Big oof.

it makes me feel like the only person in the world who's just totally bored by that shit XD even if I know I'm not

Big Mood

I can never relate to that part of fics so my eyes always kind of glaze over until they get down to the nitty gritty emotional attraction then I can nod along like Yes, this I understand

And stories seem to treat it like the culmination of all that emotional attraction and then at the moment in the story that is supposed to be the emotional climax you lose whole chapters to just lots of sweaty boring shit

Honestly my favorite fics are the one where sex is less about Burning Passion and more about having fun like, I adore writers who just have characters making jokes or talking for the whole duration of their sex scenes

like they portray sex as something incidental to the two characters hanging out and enjoying being together

I haven’t seen much of that, but the way that I totally check out once the banging starts might have something to do with that

I might just be biased because I have never written a 100% serious smut tag in my life - it's always tinged with humor to highlight the inherit ridiculousness of all sexual acts

idk I always just approach it like, if they're not Obviously Having Fun, then what's the point

sex for the sake of sex just doesn't appeal to me whatsoever

Yeah if it’s directly effecting a character’s development or something I like it, but so much of it is just there to be there, which is fine, let people enjoy shit, but the prevalence of that ends up feeling kind of alienating sometimes

Yeah, that's why I tend to shy away from stories that list like, explicit sex acts in the tags 'cause that's usually a good indicator that the story is sex-based not development/interaction focused

Its a good rule of thumb but obviously there are some GREAT stories out there with really explicit sex scenes tossed in for flavor, so judging by the tags isn't always foolproof

Yeah, that’s a good way to do it, I occasionally exempt explicit rated fics from my searches but I’m so desperate for stuff that will keep my attention that I can’t be too picky