The whys and wherefores of bruise porn

ETA: I've deleted my buised-Xander icon so people don't have to see it pop up on their friends list. I should have thought more about using that. Sorry! (Oh, and to clarify -- nobody complained to me about this -- I just realised I was making people see it who probably didn't want to.)

There's a good discussion of this whole bruise porn thing over here. People who get it, people who don't, all posting civilly and insightfully. I thought I'd repost what I wrote there:

I've made a couple of these so far. I thought it would be a fun challenge and I do find Hurt Pretty Boys kind of hot.

But then I found that by far the biggest turn on for me was making the pictures. I think this is a power thing. I've seen some hot pics by other people, but it's the ones I made myself that I sit and stare at. Because I did that to them.

I don't know if I'd react the same way if I did a pic of a woman. The power issues wouldn't be the same unless she were a pretty tough woman. Someone mentioned Zoe -- for me, there'd be a big difference between roughing up Zoe and roughing up Kaylee.

I perhaps now sound like a Big Scary Freak. *g* I don't like to see people get hurt IRL. I don't look at pictures of people who have been beaten and eroticize them. I don't watch people fighting and get turned on. But in fiction? Sure.

In any case, I think this will run its course fairly soon. There are less ways to hurt a guy in a manip than in a fic and I know I'll get bored after I do a few more.

But I'll have to do a few more to find that out. *g*