The Slash Genre

Mibba is filled with thousands of interesting stories written in every genre and fandom, and a lot of those stories are slash. For those of you who don’t know, slash stories are stories that involve male on male romance. One thing I have noticed about slash stories is that a lot of them are written by women and the primary audience is women. My observation got me wondering why, because it wasn’t something I was expecting. To figure out why, I asked some of the writers and readers: What is the appeal of slash?

Many of the fans of slash said that, when reading fanfiction, they gravitated more towards slash because many hetero fanfictions tend to focus on female original characters. Captain Mars said, “Let's say I like Harry Potter, because everyone will know what I'm talking about. If I want to read a fanfiction about Harry and Ron, then, I'll go read one. If I wanted to read about an OC, I would read an original story instead of a fanfiction. “ Another slash fan, hyrule., said, “I like that Mary Sue's aren't quite as present in most slashes that I read, and I feel like I can identify more with the realistic characters, I think. I also really like reading in boy's perspective, and that's a lot more common in slash.”

Other slash fans said that they enjoyed reading and writing slash because they enjoyed the psychology of it. When writing a slash story, there are different psychological elements you can write about. Many slash stories involve one of the characters coming out as being gay, and that can be very interesting. Also, the forbidden love and disapproval from society add interesting elements to slash stories.

Slash readers and writers enjoy slash for many different reasons, just as hetero fans enjoy their stories for different reasons. One thing is certain, the slash genre isn’t any different than the others, and this section of Mibba will not be going away any time soon. Fans can expect to find many great stories as the genre continues to grow, and I am looking forward to seeing what Mibbians comes up with!