(no subject)
I'm pissed off today.
Apparently, there is a group - and I won't name names, since it can't be proven that this is the party responsibile - that is targeting M-rated Twilight fics on fanfiction.net. This group reports stories for terms of service violations.
Now, it's true, these stories are in violations. Fanfiction.net has ratings guidelines that we've all been ignoring for a good long time, with it going unsaid that you don't snitch. Now somebody is snitching, and we have to live with that.
Two things piss me off here, though.
1) Fanfiction.net is fucking cowardly. Their ratings policy went into effect years ago when I was working in HP fandom. The ratings system used to be G, PG, PG-13, R, NC-17, like the movies in the US. It used to be that all ratings were allowed, and then, seemingly out of the blue, they made the decision to disallow NC-17 rated stories.
This was in response to a bunch of parents complaining to the website because they were either too busy or too lazy to pay attention to what their children were looking at online. And instead of acting rationally, like other websites, and requiring an age agreement to read NC-17 stories (i.e. by clicking this you are acknowledging you are of legal age...), FF.net just got rid of all of it.
And they're still fucking cowards for not changing the system back.
2) Some douchebag out there thinks he has the right to decide what other people should read. From what I can tell, this group is led by one person who claims to be out to enforce some kind of quality control on Twilight fanfiction. He doesn't like the way this fandom works, and instead of realizing IT'S ONLY FANFICTION, like a normal human being, he's on a mission to clean up the Twilight section of ff.net.
I'm sure a lot of us would like to do just that, actually. We'd love to get rid of all the stories that are just utter crap. But we don't make it our mission, because we understand that it's not our place or our right to censor another person. It's not our right to decide what other people should read, or even what they should be able to read.
It all goes back to the same thing. I am a grown adult, and if I want to read utter drivel, or if I want to read about explicit sex, then that's my choice. If a parent doesn't want their child reading such things, then the parent as guardian should have the responsibility of keeping the child away from such things. It isn't the website's place to say that nobody can post or read M+/NC-17 material just because a few people think it's wrong.
The minute you let someone start playing morality police is when the witch-hunt starts. Of course, this is only fanfiction, and not as serious an issue as others, but the pattern is the same, whether it's women having acid thrown on their faces in theocratic countries for trying to attend school, or whether it's a state's legislature deciding gay people don't have the right to marry.
Are there things on fanfiction.net that could be construed as harmful as others and thus should be eliminated? Maybe. But the stories I've seen pulled down thus far were harming nobody. There were plenty of warnings about content. No one forced anyone to read the material or tricked them into it.
That said, I don't think fanfiction.net or the new morality police should be in the business of dictating content. Censorship has rarely, if ever, been beneficial to any society, and if this crusade continues, more quality work will end up leaving fanfiction.net than the crap.
Apparently, there is a group - and I won't name names, since it can't be proven that this is the party responsibile - that is targeting M-rated Twilight fics on fanfiction.net. This group reports stories for terms of service violations.
Now, it's true, these stories are in violations. Fanfiction.net has ratings guidelines that we've all been ignoring for a good long time, with it going unsaid that you don't snitch. Now somebody is snitching, and we have to live with that.
Two things piss me off here, though.
1) Fanfiction.net is fucking cowardly. Their ratings policy went into effect years ago when I was working in HP fandom. The ratings system used to be G, PG, PG-13, R, NC-17, like the movies in the US. It used to be that all ratings were allowed, and then, seemingly out of the blue, they made the decision to disallow NC-17 rated stories.
This was in response to a bunch of parents complaining to the website because they were either too busy or too lazy to pay attention to what their children were looking at online. And instead of acting rationally, like other websites, and requiring an age agreement to read NC-17 stories (i.e. by clicking this you are acknowledging you are of legal age...), FF.net just got rid of all of it.
And they're still fucking cowards for not changing the system back.
2) Some douchebag out there thinks he has the right to decide what other people should read. From what I can tell, this group is led by one person who claims to be out to enforce some kind of quality control on Twilight fanfiction. He doesn't like the way this fandom works, and instead of realizing IT'S ONLY FANFICTION, like a normal human being, he's on a mission to clean up the Twilight section of ff.net.
I'm sure a lot of us would like to do just that, actually. We'd love to get rid of all the stories that are just utter crap. But we don't make it our mission, because we understand that it's not our place or our right to censor another person. It's not our right to decide what other people should read, or even what they should be able to read.
It all goes back to the same thing. I am a grown adult, and if I want to read utter drivel, or if I want to read about explicit sex, then that's my choice. If a parent doesn't want their child reading such things, then the parent as guardian should have the responsibility of keeping the child away from such things. It isn't the website's place to say that nobody can post or read M+/NC-17 material just because a few people think it's wrong.
The minute you let someone start playing morality police is when the witch-hunt starts. Of course, this is only fanfiction, and not as serious an issue as others, but the pattern is the same, whether it's women having acid thrown on their faces in theocratic countries for trying to attend school, or whether it's a state's legislature deciding gay people don't have the right to marry.
Are there things on fanfiction.net that could be construed as harmful as others and thus should be eliminated? Maybe. But the stories I've seen pulled down thus far were harming nobody. There were plenty of warnings about content. No one forced anyone to read the material or tricked them into it.
That said, I don't think fanfiction.net or the new morality police should be in the business of dictating content. Censorship has rarely, if ever, been beneficial to any society, and if this crusade continues, more quality work will end up leaving fanfiction.net than the crap.