put it in the rules

[schmevil]

These Fails are taking a toll. They're exhausting both for those who choose to participate in the discussion, and those on the sidelines. They not only cause offense, they cause harm.

As far as fanworks challenges go, can we put it in the freaking rules?


DO NOT SPREAD HATE through the perpetuation of oppressive, discriminatory tropes and attitudes.

DO NOT EXPLOIT other people's tragedies or cultures, in order to tell stories of/for the privileged.

DO YOUR RESEARCH before writing about other places and peoples.


I don't think this is setting the bar too high, and I don't think it's needlessly censoring or stifling. Am I off the mark with this, or can we just say, "No thank you. Turn that problematic idea into something that isn't offensive and harmful, or take it elsewhere," right from the start? Formally refuse to accept fail fanworks as acceptable and as normal, and as mods, refuse to have them in our challenges.

It wouldn't stop people from being racist, and it wouldn't stop people from screwing up, but it would make questioning yourself as an artist a requirement of playing in our sandbox.

Comments

[torachan]

Definitely. It clearly needs to be stated ahead of time...

[schmevil]

Taking it as a given that this stuff is not welcome, is clearly NOT WORKING. :/

[valtyr]

How to police and enforce? I mean... at what point does 'is this a bit skeevy' become 'definitely racist'.

I mean, especially given the problematic nature of many canons - there were loads of Marvel comics about 9/11, with varying degrees of... quality. And a couple of characters have backgrounds in the Holocaust, etc.

I'm not trying to dismiss the idea; I'm genuinely concerned by the practicalities of how to apply these rules.

[schmevil]

I'm wondering if this is a "you know it when you see it" situation?

Just requiring that the question be asked, and perhaps a conversation with the mods if it goes that far, would filter out a lot problems. For some challnges, summaries are public early on - that's another opportunity for questioning.

I don't know myself, I'm just sort opening it for discussion.

[valtyr]

I'm kind of speaking as a mod, who ran a challenge this year. :) Like, we have been fortunate enough not to have had incidents like these - probably because we reach for Dr Doom when we need a disaster - but at what point am I going to put down my foot and say 'fuck it, that's racist'.

[schmevil]

I think a clear anti-oppression policy would filter out most of the really awful stuff, and some of the questionable stuff. Resource exchanges, public critiques and consciousness raising posts would also help. Enlist members to post research tutorials, or Did You Know essays. Have a post where members can ask about elements they've identified as problematic in their (and maybe others') work, and as a mod, be available for those kinds of discussions. Make it clear to the members that if all else fails, mod consensus will decide whether or not a fic has to come down. I think identifying the racist/iffy line would have to be up to individual communities, and not just mods. Member input could come from discussion posts, and criticism of mod decisions.

I mean, anyone joining a comm/exchange/challenge with such a setup would - one hopes! - be creating in good faith...

[valtyr]

We've just debuted an anti-oppression policy over at C_IM, so we'll see how it goes. It's pretty simple, but we'll see. As a low-traffic community, I don't really want to push out a lot of posts on this issue, not least because plenty of people will just start scrolling. Perhaps we can pick out issues in comics, and post scans and articles together, to encourage people to read and consider.

The problem is, of course, that when you're doing this with established communities, many members will not have the faintest idea what's going on, and some may resent it; as indeed the upheavals at scans_daily show.

I must say, these fails are making me think again and again about running a fest

[jazzypom]

I wanted to run a fest for comic book characters of colour, and I already had posts written out re: rules, and how to avoid failing, etc, etc, but it's frustrating that people aren't learning, and if I saw this mess whilst modding, I'd flip.

Although, I do remember speaking to someone (re: modding a fest) and fromw hat I gather, the mod pretty much accepts the work, and how its not necessarily in the moderator's interest to be the gatekeeper of the work, so to speak. So, I'm still hemming and hawing on going ahead with the fest, because man, I have come to the feeling that I tend to bruise easy. So.

Re: I must say, these fails are making me think again and again about running a fest

[schmevil]

Was zie modding a general interest fest, or something aimed at celebrating minority characters? If the latter, I don't see how such a fest could be fully celebratory and joyful for all the participants without rules against misogyny, racism, etc.

If the former, I can see not wanting to turn off potential participants, but on the other hand, do you want people to participate if they can't agree to TRY not to fail? I mean, I'm assuming mods would be available for consult, and there would be some sort of support system (discussion posts, resources or something...). Asking writers and artists to think before they create, and to consider their audience isn't so heavy a burden that it would drive masses of people away. Although I can see some people driven away by fear that they might inadvertently fail and then be vilified - that's a pretty common phenomenon.

And there's always the option of vetting summaries.

[softestbullet]

Co-signed.

[amazonziti]

Linked to you. If you'd rather I take the link down, just let me know.

[naraht]

I think it's really about time that something like this was done. The only sticking point in my view is, as valtyr pointed out, the iffy nature of many canon texts. Would there have to be a proviso in there that stated "fanworks based on these sources would have to be transformative rather than affirmative in nature"?

[dawn_felagund]

Hi, I'm here via Metafandom. :)

I share Valtyr's questions about how such a rule would be judged and, ultimately, enforced. From my experience as an archive mod, "ya know it when ya see it" tends to invite drama because what one person "sees" another person doesn't, and then accusations about foul play tend to fly. At least, this is the case in my fandom (Tolkien, particularly Silmarillion), but then, we have deep-seated Issues in that fandom with attempts to legislate oppression in the opposite direct (i.e., banning homosexuality in stories) and quality-control that comes down to mod preference or canon interpretation that also tend to reinforce oppressive mindsets. So I suppose, having seen mod judgment being used to the opposite effect of what you intend, it makes me a little uneasy.

I think that making people aware of these issues is a good idea. I just wonder at how making it a rule would work.

Anyway. Thank you for a thought-provoking post and the chance to comment! :)

[eatsscissors]

I agree with the sentiment; now I'm seriously chewing on how it would be possible without being arbitrary (you catch a mod on either a bad or a good day, it's a really big fest where mods only have time to check word counts/read summaries*, etc.). Compile a massive resources post or posts on various kinds of oppression and then have it as a sticky and/or a frequently referenced link? Recruit as many quasi-"official" betas as you can who are familiar with the linked anti-oppression material and then try to cultivate a culture wherein said betas are comfortable talking with the authors about the spaces where they screw it up, and flagging a mod if the author then still won't course-correct so the work can be given a deeper look? I'm thinking that even a smallish Big Bang would be nigh-impossible for a mod working alone to fairly enforce the DOs and DO NOTs (by which I mean unfairly letting one fic slide because it's at the end of the submission period and the mod in question is exhausted and not thinking as critically as zie was at the beginning every bit as much as being mean to the Poor [White] Author), let alone nailing down clear, concise definitions of oppression, appropriation, and exploitation that no author could have an excuse for not understanding, as well as penalties for offenders.

...that got longwinded on you. I'm sorry, I don't even particularly disagree with this post, I'm just been gnawing on the logistics of how such a system would work ever since the SPN Big Bang mods basically answered with, "We don't censor! :D:D:D:D" and left it at that, and I can think of ways to give the authors resources and the privileged among them fewer excuses if they write something that hurts people and brings fandom down upon them, but not much further than that along the lines of stopping fail before it happens rather than catching it once it's been done.

*In the case of the J2 Haiti fic, the summary alone should have raised eyebrows, but it still would have been a massive pile of racist tropes even if it had been set in your basic American ER and wouldn't have been noticed until someone actually dug in.

[cesy]

Points 1 and 2 would be hard to enforce* fairly. Point 3 would be fairly easy to enforce - if you can show with basic knowledge or a quick Google that it is wrong or offensive, then it's pretty clear that research hasn't been done, or insufficient research has been done. It would be fairly easy to state that Point 3 is in the rules with the aim of achieving Points 1 and 2 as much as possible, while acknowledging that perfection is impossible.

* where by enforce I mean making a ruling after a story is reported, as opposed to a mod having to check every story, which is pretty much impossible - to quote someone at CON.TXT, no mod wants to put their name to "This story has been certified free of fail", because it's simply not possible to guarantee that. However, making a ruling on "This story contains [particular oppressed group] fail at this particular point/with this theme/in this detail. Please will you take it down/add a warning on it?" is relatively easier.