Blacklists

It seems a streak of convservatism is going around the net these days, I first encountered this in the Mailing List I'm in, when a friend sent a mail that was obviously meant to be a joke. Anyone with a brain could figure it out, because a) the tone says it all, b) it was titled as yaoi (anime equivalent to male slash) and she's a girl.

Now, fandom_scruples made a blacklist of authors who write fanfics that are NC-17 in rating without locking it, or placing passwords on the said fiction.

Stated on their own words:

This journal was created to reward responsible members of the fandom who do not post incest, rape, beastialiy, or NC17 fics where young children can access them. If you were friended, we're highlighting that you've had the courage not to succumb to the 'popular' trends that have led to this fandom being infected with indecent and irresponsible fanfic. I woud personally like to thank arabe1la for having the courage to finally speak out against this.

I am one of many who do not believe these writers should be rewarded, and therefore a Black list will be started based on evidence that authors have irresponsibly posted NC17 fanfic in a place where children can access it. Hopefully, it will encourage them to remove it or move it to an archive that is password protected. When they lock down their fics, they will be removed from the list.

Mind you, I'm not a great supporter of any above mentioned but I have on occasion read some good, nay, great stories that had some elements mentioned.

In fact, I'm of two minds on the matter, one side says yes responsibility should be upheld on the side of the author posting their works for free but on the other hand I keep thinking about what my proffessor said, censorship doesn't work in the long run because someday they'll be censoring a great work of art because they (the censors) are offended by it (the work of art). It's up to the audience to decide whether they should view it or not.

Cofax echoes this sentiment in her post:

If I read a story I don't like, I may think the writer didn't do a very good job. But I'm the one who chose to read it. I take responsibility for my reading, and my responses. I pay attention to the writer, I read the headers if I care about the content, I read the summary they've provided. If they succeed in shocking me, good for them!

And that's the thing, it's up to the audience, it's not only the responsibility of the creator, it's also the responsibility of the reader whether they will read it or not!

I think what really irks me, is not so much the fandom _scruples blacklist and besides a lot of smarter people than I have given their rebuttals, but the censorship that's going on in my mailing list, some of the members were specifically against yaoi/yuri in any form. And to me that's just a really narrow minded, I reiterate I am not mindlessly for them (yaoi, etc.,), because I really think there are friendships that can really be deep without need of either one party turning it into something romantic or sexual. And I am not psychotically against same-sex relationships. So, stating that, I really am disgusted by the flaming in my ML, to the point that the admin gave in and cautioned writers to label their posts.

I think that's just wrong, just because they right about yaoi, etc., it doesn't mean they have to discriminate on one aspect, Cofax has some thoughts on this as well:

No. I don't think slash should be specially warned. And this is why. Not all slash is explicit, the same way not all het fic is explicit. If one is going to warn for sexuality, warn for sexuality. But setting aside slash, segregating it, implies there's something wrong with same-sex relationships. If a writer can post an explict Crais/Chiana story without any more than an NC-17 label, why can't a writer post a Crais/Crichton story without a slash label? They're both uncanonical pairings, after all.

And that's the gist of it, if you specifically warn people against slash or yaoi you would think that there is something wrong with that kind of love when there really isn't, you (being the univesal you) will be aiding a new generation of discrimination and no paradigm shift will ever happen! I used to think that fandom allows the opportunity for people to become open minded, I'd hate to think I was wrong. We live in the age of information and yet it seems like we are limiting ourself to the world we know in order to be 'safe', whatever that means.