it here. I know that I would put a warning on a story if it had significantly violent content - I did that with my gothic fairy tale. Perhaps WHAMs fall under the same umbrella.

Just thinking aloud here. <g> And, as usual, playing Devil's Advocate and ending up answering my own questions. Maybe.

LabRat

Tank asks whether darker stories are becoming more or less common - I haven't done any real analysis of this but I do know that some authors I BR for or talk to are finding themselves increasingly drawn towards darker themes. And finding the need to provide a WHAM warning as a result.

Anyway, I'm inclined to suggest that we could give the idea of a thread a try. If people then don't use it, we simply unsticky it and return to the status quo.


Wendy

Sounds like a plan to me. Go for it.

LabRat