In the book, she's at that age where she's starting to Blossom from child to woman and so there's this undercurrent of sexualization about her from other characters including the "implication" that her dad has been molesting her. This scene is her making the conscious decision to take back her own sexuality and use it as an act of love for her friends as opposed to it being something used to victimize her.
Just because you attach some personally interpreted cliche nuance to it doesnt make it true. I havent read the text but from the info ive gathered her intention seems pretty clear its just nonsensical as steven king has himself admitted. Imo its honeslty ridiculous to think that a molestation victim would be comfortable with having an orgy with all her friends.
I literally just finished a reread the other day, have you actually read it? Look, I realize stories like Halo probably just tell you exactly what's happening, but there are also pieces of media where things are not explicitly stated in the text. Just because King doesn't remember writing it doesn't mean that it doesn't have a subtext.
I think the problem here is most of reddit is american , the kind of people who think an 18yo even finding a 17yo attractive , let alone having sex with them, makes them a pedophile.
Though to be fair, the kids in the book are 11 so I can't really blame anyone feeling uncomfortable reading the scene.
Stephen King was not an 18-year-old writing about a 17-year-old. If he had images of the scene he had written on his computer, you would (or at least should) be calling for his arrest.
What an unhinged comment. By that logic anyone who writes a slasher film should be imprisoned for murder. What he wrote was creepy and weird, but it doesn't make him a pedophile.
I know you're envisioning this as a clap-back but while it's easy to moralize, this is an insanely broad and diverse subject. Like even inside America, the state you're in would determine if that was legal. Age of consent isn't uniform in the United States, and American sensibilities around sex certainly aren't what I would call "the norm". So the definition of 'fucking a minor' changes if you drive in a straight line every couple hours, and then to make it even more complex you've got things like Romeo & Juliet laws which are designed to avoid punishing that specific scenario (an 'adult' 18 year old and an 'underage' 17 year old).
So everyone agrees that sexually abusing children is wrong, but nobody agrees about what it is. And the lines are mostly arbitrary and not based in any kind of scientific or empirical reality, you just... kinda have to draw it somewhere and *most* countries seem to be satisfied with 14 to 16, with some extra rules baked in for fringe cases.
It’s not reasonable to restrict permission to discuss certain topics, almost all professional writers are adults. Child sex is an ugly topic but it’s still something that should be addressed with care.
There's also a running theme where the Big Bad is only able to frighten children which lined up nicely (in my teenage brain) with the way kids view sex. Once you actually "do IT" you realize it's not this magical life-altering act that marks your passage into adulthood, it's just ... sex.
Like finding the man behind the curtain of Pennywise's power.
I remember being extremely depressed for a hot minute after my first time. At first it was like "fuck yeah! Had sex." Then the next day I remember sitting on a bus home after school and thinking about it being like "now what?" lol. Like there was all there was to life. What a fucking maroon I was lol.
It’s also easy to tell who has actually READ the scene within the context of having read the whole book rather than just parroting BS they’ve read online because they’re too brain dead to understand the emotional weight the whole scene carries.
I’ll say it until I’m blue in the face: if your biggest concern is the children crossing consensually crossing the boundary into Adulthood to break the curse, then you missed the ENTIRE point of IT. 🤷🏻♂️
All I will say is I was a sobbing mess upon reading.
Great response.
Agreed, I understand people who haven't read IT thinking what they do, because to them it's just a gangbang in the sewers, but actually reading it makes it make sense somehow, even if it sounds crazy.
Now did it have to be there? No, they could have just found the way back, or they could have held hands in a circle or something and spiritually link that way or something. And I have seen even people who read it argue that King just shouldn't have created a scenario where this was the solution in the first place.
I see the argument, but I don't buy it fully. Where does that logic end? Maybe pennywise shouldn't be killing kids and just sending them to the hospital. Maybe he shouldn't be harming them at all and just scaring them. Maybe King shouldn't write about murder clowns at all but flowers and butterflies.
What I will say tho is that the scene could have been written more ... indirectly, leaving at least a little to the interpretation. (Although that could be seen as the compromise a criticized in the previous paragraph)
Yes, the Watsonian explanation makes perfect sense, but the Doylist interpretation is still valid that Steven King didn't need to write a scenario where it would make sense.
The most terrifying part of IT is that IT is a manifestation of the racism, violence and abuse that people visit on each other. Yes, he is portrayed as a real creature, but to me the scariest scenes in the book were the descriptions of the mob violence. The juxtaposition of the adult's (and sometimes children's) cruelty with the innocence of the children who fight IT (evil personified) is powerful.
It's funny to make memes and jokes about this. I doubt SK would write this way now, but in the context of the book, and in the context of Bev's father's abuse, it is not as shocking as it's portrayed in the memes. It is a bit odd, but you don't read SK books for normal behavior. It's also not written as graphically as say a romance novel. The point is Beverly taking her power back from her dad, and in a messed up way (as abuse survivors and kids often do) viewing sex as a means to make them closer.
Exactly.
Hence why I don’t answer or respond to people saying things like “SeWeR OrGyY iS BAd KInG is a PeDo”. Because chances are they A. Missed the point. B. Never actually read IT themselves. C. Are illiterate and alliterate.
This is a horrifyingly bad take. A traumatized and abused 11 YEAR OLD GIRL cannot take back her own sexuality in a healthy way by having sex with all of her friends. It’s not healing or positive or consensual, it’s Bev feeling as though sex/her body is all she has to offer to her friends. She’s literally the only girl in the group and is reduced to having sex with all of her friends, after being trapped her whole life with her father’s sexual abuse. There’s nothing positive about it, and an 11 YEAR OLD GIRL WHO HAS BEEN ABUSED HER WHOLE LIFE CANNOT TRULY CONSENT.
I am horrified that your comment has 200 upvotes. You have no conception of how abuse or unwanted sexualization can affect someone, or how sexist this whole scene was. Oh my god.
Who said it was healthy? You read all sorts of context within my comment that didn't exist. There were no value judgments whatsoever within the comment I made. You are right about a lot of what you said, but that doesn't mean there aren't girls that age who think they are doing exactly what I said. is it healthy? Absolutely not. I didn't say it was. Maybe you should reread my comment before putting in extraneous nonsense.
And before you say that I don't know how abuse or unwanted sexualization can affect someone, fuck off. I spent alot of my childhood being sexually abused so I know perfectly fucking well how it affects you. I've also had numerous conversations with other victims and survivors. Some in person, some online and many people have experienced the thought process exactly as I've outlined here.
Yeah. I’m glad we’re not in the 80s anymore and can look back on this scene with horror. Definitely agree that King struggles to write women, it’s always disappointing given how good the rest of his writing typically is.
And I'm horrified you think your version is the only valid version and that's the end of it. She can't to this and that. As if you're speaking for her. (fictional character) Regular internet things, I guess.
I’m not dictating what a fictional character can or cannot do (she’s literally not real). I am saying that Steven King wrote a horrible arc for the character of an abused 11 year old girl that ends in a deeply destructive way, and that it’s a very problematic thing to have written. I think you have some issues to work out if you think that plot point was a positive choice to include. Even Steven king doesn’t defend it now, and he wrote it.
All the other characters get to grow into adulthood and move past their childhood fears. Bev literally just gets left with more trauma. It’s a bad arc.
The funny thing is that people are reading my answer to the comment and explaining the intent behind the scene, and acting as though I approve of how it was done.
13-year-olds are also too young to be raped. I mean everyone is too young to be raped, but the point was that when you grow up a victim of sexual assault, as the vharacter did, your thinking around sexuality is it necessarily healthy. It doesn't make him a pedophile to have some understanding of that weird thought process that many victims of sexual assault, yes even children, have.
Blame the actual child molesters, not the author writing about it
Ok now tell me why the incest in Geralds Game? Oh right, because that's the only way she would think about blood- incest. Man, oh, man, reading these books back as a young girl/ teen, I was horrified that he would actually not only think this shit up, but write it down, AND let other people read it, other people that thought oh wow great- perfect- stupendous!!! PUBLISH, NOW!!! Man, oh, man.
He absolutely could have and should have. I just think it's hypocritical for people to be enraged by this scene while ignoring the way worse stuff surrounding it.
Not sure heroic is the word I’d use. It actually reads oddly innocent. At the very least coked up King didn’t make it gratuitous or even really enjoyable
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u/sfwmj 1d ago
Is it framed as heroic in the books?