In my head, the difference between rape and dubcon is very clear, just in terms of theme. If I see rape, I assume that the story is about one of the characters having experienced what I--and more importantly, they--would understand as a rape: someone on a military mission is captured and raped, for instance; a serial killer rapes Blair Sandburg; someone we like under the influence of some (overtly evil) substance (NOT drink or drugs in the typical way) rapes someone else: a story of rape and (often) rape recovery and/or h/c or (and I read few of these, but I know they're out there) grovelfic and/or punishment fic.
Dubcon to me signals something else: that the story is about whether or not--or to what extent--the sexual actions were wanted: in other words, may deal with sex under various sorts of pressure or less than ideal circumstances or characters misunderstanding or fucking up or acting impulsively or giving in against better wishes or with wrong information etc etc etc. Or there's some other question of consent: were they awake? was it really them? were they possessed at the time?
Noncon is maybe the trickiest: the first thing I think of is, say, a story where someone HAS to be raped as decreed by an evil person, and Person A, who loves Person B, volunteers to be raped (or is picked to rape them) as an act of love within the horror of the scenario. Also, noncon signals to me rape!kink, where the plot's going to be centered in some way around forcible sex but we're being told in some way its okay to enjoy it: the narrative of the story is not "When does Character screw up his courage enough to go to the cops, come out of therapy, learn not to jump at shadows" but more--you did that to me and I liked it. There's a whole new world open to me now: I didn't KNOW I had a think for being handcuffed in a dungeon and whipped. This is sort of fake literary rape--genre rape that's like TV violence--where somehow going through a day with John McClain from Die Hard turns you into a confident adventurer rather than leaving you crying in a hospital somewhere.
Anyway, these may be very idiosyncratic definitions, but they're probably what I'd go with.
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Date: 2009-06-25 02:17 pm (UTC)Dubcon to me signals something else: that the story is about whether or not--or to what extent--the sexual actions were wanted: in other words, may deal with sex under various sorts of pressure or less than ideal circumstances or characters misunderstanding or fucking up or acting impulsively or giving in against better wishes or with wrong information etc etc etc. Or there's some other question of consent: were they awake? was it really them? were they possessed at the time?
Noncon is maybe the trickiest: the first thing I think of is, say, a story where someone HAS to be raped as decreed by an evil person, and Person A, who loves Person B, volunteers to be raped (or is picked to rape them) as an act of love within the horror of the scenario. Also, noncon signals to me rape!kink, where the plot's going to be centered in some way around forcible sex but we're being told in some way its okay to enjoy it: the narrative of the story is not "When does Character screw up his courage enough to go to the cops, come out of therapy, learn not to jump at shadows" but more--you did that to me and I liked it. There's a whole new world open to me now: I didn't KNOW I had a think for being handcuffed in a dungeon and whipped. This is sort of fake literary rape--genre rape that's like TV violence--where somehow going through a day with John McClain from Die Hard turns you into a confident adventurer rather than leaving you crying in a hospital somewhere.
Anyway, these may be very idiosyncratic definitions, but they're probably what I'd go with.