meta: tl;dr because this is what I *do*

So I finished putting together the thing I want to do a challenge for, because I feel my interaction with the community should be a.) more than stories about cheese building and b.) rentboy John fic, As a sideline, I came to the horrified realization I have now officially written about someone prostituting themselves enough to add that as an actual interest.

And I don't even like rentboy fic.

The question will never be "Jenn, are you a hypocrite?" We are now at the enviable stage where "But no one beat them! ....until part sixteen." I don't even know where I set the bar anymore. I keep getting freaked out by my del.icio.us tags.

This Is a World of Women

Challenge, right. As soon as we have all recovered sufficiently from Election Drama and WisCon, which for the first time I want to attend, because any group of women who can walk away from the kind of shit that was thrown are pretty much the epitome of what we should try to be.

See A Response to Hate by purplefrog26:

So not only do you face the challenges of dealing with society but you tell yourself that you are ugly, worthless and disgusting. So it becomes a radical act when you choose to live your life and love yourself despite the negativity that we swim thorough every day.

I’m not sure what this person’s objective was in posting these pathetic attempts at humor. But I know that they did not change my commitment to living my life joyfully and abundantly. And I prefer pictures to include my face.

And this fantastic response at Fatshionista:

Do it. Take it. Take my picture and eviscerate me online. It’s just a public, out-loud, communal version of what people do to me inside their heads every single day. It’s happened to me before, online and off. It’ll happen again. It’ll happen every day I leave the house, for the rest of my life.

I am still fat, and I am still not sorry. And nothing you can say, nothing you can post, nothing you can do will change that. No matter how many times you try to humiliate me. No matter how much you want me to hate myself. Because it’s my fucking body. And I don’t owe you a damn thing.

That.

And This Is Community Standards

It's odd; the idiotic open source molestation for fun and profit, the backup project, the election, WisCon hit each after the other. I don't think there's less drama, believe it or not; I'm not even sure it's that I'm noticing it more. I just didn't pay attention.

There are a lot of parents on my flist. I'll take even odds half of us will have a child turned troll. I'll say the percentage is higher for boys, but as we have seen, the girls are catching up.



My son's a white male, relatively attractive, and going to a school that specializes in science and math with a mother who pays for the fastest internet access she can get without a government permit and studying for a degree in computer science with a kink for new technology. He's been web-enabled since his first birthday and can generally google for what he wants to know. He's started simple scripting with robot games and he likes things that blow up and horror movies and very large snakes.

I have about three years, maybe four if I'm lucky and I can keep his computer hobbled (you'd be surprised how much you can do with the registry and a few days of free time). Then goatse and two girls one cup and the myriad split penises will be everywhere all over again, because it's all new for him and my cache will never be the same. And it's not that I won't watch him. It's just the places he'll go for that after the first time won't be places I can follow.

Child's a potential of SA and it's not the first time I realized that or understood the inevitability there will come a moment where I will trace his cache and find something that I can't accept. What I didn't know is what to do about it. I'd like to thank UFB for this one; I would have avoided this train of thought until he hit puberty at least.

We didn't cover this. We didn't. We know what to do when it's slash, a flamewar, a convention fight over a pairing, what to do when the racism debates reach critical levels, when misogyny gets so hot everyone's eyeing the flist with trepidation. We know to go to metafandom to see what people are saying and to go to fandon-wank to see what they are talking about and to combine them to decide what people mean. We even have a hazy idea of what to do when RL breakups fracture an flist or long term friendships turn sour (hint: hide. Really).

Child is second generation fen; he'll know the culture by proxy, by the friends I introduce him to, by the world I expose to him. Who the hell knows where he'll end up; it could be anywhere. He watches anime and Dr. Who and wants to clone dinosaurs; wherever he goes, he'll take what I teach him in netiquette and the standards I apply to my online life and choose to accept them or reject him.

(He might become a conservative banker. I expect a pony if that happens. I'll need it.)

And one day, I might get an email from a friend with a link to an account that I didn't know existed and behavior I cannot condone with the silent question of whether community standards apply.

(Someone better sure as fuck email me, by the way. That part had better be community standards for minors; if it's not, can I declare it now?)

Rachel Moss wasn't a test case. And to tell the truth, she wasn't even the first. She's just the opening salvo of what we had to know what was coming, and she's not the worst. And I can say without fear of contradiction, one day it'll be one that is our own the way she wasn't and couldn't ever be. That will be our test case.

Comments

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Wow, thank you very much! Yes, I tend to edge toward the darker side of it; prostitution is a mix of consent issues and sexual issues and power issues all at once at the best of times. For me, exploring it has to cover those, which are also the things that fall into my squick zone and are always a handle with care even when I'm writing it. The FBI story was originally *much* lighter in concept, just to see if I could identify it with casual sex, but it didn't work because it's so rarely just about sex, even when it is.

This one, I think, doesn't have the same relentlessness as Pretty, but it feels like I'm covering slightly different emotional territory as well since John's an adult and his reasons are so entirely different. The biggest difference is in this, John had a choice that Clark didn't, which has its own set of problems attached.

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

Oh sorry, I didn't mean to imply you were recycling old material in RofA. And yes, Clark and John are in very different situations. It's just that I've been in, um, a few fandoms over the years and read a lot of fic. And rentboyr fic is far from uncommon in pretty much any fandom. I've even enjoyed some of the other rentboy fics, but as a guilty pleasure / kink thing, not as anything more. Even the well-written ones usually just don't capture the dubiousness of the whole scenario. Pretty and RofA do, and come across as both realistic to the characters, and realistic to how a real human being might feel/act under the circumstances. But without being all moralising about it.

So, in other words, you've twice done something I haven't observed any other ficcer pull off once, and I know some damn good writers. So good for you. Mind you, I suspect you may have managed realistic treatments precisely BECAUSE this isn't your kink and you're very aware of the dodgy power dynamics.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I knew what you meant! When you mentioned Pretty, though, it reminded me of what I'd been doing then and the differences threeish years make in how I approach it. Fic is discussion in a way, and I was thinking how my conversation with the text (and for that matter, this trope) has changed since then. Since at the time of Pretty, it squicked me, but I hadn't read widely in QAF and gotten hit with a slavery squick in SGA, which radically changed my view.

It's--I guess this is like meta for me. This trope isn't one I can be at all rational about and I know it and I know it's not fair to anyone who enjoys it for me to harsh their squee. I don't know if that even makes sense, to be honest, but it's very--relaxing to do it this way, like I can finally say it without hurting anyone's feelings or criticizing a perfectly good fic. The first time around, I was learning what I wanted to say; this time, it feels like I'm answering why it's so importnat to say it. Or something.

*rolls eyes* I could sound more pretentious, but only if I said it in a British accent.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Also, thank you. I think that's the highest compliment I can get on these stories.