“I’m thinking,” I told the soldier. “No one wants to hear stories of the nefarious.”
He laughed. “No they don’t, P.”
“I am thinking about my friend who died. I am glad her family doesn’t want to talk to me at this point. I obviously don’t know where the lines go. If it were me, I would want the story, the story is precious. You can’t hear these stories anywhere else in the world and you say people don’t want to hear stories about the nefarious but it’s not true. You can’t say there isn’t an appetite for this stuff because there is. Look at all the cop shows and grisly murder shows… investigations. People watch that stuff so where is the line? Is it when it is real and there are emotions involved?”
He was quiet.
“You said earlier today, you’re secretive because how people respond when you’re not secretive.”
“That’s right.”
“But I’m not you. I think I am supposed to broadcast this… stories of the nefarious.” (Jupiter trines to the 8th)
“Well you may be. But if you do, you’re going to have to deal with people’s bullshit,” he said. I recalled what happened on this blog when I claimed kinship with Elizabeth Fritzl and Jaycee Dugard and shook my head.
“Yeah, well where the hell is the line? Tonight I put up part of a story, it’s a funny one. It’s a good story and it too is a rare story in that it happened. It’s a real. recorded moment in time that led to a series of events but it was funny, see? So I know I can get away with that. I can be funny but what else can I say? I am going along and at what point do I cross a line and become repulsive?”
“I don’t know, P.”
“I don’t either. The nefarious stories are funny too,” I said. “I mean they’re entertaining as hell… as far as I know. They entertain me! But you must just have to be fake to get away with it. People just can’t handle reality, as in a story that is real which also baffles me because reality is the only thing that is actually interesting. How is a lie interesting? Someone makes up a lie and people say ooooh, interesting. I don’t get that at all. I mean it beats me, I just don’t get how lies are interesting even minutely.”
Such is the situation for Saturn Neptune. Can’t find a line if my life depended on it. It is a hard line of confusion is what it is.
I want the reality of nefarious stories, but given the people I know family etc. I suspect I am in the minority.
If I hear a great story and than find out it was fake, I am always very disappointed. But I don’t know, that’s just me!
I have a weak stomach for stories of violence/abuse yet have an appetite for stories of secret affairs and bad marriages. Maybe that’s my 12th house venus sextile jupiter…
I also like happy stories too btw, esp when it’s someone who is near the end and they find grace/happiness/love/success….
And always prefer it real. I rarely read fiction for this reason….
i have no interest in nefarious fiction whatsoever, but do have interest in real-life darkness sometimes. got Scorpio, i guess what does it.
lots of people seem only interested in the darker stuff if they can see it as utterly divorced from themselves or anyone they know – so rare that’s it’s more shocking oddity than anything they might conceivably come into contact with in their own lives.
ok, i should take that back a little – i like watching True Blood. 🙂
people who don’t like to deal with real darkness will be repulsed. those that don’t, won’t.
*shrug*
and moonpluto has something of a point…there’s a point where storytelling can become gratuitous… but that means it doesn’t tell anything new or open our minds to new perspectives….
imo..
I prefer nefarious to fluff. I like to laugh, for sure, but I need to hear nefarious in order to be prepared for it when it comes into my own life. And it always does. As for stories about your friend who died – I wish there was someone who knew of Les’ life during those years we were apart. I would hang on every single word of it, just to feel as if I was there, instead of not there. But I’m weird.
True Blood.. me too goddess 🙂
For the record, I don’t think I have stories of abuse. I have stories from the way out interesting of life. I have stories that move people in a way that improves and enhances their life. I know this to be true.
Wrote a comment earlier today, but it was eaten?
In my experience, people eat up true, nefarious stories with a spoon (unless they themselves are involved). Isn’t that why the tabloids have exploded? People are obsessed with these magazine articles because they take them to be truth, the more sordid, the better. If they were sold as fiction, no one would spend a cent on them.
tinaroma, that is true but they are spun in a way that does not evoke emotion. It’s more titillation or taking the voyeuristic streak in people.
The stuff has no depth, it makes no demands on the reader. They can just read and say, “glad it’s not me” and put it down. I don’t write like that.
and on your other comment – I didn’t see it in the spam folder, sorry!
A good story is a good story, nefarious or otherwise. I just love great stories.
I just like stories. Even when I’m busy arguing about the rights and justice (current book I’m reading). Okay wait, I like almost any story unless it’s boring.
I like nefarious. I like funny. What I don’t like is unoriginal — if I’ve heard it before an umpteenth gazillion times, my mind is going to wander and pretty damned far.
What I thought of reading this post was the story about the guy crawling in your bed in the middle of the night uninvited. Little Timmy? Little something… Can’t find it on search. Hrmph.