What does it take away?

[logovo]

I don't get the lack of empathy in the warning discussion. I'm floored by what's being said by people I like and respect. I don't think I'm a naive person, but what is this reaction really all about?

In this and other conversations, I'm thinking what does it take from me or you to try and be compassionate or just polite. I get that people don't like to be told what to do, but does it really take from anyone to put up a warning for rape or death on a fic? No, not a warning about the color orange, calculus or beachballs, just rape or death or "dark subject matter" - or if one of your friends has told you she freaks about something unusual, like it would be nice to warn her if it's in your fic, yes? What am I missing here?

Comments

[franzeska]

I imagine the bitchiness is just the product of warning debates being one of those stupid recurring flamewars that everyone is sick of but can't seem to stop having. I think that's why everyone is always an insensitive dick in the actual discussions. I don't, however, think that refusing to warn automatically makes you insensitive. It really depends on where you're posting and who your audience is. (I'm not saying no one's done anything bad this time around. I haven't been following the debate. I just think that there are times and places where it's entirely appropriate to assert your right to your own aesthetic views as an author.)

[logovo]

I think that's why everyone is always an insensitive dick in the actual discussions.

It's coming from people that I thought would not act like that, and I'm not talking just about zvi here, who is probably the first one that made me double check what I was reading.

I don't, however, think that refusing to warn automatically makes you insensitive.

I don't think it does either. But the timing of several posts, specially after impertinence being attacked in her own journal, was so, so bad. One post after another saying "fandom sucks and why are you surprised, stop being so sensitive." Whoa.

[monanotlisa]

No, not a warning about the color orange, calculus or beachballs, just rape or death or "dark subject matter"

This. Exactly.

[logovo]

It seems such a simple request. It doesn't have to followed, I get that, but the way the conversation has turned into "Get a thicker skin or GTFO fandom" has really bothered me.

[darkrose]

I don't think very many people are saying "I don't want to warn for anything, ever."

For me, there are two issues: one is that I'd really like to know what is considered mandatory to warn for. You mention death--but I don't remember that as something to warn for when I was first in fandom, so I kind of would like to know if that changed. Other people have said that they'd like warnings for a character cheating on their partner. Again, I just want to know what the expectations are precisely so I don't hurt anyone. And if these things were so obvious, then when I said (after previously indicating that I self-injure) "I'm trying to keep from banging my head into a wall," someone--who'd been arguing pro-warning for everything--might not have assumed I was being metaphorical and responded with an incredibly flip answer that would have tripped a trigger if I'd been at home. Which is a long-winded way of saying again that the obvious sometimes isn't.

During this discussion, I realized that I get angry about being asked to warn for BDSM, because kink isn't just something I read about or do--it's a part of my sexual identity, one that I've spent a long time trying to work through. Being asked to include my sexuality along with rape and abuse feels like I'm being told once again that I'm sick because I'm kinky, and I should be ashamed of it. I would like a way to let people know that my fic usually includes kink without feeling like I'm pathologizing my own sexuality.

[logovo]

I haven't seen anyone say that either, more like there are no safe spaces and readers who can't deal with it should not be reading fanfic that hasn't been prescreened by friends.

Mentioning death was dumb of me, because that wasn't in the main thrust of the discussion. I don't know how death warnings started either, they were around in the mid-90s in the XF corner of fandom I hung out in, but of course not everyone warned for death.

Anyway, if I understand what is going on this thing started around rape warnings. There are too many readers who carry that. Bu that it makes it common enough that asking for warnings on rape is reasonable.

I saw some of what lcsbanana and telesilla said about BDSM being used as a warning and I definitely don't want that being lumped in with something like a rape or noncon. That's very insulting and I get why it would make you angry. I don't know the arguments that people are making for warning for BDSM, although XF friends who wrote it told me they used it because they didn't want to end up hearing complaints from readers. That's quite a different thing from saying that BDSM makes rape survivors relieve past trauma - I need to go back and read lcsbanana and telesilla, see where that conversation is taking place.

[logovo]

Oh, and I see you had a post about this as well. Sorry, I'd not seen it.