Real talk, though, because it needs to be said: as much as we all joke that porn was the only good thing this place had left, the reality is that it being the only place where one could regularly engage with and promote sexual content being gone is really not understanding at all what makes this place special. I mean we all joke about “horny on main” and all that, but the reality is that for a lot of the LGTBQ+ community, particularly younger members still discovering themselves and members in extremely homophobic environments where most media sites were banned (but Tumblr wasn’t even considered important enough to be), this was a bastion of information and self-expression. For a lot of artists too, this was a great place to come and post NSFW work and get traction that became Patreon pages that became honest jobs.
The problem with “family friendly” social media is that more often than not, the ones hit the most by the whole family friendly nonsense are marginalized groups that have no vehicles to express themselves. Stuff like YouTube consistently bans or flags simple content featuring something as innocuous as two men kissing as “adult” content and makes it hard for LGBTQ+ content creators to compete with their non-queer peers for a lot of those reasons.
The ultimate problem isn’t even that banning of NSFW content, it’s the general mess surrounding it and unintended consequences to these groups. For MONTHS Tumblr has had a huge problem with porn spam bots and outright child pornography, and for MONTHS the majority of the userbase has been in general consensus that both of these things needed to stop. Tumblr did NOTHING. Absolutely nothing. When Apple finally removed their app from the store, SPECIFICALLY because of the child pornography, Tumblr decided to do what any rich corporation owning a social media site with zero understanding of what makes it popular would do, and decided that the best course of action was to eat itself like an Ouroboros. Rather than admit that they have done an absolutely shit job at keeping pedophiles off this website and rather than hiring the necessary staff to carefully moderate content, they decided to loose a poorly programmed bot that literally deleted perfectly SFW blogs with thousands of followers, and rather than properly handling moderation, they decided that it was best to simply go the lazy route and block anything even remotely NSFW.
They run this site in the worst way possible, and I don’t understand how @support or @staff or their completely oblivious “CEO” plans to keep this sinking ship alive.
the reality is that for a lot of the LGTBQ+ community, particularly younger members still discovering themselves and members in extremely homophobic environments where most media sites were banned (but Tumblr wasn’t even considered important enough to be), this was a bastion of information and self-expression.
Not to get controversial or anything but can we stop with making fun of women being abused by their husbands and playing it off as ‘straight culture’
I lost 10 followers for saying we shouldnt make fun of domestic abuse victims.
can we also please stop making fun of men being abused by their wives thanks
Good addition
Can we also stop acting that domestic abuse is just a “straight” thing?
It’s literally teaching our baby gays that any same sex relationship their going into is safe and they don’t need to be worried about being abused and controlled.
PSA: How (and how not) to elect a third-party candidate
I’m seeing some concerningly timed posts going around instructing people to be suspicious of the Democratic party and vote third party, so here’s a quick reminder:
The candidates you are currently widely seeing lawn signs and stickers for are the ones that have a chance.
YES we need to break out of the two-party system – but any successful attempt to do so will need to be staged and mounted well before October of an election year.
~
If you can already name your local third-party candidate and your neighborhood is covered in their signs – that’s great, vote for them if you like their policies!
If not, vote blue and then do the work to make this happen next time.
It’s not impossible but it takes at least a year of concerted effort to make a candidate feasible.
Last-minute pushes for third-party candidates are almost always backed by Republicans because they know they can write a thinkpiece, pick off the POC and LGBTQ+ voters who are (rightfully) disaffected, and elect more white supremacists.
And this makes it even harder to actually break out of the cycle because people blame third-party candidates when this happens.
AO3 actually says this, in the TOS that every user agrees to:
it’s right there in the mission statement, y’all. This has been their policy since day one.
Most criticisms don’t say that’s their obligation, you all are really missing a lot of what the complaints are about. I feel like if you all actually read what people were saying instead of writing everything off as “oh they want ao3 to protect them and censor us” you wouldn’t see so much “discourse”. You have to admit that all of the moralizing and victimization being done in the name of this site is extremely obnoxious and winds up exaggerating what should be cut and dry.
@phoenix-ace “you must censor fics to protect people from upsettting and immoral content” describes 99% of every complaint I see about AO3, with the other 1% being “it shouldn’t take so much money to run the site”. Both of these have been extensively refuted, with tons of evidence to back them up. What are the other complaints you’re referring to, that are valid and being written off? If there are real concerns I’d like to hear them – I just haven’t seen a single one.
Rampant racism and homophobia in fics that people dont actually fucking tag so we cant just avoid it.
a part of me feels like this is like complaining about going on /b/ and seeing racism and homophobia. It says, in the guidelines, that they won’t remove offensive content, they don’t review for it, and you browse at your own risk of being exposed to it.
does that suck? Yes. Do some people probably need a safer browsing experience? Yes. It’s not going to be AO3. AO3 is a public, largely unmoderated, unscreened archive. They give you the tools to build moderated, screened archives with their software, but they aren’t one. They post all legal fanworks. That’s what they are. That’s what they have always been.
If you’ll reread what I said I’m not advocating for them to remove it. I want a way for readers to tag content so that the tag system is actually useful.
Most people arent gonna tag their racist and homophobic shit for racism and homophobia especially not in this community where casual racism and homophobia is rampant.
If they arent going to remove it (which I have feelings about by the way but is not the point of this conversation) the least that can be done is updating the tagging system.
And the whole they give you the tools bit… that does nothing for a bunch of us. I cant code and I dont have the time to learn to code.
Like the general sentiment is “dont like it dont read it” and “that’s what tags are for” both those sentiments are USELESS when people dont tag shit.
No system allows you to tag other people’s work, because that is a system that is so ripe for abuse and exploitation it’s ridiculous. Assholes would tear that feature apart within a week. Seriously, name another sites that lets you add a tag to the original post of someone’s post.
Ultimately, aside from the big four warnings, all tags on AO3 are discretionary and up for interpretation – if you’re just browsing the fandom direct on AO3. But there’s other options for curating content.
You can tag your bookmarks, recs, or collections that you add the fic to – so if, for example, you wanted to make a “RACIST BULLSHIT” list of fics and start adding them on there, that is within your power, and the author can’t stop you. Alternately, if you want to set up a shared collection with friends where you add and share fics that DONT contain those things, you can totally do that too and share it for others to use.
(I actually work on one of those, where there’s a very creepy character who’s often a fan favorite in fics, so myself and some other people who hate him set up a collection of fics which do not mention him at all, or only portray him as the slimeball he is.)
AO3 also has RSS feeds, so you could stream a certain kind of fic to somewhere else – say, a tumblr – and moderate from there, either by screening fics before they’re posted or by adding tags/warnings and deleting fics at your discretion or follower request. Streaming RSS feeds to tumblr blogs requires no code knowledge and can be set up in maybe half an hour.
So the current system where people dont tag racism and homophobia and all that other terrible stuff thus rendering filtering and avoiding that stuff useless and pretty hard to is fine but allowing people to tag something (which people can choose to ignore by the way) to make the tags more effective against racism and homophobia is a problem? Okay.
Also no one else does it so why should we is not a valid argument its actually pretty childish.
I’m glad there is all this extra and time consuming stuff that can be done but it is not to much to ask that avoiding racist homophobic etc content be as easy to avoid as it is for me to avoid a ship I dont like.
If AO3 is gonna be steadfast in not dealing with stuff that perpetuates racism and homophobia etc that’s the least that could be done.
Okay, cool, you use this hypothetical system to tag racism, and you always use it carefully, and people are better warned because of your tags, and everything is better. For….. oh, I’d give it 6 hours on the outside, after the update goes live.
Then somebody goes back and retaliates by tagging all of your posted fics with innacurate warnings or worse. Or tags all of your fics with racism back, regardless of how relevant it is. Somebody else goes through and tags every single fic with a certain ship with homophobia, or racism, or pedophilia, or incest, or abuse, because of a ship war. This renders your carefully curated tags irrelevant as somebody goes through and tags every fic that mentions or implies a ship as racist. Some troll tags a bunch of fics with slurs and nonsense tags. People start using tags to flame or discourage people from reading ships they don’t like. People start using tags to bash a specific author.
It would not just be you and yours who would get that power; it would be millions of people. It would be homophobes and racists having the power to post tags on the front page of your fics. It would be people who hate you having the power to affect how others see your work. This is a two way street; any power you gain over homophobes writing fic, they also gain over you and any fic you write.
You don’t trust people to tag their own racism, but you trust them to not exploit power that you give them? Why?
Does this person go to Barnes&Noble and throw tantrums about racist books there?
B&N sells Mein Kampf. It sells The Art of the Deal. It sells Ayn Rand’s entire bibliography. It sells books by misogynist “pick-up artists.” It also sells books on feminism, the civil rights movement, and novels by queer authors!
But, despite it having a variety of works by authors with greatly varying morals and politics, I’ve never seen anyone over the age of 4 get mad about bookstores existing.
^^^like i said before, if you are against sites like Ao3 existing, you are against libraries.
I wonder where the break happened that such wide swaths of younger fans don’t grasp fandom things that used to be unspoken understandings. That fic readers are expected to know fiction from reality, that views expressed in fic are not necessarily those of the author, that the labels, tags and warnings on various kinkfics are also the indication that they were created for titillation and not much more, please use responsibly as per all pornography. The ‘problem’ isn’t that so-called ‘problematic’ fic exists but that some of the audience is being stupid, irresponsible, at worst criminal, at best not old enough to be in the audience to begin with. And that’s on the consumer, not the author who told you via labels, tags, ratings, warnings and venues what their fic was about and what it was for.
I can’t stress enough how important this post is
It’s like having a video store. Physical and tangible but the store clerk is an android and everything is for free. You can browse, watch trailers, take your choice and leave.
A kid walks in and goes to the R rated section. Picks out a movie. A voice pipes up,
“Are you old enough for this?”
“Yes!”
“You sure?”
“Shut up!”
The robot sighs. It’s not in its programing to deal with blatant lies.
“I am obligated to tell you that the film you wish to view has depictions of graphic voilence, sexual content, and imagery that may trigger. Viewer descrection is advised.”
“I can handle it. Just gimme the movie.”
“Dipictions in the movie do not nessasarily represent the views of the content creator.”
“Alright, alight, shut up already.”
Robot sighs again
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Kid skips out of the shop.
Robot watches the clock, whilst sorting out new arrivals of content and checking their tags.
15 minutes later the kid kicks down the door demanding to speak to the director, ghastly offended and whining about
“ I don’t care that its free. Why is this content in my store? Why are these views being expressed. How dare you make my innocent eyes see this. This content is problematic and triggering. etc etc”
Robot points to a sign on the wall that reads,
“You were warned. Once seen cannot be unseen.”
The kid sputters.
“But.. But..”
The robot pops a sign on the counter.
‘Gone to lunch’
Robot continues to check the new arrival of content and its tags.
robot continues to
check the new arrival of
content and its tags
^Haiku^bot^9. I detect haikus with 5-7-5 format. Sometimes I make mistakes.
All of you have loved ones. All can be returned. All can be taken away. (•_•) | PayPal | Patreon
That’s all fun and good in theory, and of course audiences have responsibilities, but in my experience people just mostly have beef with people creating goddamn underaged pedophilia bait porn.
Fanfiction does not cause pedophilia. It doesn’t indicate pedophilic leanings on the part of the creator or readers either. But you probably already know that, you just still think it’s cool to accuse people of sex crimes for writing. Next time you want to show your ass in public, recall that all published YA lit, including the stuff with sex, is written by adults, and get the fuck over it.
It is NOT child pornography, you worthless asbestos-riddled imbecile. Real children are not involved in the creation of fiction. Real children are not abused or trafficked to make fanart.
Real adolescents, because that’s what fanwork you’re bitching over is largely is about, teenagers, not prepubescent children, real teenagers have sexual thoughts and feelings. Some of them fuck. Some fiction recognizes that. Pull your head out your ass, get your mouth off your momma’s teat and get your brainless, mainstreaming douchehole ass the fuck out of fandom. Nobody fucking wants you here.
Still not child pornography, @dragonenby, you little coward. You might not know this since you may have been on puberty blockers, but most adolescents experience sexual desire. Sometimes they fuck. There is nothing wrong with fiction representing that reality, even if it wasn’t your reality. You are not the whole fucking world, and thank god for that, you useless kernel of shitcorn.
If the antis push hard enough, they might be able to convince AO3 to go adults-only like AFF.net. (I do not think this is likely; the AO3 board is very aware of its value to young fans.) That’s a lot more likely than AO3 censoring its content to match this year’s screaming “OMG YOU PEOPLE ARE HORRIBLE PERVERTS” crowd.
Slash fandom has been ignoring those for more than 40 years; we’re not going to start now because new fandom somehow thinks Harry Potter fandom didn’t exist.
…apparently mean shrinking follower counts, and hey, in that case, let me repeat:
THE “PRO LIFE” MOVEMENT AS IT EXISTS ISN’T PRO LIFE, IT’S THE DESIRE TO CONTROL WOMEN’S BODIES AND SEXUALITY WITHOUT REGARD FOR THEIR WANTS, NEEDS OR SAFETY. ABORTIONS HAPPEN – EITHER LEGALLY AND SAFELY OR ILLEGALLY AND IN MUCH MORE DANGEROUS WAYS. “I AM PRO LIFE! ABORTIONS SHOULD BE BANNED!” TRANSLATES INTO “I WANT WOMEN TO DIE!”
KINDLY FUCK OFF MY BLOG IF YOU’RE PRO WOMEN DYING IN UNSAFE ABORTIONS.
This was a PSA brought to you by me being sick of this shit.
Anyone else only in their 20s but feel like they are running out of time to get their life together??
Don’t.
I felt this way too, in my twenties, but you know what?
I began transitioning at 30. I went back to grad school at 32. I’m living my best life, and while I’m a little behind the curve compared to some of my classmates on some things, I’m also so far ahead of them on others.
You need follow nobody’s schedule but your own.
Life is hard and the world isn’t doing any of us favors.
Be kind to yourself, and remember that you still have plenty of time. The only difference between starting now and 5 or 10 years earlier is now you have more experience.
FOR REAL, I JUST WATCHED A VIDEO OF A GIRL DRESSING UP AS ANNA AND SHE WENT TO HER LOCAL MALL
SHE WENT INTO THE DISNEY STORE
WHEN A LITTLE GIRL CAME UP TO HER AND TRIED TO TALK TO HER
THE COSPLAYER WALKED AWAY
AND LOOKED AT THE LITTLE GIRL LIKE SHE WAS NUTS
THAT IS HORRIBLE
I USED TO DRESS UP AS SNOW WHITE FOR CHARITY EVENTS WITH CHILDREN
I CANNOT TELL YOU HOW AWKWARD IT WAS WHEN OUR ELSA DID NOT TALK TO CHILDREN
SHE WAS NOT INTERESTED IN TALKING OR BEING AROUND THE KIDS AND THAT MAKES THE KIDS UNCOMFORTABLE!!!
IF YOU ARE COSPLAYING A CHARACTER THAT IS POPULAR AMONG CHILDREN, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE BE NICE TO KIDS
TO THEM, THEY ARE ACTUALLY MEETING THIS CHARACTER THAT THEY LOVE OR KNOW
IT IS UP TO YOU TO NOT BE A DICK
You also gotta know that if you’re going somewhere where there will be children and you’re in a costume even slightly similar to a Disney character they will think you are that character.
My hair is dyed white and at last year’s Ren Fest I was dressed as a water nymph. So i was in all blue, with glittery blue heeled boots on. Personally, I would have never thought that I looked like Elsa. I had leggings on, not a dress. And no ice themed anything. But that didn’t stop the sweetest little princess from asking me if I was Elsa.
I’ll admit that I was thrown for a loop, since I thought I was a pretty convincing mermaid on land with my scale print leggings. But I’m not a dick so I quickly recovered and said I was her cousin. Kids are more than happy to accept that and she smiled then shyly ran back to her mom to tell her she met Elsa’s cousin.
If you’re in a glittery costume of any sort, in a place where children will be, be prepared to be nice to them. Otherwise you’re just a jerk. No one likes jerks.
Don’t be a dick.
Seriously. If I go anywhere in ANY costume, no matter if I’m a princess, hero, or villain, I’m nice to the kids. They just wanna play!
I don’t even like kids, but one of the most rewarding cosplay moments I’ve had was interacting with littluns as Rose Quartz. Every kid got a hug if their parents said it was okay. Every kid got told that they were very special because they’re a human being. I’m looking forward to doing it again this year, because giving a kid a moment of genuine magic really is something else. It doesn’t hurt you to smile at a child.
When I cosplay Pearl I have precious little ones come up to me and you better bet I goof with them about how gross eating is or how loud amethyst is (and pretend to get a sooooo offended when they say someone else is their favorite gem)
You are making magic real for those kids in that moment and if you aren’t prepared for that, maybe think twice before cosplaying that character. I had a child completely frozen in disbelief and joy over seeing me, a character from a show they love, that’s power you have to wield responsibly.
It’s not just with popular lady characters. My best little-kid-cosplay-moment was when I was cosplaying Thor (not lady Thor from the comics, my own version of genderbent MCU Thor). I was walking through the dealer’s hall and suddenly saw a gaggle of Tiny Avengers in those Walmart costumes barrelling towards me. They crowded me in excitement and asked where Loki was because they wanted to find him and beat him up (I told them to give him an extra punch from me when they found him), then all six tried to crawl into my lap when I said yes to a photo. Cutest thing ever.
BE NICE TO KIDS WHEN YOU’RE IN COSTUME.
//If you’re going to be cosplaying -any- character that children will recognize, BE NICE TO KIDS!! To them, you -are- that character. And you have no right, what so ever, to destroy the illusion of what, to them, is a magical moment.
When I cosplay Batman, to little kids, I am Batman. And it is such an amazing experience to have kids run up to me and want a hug, and tell me about how when they grow up they want to fight bad guys too. I can’t fathom someone being so rude as to ignore them.
I have a friend who cosplays Han Solo, and a little girl was so excited to see him that when he knelt down to talk to her, she hugged onto him and didn’t want to let go for ten minutes.
Also, remember IF THERE IS A LOST CHILD AT A CONVENTION, AND YOU ARE COSPLAYING A PRINCESS OR A SUPER HERO, THE CHILD WILL GO TO YOU FOR HELP LONG BEFORE THEY THINK TO APPROACH A SECURITY OFFICER!!! You have a duty to help that child! Help them calm down, escort them to the nearest safe zone, and inform a security officer that the child has misplaced their parents/guardians. -Never- use the term ‘lost child’ in front of the kid, it’s the parents who wandered off and got lost, not the child.
Read this, then read it again.
this is why, no matter who I cosplay, I’m in character to everyone I’ll meet, whether they’re adults, kids, or teens like me. super important, honestly
I can’t wait to cosplay as some Really Recognizable characters (Wonder Woman, Shovel Knight lol) because I want to play with the kiddossssss
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