I never was one of these people...
...who seriously considered the possible need for an exit strategy.
But this post makes it clear that there is no free speech on LJ.
This woman was the mod of a community called pornish_pixies, which was deleted for content after someone complained to LJ that the community discussed and wrote about incest.
According to her post, she was told by LJ Abuse:
Two obvious issues here.
First. As best I can tell, these people were writing fiction. About an illegal activity, sure. But fiction is not reality, people. It seems appropriate that LJ Abuse, or somebody in charge of LJ Abuse, should be able to make some kind of distinctions about what is Abuse and what is Free Speech.
Second. Incest? I mean, yeah, it's illegal. But unless these people are all blood relatives, how can the fact that they are congregating be a threat? They can't all have incest together, surely? Are they all plotting how best to have sex with their siblings? Molest their cousins? What? And I note that they DID NOT say anything about, I dunno, child molestation or something. THAT might, possibly, worry me, if a bunch of people got together to actually discuss the best strategy to get your nephew alone or something. And yet, writing a story about somebody who molests their nephew is not a crime. That's a protected First Amendment right. (Oh, don't start, alpha_strike. We all know you have been ranting forever years... :p)
Anyway, apparently censorship just happens on LJ. LJ Abuse has no discretion or control over it. Some lawyer whispers "increased liability" in their ear (about INCEST!) and passive voice censorship ensues.
Anyway, is it paranoid for me to be considering what to do, for real, if they choose to strike out at our slash communities? One obvious solution would be to fall back on a yahoo group, should fan fic communities go down due to copyright issues or something. What groups are out there for Stargate? Anybody? How active are they?
I'm also interested in getting contact info on people I care about. If you'd like to stay in touch if things ever go south, feel free to e-mail me at brainofck at g mail dot com. Heh. You can subscribe to my newsletter...
But this post makes it clear that there is no free speech on LJ.
This woman was the mod of a community called pornish_pixies, which was deleted for content after someone complained to LJ that the community discussed and wrote about incest.
According to her post, she was told by LJ Abuse:
- They further say the reason for this is that material which can be interpreted as expressing interest in, soliciting, or encouraging illegal activity places LiveJournal at considerable legal risk. When journals that contain such material are reported to us, we must suspend them. Because LiveJournal's interests list serves as a search function, and because listing an interest enables other people also interested in a similar topic to gather and/or congregate, we have been advised that listing an interest in an illegal activity must be viewed as using LiveJournal to solicit that illegal activity....
We recognize that many people list these types of interests for shock value, as a method of expressing opposition for these illegal activities, or to indicate fictional activity. Unfortunately, the Abuse team does not have any discretion in these cases; if a journal profile contains interests that support illegal activity, we must suspend the journal. Journals, on the other hand, may express or imply interest in illegal activity or express or imply a desire to meet and/or interact with others with similar interests, but only if the journal clearly (1) is in opposition to or condemnation of the illegal activity, (2) does not encourage the illegal activity and (3) is not used in furtherance of any illegal activity.
I do recognize that your community account may not necessarily be the type of content that this policy is directly intended to remove from LiveJournal. Unfortunately, as I've mentioned, the Abuse team has no discretion in how these instances must be handled. Because your account was reported to us, and because it contained illegal activities in your interests list, we must permanently suspend it.
Two obvious issues here.
First. As best I can tell, these people were writing fiction. About an illegal activity, sure. But fiction is not reality, people. It seems appropriate that LJ Abuse, or somebody in charge of LJ Abuse, should be able to make some kind of distinctions about what is Abuse and what is Free Speech.
Second. Incest? I mean, yeah, it's illegal. But unless these people are all blood relatives, how can the fact that they are congregating be a threat? They can't all have incest together, surely? Are they all plotting how best to have sex with their siblings? Molest their cousins? What? And I note that they DID NOT say anything about, I dunno, child molestation or something. THAT might, possibly, worry me, if a bunch of people got together to actually discuss the best strategy to get your nephew alone or something. And yet, writing a story about somebody who molests their nephew is not a crime. That's a protected First Amendment right. (Oh, don't start, alpha_strike. We all know you have been ranting forever years... :p)
Anyway, apparently censorship just happens on LJ. LJ Abuse has no discretion or control over it. Some lawyer whispers "increased liability" in their ear (about INCEST!) and passive voice censorship ensues.
Anyway, is it paranoid for me to be considering what to do, for real, if they choose to strike out at our slash communities? One obvious solution would be to fall back on a yahoo group, should fan fic communities go down due to copyright issues or something. What groups are out there for Stargate? Anybody? How active are they?
I'm also interested in getting contact info on people I care about. If you'd like to stay in touch if things ever go south, feel free to e-mail me at brainofck at g mail dot com. Heh. You can subscribe to my newsletter...