fandom_scruples is, what they're trying to do, and all that nonsense. If not, go here, read it, and then come back and read what I've got to say. As a general rule? I'm pretty laid back, but this has me pretty goddamned steamed up. You know what I think pissed me off the most? I think it was this offhand phrase: never once said this was a campaign to get people to stop writing this type of fic. It isn't. It's your life and you can spend it writing trash if you want to,
Writing trash -- that's what's got me seeing red. Now, I'd like to ask them, on what basis are they making the decision that what people are writing is trash? What, precisely, rather, is trash for them? I assume that it would be extensive descriptions of explicit sexual situations such as perhaps incest, or underage intercourse, or perhaps BDSM of some kind. So, okay, that's trash. Let's all throw out our copies of Lolita, or Ada or Ardor. Nabakov, you trashy, trashy man.
The offhand statement that any fic including these situations must surely be immoral, and evidence of lax ethical standing makes me so angry I could spit forks into their eyeballs. It makes no allowance for the simple luminosity of prose that some authors use, nor the depth of psychological shading that can go into some of these fics. The *hard work* that people put into writing these stories is simply wasted because, after all, what they're writing is trash. Let's not let them do that, shall we? Instead, hey! I've got a better idea! Let's all write really sappy, obvious, clichéd and sentimental riddled with misspellings, ridiculous syntax, and complete manglings of the English language, just so long as nothing naughty happens, you hear me?
However, those at
fandom_scruples graciously concede that it's okay for us to write whatever dirtywrongtrashy things our little perverted hearts desire, and aren't we lucky for that? They're so magnanimous. But, let's keep that under lock and key so that innocent eyes can't be tortured having to read what our sick and twisted imaginations have come up with. I mean, really, let's be honest here, folks: reading NC-17 fic will certainly traumatize and scar the darlings so deeply that they may never recover. And the sole fault will lie with the author of the fic. Not the parent, who doesn't say "Hey, whatcha readin'?" if their child is so impressionable that the word 'cock' is going to shatter their worldview and send them into hysterics, nor the underage person who decides to keep reading after they find something they consider offensive in a fic. Because is it really so very hard to be like "Hmm...incest. Not my cup of tea. Let me click the back button."? Usually I find that pretty easy. Yeah, let's put the responsibility for this *squarely* and *solely* on the head of the author.
Also, pray tell, which rating system will we be going by, once we decide to lock up all those wild and dirty wrong sex fics? How many times can I use the word cock before I have to lock it, hmm? And, also, will we be follow the MPAA's idea that extreme violence is just plain fine just as long as no one sees a nipple? Because, really, that's clear and logically the right way for things to be.
You know what, while we're locking away those fics that are offensive, let's start rating books. Let's limit the accessibility of books that have sex in them, and subversive ideas, and bad language, too. Lock 'em away. No one wants kids getting their hands on those. It'll give 'em ideas. And Lord knows, no one wants that.
