Is it reasonable for someone to tell a writer “hey, I’m part of this race/sexual identity/disability that you’re writing about, and your depiction is very stereotypical and problematic. You need to take down this work or rewrite it.”?
A friend of mine considers themself anti-censorship but thinks that if you write about an identity you aren’t a part of and receive criticism for it and don’t take down/change the work, people are allowed to set you straight.
(“Set straight” in this instance means making posts that say “this person is racist/homophobic, so report their account and do not support them”, making burner accounts to comment on all of their posts about how bad the fic in question is or calling them racist/sexist, or spamming the fic with aggressive comments).
Their argument is that freedom of expression stops when your expression involves stereotypes or misinformation about marginalized groups, since it affects real people. I’m having a hard time disagreeing with them to be honest.
no, it is never reasonable or justified to harass anybody. period. I have already talked about this before but you (general you) cannot know if someone is racist or homophobic or a bad person in real life just because they write about fictional stories that are taboo and “problematic” in a way that is “problematic”. I have always praised “write whatever you want, however you want” and I mean writers can and should write whatever they want, however they want. what art someone creates does not reflect their real life moral compass or who they are as a person.
my advice for your friend is to close the tap and move on. because while I get how frustrating it can get and while their feelings are valid, fanfiction is not an activism and fanfic writers do not owe anybody anything. fanfic writers write for themselves. they don’t write for anybody’s approval. or at least I write for myself, not for anybody’s approval.
no, people are not freely allowed to “set someone straight” if it’s a hobby that that someone does for themself and their own enjoyment. “but what they write is harmful” actually it’s words on a screen that you (still general you) choose to read, you can stop reading anytime you want. and if someone else reads it and thinks “oh everything that is written in this fanfiction must be true in real life because it’s portrayed as such in this piece of fiction, I will change my entire moral compass now” then chances are that with or without the fiction they consume, they are already troubled — if they can’t separate fiction from reality — and they need help. the problem is them. not the writer or how they write their fic.
no one needs to take anything down because it pissed someone else off. “taking something down because someone else doesn’t want people to see it and so they believe they have the power to control what other people see and what can be created” is literally a fascist tool and what censorship means. so your friend cannot claim to be anti censorship if they think a work that offended them specifically should be taken down, otherwise I promise you there would be no fic about taboo contents or “problematic” ships. because these fics still offended someone and there are people (pro censorship folks) who believe these fics should be taken down because it offended them.
anti censorship means no censorship, no censorship means no censorship. it does not mean “works I personally think is morally good enough can stay but works that I personally find too offensive must go”.
“but it affects real people”. no, it doesn’t. it’s a work about fictional characters. not you. “but it’s about marginalized people who are real” it’s still a fictional stories about fictional characters. by your friend’s logic, works that contain topics like violence, murder or SA also affect real people because violence, murder and SA happen to real people in real life too. go back and read what I’ve already said:
“if someone else reads it and thinks “oh everything that is written in this fanfiction must be true in real life because it’s portrayed as such in this piece of fiction, I will change my entire moral compass now” then chances are that with or without the fiction they consume, they are already troubled — if they can’t separate fiction from reality — and they need help. the problem is them. not the writer or how they write their fic.”
no, fanfics, especially about fictional characters, do not affect real people. what does is harassment. if you (general you) make a call out post about someone, if you harass someone because you disapprove of the fictional stories they write, if you encourage other people to harass them because you disapprove of the fictional stories they write, then you are nothing more than a pathetic bully who just wants an excuse to harass real people over fiction in order to feel morally superior. but what you actually are is just a pathetic bully who should be ashamed of themself.
also… good luck trying to report works you don’t like on ao3, a no censorship site that was created specifically to host and give platform to works that are deemed “offensive, harmful and problematic” by pro censorship folks.
