That MSNBC article *really* annoyed me. Has slash suddenly become interchangable with porn? How irritating. Looking through the stories on ff.n, it occurs to me that there are more NC-17 het fics than you could shake a stick at, but does MSNBC care? Obviously not. They blatantly attack Rhysenn and IP, citing information from her website and one of the sexier scenes from her story. While some may find her fics offensive (I personally can’t go within 5 miles of some of her stories), it’s clear that there are plenty of people that like to read them. She and Cassie have a rather significant fan base on eGroups.
Also, why are they automatically assuming that slash = porn? I recently read the third fic in A’jes’ Blue’s “Catharsis” trilogy, and it was very tastefully done. More tasteful than you find in the average non-slash novel you find in your local library. (And to think that the “Clan of the Cave Bear” series was on my 7th grade reading list!) It really irritates me when companies make uninformed, sweeping decisions like this. Bah. I hope they print a retraction, but I highly doubt they would.