Taboo subjects in art and writing

Serious talk about death and suicide (especially if you don't condemn the last thing unequivocally).

May be a cultural difference, but I never saw that as a taboo? An uncomfortable subject maybe (not necessarily), but not even close to the point of the other things you listed.

More generally, I do think an artist should be allowed to cover any subject they want, any way they want (even if it's extremely offensive to me).

If the artistic aim is the main aim, I don't think anything should be censored (by the artist or by the society). However, if art is only at the service of a ideological work pushing illegal or excessively immoral ideas (imo), I would have a less lenient attitude toward the works.
And.. well, it happens regularly with these subjects that the main aim is not art, and that's where the problems begin (no one is competent to decide if art is the main focus of a work).

I don't think it's what you write about it how you write about it.
I agree that no subjects should be taboo, but writing with care not to cause pain to people inflicted by subjects is something that should always be forefront of your writing.
in my comic i have on occasion spanking as punishment. this is unpopular with the younger generation readers so i reduced the amount of spanking art in the free stories and decided to put more in the chapter im going to put up for sale.
( i was going to cut it out all together but a survey given to my fans gave me 50/50 results when ask if it should go)
if we stop writing about things that are taboo then we get a world of cover ups and secrets, leading to a world of forced thinking. just because a subject is not pleasant to read about dose not mean lessons are not there.

The best thing to do is to research it first and get to know people who suffered like that so your facts can be accurate. Secondly, you have to show what you wrote to other people to make sure you are doing it right.

i think that there are very few places that fiction cannot go, but it's really important to know when you're dealing with a topic that is controversial or very emotionally charged. If you are, then you do your research, run it past other people before putting it out there for the world to see, and do your best to cover things in a manner which is respectful.

CW: Sexual Assault

The thing that I think a lot of people don't consider, however, is how including a taboo subject changes the dynamic of a story. Let's say you have a fairly standard, comedic high fantasy novel. You add a scene where one character explicitly discusses their sexual trauma at the hands of another character. No matter how well you handle it, by including this scene, the dynamic of the entire novel has now changed. You're acknowledging to the reader that "Yes, horrible things like this do happen here," and breaking the conceit that this is fantasy and there are certain limits on the awfulness of what can occur in the story. It suddenly becomes more difficult to switch back and forth between comedy and action, because the fact that sexual assault is a possibility in this world is lurking in the reader's mind. Moreover, every scene involving isolated or captured characters becomes deeply tense and unsettling, because the reader is aware that something truly awful could happen to the character in question. When you talk about something especially dark or taboo, even briefly, it can change your entire story. Among all the other reasons to be cognizant of how you depict things, this is important to keep in mind as well.

I think it's fine to write about taboo subjects, but it's also important to be aware how much a taboo subject can warp the tone of a story around it.

I'm a big fan of "darker" works that cover a lot of taboo subjects. I love writing them often as venting but sometimes seriously. I think one of the most interesting ones you see come up, and see a lot of the forum when people mention things they don't want in fanwork or in comics, is incest ships. And I find people's reactions to incest in fiction, or even the idea of it, fascinating for many reasons:

1. If they are, as they often are in works that are simply trying to be taboo and edgy without going too into a "bad" relationship, genuinely consenting, sane, adult who are both aware of the situation and accept it, why is it so awful? Simply because it's illegal? There are many things that have been illegal that we've decided aren't actually hurting anyone. One of the most common forms of this is the siblings who have been separated since they were young, have started dating, find out they're siblings and both agree that they don't care, they're in love. Suddenly, even though all else about the relationship is healthy, it's a bad abusive relationship. Another cast is when set in historical society, it was quite common to marry your cousin to keep the money within the family and, by the logic of those days, the blood line strong. This was perfectly normal, and often consensual, even if often only for money and good sense rather than love.
2. There is a comic at the moment that's frequently in the popular section that deals with incest between cousins. As far as has been shown so far, this is quite clearly somewhere on the non-consent to "dubious"-consent scale (the only question being, does he agree because he wants to not deal with trouble from this obviously abusive household, or does he not agree at all). However, it's not uncommon in the comments to see people condemning the creator for somehow promoting incest. As if involving it in their comic, even in an obviously negative way like that, somehow promotes it.
3. A personal and I think quite hilarious example. Early on in my comic creation, I friend mentioned Percy and Eric have good chemistry and would make a good ship. I didn't say anything either way. However, when it's mentioned Percy and Eric are cousins, this changes, despite in the same scene it being explained they're only cousins in the old fashion sense, they're from the same family line/house, but their branches of the family tree split off nearly 500years ago. They're about as far apart on the same line as you can get. But it was interesting that even after explaining how distantly related they actually are, they still consider this incest. Also, highly amusing because this is not ever anything but friendship and familial love in canon, it's entirely them seeing it but somehow I did it.

I think fiction should be allowed to cover whatever it likes, as long as it's done well, but there are a lot of cases where people consuming fiction are just unfair and you can be condemned for just including it, no matter how you do it or the context. But it's also interesting, there are some subjects considered more taboo than others. I've written stories about incest, usually of the type 2, and been told to stop because it's illegal and disgusting (again, as if writing it negatively is encouraging it???) and yet no one has ever told me to stop writing murder stories because murder is illegal and disgusting?

in my opinion, i think fiction should be limitless

Actually.... I don't try to avoid problems about those taboo things in my comic, I decided I was going to embrace them instead.
Sometimes drawing them very crudely, sometimes drawing them in a subtle manner.
I think it's necessary to show the different ugly faces of life in fictions (depends on the fictions in fact and how it is made). Because it exists and sometimes I think we can offer a certain thinking of things about it, the beginning of a way to deal with it.

Hmmm I don't really see it as taboo subjects. I think everything should be fair game. But more like there are taboo ways to present ideas/tell stories.

For example, you wouldn't put rape in a Children's board book.

But likewise you shouldn't put something super fluff into a deep heavy and important adult scene either.

I do not think, that any subject should be taboo for a comic, but these complicated topics need to be handled with care and research. To use the example of suicide:

Public report or depiction of suicide in mass media is known to have an effect on the public and it has been researched that an increase of follow up suicides can come from it. As a creator it is important to talk about uncomfortable subjects, if you feel equipped to do it. But it is also important to think about the potential harm and damage covering these issues can cause.

In the case of suicide there are guidelines to avoid these negative consequences, like not showing the method directly and things like that. I was super pissed when the show "13 reasons why" ignored nearly all of these guidelines in spite of having psychologists tell them, what to do.

If you include these potentially dangerous subjects in your work I would also advice to have a good reason to do so. It's nothing that should be used for just shock value, I think. You can also use your work to question these taboos (incest has been mentioned, which is an interesting topic to explore, I think).

TL;DR: Having dark stuff in your story can be super important, but you need to do your homework and be empathetic to those facing those issues irl! Yes, my comic does have some of those subjects. There is no way to avoid offending people, you will upset someone, just stay respectful and be open-minded to learning new things.

I personally really like darker topics, fiction should be able to cover any type ground, imo. I mean, what better way to explore your own emotions than within the controlled realm of a story? In the US taboo stuff runs along the lines of being (In my experience):

• Rape
• Abuse
• Certain mental illnesses
• Suicide
• Race
• Religion

Death/murder and nonsensical violence in media is more accepted, sometimes not even questioned, or even glorified. But man, if you add in one of the things I listed above, people get on your ass! I can see how some of these things can be touchy for a lot of people, as sad as it is rape and abuse hit really close to home for many folks, either being friends and family members of victims or victims themselves. My work did a survey not too long ago relating to this, out of the thousands of us 9 out of 10 was, or knows someone who was a victim of abuse and/or sexual assault. While exploring such topics in fiction can be cathartic for some, not everyone is alright with reliving the events.

Mental illness has classically been villainize, either used to make a character look stupid, insane, or evil. While we as a species are getting better, mental health still isn't given the best treatment. Anymore people like sweeping it under the rug, or using it as a cheap sympathy cash-in. (like how illnesses like cancer gets used as sympathy fodder) The subject is normally considered taboo because people just don't like talking or even thinking about it, mental health is a very personal, and most don't like making themselves that vulnerable to others. Even denying possibly seriously mental instabilities themselves.
My dad is a good example of this, he shows very obvious signs of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, but refuses to acknowledge or even discuss the possibility of him having any mental problems. Not just because he's a boomer, and was raised that it's bad, but because it's extremely uncomfortable. (and, you know, the disorder)
Also mental health is still treated like a joke for a lot of people who just can't wrap their heads around it. My mom used to think you only got help if you were "crazy", as she put it. When she learned my uncle sought help for anger issues, possibly brought on by depression, she learned to take it more seriously.

Religion? Well, the US being an Theist evangelical country, there's a lot of feelings surrounding the inclusion of it in fiction. It doesn't help that works including this subject are either chick tracts or horror fictions where religious people are depicted as dumb monsters, or calculating murderers... or how people on both sides of the fence just blow this up in the worst way possible.

Race? Yeah, if you've schooled yourself on US history you can probably guess why this subject is taboo.

Suicide is similar to the mental health thing. It's an uncomfortable subject to talk about, usually leaving friends and family confused, and distressed.

Communities such as most of Tumblr, and the queer community kinda demonize the use of taboo subjects. Like, the very existence of something problematic being a work of fiction about queer characters is unspeakable! I'm kind of a douchebag contrarian, so I love tackling dark subjects not only because it's my personal preference, but because I've been told not to do so. I feel like they need to be discussed more, so I don't just have darker topics in my comic, I made them a major focal point. I don't care if people like it or not.
I will say, though. Research is soooo important if your going to use something that is so subjectively experienced, and in need to be taken seriously. My story focuses on mental health, abuse, some queerphobia, and will be touching on sexual assault later on. Before starting my comic I talked to people willing to discuss their experiences, therapists and psychologists about the medical side as well as their encounters with people suffering from the issues I'm working with (The HIPPA friendly version, of course), I watched videos, read research papers. Knowing the technical and personal side is incredible important. Getting the opposing pov, and the psychology behind that mindset is helpful too!

Even now I'm always learning new things and experiences from people. Also there is no real way to avoid causing problems, even the most respectful works covering dark topics can be taken badly or be seen as edgelord trash.

Suicide is a cultural subject. In certain countries and religions it has been vilified because when you kill yourself, you take money away from those institutions. In other countries and religions it is acceptable, and in certain conditions expected. The indoctrination you received from your state and religion have formed your views on the subject. Most people never get past that indoctrination to form their own views.

I think it's fine to write about all the taboos. Art is a medium. Mediums all face censorship at one point or another. If people can't handle things then they can just choose not to read them.

An another note: Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire has a lot of that shit and people love it.

Okay, the fact of the matter is that you're going to offend somebody sooner or later with your work. Might as well just make the work you want to make and let it be judged for what it is rather than try to second-guess what other people may think. People launched a campaign to get the Teletubbies of all things banned, for crying out loud (It allegedly contained "pro-homosexual propaganda)!

Everybody has a right to be offended, and that's fine. Nobody has a right to not be offended or to demand that something that offends them is changed or destroyed.

I think there's two sides to this. To one side, I think a part of art is about pushing the envelope and exploring difficult topics. Sometimes it is a person exploring their own trauma, too, which deserves consideration. On the other hand, I think its appropriate to criticize any media that seems to promote insidious content, and I believe, particularly those creating media that reaches a large audience, there is absolutely a duty of consideration to the content created.

Like, I think Tapas' rules about hateful content and what not are very fair.

But the complications of these subjects is exactly why there are no hard and fast rules about what can be discussed.

I think it's less about condemning suicide, then just being sure not to glorify it. But exploring it honestly and with sensitivity is fine. I think "serious" can be subjective, because we're only going to want so many stories that are a really deep exploration of death, per say, but while a vampire story might come across as less serious, it could also be a way of broaching deep and difficult subjects from a different angle.

I'm not really sure what this is targeting? Cannibalism? Organ donors? Necrophilia? Just not sure the exact meaning. But one of my favorite shows was NBC Hannibal, so hey! Dead bodies! Also vampire stuff. Undead bodies~

Anything sexual is definitely more regulated in popular media, and sometimes to a ridiculous degree. This is another one where context would be hugely important to me. There are cases where creators include something like rape in a way thats very much "look how edgey and dark I am!". When, where, and how to include sexual violence in media will always be a sensitive subject, and it should be sensitive, but that doesn't mean people can't or shouldn't include or explore the topic.

On the bright side, indie media is much more able to tackle these topics, even if popular media isn't great with them.

Not so much insult, but I'm all for critique of these things. XD

Some. More so with future work. And I just plan to address it as thoughtfully and sensitively as possible. In some ways I don't feel equipped for that, but I think it's worth trying. And I do think its important to be sensitive to those creators (especially young ones!) who miss step with sensitive topics. People learn and grow over time, and we're all going to make mistakes and learn to change. A mob of hate for those that make mistakes is typically not a good or healthy way to create change. (though there might be cases where many people raising their voices loud is necessary for change, particularly in addressing someone in a position of power)

Everyone has the right to explore any topic, but they are not free from critique if they cross lines or promote harm in some way. It is both necessary to push limits and to create from a place of empathy. It is okay to make mistakes, but important to learn from them.