" one author on another site who does"

Do tell.

I've just discovered another no no word: 'booty'.

And the phrase "fine with it" when writing about other people accepting a young man being gay. Even some of the good writers miss the boat on this one. 

"Teddy wrote on Tue, 26 May 2020 06:05"

And the phrase "fine with it" when writing about other people accepting a young man being gay. Even some of the good writers miss the boat on this one. 

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It seems to work as a phrase in the UK? The meaning is simple. "Fred's parents were fine with it." means they were not discontented, nor ecstatic.

"timmy wrote on Tue, 26 May 2020 00:25"

"Teddy wrote on Tue, 26 May 2020 06:05"

And the phrase "fine with it" when writing about other people accepting a young man being gay. Even some of the good writers miss the boat on this one. 

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It seems to work as a phrase in the UK? The meaning is simple. "Fred's parents were fine with it." means they were not discontented, nor ecstatic.

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if it were used occasionally this would be true but when it gets used nearly every time the situation is encountered in these tales it begins to become rather boring, unimaginative, and awkward, in my opinion, of course.  

"a story where all the main charactes got run over and killed by a train rather than any sort of reconcilliation taking place"

I'm going to reference a dead tree book here. It was set in California, and all sorts of conflicts were coming to a head ... and then there was this massive earthquake.

The author in question has quite a literary reputatiion.

I agree that it's a rotten shorthand, and it also tells not shows. "Freds parents were so fine with it that they held a coming out party for him."  Woudl that be better?

"Loose/lose is so common I'm actually surprised when someone gets it right nowadays."

And how about 'discrete' and 'discreet'?

"The Composer wrote on Tue, 12 May 2020 10:28"

"Loose/lose is so common I'm actually surprised when someone gets it right nowadays."

And how about 'discrete' and 'discreet'?

--

At the prospect of being considered as a science geek:

The energy levels of a hydrogen atom are discrete but not discreet.

PS Haven't I seen stories of yours rendered in 'Comic Sans'?

"The Composer wrote on Wed, 03 June 2020 10:03"

At the prospect of being considered as a science geek:

The energy levels of a hydrogen atom are discrete but not discreet.

PS Haven't I seen stories of yours rendered in 'Comic Sans'?

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I read the misguided and sad chiding of the use of Comic Sans here.  I forget who the unfortunate soul is who made the comment.  Best left to his own devices.  Howerver, let me say, without reservation, that it's a great font.  Wonderful.  Among adjectives I'd throw at it are irreverent, sprightly, jaunty, youthful and, for those of us needing it, easy to read.  I would be interested in knowing why anyone would object to it.  Probably it's the same wounded souls who go around muttering, "Bay, humbug," in late December.

"cole parker wrote on Wed, 03 June 2020 16:56"

"The Composer wrote on Wed, 03 June 2020 10:03"

At the prospect of being considered as a science geek:

The energy levels of a hydrogen atom are discrete but not discreet.

PS Haven't I seen stories of yours rendered in 'Comic Sans'?

--
I read the misguided and sad chiding of the use of Comic Sans here.  I forget who the unfortunate soul is who made the comment.  Best left to his own devices.  Howerver, let me say, without reservation, that it's a great font.  Wonderful.  Among adjectives I'd throw at it are irreverent, sprightly, jaunty, youthful and, for those of us needing it, easy to read.  I would be interested in knowing why anyone would object to it.  Probably it's the same wounded souls who go around muttering, "Bay, humbug," in late December.

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It is only reading speed issues that I criticse it for. It is a pleasant font and has a place. Probably not in a broadsheet newspaper, though.

To me, fonts should be like computer operating systems: completely transparent.I don't mind whether a computer runs on Windows, Linux, or Mac, because I'm not interested in the operating system. I'm interested on the applications that run on that system, like photo editing, video editing, word processing, email and the rest of it.The same with fonts.

There is a place for fancy fonts, such as on the cover to a book. But when it comes to the main text, when you are going to read tens of thousands of words, you do not want the font to intrude on that process. That's why I dislike drop caps at the beginning of a chapter. There is a weird dead tree publishing convention that any paragraph that follows some form of heading is not indented, but that all subsequent paragraphs are indented. Why? I have no idea, except that I'm forced to follow that convention. Another convention is that if you intent paragraphs, you should not place in the space between one paragraph and another. Why? I have no idea.This might seem something of a digression. It is not. When you are reading page after page of page of text, you are interested not in how it's laid out, nor the font it is presented in, but the content of the text. Anything that diverts you from that interest is a failure.

Sorry if I'm going on at length about this. But, fonts. There are all sorts of limitations on readability: line length, line spacing, and all these others. The font is part of this. If an author wants to use a fancy font, that's fine, but it often impedes the readability of the text.

I don't necessarily disagree, Timmy, especially because you have reasons for your choices.  And Composer, you make good points, too.  There is another way to look at this, of course.

If everything looks the same, not only can boredom set in, but it takes away some of the creativity of the author.  I use colors on my home site not only because the site owner likes it that way, but because I can add a visual element to a story.  I use a different color scheme if the story is sad rather than joyful, action-paced rather that tranquil.  This can be done with both the background color and font color.  It's also possible with indenting and choice of font.  They can be chosen with the thought in mind of affecting the reader's mood while reading the story.  Having no indent makes the story look much different, much less friendly, say, than having an indent.

Readability, of course, is important.  Very important to me.  To enchance that, I like to add spaces between the lines of the story.  In Word, I use 1.3 line spacing.  Much easier to read that way.  I also like the font slight larger than some sites use, though that's easy for the reader to control.  But I also choose a font that's easy to read and not a bit distracting.  Maybe others disagree, but I find Comic Sans just as easy to read as Time New Roman and much less boring.

C

"cole parker wrote on Thu, 04 June 2020 21:11"

I don't necessarily disagree, Timmy, especially because you have reasons for your choices.  And Composer, you make good points, too.  There is another way to look at this, of course.

If everything looks the same, not only can boredom set in, but it takes away some of the creativity of the author.  I use colors on my home site not only because the site owner likes it that way, but because I can add a visual element to a story.  I use a different color scheme if the story is sad rather than joyful, action-paced rather that tranquil.  This can be done with both the background color and font color.  It's also possible with indenting and choice of font.  They can be chosen with the thought in mind of affecting the reader's mood while reading the story.  Having no indent makes the story look much different, much less friendly, say, than having an indent.

Readability, of course, is important.  Very important to me.  To enchance that, I like to add spaces between the lines of the story.  In Word, I use 1.3 line spacing.  Much easier to read that way.  I also like the font slight larger than some sites use, though that's easy for the reader to control.  But I also choose a font that's easy to read and not a bit distracting.  Maybe others disagree, but I find Comic Sans just as easy to read as Time New Roman and much less boring.

C

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The studies at the time suggest that Comic Sans, being a sans serif font, would be reasonably fast to read. Even so our reasons for choosing a serif font remain valid for the site, together with the flat background

There is the option here to have it, of course. It's in our font list, so one need not feel disenfonted

When I see a coloured background I use Safari's Reader View, whcuh removes it[/font-family][/font-family]

I'd known I was gay like forever and had come out to my folks when I was thirteen. They'd told me they'd suspected I was gay for some time and it made no difference to them as I was still their son.

I mentioned earlier in this thread that I appreciate a bit of creativity when authors write about whether parents are accepting of their offspring's sexuality. "Fine with it" seems to be a standard phraseology, which, at least for me, seems to be overused.

Today I ran onto a story on here that while not making an issue of something that was only incidental to the story, presented it in a way that to me was... what? Comfortable, I guess? 
"Quote:"

I'd known I was gay like forever and had come out to my folks when I was thirteen. They'd told me they'd suspected I was gay for some time and it made no difference to them as I was still their son.

So thanks to Ivor Slipper in his story, Kissing Friends. It's short, makes the point, and avoids cookie cutter phraseology

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I can guess why an author would use a phrase like 'fine with it.'  He's probably trying to show normality, something that's fairly new.  In the past, it seemed most families would have a problem with it, or at least take some time to get used to it.  In many families in the world today, 'gay' isn't the bugaboo it was, adults are more accustomed to the idea that some, or many, kids are in fact gay, that it isn't a choice but most likely an inheritance, and so an announcement like that from their kid is accepted as fact and isn't the problem it was up till not many years ago.  'Fine with it' makes that clear, means it's no big deal, that it's accepted, that the family simply moved on.  I'd assume that was the thinking behind using those words, rather than making it a bigger thing than the writer wants it to be by taking more time to discuss how the statement was accepted.

"cole parker wrote on Fri, 12 June 2020 09:46"

--
I can guess why an author would use a phrase like 'fine with it.'  He's probably trying to show normality, something that's fairly new.  In the past, it seemed most families would have a problem with it, or at least take some time to get used to it.  In many families in the world today, 'gay' isn't the bugaboo it was, adults are more accustomed to the idea that some, or many, kids are in fact gay, that it isn't a choice but most likely an inheritance, and so an announcement like that from their kid is accepted as fact and isn't the problem it was up till not many years ago.  'Fine with it' makes that clear, means it's no big deal, that it's accepted, that the family simply moved on.  I'd assume that was the thinking behind using those words, rather than making it a bigger thing than the writer wants it to be by taking more time to discuss how the statement was accepted.

--

I think this sums up what I've been wanting to say for a while about the idea of using "fine with it" in a story.  In this day and age, if some people being LGBT is supposed to be a normal part of life, then other people shouldn't be making a big deal out of the fact that someone feels same-sex attractions, and thus it means that, indeed, they should be "fine with it."  Nobody's going to be jumping up and down for joy, there isn't going to be a huge coming out party witha parade marching down the street, and nobody's going to be collecting on any bets.  You're not heterosexual?  All right.  There shouldn't be anything more or less to it.  Sure, be mindful about such things as safe sex, but other than that?  It's not supposed to be a big deal in this day and age, so why try to make it one?

I've been thinking hard about this one. I'd like people not to be 'fine with it'. I'd like it more to be a 'yeah? and?' thing, but it takes more skill to express that than many writers have.

I have never wanted tolerance, nor acceptance. All I have ever wanted is normality.

By the way, that 1966 song turns out to be as relevant today as it was that summer.
You can take a listen to that Steve Stills classic (in case you've forgotten it!) by clicking here.

I hear what everyone is saying. Good points all.

My only objection to the phrase is its appearance in 95% of the stories where there are similar events. It's predictable. It happes over and over an over again. From a literary standpoint it's beginning to bother me.

"I told my folks. They're fine with it." 

Okay... Nice, but didn't the last 43 stories I read have that exact same phraseology? It lands with a big thud by the 44th time. What's wrong with a little creativity in order to make a story appear less cookie-cutter-esque. 

"My parents found out I'm gay. It's all good!"

shrug...

Quote:

I guess that (for me, at least) it kind of falls under the topic of "You write what you know," and that's just how I tend to talk under most such circumstances that require such a response of how something is fine/good/terrific/cool/etc., and it's how a lot of the people I know tend to talk.  (Maybe I just need to get out more.  I don't know.)  So I find it kind of strange that someone would find it, at the very least, too repetitive, and have not often had any reason to consider any other variation on the declaration of "It's fine."