Triad Forum

Okay, I know a lot about how mating flights work, especially after reading the books, but now I have a ton of questions to ask.

1) Where did stand ins (the girls who wait for the mating flight outcomes) come from? (as in where did the _idea_ for them come from)

2) If the rider of a male dragon does not want to participate in the flight, can he just say no? (Such as F'lin did in RBW)

3) When a male dragon fails a flight, does the dragon's rider have to "give in" even if he does not want to? For example if the rider is hold bred and does not want to allow himself to lose control what's stopping him from locking himself in his room? Is the urge truly so severe that he has no choice?

3) What keeps a female rider from locking herself in a room with the person she wants to be with when their dragon rises? She is not keeping her dragon from rising, and she is still enacting the flight, not to mention the fact she does not know what is happening until she wakes up. How specific is the urge? If she is so lost with her dragon how would she tell the difference between the male dragon's rider and another man (example: her lover).

4) In AM books its made clear that if the rider has a preference for another rider, that the preference could affect the outcome of the flight and affects dragon preferences in mates. This has been seen many times and has led to monogamous relationships in the Pern series among riders. Does this go against Triad Canon? Because a comment was made to me that it is highly unlikely that the gold/ green rider would get to be with who they wanted to be when their dragon rises. They even went as far as to say it was rare.

Just thought I'd ask, especially sense it is not fully explained in the FAQs.

I don't know if you've checked yet, but we have an entire category in our FAQs about mating flights.  :)

http://www.triadweyrs.org/faq.php?fq_id=37 (http://www.triadweyrs.org/faq.php?fq_id=37)

That's some fun reading to get you started.

Yeah, I've read all of those, but it does not fully address the questions above.

1) The idea of a 'stand in' almost certainly comes from 'Red Star Rising' where the weyrlings have the following discussion. I'm not sure what page this is from as I only have it in electronic format.

Quote"Jule, suppose your dragon fancies a dragon whose rider, you can't stand?"

"You mean, O'ney?" and she grinned at Angie's discomfort.

The girl overcame her embarrassment and snapped back quickly enough, "He's impossible, even for a bronze rider. You ever heard him go on about how his wing is always first in competitions? As if that was all that mattered!"

"To him it probably is," Grasella said, but, "Jule, I'm more worried about the blue riders. I mean, some of them are very nice guys and I wouldn't want to hurt their feelings, but they don't like girls."

"Oh," and Jule shrugged indolently, "that's easier still. You make an arrangement with another rider to be on hand when your green gets proddy. Then the blue rider gets his mate, if he's got one, or anyone else who's willing, and you'd better believe that anyone's willing when dragons are going to participate. So you bed the one you like, and the blue rider his choice, and you ALL enjoy!" The girls absorbed this information with varying degrees of enthusiasm or distaste.

"Well, it's up to yourselves what you do, you know," Jule went on. "And we're not limited to this Weyr, either.

Although some fandom weyrs do encourage the concept of having willing women around for the losing riders.

Hope that helps a bit

So it sounds like it's an unofficial arrangement that the more promiscuous riders undertake.

Any insight on Stash and my other questions, though?

-Matt

1)See here (http://www.triadweyrs.org/faq.php?fq_id=551) for policy on stand ins

2)I would say that if it was before the flight really got underway, then yes, the rider of the male could say no to his dragon and take themselves elsewhere.

3)If by fails you mean a losing rider from a green flight then they have two options, find a willing partner or deal with it.  Some might choose to do that by the proverbial cold shower, others might choose to have a drink, but they can deal with it. A gold flight they most likely will choose to find a partner as it is more intense.

4)Theoretically nothing, however training and experience should kick in and she would realise that she needs to get to where the riders of the chasers are, 'the dragon flies, the rider complies' and all that entails.  They riders would be taught that a flight is just that, a flight and doesn't mean anything.

Hope that helps with some of it

regarding question 1), what I meant by stand ins was the girls that grouped around the male riders during mating flights so they can be with them afterwards... where did that come from?

When you are talking about stand ins in that hyper link, is that refering to the idea of making a prior arrangement so the riders don't have to be with each other? So it can be done?

It can't be done at Triad.  You get who wins the Flight, period, whether they're the one you wanted or not.  In the Triad world, riders are taught that a Flight is just a Flight and its a fact of life.  If you love the guy who catches your dragon, so much the better.  But in the moment you wouldn't care WHO it was, instinct takes over.

As to where it came from, perhaps the passage Emma mentioned, or perhaps, like with Pillowcrafters, its just something the fans made up so all their fanfic Flights can have happy endings.  But its not something we do.

For #3 - if you want to know if a brown or bronze male rider can refuse to be with a male greenrider during a mating Flight, the answer is no - in the moment of the Flight, they won't care if the winner of the Flight was a MAILBOX, they'd go for it.  It's pure instinct at that point.  After the Flight is over and they wake up and are themselves again, that's another matter.  They don't have to stay any longer than they want to.

For #4 - The riders choice MAY effect their lifemates choice in some way if the dragon already had no preference for who caught them.  But in the end, the rider goes where the dragon goes, so if its not the one they originally wanted, they won't even care until the "morning after".  And really, if they guy you like doesn't win, its not THAT big a deal.  You can have sex with the one YOU like any old time.  But sometimes you get lucky and you get to experience a Flight with the one you wanted to.  Its all up to the writer.
And we've done SLs in the past that dealt with the idea of a rider trying to resist a mating Flight and it turned out very badly for the riders and in a way the dragon too (it was a gold Flight and the Clutch was unusually small).   Out of Control (http://www.triadweyrs.org/story.php?st_id=487)  But also, by throwing themselves in a room, they'd be resisting the Flight, which could break the connection between rider and dragon and that could result in the dragon going /between/ as they fell.  So that's what stops riders from resisting/locking themselves away from Flights.

Wait, is this something that has been discussed in the council? Because Emma, who is also part of the Administration just gave a completely different answer. Not to mention that some of the things you just mentioned are not in AM's books period.

I think that this is very important, especially for those members that chose to play a not so "perverse" way of Pern. I know that fandom has altered some aspects of Pern, and my question is, has fandom altered the canon of the Triad as well rather than staying "pure" to the true AM Pern canon?

...and thus ends my membership at Triad.

Triad, as well as Stasha's knowledge, led to my initial delve into Pern.
My voyage very quickly was halted by the utter depravity associated with mating flights, not to mention the overwhelming amount of inconsistent and simply illogical elements of the canon. These questions were to ease my experience, to confirm whether I was simply reading too much into it.

I wasn't. These descriptions of mating flights have haunted me to my core; I have lost sleep, I have had difficulty paying attention at work, all due to the fact that such disturbing and depraved concepts exist. This author McCaffrey has stripped away human nature itself from her work and reduced human beings to mere animals, slaves to their wanton lusts. And I am completely ed to have ever come across such work.

Goodbye.

-Matt

Quote from: "Matt"I wasn't. These descriptions of mating flights have haunted me to my core; I have lost sleep, I have had difficulty paying attention at work, all due to the fact that such disturbing and depraved concepts exist. This author McCaffrey has stripped away human nature itself from her work and reduced human beings to mere animals, slaves to their wanton lusts. And I am completely ed to have ever come across such work.

I'm sorry you have to go, Matt, but if it effects you that deeply then it is definitely the best move for you.


And actually Stasha, Emma and I didn't disagree.  She gave you the reference to were the "stand-in" concept might have come in to answer your question.  However, that is not necessarily AM canon.  Remember, she consistantly contradicts herself.  If they could have stand-ins, then why was F'nor so concerned about winning Breke's Flight?  It would have been more logical for him to just serve as her stand-in rather than try the much chancier move of hoping his brown could catch her gold.  So because of that Triad follow the original canon and Stand-ins are not allowed.

She said that BEFORE a Flight got underway the rider could take his dragon away.  I certainly didn't disagree with that.  I was saying that once a dragon caught another dragon there is no choice.

Your wording on one of your questions was confusing since you said:

QuoteWhen a male dragon fails a flight, does the dragon's rider have to "give in" even if he does not want to?

The word "fails" there makes it sound like you're asking what would happen to a person if their dragon does NOT win the Flight, so Emma answered that question.  However, your following questions made it sound like you were asking about if he DID win.  And that was the question I answered.

And finally Emma said that THEORETICALLY nothing was stopping them from running away and locking themselves up in a room.  But, as I explained they would be taught the dangerous consequences to themselves and their dragon and the rider pair that caught them if they chose to behave that way.  The knowledge that they could lose their dragon forever (which was mentioned in Lessa's first Flight that it was a possibility if she did not maintain the link with her gold) would keep a rider from running and locking themselves into a room.

So as far as I can see, Emma and I did not contradict each other at all.  The Council didn't discuss it, since these are things that have been set at Triad for longer than I've been here, so there was no need to.

For the record, when referring to books, it is useful to read this first:

http://www.triadweyrs.org/faq.php?fq_id=489 (http://www.triadweyrs.org/faq.php?fq_id=489)

Because of the contradictory nature of the books, many of the later books are not considered a source of canon, since they tend to disagree with each other.  A lot.  Constantly.  ;)

As for moral judgments...I will leave those where they belong.  Far away from here.

I think there is a lot of miscommunication going on here, which is something that I know I have been having a lot if difficulty with sense I have started here in the Triad.

First of all, I was still referring to what if a rider lost a flight, and if you read back you will see I was questioning what Emma was referring to on stand ins (Emma btw thank you, that was very helpful for Matt and I)

Second, in regards to rider morals and sex. I think the issue of hold-bred riders and their morals is being way too simplified here. In the hold it is made clear that they believe in the traditional ideal of morality that you should not sleep around, no homosexuals, etc... (no I am not tieing this in with religion- though it is odd that the Holds hold onto long dead religious values -yet another AM condradiction).

Some one who is raised by these views their whole is life is not going to change these views because some one tells them it's alright. So I strongly disagree, based on observing and experiencing human nature, with the notion that morals can be altered so easily. So a rider may not change his views on sexuality regarding a mating flights and it is very possible that even a greenrider at least (who can still stay in touch with her dragons and be with a "stand in" as referred in the quote that Emma made), is very possible, and I don't think is out of canon.

"You make an arrangement with another rider to be on hand when your green gets proddy. Then the blue rider gets his mate, if he's got one, or anyone else who's willing, and you'd better believe that anyone's willing when dragons are going to participate. So you bed the one you like, and the blue rider his choice, and you ALL enjoy!"

The blue get's his mate, and you get yours? This is the very definition of a stand in. They are describing a prearrangement that two riders make so they don't have to experience flight lust with complete strangers. This also implies that rider's preference does in fact affect the dragon's preference as well. This explains relationships like Lessa and F'lar, F'lessan and Tai, T'gellan and Mirrim, and other riders that are written about through out the series, and it is not written often that dragons, especially senior queens, change their mates often. In the Ninth Pass we only saw this transition with High Reaches Weyr, and even Jora eventually settled with R'gul once her mates stopped dieing.

Yes I understand that AM was inconsistent, so if she is so inconsistent then add something in the FAQs that actually goes in depth, because telling me read the books (when they are inconsistent with each other- and yes I have read them all) and go from there is not helping.[/i]

Of course their values will not change overnight, and that is why we write personas who have trouble dealing with that aspect of themself, even after Impressing.  Cali has a greenrider who has trouble accepting his feelings for other men, and I write a bluerider who similarly has some confusion about his own sexuality.  Their morals don't just magically disappear, and that's what makes them fun to write, and hopefully read about.  But they also have to deal with the fact that if they don't go along with the dragon during a mating Flight they risk the possibility that they will lose the dragon.  So, like it or not, want it or not, ACCEPT it or not, when their dragon rises, they are going to sleep with other men.  Triad doesn't do stand-ins.  Period.  They may be allowed in other clubs, but not in this one.

I think we've answered your questions as best we can.  If you still don't understand, then perhaps its something that we're going to have to deal with on a post-by-post basis.



EDIT: Just a note, by "stand-ins" in this case, as in the case of the website, I'm refering to a person who stands on the side, chosen by the green's rider or the rider of the dragon who catches her, who steps in once the Flight has been decided to partner the WINNERS of the Flight and 'stands-in' to have sex with them rather than the lifemate of their dragon's mate (as was the situation discussed in the quote from Red Star Rising).  The women and men who stand around waiting for the LOSERS of the flight are not called stand-ins.  Those are "bystanders".

Quote from: "Eimi"EDIT: Just a note, by "stand-ins" in this case, as in the case of the website, I'm refering to a person who stands on the side, chosen by the green's rider or the rider of the dragon who catches her, who steps in once the Flight has been decided to partner the WINNERS of the Flight and 'stands-in' to have sex with them rather than the lifemate of their dragon's mate (as was the situation discussed in the quote from Red Star Rising).  The women and men who stand around waiting for the LOSERS of the flight are not called stand-ins.  Those are "bystanders".

Red Star Rising was not talking about bystanders, they were talking about stand ins, and I think that is made extremely clear, and it is sad that it is being twisted into something so disturbing.

I know how flights work, just that aspect that a person is willing to be a bystander and give themselves to some one with no regard or hesitation hurts me on a more personal level because I know from personal experience that it can't be done without some sort of emotional attachment (I guess unless some one is a prostitute, but even then it's like a prostitute has to remove mentally remove themselves in order to survive the situation). It makes it me feel like sex is something that is so casually thrown around to the point that it removes a very human aspect about of sex and turns it into something that can only described as animal not only for the riders involved, but for a society.

This interpretation is very shocking, especially because we all agree that canon in Pern conflicts with each other. So why are we choosing to do mating flights like this when obviously it does not have to be that way? Why are we choosing to make our creation like this when obviously there is an alternative canon supported choice?

And sadly this is where I have to draw the line. I loved writing with everyone so much (Especially you Amanda :) ), but this goes against my very moral fiber, what I believe in, and it goes against everything I know about being human. I can no longer be a part of this.

As for my characters I only have one final request, and that is to allow Amanda to have Alasha if she is willing, if not please delete the character. I only say this for two reasons. One: because Amanda and I have put in so much work in a plot together that I don't want to see that it was all be in vain. Two: Because I think Amanda knows and understands Alasha best, and being as protective as I am about the character I trust Amanda to stay true to her nature (even if she lets Lirit ravish the poor girl :D )...

Sincerely,

Stasha

Quote from: "Stasha"This interpretation is very shocking, especially because we all agree that canon in Pern conflicts with each other. So why are we choosing to do mating flights like this when obviously it does not have to be that way? Why are we choosing to make our creation like this when obviously there is an alternative canon supported choice?

Unfortunately, you'd have to ask the club's original founders if you wanted an answer to this question.  The group running the club now inherited a club with strong canon and traditions, and did their best to hold to those because the founders did something right to create a club that has been going strong for 8 years.

Some Pern clubs don't last more than a few months.  We've been pushing on for nearly a decade.  At this late date, it seems that rewriting the basic rules the club was founded on would be unfair to the members who have been with us for years.  Erasing and rewriting all of their characters history (8 years worth of it, in some cases) is a pretty big step, and a lot to ask.  Especially when plenty of people have written entire storylines based around disapproval of these basic facts--in fact, a large number of people find it to be an interesting challenge to deal with characters who can't accept a morality system so fundamentally different from their own.

I'm sorry you feel uncomfortable with the accepted canon.  There are certainly clubs out there who follow wildly different versions, and if you would like to find one more suited to your needs, no one will begrudge you that.  We all have different ideas about what we like and what we can tolerate, after all.  

I suggest going to WeyrPlug (the yahoogroup) and posting a 'Looking for a Weyr' e-mail.  If you write exactly what you don't want, you'll probably be able to find someone who deals with mating flights in a way you find comfortable.

As to the canon of the original founders, let's keep in mind that though DE/RSR was written in 1997, it was not widely read and was not considered part of most groups' canon until later. In the case of Triad, consider the following:

1 - During the turns between DE/RSR and Dragonflight, even the idea of women Impressing greens was lost.
2 - At the time of Dragonflight, much antagonism existed between the Weyr and the Holds, with different moralities held in each area.
3 -  Between the time of Lessa & F'lar and Triad, other events shaped thinking and once again there was a separation between Weyr and Hold, at least in most cases.

Whether it suits someone's personal morality or not, the canon of this club is what it is. Some fans want a looser canon club that allows female Impression of browns: Triad doesn't offer this. Some fans want a club where all crafts are open to women: Triad doesn't offer this (at least not in the broadest sense). Some fans want a club with new and different dragon colors allowed: Triad doesn't offer this.

The canon of the club is what defines the group, which is one of the reasons that from the beginning there has been a strict mentor policy. Those who cannot or do not want to adhere to the canon of the group usually find another outlet for their creative juices. It's not being exclusive or imposing one person's morality on other people, but offering a club with a canon that suits the group of people who write here.

I'm going to lock this thread down.  If anyone has anymore questions, please pass them onto the council