My $.02 about Captive Prince:

It is a story with problematic and morally squiffy content. It's not free from critique. Nothing is! But there's a difference between critique in good faith, and jumping on the Hot Take Discourse Train to shame and stone anyone who enjoys it.
I.e...

Critique: "the fantasy of a romantic relationship growing out of a slave-based society is rooted in white supremacy, because colonialism is seeped into our society. Those disadvantaged by white supremacy may have a different experience/reaction to that fantasy, despite the >>

>> negative or critical ways in which slavery is depicted in the work."

An uninformed hot take: "anyone who likes this is a straight white woman who loves to fetishize slavery and gay men and they deserve harassment for not liking this other more morally pure content!"

No shit a book that has a master/slave and colonizer/captive relationship would be distressing or off putting for some people. There's very good reason for that! Western society is shaped around colonialism and disenfranchising non-whites.

But I am not convinced that the mere existence of a particular trope, with no other analysis or consideration for the ways in which the work explores it, is automatically fetishizing.

You dont have to like or consume anything you don't want to. But not everything is fetishizing.

Gotcha, thanks for informing me, I'll delete that now. I repated the term because CS used it specifically in talking about themselves (and their MC), but now I know! https://twitter.com/meltingcyan/status/1252194826532958210?s=19

I know the author is nonbinary & a member of a minority ethnic group in their native Australia. That matters, too, & is overlooked by bad-faith critics.

But assuming death of the author, i still think trope existence alone isn't enough to explain to whom or why it appeals.