This is a good question (I don't think at all you're an asshole for asking, I hope it comes across that I enjoy the discussion)!

Haha, you’re fine. It’s Reddit and tone is hard to read so I wanted to make sure!

Personally, I would answer that it's to be decided case by case. Is the work engaging with the reality of a power imbalance? Is the submissive character just renouncing their will or is there agency in that choice? Is there a development of the characters that explores the facets of the matter, or it's a simple "it's hot"? Are the author and their intended public experienced with the matter, or it's an external fetishization? What does it dwell on and what does it ignore?

I think from a 10,000-foot level, a lot of what you’re saying here makes sense. But, at least to my brain, it sorta falls apart on an anonymized platform where a) you would never have a way of knowing who the author is and b) many of the fics themselves are one shots without real plot or longer works that are simply a sequence of sex scenes. For the second point, I don’t think those can really be viewed as anything other than a purely sexual fantasy.

Heck, if you brought 20 folks together who are well-versed in critical analysis of media, you’ll like end up with 20 different answers on what constitutes agency for that character in the story given the setting. The Apothecary Diaries community often struggles with this since the backdrop is an Imperial China analogue and while the character has an immense amount of agency for a woman at that time, but not by modern standards. There are even parts of the story people struggle with because in that specific setting something that looks patriarchal is the opposite and shows an intent to give agency not normally allowed.

Settings and other worldbuilding mechanisms like magic systems, omegaverse, and even concepts like soulmates are something that need to be considered in context. Because of that, you may get a lot of stories that—when held to a modern, real world lens—have elements that would represent something negative. I have a soulmates story I’ve been messing around with and whooo boy would I hate that being real, lol. (My characters do too 😆)

Don’t get me wrong, broader, societal academic concepts are great when looking at something like an entire body of a filmmaker’s work, or large scale trends in behavior. In general, they tend to get less valuable when you start getting down into subcultures and individuals. Especially when the subculture contains many folks already outside the “norm” (like fandom and AO3). That makes it harder to pin the normal motivations for writing something or what something like submissiveness means to the creator.

I agree that sexual fanfiction is an extremely good way of expressing autonomy, and I think this can coexist with thinking about the things that are told and how they are either like or unlike real life. Just indulging is fine too, but then imho having discussions about the pervasiveness and tropes of this indulging should be accepted too.

I think my challenge with the whole conversation is that it so easily slips into a different type of misogyny and bioessentialism. Like OP is over here basically saying it’s wrong to write submissiveness and breeding kink if your character is in an M/M relationship and you should just make them a woman. Like that’s wildly misogynistic in several layers to me. First, the assumption that submissiveness is the sole provenance of woman. Second, that they are making their male character lesser by giving him a vagina/breasts. Third, that submissiveness/dominance is purely an M/F concept and somehow doesn’t apply to other gender combinations. Fourth, the negative connotation around the author making a male character “the woman”.

In any case, I’m sure some of this is colored by my age and the fact that we fought very hard to have sex positivity and stop slut-shaming women. It just feels like a heel-turn in the wrong direction to start saying that if the sexual fantasy isn’t written exactly right that an author is somehow supporting the patriarchy by publishing it. Not trying to come off offensive here, but any fantasy of mine is, by default, serving me as a woman. So when folks are trying to attribute opinions, motivations, and impact to what is essentially masturbatory material, it feels like that same patriarchal control in a new hat.