Hellooo, everybody!
I am breaking down the ten worst problematic tropes in fiction.
Fiction isn't designed to be delicate. We write about death, bloodshed, heartbreak and suffering. Stories are
here to explore the darkest sides of humanity. That's what makes them intense and gripping.
But we can do this without being directly harmful to our audience. A problematic trope is not a trope
that’s too dangerous or scandalous. It doesn't make the writer coole or edgy. A problematic
trope is a plot device that perpetuates harmful stereotypes that are an actual problem in the real world.
Basically, you're taking a harmful belief that really hurts people, and you're giving it
your seal of approval, whether knowingly or not. This is not about coddling your audience.
Hell, I've got a slit throat and a post mortem c-section in the first five pages of my book.
And it's a romance!
But people absorb what they experience, they emulate media. And reading is no exception.
So while it's important to be creative, and to tell the story that you're passionate about,
it's also important to be mindful of the messages that you're conveying to your audience. Because
your audience will absolutely internalize them. Honestly, all the tropes on this list should be
really easy to avoid, and they shouldn't be at all shocking. But I'm sure there'll be plenty of
angry people in the comments, because after all, common sense ain't common.
Let me know which trope you hate the most in the comment below.
(The sound of a pen scratching. LOGO.)
Before I get started, I have BIG news.
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If you like dark fantasy romance, with lots of bloodshed
and violence, with a super healthy forbidden romance, and with a really fun diverse cast,
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Don't forget to subscribe to my channel. I post new videos on Wednesdays,
and if you wanna be alerted as SOON as I upload, ring that bell. And now we're diving into the ten
worst problematic tropes in fiction. A couple disclaimers: this is not an exhaustive list.
I actually wrote a list of twenty-five problematic tropes before I decided, maybe I need to rein this
in here. Basically these ten tropes are just a fraction of what I've come up with and I'm not
saying they are the worst of the worst. They are just a segment of the pool I developed. This will
most likely be a multi-video list, so stay tuned in the future for more episodes. Additionally,
if it wasn't obvious this entire video is going to be filled with triggers. I will be
talking about bigotry, sexism, homophobia, sexual assault, TERFS, ableism, I could go on. If this is
triggering for you, I completely understand. Maybe skip this video, or save it for a time when you're
in a better headspace. Number One (1): Bury Your Gays. The Gays trope is when LGBTQ+ characters are
seen as more expendable than straight characters. Overall queer characters are more likely to
die than straight characters in media. Often they're the only characters to die in the story,
and quite often it's a direct result of their queerness. Obviously this is problematic,
because queer people throughout history have been killed for being queer. So perpetuating the system
of punishment in your fiction is incredibly harmful. Now some people hear this and think
“What the fuck? Who am I allowed to kill then?” Which seems really weird outta context. Fiction,
particularly speculative fiction, often includes copious amounts of murder. But you can do this
without perpetuating harmful tropes. Say you have a cast of ten characters. Nine of them
are straight, and one of them is gay. If you only kill the gay character, that sends a very specific
message, don't you think? Even if you were to kill a straight character alongside of them,
it doesn't matter because you literally killed off your entire queer representation. But say
you haven't got the ten characters and five of them are straight, whereas five of them are
queer. If you were to then kill one gay character and one straight character, it sends a completely
different message. There are still plenty of gay characters living and thriving. Plus you treated
your straight cast in the same fashion. Number Two (2): Dubious consent. The character said no,
but their eyes said yes. The character resisted, but they ultimately enjoyed it.
The character told them to stop, but they fell victim to seduction. Dubious consent is not sexy.
It just makes the scene gross and uncomfortable. If that's what you're going for, then you nailed
it. But if you want to create a romantic saucy scene, this is absolutely not the way to go.
Sexual assault is a huge problem for people of all genders. And because of the way it's regarded,
a lot of sexual assault survivors don't feel comfortable speaking up or going to the
police. Writing dubious consent as desirable only further perpetuates this very unhealthy narrative.
It's triggering for survivors to read, and it normalizes a really fucked up idea of what sex
is supposed to be like. Remember writers, arousal is not consent. Number Three (3): The token black
character, and the black character dies first. I put these two together because they come down
to a common denominator. These characters are included so the writer can say “Here you go!
I did it. I wrote a Black character. Where are my diversity points?” The token black character is a
lone black character among a sea of white folks. They don't have any lines, they don't contribute
much to the story, and if they do, it's just to motivate the MC. The black character dies first
is another throwaway character that only exists to be the first fatality. In both of these situations
the character only exists so the writer has proof that someone who wasn't white exists in the book.
Except in the first example, that someone has zero agency. And in the second example, that someone is
just cannon fodder. This is problematic because it's dehumanizing. Writers are relegating people
of color into these roles because they don't know what else to do with them. If you're shoehorning
in a character of color and you don't know how to write them as a multi-dimensional human being,
then this is probably a good time for introspection and education. It shouldn't
be hard to humanize a character who's literally a human being. Number Four (4): Fridging a woman. To
fridge a woman means to kill a female character, usually a wife or a girlfriend, in order to
motivate a male character or advance his hero's journey. Now plenty of characters are killed to
advance the plot, but fridging a woman is a wee bit different. The female character is reduced
to a plot device. Her sole purpose is to die a painful death so the male character can become
a hero. See? Her death was totally worth it! This trope is problematic because it reinforces
misogynistic stereotypes that exist in our world today. A woman's duty is to fuel and motivate men,
and ultimately their disposable This is a mindset that has gotten women abused, subjugated, and
murdered for centuries. Perpetuating it in fiction isn't going to help us at all. So how do you avoid
this trope? Maybe don't kill a girlfriend or a wife in order to advance a man's plot. That sounds
like an obvious solution. If you do have to kill a female character, give her an actual character.
If you can't, maybe don't write women at all. Number Five (5): Inspiration porn. Inspiration
porn refers to a disabled or neurodivergent character who exists to inspire the reader. Wow,
look how challenging their existence is. Don't their struggles make you appreciate your life?
The problem with inspiration porn is once again it's dehumanizing. Disabled people are regular
normal people, living regular normal lives. This may shock you, but my fiance is disabled and
he shits and pisses like everyone else. This may shock you, but I'm neurodivergent, and look at me!
Don’t I make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Look, we’re just trying to live lives,
we do not exist to inspire you. We exist to better ourselves. Avoiding this trope, like
all the others, is pretty easy to do. Just write these characters as multi-dimensional human beings
with diverse traits like everyone else. Last time I checked Cliff wasn't defined by his cane. Number
Six (6): The dead trans character. Are they a sex worker? I have a feeling they're a sex worker.
I read a lot of books and watch a lot of TV, and typically when there's a trans character present,
they die. And nine times out of ten, they're a sex worker. No shade to sex workers. But
depicting an entire group of people solely in this light, especially a light that's already
unfairly judged, just isn't accurate. Sex work is real work, but we'll save that topic for another
day. My point is, avoiding this trope comes down to just acknowledging the fact that you are not a
monolith. The dead trans sex workers problematic, because it paints all trans people a single brush.
There are almost always sex workers out of necessity, not by choice, and they die
in a horrific fashion. You can represent trans people in your book in another way.
Literally any other way. They could be alive for starters. And maybe you consider them being I
don't know, the best friend, the mentor, the girl next door or the hero Just a thought,
you do you. Number Seven (7): Sexual assault made me stronger? (Gagging noises) I know you're all
thinking about Game of Thrones. Poor Sophie Turner was done dirty with those lines. But this is a
trend that's been going on for eons. It's almost always perpetuated by male writers. Male writers,
stop it! I’ve critiqued these stories myself. The femme fetal finally breaks down and shares her
story, revealing that she was gang raped in her past, and that's why she's a badass she is today.
Someone please feed these writers to sharks, I beg you. First of all, yes, sexual assault
is a widespread problem and it affects a lot of women. But turning it into a phoenix story
is offensive. It's like turning dysentery into a weight loss solution. Yeah, I nearly died,
but look at my summer bod! Women can be badass without being violated. Women can be strong,
tough, determined or any other assertive trait without first being demeaned by a man. You don't
have to work sexual assault into a backstory. This is not the only way to toughen up a woman. Women
are already pretty tough to begin with. Number Eight (8): The mentally ill villain. “But Jennaaa!
I can't write a mentally ill villain?” I don't know, can you? One in seven people in the world
have a diagnosed mental illness, which doesn't even touch on the people that have undiagnosed
mental illnesses. The point is, it's extremely common. Which means it's very likely that some
of your characters have mental illnesses as well. But if your only mentally ill character is the
villain, you can kind of sort of see how that’s a problem. There's a huge stigma against mental
illness. It prevents people from being accepted by society, and from seeking and receiving help.
Demonizing people who are struggling to receive medical attention is a pretty shitty thing to do.
Now, like most of the points on this list, there is a balance. If you have a buttload of evil doers
in your novel, adding one mentally ill villain probably isn't a big deal. But that's assuming
you also have mentally ill heroes, which honestly shouldn’t be hard to do. Anxiety, depression,
PTSD, OCD—there are so many mental illnesses that are extremely common and should be really
easy to input into your cast of characters. I'm sure you can think of some really popular heroes
who fit those mental illness descriptions. Number Nine (9): The romanticized predator. This kind of
goes hand-in-hand with dubious consent. Once again, we're looking at sexual assault being
romanticized, but this time it's the predator who's getting the rose colored glasses treatment.
Usually the predator is male, and his predatory behavior is being labeled as dominant, strong,
and desirable. First of all, naturally dominant people do not need to force others to obey
them. That is the opposite of strength. Forcing someone to be intimate with you, first of all,
isn't intimacy. And second of all, it's an act to try and claim power that you don't naturally have.
Second, this is once again painting extremely toxic behavior as positive, which has a profoundly
negative impact on the real world. I have lost count of the number of people who’ve told me that
they ended up in abusive relationships because their only examples of romance were the toxic
books that they were reading. Remember, people are impressionable. They absorb what they read.
Telling your audience that assault is desirable will inevitably result in real life damage. And
last but certainly not least, Number Ten (10): Better of dead. This is a trope when someone is
neurodivergent or disabled, and the reader is led to believe that they are better off dead. Their
life is not worth living because it's shallow and lackluster. They're not able to do what normal
people do, and thus death would be mercy. First of all, how fucking dare you? Second of all, do you
know how many disabled people read these books and then learn exactly what you think of them? Now,
let me clear the air here. Obviously, sometimes there are situations where someone is suffering
in immense physical pain due to some kind of chronic illness or disease. And maybe in that
case, they would see death as mercy. Additionally, suicidal inclinations are a problem for all
people, disabled or otherwise. But these are situations that need to be handled with grace and
care, not as inspiration fodder. I've seen this trope used for autistic people, blind people,
people who can’t walk. And the message it sends is deeply hurtful and invalidating. Yes, many
disabilities are challenging, but you can write that without painting the character as Old Yeller.
Having two perfectly functional legs does not make a life worth living. So that's all I got for you today.
Don't forget The Savior's Champion and The Savior’s Sister are on sale right now for 50% off each!
So if you want to dive in to my dark fantasy romance series, now is the time to do it.
They are both half off on Amazon. This sale is available internationally. I have it linked below.
Don't forget to subscribe to my channel. I post new videos on Wednesdays. And if you wanna be alerted
as SOON as I upload, ring that bell. And be sure to follow me on social media. I’m on Instagram,
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