yonmei

04:02 pm: Having a sense of proportion
I am no longer a Quaker - haven't been for over 20 years. (Discovering I am an atheist, to my mind, pretty much terminates being a Quaker.)

But I retain the Quaker sense that one should try to live one's life with consistent values - this is why I am banned from Livejournal.

But... what this goes along with, is - though I can try to live my life with consistent ethics in all matters - I do not think that every issue has the same value. Certainly not just because it's happening to me.

I could quit Livejournal, and refuse to join Dreamwidth, because I detest the idea promoted that motherhood is obscene - the idea, upheld by LJ Abuse when headed by Denise Paolucci, that a photo of a baby breastfeeding is more obscene that a soft-porn shot of a woman with artfully blurred nipples, and it's more important to ban such images from Livejournal than it is to ban people who post cartoony images of women being tortured.

My quitting Livejournal and refusing to join Dreamwidth is a decision that primarily affects only me. Insofar as it affects anyone else, it encourages the promotion of fandom and friendship across journalsites - for diversity and decentralisation: which I also think are good things.

I think the discrimination against mothers and the sexualisation of women's bodies implicit in the Livejournal ban is an important issue: I do not, compared with many other things I care about, think Livejournal's ban and rewriting of the rules was ever a particularly important issue - it mattered to me (and possibly to others who friended me) on a personal level.

This is a rambly post which may become a more coherent one about broader issues, once I've thought things through a bit more.

I'm just thinking: these issues that we bump into all the time in fandom space (the neuroscientists who thought fans were lab rats, the sexist guys who have problems with Scans Daily being slash fan space, the anti-slash fans who want to make sure we know they're sure their heroes can't be gay, whether Spike is a hero or a villain or just another blond with a tortured gaze, if Doctor 10 was a Doctor Gone Wrong for mindwiping instead of saving Donna... they all relate to larger issues (except maybe Spike) but they're not, in and of themselves, important. Except maybe the anti-slash fans when they were noisy, but they seem to have quieted down a lot of recent years.) But sometimes (like recently - not someone on my flist or likely to be reading this) you run into someone who seems to have lost track of that, who's got the impression that if it matters to them it's of Global Importance.

Which is disturbing, really.

Tags: fannishness, join us on the outside, lj abuse did what???, slash

08:17 pm: There are trainwrecks and trainwrecks
The Teresa Nielsen Hayden has a 503-comment trainwreck. (Update: which she has now deleted/made private.) Some of the comments deleted from the trainwreck: and Coffee and Ink had thoughts.

More links here and here. And two posts very worth reading by Ros Calverley: I really did want to sit this one out... and Some further thoughts on unpleasantness, pain and so on.

Tags: dragon eggs need clicky, dragons, join us on the outside, privilege

09:22 am: Seven Reasons Why Fanfic Is Like Gay Marriage
I like this:

1) A lot of people believe it is immoral and illegal--despite some forms of it being legal in some places, and having a history that goes back thousands of years.

2) A lot of the reactions are based not on rational or legal arguments, but personal squick--specifically, anti-sex squick, where the objector believes that any form of sexuality they don't like should be forbidden to everyone.

3) There's a long mainstream history of ignoring or denigrating both alternative-to-mainstream sexualities, and alternative-to-mainstream creativities: and strong connections between both.

4) Both inspire a common reaction of, "well, I suppose some people Do That Stuff, but do they need to be public about it? Why can't they just keep it to themselves and not inflict their weirdness/perversion on the rest of us?"

5) A serious, public interest in either can result in lost job opportunities and community ostracisation. It is common enough for people to argue in both instances "you're not actually being prosecuted - what more do you want?"

6) Some people reply to either with "well, you can want that, of course... but you should be able to control your impulse to act on those wants."

7) Most of the people getting outraged are not personally affected by either. In very basic terms, they are trying to control the behaviour of other people that has absolutely no effect on them. If you don't believe in gay marriage, don't marry someone of the same gender. And if you don't believe in fanfic, neither write it nor read it. A hefty helping of MYODB is now being served at the control-freak buffet. Please help yourself.

(Credit to elfwreck and aislingthebard, responding to a specific ranty-mcranty-pants post about the ingratitude of fanfic writers that they are not constantly being sued.)

Tags: i love fanfic, i write fanfic, join us on the outside, let's all be outcasts together, outcasts should stick together, write write write