hey everyone, I don't often poke my head into the general community at large but I think there definitely deserves to be some acknowledgement about what's going on. I was part of the staff team on liminal when sasha was accepted, but I would like to clarify some things about it.
rach came to us saying sasha wanted to join the board, that she wrote on darker subjects, and had a reputation on the tea blogs. most of us didn't know who exactly sasha was or just knew the name in passing. we were told there would be some 'light references' to [tw] grooming (my ace ass did not immediately think in a horror setting this would be the sort that involved a sexual nature because there's plenty of set up for people to be manipulated in the apocalypse for say, murder and things, but I digress).
sasha and niki sent in the freeform part of their apps, and after pinging us all (far too many times) rach asked us all to sign off on it. most of us put the stipulations on it that it shouldn't break ToS, should be handled tactfully (which obviously is now recognized as an impossible thing), discussed with writing partners to ensure comfort, and be properly tagged. I also stipulated if issues arose, we would have to re-evaluate.
when I read the freeform, I was taken aback by the entirely NOT 'light' references and immediately pointed out the TWs were not harsh enough. I made very clear that it needed to be tagged a lot better than it was, but I had to retire for the night. when I woke up, I found the app had been accepted (despite most of the team not having read the plotter) and someone had opened a ticket about it. a ticket that was then handled poorly.
I backed up this member because they were entirely correct and I agreed with them! my suggestions for added TWs were a lot harsher than what ended up being settled on, I had to argue tooth and nail over romanticized content and acknowledging the character was an abuser, and then I made sure the member got an apology for being disregarded. since that moment, things just got worse. I did my best to make sure sasha got called out for inappropriate tagging, joking, etc., and rach cut me off almost every time. I did my best to protect the community, and in the end it wasn't enough. and being disregarded (because sasha also made me very uncomfortable and I voiced that many times) along with seeing other members (and other staff even) be disregarded made me step down from being staff long before the incident that brought this to light.
I cannot speak for the rest of the staff, but I am sorry to those who had to deal with all this. I take responsibility for my part in it but I did try to do what I could to protect the community thereafter. If I had voiced better that I wasn't comfortable with the character being allowed on the site instead of leaning in favor of giving someone a chance, maybe a lot less people would've been hurt. I am at least glad to see sasha is being shown for the person she really is though, and if it took the death of Liminal, so be it. manipulating rach as she did is a cruel and vile thing, but that doesn't excuse the fact that we still let her be a part of our community with the character she was writing.
I hope you all stay safe out there in the RPC and get to actually having a fun time writing instead of having to deal with this sort of thing. if I can help clarify anything else, please let me know.
blakekathryn
snowghoul
ellievsbear
tangentwithtanner
yousharknotpass
