Art Post - Dark Erotism

Whore - In This Moment

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Samuel Sterns / The Leader - Marvel Studio

I am the dirt you created

I am your sinner

I am your whore

But let me tell you something baby

You love me, you want me, you need me!

I can be your whore!

I am the dirt you created

I am your sinner

I am your whore

But let me tell you something baby

You love me for everything you hate me for

If you're a minor I'll ask you to leave. Hop hop, leave, go play Fortnite, do your homework, whatever, just leave. Very strong CW for abuses (sexual, psychological, physical). Alright, today we're gonna mention dark erotism and so the romantization of abuses and violence through this specific art. Explaining why and how it can exist. Sam/Ross isn't something I ship, not romantically at least. But it's still a fascinating toxic dynamic that I love exploring.

I'm super happy with how it turned out, Sam's face is really great, I think I'm slowly starting to make a recognizible and accurate MCU Sam face.

I love erotism, I love the history behind, the aesthetic. It's the most human form of Art with everything it implies and as such it can be soft and comforting or violent and disturbing. But erotism isn't necessarly porn and porn isn't necessarly erotic. You can have one without the other. I don't like porn because I don't feel shit while watching it, I only see people doing a very natural shit, it's like watching a cow eat some grass. It's boring to me and pointless. I do love drawn porn because I enjoy the composition, the skilln the lore. Now that's erotism, a staging, an ambiance, a story, a message. That's why I enjoy soft romantic ones as much as I love very violent and disturbing ones, because Art doesn't and shouldn't be only comfort and rainbows and cute. Not everything you have to tell is comfortable.

And so, even if the implications of this fanart are sexual, the point isn't porn nor sex. The point is Sam and this fascinating ambiguity with Ross. That's why everything is red, it's obvious enough that it represents both Red Hulk and Sam's red prison. But that's also why Ross' coat and arm are red, not just because "haha Red Hulk", but also because I wanted everything about Ross to fade in the background so your eyes will automatically focus on Sam and Sam only. That's why he's of a cold green color. Not just because it's Sam and he's green (it's very convenient though), but because green is red's complementary color. That's why Red Hulk is red, to oppose Hulk's green. But the thing about complementary color is, like the name says, how they bring each other out. Red is more vibrant and noticeable around green and vice versa. If Sam is so visible to your eyes, that's because of the red around him. That's how the MCU Leader was born, out of this red prison and abuse, it can't exist without it. It can't stand out without it. That's why the shadows on Sam are blue and not reddish and why there's red around the lines that construct his face and body. Blue is cold, it gives Sam a cold shade of green that will make him stand out more than if he had a hot shade of shadow like red. But there's still red in the very structure of his face and body, the lines, because like I said that's what built him. That's why I made his blood red when I usually yell it should be green.

In my original sketch, Sam's face was a bit more "pleading" while still being rebellious and I liked it a lot but I changed that because I wanted him to be fierce and strong and ambiguous himself. I added this very small line on the corner of his mouth that has you wondering if he's angry or smirking, is he really suffering the moment or in control and enjoying it ? That's the whole point of Sam after all.

I really don't believe in humanity anymore. Specifically men. I don't think you can be abducted and emprisonned without a trial and tortured daily without getting through the worst possible kind of humiliations, which of course, are often sexual. Especially in such a twisted and typical toxic relationship made of power and submission and promised and dehumanization.

The thing with sexual abuses is it's not just a sexual intercourse with physical violence and physical pain. Hell, it's not even always violent and physically painful. It's a way to humiliate and dehumanize your victim while showing absolute power and dominance. It's the closest form of absolute control over someone's life you get right after murder. This is a way to have someone at your disposal. It's the strongest form of dehumanization but also a way to feel powerful. It's not just about breaking your victim, it's also (and mostly) about feeling powerful by making a human's life yours, that's why men of power enjoy sexual abuses because it's abuses and not because it's sexual. I don't see Ross as gay (in fact I think he would be very homophobic given how this dude was willing to sacrifice his daughter to conservatism, no shade to his fans, you can picture him as gay if you want, it's my own very personal vision and it shouldn't impact yours), to Ross it's not about having anything sexual. Sam isn't a man to him, it's a mean. It's a mean to reach his goal but also a mean to feel powerful and in control. It's something he can use at will and just throw once he doesn't need it anymore, until the next time. Ross doing this to Sam is a way for him to break Sam and turn him into his thing, but also a way to feel strong and powerful. It's about his ego. But I also think he would use Sam to comfort himself. To fill that hole left by the passing of his wife and his daughter's hate. A way to find a form of love. Ross is deeper than just "mean guy with control and anger issues" after all.

So even if Ross developped love and compassion for Sam, it wouldn't be in a gay way. He wouldn't touch him because of attraction.

(Sam is totally gay tho but it's not the point here either)

But I didn't want Sam to be represented as a weak broken victim. I didn't want him to be just that, just a victim. That's why it's Ross who is fading away in the background and not Sam. Because it's Ross who's losing himself and his humanity. Slowly it's Sam who gained power over him through Ross' own abuses and choices. That's why the focus is on Sam and why he has this angry rebellious look. Because the point is no matter how Ross dehumanized him and broke him, Sam's will is still alive. Sure, Ross' abuses marked him forever and he'll wear it like a coat (you understand why it's here now), it marked his body (thus the red in the lines), it will be part of him forever but it's not what defines him, it's not why your eyes automatically focus on him. No matter how Ross' coat is covering him, no matter the grip he has on his neck, no matter how much he changed Sam and "designed" the person he is now through these red lines, Sam will always be more than that. It shaped him into what he is, but he's not just this. Not anymore. "I'm making my own choices now".

What makes Sam and Ross' relationship so toxic, twisted, violent, dark and interesting to explore is because of how they needed each others, how they were addicted to each others. That's the problem with toxic relationship, the hold your abusor has on you isn't just through a physical grip, it's a psychological manipulation. They make you love them and what makes it harder is how they often love you and need you too. It's easier to hate someone who hate you than to admit the person who is hurting you love you (and I'm not necessarly talking about romance here, it can be a friend, family), because you don't want to leave, you want to hope and "save" them even if it means sacrificing yourself. That's why toxic relationship are so hard to leave, because even if you're not isolated, you cannot help but love them and hope for them. Love isn't always a beautiful thing, love can be the most painful and dangerous leash. Love can be an addiction, it can be violent. It's not always about living happily ever after.

It's not always about romance or family or friendship. You love objects, you love situations, you love stories, it's not a romantic bound, it's rather a need. Love is a need. And I do think Sam and Ross loved each others in that way, because they needed each others.

In the way that Ross was everything to Sam, literally, the only person he was talking with, someone who showed him compassion (and while it most likely started as fake, I think Ross developped a real compassion given the visible guilt he shows when he explains to Captain America how he wanted to move him in another place but couldn't because of fear of losing him), someone who gave him hope. Even if Ross is the one who destroyed Sam's life and took everything away from him, he became his hope. This is exactly what a toxic relationship is about, something destructive that took everything from you so it becomes your only hope. Once you have nothing anymore, all you have left is the thing that destroyed you, so you cling to it.

Sam clearly wanted to believe in Ross, that's why he kept helping him even if he knew he would betrayed him. That's why he says "it was my curse to watch your betrayal in probabilities", it's a very strong sentence. I said it in another post but "curse" and "betrayal" are very strong words that show how personal it was to Sam. It was more than "he didn't free me", it was someone he wanted to believe in who broke what was left of his heart and trust in people. Ross BETRAYED him, he represented Sam's hope in humanity, he did the worst possible shit because he believed in him. Building weapons, killing people (indirectly yes, through his advices and technologies, but still, given his tender nature and how he wanted to use science to help people it probably hurt him like Hell to hurt people and bring more corruption) it probably made Sam suffers.

Back then Sam would have done everything for Ross because through Ross he could have his life back. Thus the lyrics I chose "I am the dirt you created" because he's nothing, "I am your sinners I am your whore" because of how he "prostituted" his mind and moral for Ross. He sinned for him and he gave him his whole self so it's very suiting. When he says "I'm making my own choices now" he makes it pretty clear he wasn't living for himself and was just bending to Ross' will to get out of that Hell before. But I think it was a bit more personal than just "Ross is a mean to achieve freedom". And it's only human, giving a meaning to your suffering and your sins. I think he believed in Ross to be a good person and erased corruption, to save him but also other unfair victims also because he needed to give a justification to his suffering and his sins. In order to climb ladders and get power in a corrupted system you gotta be equally corrupted, so Sam got his hands dirty for him, because he believed he would change and change everything with him. Even if every numbers proved him wrong, Sam wanted to believe, that's why it was a curse to him, because he didn't want to accept it. He wanted to defy these numbers. Because Ross was everything to him, his freedom, his last connexion to humanity, his hope. That's what I mean by love. I don't mean Sam wanted to have a romantic relationship with him and marry him and live happily ever after, that's a very simple and lazy representation of love. I mean Sam developped a connexion to him that is deeper than just "this lad can set me free". So his betrayal hurt even more. And Ross loved him too, in the way that Sam was useful to him, he gave him power. But he was more than that, he could tell everything to Sam. He could tell Sam how he was planning to take over the US gov and have him help him. He probably talked about Betty to Sam. He could be a monster in front of Sam. No matter how Ross dehumanized Sam, he created a strong dependance to him and he probably hated him for that, maybe even leading to more violence (maybe to prove himself he didn't care). That's why I took these specific lyrics of "Whore" by In This Moment. Because "you love me for everything you hate me for" is the perfect way to describe this dependance. He loved Sam for the power he brought him, through the way he helped him climb ladders but also the way he could control Sam as I explained above. But he hated him for that too, because it became a need. And eventually, no matter how strong his hold is on Sam, he will fade away and lose himself to it. That's why he's the one disappearing. The point wasn't to dehumanize Sam's abusor for the sake of it because "abusors aren't humans", it's because they are that they're so threatening and dangerous. It's because they are that our pain and ressent is so intense. It was more of a way to have Sam "win" over him. Ross is very human, that's why he's terrifying. And if you look closely at Ross' hold on this art, you'll notice that even if he's pressuring Sam's neck with his thumb, the grip is still slightly lose, almost gentle. He can't bring himself to just snap that neck, because he needs Sam as much as Sam needs him. He covered Sam's naked body with his own coat, as if he wanted to protect him from the humiliation. Ross' career is everything to him, this coat is important to him, that's why I chose this to put on Sam's shoulders and not a shirt or another kind of coat belonging to Ross. Having Ross' tag on Sam is a way to make him his property, but also a way to protect him, almost in a paternal way which makes everything even more twisted and unacceptable.

Everything in this artwork have this very painfully disturbing double meaning. Everything that hurt is also mean as a way to protect and comfort. Everything comforting is also here to hurt. Everything disgusting is erotic and appealing.

It's their twisted love story, a love made of hate.

This is what most abuses are and why they're so silent, invisible and "acceptable". Because it's love.

We often talk about the horror of abuses, we often imagine abuses as that one time visibly violent assault in the street but we never mention how most of these abuses are silent, invisible because of how normalized they are. Born of trust and love sometimes. We never mention victims hidding in shame and guilt for normalizing it and for craving it in some case, craving the destruction, wanting to love it, to make it acceptable, to make it normal and deserved. Because it's easier to accept. How are you supposed to accept what happened to you and to go on if it doesn't feel normal and how can you hate if it's normalized ? This is the awful paradox victims go through.

What make this kind of violence so cruel is how it's not manichean. How it's not that simple. Hating something is easier than normalizing it. Normalizing the horror is easier than aknowledging it, it's this cruel contradiction that is so hard to live, because in a case or another you're not allowed to feel the way you feel. Everybody will tell you about the violence of your abusors and dehumanize their abuse, but nobody will ever tell you about the violence of your own mind gaslighting you into accepting an abuse to cope and how, trapped in your thoughts, you can become your own abusor. So what then ? Are you a monster too ?

So all you have is guilt, shame and the feeling that you deserved it. I went through this as a teen. When my friend forced me to touch him he was kind. His grip was strong enough to hold me still and preventing from removing my hand again, but he was kind and he was loving, it was merely a touch, it's not like I lost my virginity, we were kids, this is the kind of thoughts gaslighting you into thinking it was nothing and it was acceptable. So when he stopped, when I was finally freed from these repetitive humiliations, no matter how much it made me sick to have to go through this, what hurt me the most wasn't the abuse, it was the betrayal. I hated hum more than anything for making me live this situation, but I wanted him to love me and worst than that, I wanted to love him and it was the most hurtful and traumatic part of it, because nobody told me it was a normal feeling so I felt disgusting, soiled. I thought people would be angry at me and they would stop loving me if I ever mentionned that and for years I was scared this person would comeback and just casually talk about it as the fun harmless kid game he probably thought it was, because I played along too after a while, once it became a normality. After all, it was merely touches, it was nothing, it wasn't a sexual intercourse, just touches. And who knows, maybe if I allowed it to happen I would just start loving it too and have a good time. If you can't avoid it you might as well try to enjoy it, so after a while you allow it, it was the idea. (it doesn't work if you wondered, it made it worst).

That's why it took me 10 years to mention it to my fiance and 20 to anyone at all. Because I thought I was gross, a pervert for even wishing to like it. I don't remember the face of that person, nor the name, nor the abuses, but I remember how I wished I would learn to love it. And it hurt. Wishing to enjoy the unacceptable. Hoping you could love something you hate. But I needed that to protect myself and back then I didn't understand because you weren't allowed to feel this way. Because the desire to like something you hate is still a desire, even if you hate it. And the thought that you might desire something you hate is an absolute horror. Because even if your desire was merely "I don't want to suffer this anymore", it's still a desire and you don't look deeper than that. I guess the worst part in that is how it's not even this abuse that traumatized me the most because at least they weren't cruel, they were young and uneducated and I guess they did think I wouldn't learn to enjoy that. Sure it's not an excuse but it wasn't meant to hurt me, it wasn't cruelty even if it was cruel. The most violent shit I went through weren't sexual, it wasn't visual, it wasn't violent It was medical, psychological, ableist. This sexual violence was merely a detail in my life. It's like being trapped inside an Iron Maiden, remove a spike, it won't change shit. That's what it is, a spike at best. That's why this art is not just about sex, it's about humiliation as a whole, that's why Sam is naked, because that's how I feel everytime I go through it.

This is about abuses as a whole. Physical, sexual, psychological. Willing abuse or just negligeances. Every kind. The abuses that hurted me the most aren't violent, they're not visible and they're normal. It's Not just Ross and the tortures that had Sam losing hope in humanity, it's everything he saw in his calculs, it's the silent normalized invisible horror and injustices. Sam realizing how cruel humanity can be to get power, to get money, to get fame and more gruesome how normal and acceptable it is. That's what broke him the most, not the unacceptable but the very cruel accepted reality. And it's what broke me the most too. Ross is merely a metaphor of all of that.

And just like I wanted to love the touches I was forced into, I started developping the need to romanticize humiliations and find comfort in it. And Art is the healthiest way to exteriorize it without actually hurting others and yourself. Art is a roleplay and unlike an actual abuse you can stop it anytime, you can look away, you're in control. You make it, you control it, you don't suffer it. There's a lot of stuff I'm not into, some makes me feel highly uncomfortable even because I'm just not concerned I guess so I stick to my education on that matter aka "this = bad" but I know I can just mute words, accounts, posts. I know there's also a lot of abusors (like, half the men in any art field such as comics, cinema etc etc...) and I can just not support them or buy their stuff and y'know, that's kind of the thing, it doesn't matter if you censor dark arts, abusors will exist anyway, you can censor these loli con account or rape representation all you want, kids and women will still be abused while working on your fav shit (hi the Goonies) and you won't bat an eye about it because you don't wanna get "your childhood ruined" anyway. Dark arts are easy to target because you don't give a shit. I talked longer about censorship and dark arts here so I'll have you read this, but you get the point.

And it doesn't matter how hard you want to censor and remove disturbing, toxic and violent dynamics in fictions, because it exists in your reality and people will suffer it anyway.

Romanticizing it through fiction is a way to understand it, to understand what you've been through, to cope. Accepting the unacceptable is merely a defense mecanism. We're all very inequal in front of traumas, some can't stand it at all, some needs to make it appealing. And fiction can do that, it can make something atrocious appealing and help you cope without hurting the people who need to look away to cope, because no matter if you're into it or can't stand it, in a way or another you're in control of the fiction you create and consume. Through fiction you can explore something you're not allowed to in a safe and healthy way but you can also look away (thus the importance of properly tagging tw/cw, it's not a way to add censorship, it's a way to be able to mention highly disturbing shit while respecting people and so allowing it to exist instead of having a censorship). That's why this art is important to me, that's why Sam is fierce and rebellious, that's why even if the red is part of him he still stands out, he's still the focus, even if he is through the red, it's about him, it's not about his abuses.

My traumas are part of me and I'll carry them until my last breath, they turned me into the person I am now. It's a part of me. But I am me, I am not the traumas and the pain. I find strength and comfort in my scars and I refuse to feel shame, to feel weak and to reject something I can never get rid of because it would mean rejecting myself. So I'd rather make it hot. That's why I talk so freely about all that, because rather than yelling "It's just a drawing of a fictional abusive relationship, if you see it as more than a drawing and if you see an actual depiction of abuse then you need to touch grass" and rather explain why you would draw one and what it can bring.

Because it doesn't matter if it's still a drawing, you still cry and fear in front of fiction even if it's fiction and I'm still representing and romanticizing an abuse even if it's a fictional one, it was the intention. Denying it because "it's just a drawing" is anti-art, lazy and it adds to the shame because you admit it's so shameful you gotta pretend it's not what it is. It's a drawing made to overcome the shame, not add to it.

That's why this art is erotic, disturbingly arousing. I made it hot on purpose. I took "whore" of all song on purpose.

They need it, they take it, they crave it, they hate how they love it and they love hating it. It's meant to be weirdly seducing.

But it's not romance. It's not charming. It's not cute. It's horrifying.

There's something very fascinating in the horror. That's why some people saw a smirk in Sam's expression and not just pure hatred (and that was the point so I'm glad you noticed), because no matter the hold Ross has on him, he also have an absolute power over him. That's why Sam/Ross is an interesting dynamic (that I love comparing to Orus/Seth) and why I love drawing them in such a disturbing sexual set up, even if I hate them as a ship. Through Sam, through this power he has over his abusor, I can also feel powerful and avenged. But more importantly, I, too, embraced my traumas and found satisfaction in them, because I can never get rid of it so I might as well make it appealing. I am happy I can make Sam sexy to you even when I show up his head and body. His scars, his disabilities, his traumas, his abuses, everything he sees as a weakness and a shame, everything that made him a monster are also the things that are making him this strong and seducing in this art. Some people are like Sam, they think their scars broke them forever, they think the horror took their humanity away forever. Like I said, we aren't equal in front of traumas. But that's not how I see things or cope, I love who I am with all my scars and the horror. I guess that's why I love romanticizing the horror, because it's my way to find beauty in my own and go on. I understand for some it's impossible and they absolutly don't share that vision. It's merely my own, it belongs to me. The way I see my body, my history and translate it through fictional characters I like belongs to me and don't need anyone else's approval but mine.

And I enjoy seeing all the reactions around it, from people who feel disturbed, from people who feel aroused, from people who feel curious or who feel shame because they enjoyed a dark fantasy. I don't want you to only see my arts through my eyes, I don't want you to see this fanart as just "Lirhya's trauma dump" or personal slice of life, I want you to appropriate everything I draw, to slap your own feelings and interpretations on it. Negative or positive. Because that's also what Art is about and the same way I enjoy interpreting comics or MCU Sam's writing in my own way even if it wasn't what the writers meant, I want you to interpret my stuff the way you need, the way it suits your history. No matter if you think it's gross and disturbing or if you think it's sexy and appealing. That's why everything in this art can be interpreted in a way or another. I talk about my mindset and how every single one of my arts, even the dumbest, is a part of my soul because I want people to understand how intimate everything you create is. How every single thing you create is a piece of your soul, even when it's dumb and feel "meaningless". To stop feeling shame over it. To learn to express themself through it and discover themself. I write this for people who might need to read these words. For people who want to go deeper into their own self expression but are afraid to put so much of them into it. For artists around there who want tips about organizing an artwork. For people who are just curious about it. It's an invitation, if you take it you're free to do whatever you want with it. That's why no matter what I say about one of my baby, how I interpret it, the intention behind, I want you to have your own. Even if it clashes with mine, as long as you respect it you can do whatever you want with what I have to offer. Earlier I said love was a form of need and that's what art is, it's a need. You create it because you need to. You consume it because you need to.

And so, giving your own interpretation to someone's work to answer your own need is the rawest and purest form of love.

Until next time, enjoy~