As a warning for folks, we're getting ready to put guidelines in place for content and ratings.
For most of the site's content this won't mean much of a change, but for certain more sensitive topics we'll be needing to re-evaluate how we allow them to be presented on-site.
We need your help with this. We're a small team, and policing the site's content is going to be tough. For the time being, we're going to simply ask that, if anyone sees a story posted that they feel has content we may need to be careful of, they let me know via direct message so that we can take a look at it.
Just to clarify, this isn't a change in site terms, but with our international reach we need to be careful about making sure our readers have a safe, friendly place they can come to enjoy trans fiction.
Thank you.
Melanie E.
Comments
People need/want different things
Before I transitioned I wasn't interested in sex, even less so now, I tend to stop reading such stories and not looking back (but remembering the author).
I am very appreciative……
Of the response my earlier blog received - and even more so that it is being listened to and potential action is being considered.
Like many of those who responded to my blog, I also agree that free speech is an imperative right and that we need to be extremely careful regarding infringing on that right. However, there is a point where the right of free speech becomes abusive to others.
Yes, no one is forced to read those specific stories, or those particulars authors, but my fear is that this type of fiction will become so prevalent as to force some of us who have enjoyed this site for years to look elsewhere. And that would be a great loss.
Thomas Jefferson once stated that one person’s rights end when they infringe on another’s. The hard part is to know where that point of infringement is reached - and how to prevent it happening.
Hopefully, your actions will help.
Thank you for your efforts.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Guess I should tone it down
I think my current works are ok, but the unpublished things I've been working on are admittedly porn and will likely not be published. In light of the present possibility of new rules, I wonder if it is time to actually publish on Kindle or Literotica? I'd have to work at lot harder. My previous stories on BCTS were often to help me heal from past trauma. I would miss that outlet.
I Was Following The Previous Thread
Relating to content and its acceptability. I am always reluctant to get involved in complaints about whether a story crosses some limit. My own criterion is if you don't like it, don't read it.
However, while I agree that the particular story which caused the complaint could hardly be called savoury I think we should be very careful about limiting an author's input on the grounds that it may offend. Many things offend someone and some things occasionally touch a raw nerve.
Some years ago I was on the receiving end when every other story seemed to be about super-heroes/super-heroines, but eventually that craze passed.
I would point out that the author of the story that sparked the complaint has been posting here for over seventeen years. All of her stories are marked "Explicit Content" and that is certainly true. She is known for vivid descriptions of sexual acts and what some describe as pornography. However, she is also an entertaining writer and, as far as I know, has not been previously accused of stepping over the line. I haven't researched this so I could be wrong. Readership (hits) for one of her stories go as high as 3500 but comments are generally few. To me this shows that there is an audience here for her work but it is one of our dirty little secrets. We can pretend that we are more "pure" than FM.
I believe that the correct remedy for a situation of this kind is for the individual (or individuals) offended to press the button for the "ignore list" and/or notify our admin of the particular post. What Melanie is proposing looks sensible, but I would expect Admin to notify the author and the BC readership if they decide to delete a story. Censorship is rarely good. Let's not join the crowd who burn books.
Actually, BC already goes further than that. Anything (usually comments) that is deemed "unfriendly" gets deleted without recourse or appeal. Erin applies that rule judiciously and I've never been able to fault her judgement (even when it applied to me). It prevents the "flame wars" that we used to have years ago.
The issue I raised……
Was not regarding sexual content, and I will immediately state that the implication that it was is incorrect.
The issue I raised was that there is a HUGE difference between “explicit content” and a story that glorifies rape and blackmail.
I have no objection to anyone either writing or reading whatever they wish - but I do agree that it should be better identified so that a reader can be aware of what is contained within before they read the story. Content can be highly explicit without including rape, or any other act that could be considered violent or offensive to the reader.
To be completely honest, it wasn’t even the rape, or the extortion after the rape, that bothers me. It is the fact that the story glorified the actions, and readers cheered it on. To me, that illustrates what has happened to our society over the past several years in a very obvious way - and it also adds a certain truth to what a certain Bible thumping, overly conservative, hypocritical portion of our society claims to be true of the transgender community.
I also stated that it appears to me that stories that include violence, abuse, forced fem, etc., appear to be much more prevalent now than they were even five or so years ago. It has been my observation that this seems to be a trend, or perhaps it is cyclic (I haven’t noticed a cycle, but perhaps it simply is too long of a cycle for me to have seen the other end of it) - but that is just my observation and I asked if others agreed. I did have responses from multiple people that they too have noticed this.
I am not in favor of limiting anyone’s rights - but with rights come responsibilities. Each of us has a responsibility to our fellow members here to provide a reasonable accommodation for those who could be triggered by stories like this, or simply don’t want to read them.
I do think that authors should be more explicit (yes, I used that on purpose) in how they tag their stories. I might have read the story anyway, even if it had been tagged to contain violence or rape, but at least I would have known what was ahead. I have read many stories where a character is raped or attacked as an integral part of the story, or it is an integral part of what develops their character - but it is usually depicted as a reprehensible act. Not as something to be glorified and cheered for, and as I previously stated, that, more than anything, is what bothers me.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
I hope it didn't seem I implied those were your concerns.
My points in the comment were only about making sure people knew what we were looking at.
*hugs*
Melanie E.
Just a clarification for folks
This ISN'T about fetish content or sexual content in general, and isn't (directly) related to Dallas' earlier blog (though that was part of what inspired us mentioning it now.)
We were already in the process of this beforehand, but seeing the discussion at hand we decided to bring it up.
We're talking more about how specific sexual content is tagged, and the limitations on what can be included in stories in terms of legality of content (age being the biggest factor.)
We're still sussing out all the details of the upcoming policies, so seeing discussion here is definitely something we want and need (among other feedback.)
But I do want to make it clear:
--This isn't going to be a crackdown/limit on story types, whether they're to anyone's personal tastes or not.
--This isn't going to be a crackdown on any fetish content that we don't have a legal reason to be concerned about.
--This is about the welfare of the site in regards to international law, not about any of our individual story preferences.
For some folks I hope the above will assuade some fears you might have. For others, I know the above is *probably* disappointing. But again, we're looking to make sure the site is safe, and accessible, for as many people as possible.
I really can't give out any more details or information than that until we have the precise policy sussed out.
Melanie E.
Not Attorneys
Right or wrong, I don't write about prepubescent children, though It may be better not to write about anyone less than 21. While I have experienced it, I avoid rape. Other than that I just don't know what to avoid. I've had the impression that Europe is more liberal than the US, though from a news story, it seems that several eastern European countries have strange laws. Perhaps this would be an opportunity to instruct us as we go along?
Europa
Western Europa is quite liberal and places a very high value on personal/individual freedom and privacy. Meanwhile many of the eastern European (i.e. formerly communist) countries struggle with the concept of personal and individual freedom and responsibility. And with virtually no democratic tradition they are prone to authoritarian and despotic tendencies.
And with the abuse of our personal freedoms by migrants with, more often than not, Islamic backgrounds the society at large is starting to polarize along racial and religious lines.
From my position in Germany and with just a casual observation, it is somewhat difficult to make broad assumptions.
In general the age of consent is 18 years. Though in private, and with both partners around the same age, that can be reduced to 16 years. But publishing or distributing any depiction of explicit sexual acts where one participant is below the age of 18 years is still a criminal offense, and considered pedophilia.
Re: clarification
This point can be addressed by each reader individually. Because every one of us has the free will to decide what stories we want/like to read. If someone does not like a story, then stop reading and close that tab or window, and move on to a different story!
I think that this point falls squarely under the “Rule One”. We should strive to keep the contents of our posts within the legal limits, as well as within the general framework of common courtesy.
This is the real tricky one. Since laws differ greatly between countries and jurisdictions.
Just consider the current example of “free speech” legislation between Turkey and Sweden, and the impact that is having on the efforts of Sweden to become a member of NATO. Sweden has freedom of religion, and holds the freedom of speech and opinion as a basic human right. Therefor every citizen/resident may freely express their own personal opinion in any way, as long as third party property is not violated. Turkey has no respect nor protection of freedom of speech, especially if it is in dissent or protest of official policy or the current rulers, and especially of Islam. So, since some protester in Sweden had bought himself a Quran and burned it as a public protest, Turkey (as a NATO member) is now blocking Sweden from becoming a NATO member, and trying to impose Islamic law and curtail free speech on the Swedish population.
Another example that I encountered this week is the sexual abuse scandal that erupted around Pitcairn Island around 2004. Where the descendants of the mutineers of the HMS Bounty had created a tradition of having sex with any and all girls soon after they reached the age of 12. Almost half of the of the adult male population was eventually charged with rape, sexual abuse and similar behavior. The main argument of the defense was that they are not bound by British laws, even though the Pitcairn Islands are a British Overseas Territory, and they appealed the guilty verdicts all the way to the Privy Counsel in London.
Another example is the difference in personal privacy regulations between Europa and the USA. That is one reason why a big chunk of Google Street View is blurred out in Germany. People place a very high value on their personal privacy. And Facebook was recently hit with a substantial fine by European regulators for violation of privacy laws.
But, how about looking closer to the BCTS home? Based on what we hear here in Europa about what is happening in the USA with all kinds of book bans and anti-trans/female legislation, reading the stories posted here on BCTS might soon become illegal in states like Florida and Texas. Heck, it seems that some parents in the so called “Bible belt” have been successful in getting the Bible itself banned from public and/or school libraries based on the criteria established in recent legislation.
I commend the moderation team of BCTS for proactively trying to establish some guidelines and mechanisms to protect not only website and its operators from potential legal peril, but also the authors, readers and members of the BCTS community.
At the same time I encourage all authors and posters make extensive use of the tagging facility here on BCTS. And also consider how your story fits within the very broad guidelines established in the three rules available on the main page, as well as the often more restrictive and obscure laws in different jurisdictions.
Freedom of speach
While I won't advocate censorship of any particular content, I would advocate segregation of content. That is, content that contains possibly objectionable material moved to a separate access page. So if a story that contains erotic scenes (or other sensitive content) it would require moving off the home page to access it. Much in the same way that we do in order to access Hat Box stories.
The problem I see with that idea is that some serially presented stories jump back and forth between ratings. So the question becomes, if this were to be put into practice, is when a single chapter crosses the line (wherever or however it is set) is the whole serial or just that particular chapter segregated?
I'm not sure what programing hoops would need to be jumped through to make this happen. Just an idea that jumped into my head.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
I can see your points…..
And they are very well thought out and made - including the consideration of how difficult it would be both from a programming perspective and simply identifying content with regards to serials.
Personally, I would advocate for simply better use by authors of the provided tags. Or perhaps the tags need to be refined or expanded to include additional warnings? This would also allow for individual parts of a series to be tagged differently based on each parts content.
Too many times an author simply tags a story “explicit” and considers that to be enough. That is painting with a pretty broad paint brush, and a love story with a sex scene could be considered just as explicit by some as a story with a violent assault or rape scene. Yet one could be offensive to some, but not others - while the other could be triggering and offensive to some, but others could find it fits their particular kink or fetish.
Sex scenes written as part of a larger story can be endearing as well as a key in developing a character or storyline; rape or assault scenes can also be an important aspect of character or story development. As such, they can be inherent to what an author is trying to say - yet they need to be better tagged to separate them for the reader to assess content prior to reading.
Just my opinion of course, but it might be a more easily achieved solution - or even a mid-way point to getting to your suggested solution.
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Previously
It has been pointed out that it would be a nightmare to try and make already-posted stories conform to a new tagging policy. I think that a user-defined tag be used to describe such stories. Authors of previously posted stories would be encouraged to add such a tag to their stories via a generic blog post, but not addressed to an individual author. Then it would be their choice to add such a tag to their stories. Obviously (to me, anyway) deceased or inactive authors' stories would not be tampered with.
Just my two cent's worth.
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king. The palace becomes a circus.” - Turkish Proverb
Literotica
I just read a story over there and at the head of the story there is a disclaimer that the minimum age of the reader should be age 18.