Ey ey, that got me thinking, what are your thoughts about childfication of online spaces?
I've stayed away from fandom for a long time, if not my whole life, because of my lack of social skills. It's strange for some that I'm never in the know about anything that's going on, but I get a kind of tiredness when I think about the possibility of trying to understand and get into fandoms in general.
What exactly you think that qualifies as childfication? Is it more than just banning NSFW content altogether?
It's a annoying topic to debate whenever I've seen in every platform, and it's not only minors that get disgusted (it's kinda fair for some people that don't like to see this kind of topic in child/teens spaces like cartoons or some anime) but I've seen a lot of adults that get annoyed and angry for any kind of sexual innuendo that people try to post, even if it's about characters that are described as adults or their own ocs.
I don't know, it's just something that got me thinking about for some time. I'm a artist that get nervous about the idea of blacklash for posting this side of my ocs.
That's a long rant, sorry.
As someone else put it in that last post I made, I guess that the more appropriate term would be "advertisement-friendly". Everyone everywhere wants to get paid for ads - from market tycoons to instagram influencers and artists - and the squeakier your public image is, the more likely that is to happen. Here's an anecdotal story that exemplifies that perfectly:
I simply could not help but notice a while ago how many of my peers were getting sent that new xp pen tablet for review, meanwhile my inbox and email remains conspicuously xp pen-correspondency-free. There is a couple of reasons why that could be, but the most likely one is that my work is simply a little too explicit for the company to want to associate with. This is, unfortunately, a smart business practice on their part that I cannot necessarily fault them for, but it was interesting to observe it in action, first-hand.
(I do not want an xppen tablet, please do not misunderstand me as resentful, LOL. If anything, an argument could be made in favor of xppen for choosing to collab with slightly smaller/new artists, and I hope they get sent all the free stuff they could possibly need - because I have been here for a while, and I do not need those things myself!)
Anyways, as implied, advertiser-friendly walks hand in hand with "family friendly" - not family appropriate, I would argue, because to me that terminology ideally considers mental-health as well as plain visual optics - and blasting your children and teens with BUY CONSUME BUY CONSUME messages is not conducive to healthy brain development... This is a culture we were all raised in to an extent or another, and probably one of the reasons why so many people reinforce it as an extension of their ethical code today, despite not associating with conservative or religious groups otherwise.
To be fair, there are absolutely times when crassness online does get annoying. I cannot believe the ways we speak to each other on the internet. And I think that our culture of oversharing about our sex lives and medical histories often crosses a line - less concerning my personal comfort, but much more so in regards to the safety and health of the person doing the sharing, in an age where nothing in the web can be truly erased, and people are using the internet younger than ever. But regardless, blocking and moving on is always better than lashing out at a stranger online. I would apply the same logic to fandom spaces.
I do think that it has become impossible to post sensitive content without being questioned in some shape or form. But that's a result of the ease with which things escape containment nowadays - people would have ALWAYS had """concerns"""", those people just didn't use to be exposed to non-mainstream/transgressive work without actively looking for it before. This unfortunately also exposes you to those for whom an explanation or clarification will not suffice. And, if you personally don't ever want to talk about your thought process or intent ever, that is your right, but then you will have to make peace with people's assumptions.
It can be a tough environment to navigate, but I think that unless what you are sharing is PARTICULARLY scandalous, people vastly over-estimate their ability to amass a negative reception. Most people do not care enough nor do they have enough time in the day to interact with the things that they don't like.
Christ. Well, I guess you don't have to feel bad for your rant anymore.
Ultimately it's all a little messy and complicated but it is more concerning than it is scary, in my opinion. Just share your stuff and try not to take someone's fright or confusion too personally when they turn a wrong corner.
