The consent thing is often heavily mentioned by our submitters. We only mention something if one of us has trouble understanding the wording of the ask. As I again, have mentioned a few on the team have intimacy trauma. It is reassurance for us and other readers since some of us and readers with neurodivergency cannot always fill in the blanks or see the full meaning behind someones statement in the way phrased. This is by no means a way for mods to make anyone feel uncomfortable or unwelcome. Also as much as consent should be common sense for most adults, it isn't. You're speaking to someone who has been on the short end of the stick in believing everyone has and has been proven other wise more times then I'm comfortable recounting.
Virtue signaling is an incredibly poor choice of words, it's best you actually know the person or topic you're talking about before casting that sort of claim unto someone else.
As I mentioned, I heavily endorse the existence of other nsfw blogs because our ask box is often overwhelming, so multiple blogs to take the load or to go to another place that they feel accommodates them is indeed a better option.
I'm not certain if you also read into Mod Mai's response, however it was certainly more articulated than mine and touched on more things you should be mindful of. Mai also goes into how your points of "being able to accept more unsavory asks" is something they are open to doing as well but just haven't in consideration to the other mods comfort with there being triggers for some of us.
Regardless of your supposed age gap with this anon, by law that wouldn't matter. You answered them in response to a nsfw topic and told them to come back later. Law doesn't exactly look kindly on the implications of that as the proper response would have been None at all and a block. So by answering at all without properly shutting down the interaction, you've now given people the impression that your own boundaries regarding minors interacting with your adult space blog is lax and unserious about the safety for adults and minors themselves.
As for age gating, several of the mod team are older, I'd gather certainly having more years than you just to put it lightly, based on your loose admission of age. So we come from experience with age gating, how important it is and the known responsibility we have in order to do everything we absolutely can to the best of our given ability to be sure to keep minors from this space sans making the blog password locked; which would be too difficult for readers and us ultimately removing it as an option for us at all.
Just consider the fact that since you Are an adult now or are claiming to be one as of running this blog that there are several more things that you need to be mindful of and this includes being able to put hard boundaries down around anyone else who isn't 18 when it comes to these topics. Not just for your own safety, but for theirs and for the safety of your readers. Your bit about interacting in compliance in the law with your peers actually is a clause that only applies if you know them in person or have known them several years before the interactions and if you reside in the same region. It does not extend to online interactions. Many bad actors attempt to use that argument to defend themselves, to which I am not saying you are one but I am pointing out that it does by no means defend your arguments stance on that point specifically. This paints you in a rather malicious light. Speaking as someone who has close ties who work in law and enforcement.
However if that's something you don't intend to take seriously, or that you intend to allow drama on your blog, at all, in any form. Then to respect dev's wishes on the stance of fan drama we likely won't promote your blog or interact with you.
Frankly; about the usage of anon as a submission option. You're being somewhat hypocritical by having anon on yourself, are you not? Though our own reasoning for having anon on is because some adults in the fangan space are uncomfortable having their accounts, or kinks public knowledge next to their name so it's privacy related. Some fans only interact with fangan with a side blog and not their main, this option is left open to them for their comfort and frankly in case it's a situation where they do not wish to have their name associated with their submission.
This is not my first time running an imagines type blog, I have several years experience at another one, that is still active. I am modeling our blog being run in a similar manner, however on that blog the NG list is much smaller since I don't have as many hard boundaries as some other mods and personally, just like mod mai; am able to write those topics. I am simply as I mentioned, just not always comfortable doing so and just chosen not to instead.
End all; how you run your blog is your own business but we ask that you don't shade or allow shade of other blogs in your inbox considering it's a fantastic way to stress out Dev in the fact that Dev is even just allowing our blogs strictly because we follow certain rules, expectations and boundaries of Dev themselves.
While I know my responses for discussions like this tend to be lengthy, I'm hoping it was able to be well received and encourage once again to look at Mai's own response so you can further understand our perspective.
