#if I had a cent for every time I think that...

[llonkrebboj]

Adding my 5 cents of context.

I started reading cnovels on the web in 2014 - not on the official sites because my Chinese wasn’t quite that functional for developing internet savviness yet, and I hadn’t figured out there were official platforms… later when I did manage to create my accounts and get them working, certain things had already become common practice.

Starting in female lead 言情 romance mainline novels before moving into danmei a year later, there were still ripples caused by net cleanup campaigns that I heard of distantly in my corners.

First, news and rumors about a fairly popular author 长着翅膀的大灰狼 | Big Grey Wolf With Wings being investigated for allegedly ‘profiting from sales of pornography’ (friends, like the haitang authors of 2024/5, she wrote books!). Three of her works - all het with female leads - were deemed as obscene by an enforcement agency, and she ended up with a suspended 3-year prison sentence in June 2015.

Link to the article about Big Grey Wolf With Wings: https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_1366172

Much later (years later actually, while looking up things for the Chengdu Hugo awards scandal), I found out about the 扫黄打非·净网 2014 | Sweeping Pornography and Striking Illegality – Clean Web 2014 campaign to clean up ‘pornography and illegal content’ online. You can read about it on this blog. (The work of 扫黄打非 def continued through the years.) Pretty much every major platform like jjwxc, qidian, weibo, and even cloud storage sites got swept up in this. And jj which was a hub for romance and danmei stories got labeled a hotbed for adult content.

I have a distinct memory of bewilderment when the tag for 耽美 - I hadn’t quite figured out what that was or what it meant - suddenly turned into 纯爱 overnight on the site where I downloaded my txts. Piecing backwards from jjwxc forum questions and replies, it seems like this happened in July 2014. Not only jj, but if you check most sites now, the tag you will see for BL is 纯爱.

Danmei name-change to chunai: https://bbs.jjwxc.net/showmsg.php?board=22&boardpagemsg=12341&id=116331

As the forum moderator explained, the adjustment (rebranding) was due to much stricter checks during that period - likely related to the Clean Web 2014 campaign. Just looking at the words alone, 耽美 - carrying associations with sensuality and influence from Japanese Boys’ Love, and 纯爱 - emphasizing innocence, emotional purity, and the absence of sexual content. I guess you just have to do what you gotta do to keep the website operating.

(On lofter right now, neither chun’ai nor danmei are searchable tags. You do get a handful with 原耽 though, as a truncation of original danmei.)

Between 2015 and 2018 (I only found out the exact rough timeline looking it up for this reply, but it mostly aligns with the time I started noticing complaints, begging and funny ribbing @ reviewers appearing in authors’ notes), jjwxc formalized a “three-stage” review process for all content: First, automated machine screening; second, review by a randomly selected trio of users; and third, high-level editor approval. If a piece failed at any stage, the author would be notified to revise or the content would be removed. Around this time was when the standard of 脖子以下不能描写 | no depictions under the neck, as well as when ☐☐ came into fashion.

Moving into 2019! I think this is the year more people will start to remember because more of anglosphere fandom had been getting into cnoveland and fantranslations by this time, whether it be through the earlier novel adaptation cdrama, BL adaptations or Untamed.

Around May 2019, even qidian had whole sections of their site frozen for up to a week; books were taken down and people were losing their accounts over completely random things from puns that edged too close to forbidden words, to slightly steamy kissing scenes (although I think this mind boggling period turned out to be due to reviews via bots which flagged things indiscriminately)?

Something similar was also happening to jj, fanqie and midu in July 2019. And all of them were forced to stop updates and suspend commercial operations over a certain period during which time, they were supposed to ‘clean up problematic content, strictly enforce content review and management systems’. Of and course, fines. Fines were definitely paid. And for all the other times too.

Article for the above: https://www.zaobao.com.sg/realtime/china/story20190716-972936

[Some forbidden topics: https://www.jjwxc.net/backend/forbiddensubject.php]

More than before, writers started using clever metaphors, ancient-style language and other euphemisms to get around the filters. You might even have heard of some of the jokes made in hell like 古代文言文式开车 ~ writing smut in classical, literary language.

And it wasn’t just sexual content. Military romance, historical fantasy, real life politics, anything that touched on religion or violence—those were all fair game for censorship too*.

*People with the jjwxc app, you can go to check under public messages from 2021-06-10 ‘多部门署启动“净网“集中行动，请网站各位作者注意严控作品尺度和导向’ | Multiple departments have launched a coordinated 'Clean Internet' campaign. Website authors are urged to carefully monitor the content and messaging of their work, and look at the guidelines laid out there. A portion of it is translated (via mtl) in this tumblr reply.

Also, the elephant in the room was illegal publishing. Some authors who couldn’t get ISBNs would self-print 同人志 | fanbooks and sell them at cons or online. That was fine… until someone reported you. Like in the case of the author by the pen name of 深海先生 | Mr Shenhai, where they accused another danmei author of plagiarism, and the author clapped back by reporting them for illegal publishing. Mr. Shenhai got arrested and sentenced to 4 years in prison. And of course the MXTX arrest rumors of 2020/21 that probably were true.

All in all, I guess the shift from danmei to chun’ai wasn’t just about semantics, it really marked these 10 years as era of transition for Chinese BL, from the freedom of before to whatever state it’s in now.

After the arrests last year of danmei authors who published their works on the Taiwanese website Haitang, the authorities have allegedly arrested another 200-300 authors, many of whom took to weibo to share their experiences recently.

What struck me is how the authors always blamed themselves for not being cautious enough or being led astray by their financial needs, but nobody put the blame on the unjust rules and the greed of the authorities that led to their arrests - not that they would dare to. It's an utterly bizarre situation that, as a new danmei English license seems to be announced once every few days here on the other side of China's Great Firewall, within China the persecution keeps getting more rampant and the danmei community feels more and more cornered and frightened. Reality is always more surreal than fiction.

I translated some of the author's weibo posts, please see below:

“I knew I was being naïve and over-optimistic (about the repercussions of writing danmei), so I can’t blame anyone. Sometimes I want to resent society but then I’ll give up the thought. As for the criminal punishment, my view on it is still the same - I even feel that I’m different from those who engage in prostitution; after all, I made all this money by typing my stories word by word. Yet when I got into trouble, people talked about it as if I didn’t have to work for my income.” - This is from an author who wrote danmei because her family’s poor and she wanted to save money to travel. She got into a master’s programme before this and the programme kicked her out because of her arrest.

“Ever since I was little, I’ve always been the well-behaved golden child in my parents’ eyes. I had the best grades among my peers and won scholarships in both high school and university. When we visited family during New Year and other festivals, my parents were always proud of me in front of our relatives. But that day I shamed them thoroughly and the shame will always stick around...I love the characters I wrote very much, planning and creating their stores always brought me so much happiness and fulfillment. But a mistake is a mistake. I want to use my personal experience to admonish others - don’t try to go against the regulations in any way ever, don’t put yourself in the slightest bit of risk.”

“I’ve never felt this horrible in my entire life. I’ve always firmly believed that nobody in this world could be that bad. My rose-tinted glasses were broken along with my romantic expectations for the world. My values and outlook on life were shattered. When something like this happens, perhaps only the family of the author involved and the author herself would be hurt deeply! It’s just business for everyone else!”

This one’s written by the author’s sibling: “Another sleepless night. Tomorrow is the Dragon Boat Festival, and it’s been three festivals since we could be together...I’ve felt remorseful for countless times that I didn’t contact more people and I felt that I haven’t done enough. I prayed to the gods and the Buddha for more times in the past two months than in the past 30 years. Besides asking for the Heaven’s protection and blessing, what else can we do?...You supported yourself financially during university solely by doing part-time jobs. We’ve always put too much importance on money, and that’s how we allowed you to make a mistake.”

(link to the original weibo posts: https://x.com/whyyoutouzhele/status/1928763362541818266)

[kwanhui]

after sitting on everything for a few days i decided that i personally do not have the energy to continue to speak on seventeen and the disaster they presently are any longer. i’ve had a long run of talking about everything new that comes up, answering asks about it, all that jazz and i’m not in the slightest ungrateful for you guys engaging with me but i’m exhausted with it. it’s genuinely mentally draining lol. but i am going to say this, and it is likely going to be the last time i ‘publicly’ state my two cents on anything negative they do.

i am saying this as someone who is thoroughly exhausted with seventeen and fully faults them, and generally them only, for everything they do. i believe they have full freedom over their decisions and are not forced into anything against their will. i am not an apologist or a boy mom carat in the slightest.

i do not think liking something that has its (major) flaws makes you a bad person. i see a lot of you feeling as if you have to step away from the fandom from an ethical standpoint, and i don’t think that’s the case. if it is a personal choice that is better for you to make, then absolutely do that. however don’t feel like it is an obligation upon you, that otherwise you are a morally flawed person. you do not have to do anything.

you can just be. you can be angry, you can feel enraged and even hateful. you can no longer feel the same towards some of the members. i have members i have not forgiven for things said years ago, who i no longer feel the same about as the rest of the group. that is your right.

i do, however, think if you continue to sweep everything under the rug, ignore it and make justifications, and never reflect on the flaws of your interests, that that makes you a bad person. if you are actively aware of all the details of all that has happened, and your reaction is ‘oppa did nothing wrong’, i do think you are not a good person and you have allowed your interests to corrupt your morality.

if you’re going to stick around, find that balance. i don’t think you have to ‘stop loving’ them. because ultimately there’s really no such thing as a real fan. it’s not all or nothing. you don’t have to love and support them unconditionally or leave the fandom. you don’t have to feel as if your disappointment means you are required to go because disappointment doesn’t fly. it’s foolish that we’ve allowed that mindset to be so prevalent in fandom spaces because how are we more angry at fans for their disappointment than we are artists for being disappointing?

be mad. hold those men accountable. put em in the doghouse. change your bias. it’s genuinely all okay. there’s no rules and regulations to fandom as badly as everyone tries to convince you otherwise. you do what’s comfortable for you as frowned upon as it may be and stop caring what people think 🤷‍♀️

and honestly i think that if we were going to affix the ‘real fan’ label to anyone, it should be the people who want better for the people they like, who genuinely want them to be well educated, sincere and ethical people, not the losers who excuse them for every poor choice they make.

and like anything, there are exceptions to this. there are absolutely unforgivable things where your support of people in spite of them does make you awful. and seventeen has made some pretty rotten choices but i don’t believe they’ve crossed into the territory where carats are terrible for continuing to like them (or in some cases, tolerate them). i genuinely believe they are in be angry with them, distance yourself from the members at fault, even hate em if that’s what’s good for you territory.

just… if you really don’t want to go anywhere, don’t. stick around and be angry while you do it. that’s healthy and normal 🤍

[swiggity-swexual-i-am-asexual]

As per usual, it’s DP crossover with (probably) DC, although you could probably adjust it for other fandoms

ANYWAYS

A little kid and his mother are trick or treating in another city, perhaps at some kind of event rather than knocking on doors, and the kid is dressed as Phantom. It’s very adorable, with his little ghost-shaped bucket and clearly homemade and already stained costume—listen, white only works if you can just fly over street grime or phase it out of your clothes—and his slightly I’ll fitting wig. The kid is SO happy to be out and about dressed as his favorite, and maybe even showed it off to Phantom back in Amity Park before his family left.

The hero, insert whoever you wish here, is probably in civvies and just enjoying the event. The kid, meanwhile, is so glad when people ask who he is so he can explain, and so- the hero gets to hear ALL ABOUT the local town hero who is probably pretty small time despite the kid’s clearly exaggerated stories. The hero certainly never heard of him, but the kid’s mom confirms that Phantom really was the town hero, despite some mixed reviews of the poor guy.

“Did you manage to show him your costume?” the hero asks.

“Yeah! We went down to the cemetery to leave flowers and I got to show him my costume.”

Wait. Cemetery? Maybe it was part of theme, because Phantom had to be named that for a reason, but… it sounded like…

The kid ignores the suddenly VERY still hero and instead turns to his mom. “Momma, do you think we should bring him candy? He doesn’t get to trick or treat like we do, and I can work super hard to get him a bunch!”

The kid’s mom just smiles. “We could, but maybe we should bring him something homemade. I bet he’d like something more filling, teen boys like him have a hollow leg.”

The kid wrinkles his nose. “Like Vernie with the pizza bagels?”

“Like your cousin, yes. We can make some cinnamon rolls and take them to his memorial, maybe bring some of the apples from your grandpa’s garden…”

The hero is pretty much forgotten as the two-part family wanders off, not quite intentionally forgetting the hero is there so much as the hero somewhat accidentally ended the conversation when they just froze and didn’t ask anything further.

Not that the hero didn’t want to. But they’d learn something very serious.

One—there was a small town hero they’d never heard of. Two—that hero was apparently a teen. Third—most pressingly, the teen hero was both beloved enough to have kids dressing up as him and dead enough to have a grave.

This… might require some phone calls.

[shoot-i-messed-up]

Headcanon that every alien in the GL Corps seems to bash on Earth for being a backwater planet full of savages only because Abin Sur, previous holder of the title of the best GL, used to complain and whine at Game Night about the “problem planet” in his sector

[kittygawa--jr]

:/

[purplesaline]

I firmly believe that the solution to 99% of the problems we're facing as a society right now is Building Community

And the best part of this solution? Everyone can participate to the extent they are able/willing and it doesn't need to reach a critical mass to make a significant difference. Every community that is built, whether it's between two people or an entire town, is beneficial to all of us.

You don't need special skills to do it, you don't need to know how to organize or even be good at socializing! It can be as simple as shoveling snow from your neighbours sidewalk even if you never speak to them.

We all have skills we're good ar and enjoy, we all have resources others lack. I don't have much money but I've got endless time, for example, so a friend drops her dog off with me a couple days a week. I don't charge her because I benefit in other ways but also because it helps build community. Not asking for cash allows her to pay using resources she has more of, either to me directly (she drives me home from my hospital appointments each monday), and indirectly by helping others which further builds our community in a pay it forward sort of way.

Community uses Good Will and Favours as currency instead of money and it's the only thing that can break the back of capitalism.

Community can take a lot of up front investment to get started, and not every person you invest in will add value, but in the long run your total return investment will be more than returned to you.

[dragongirlbunny]

its always wild to me when people assume their kink is the default experience like im not kinkshaming but please have the self awareness to realize that your experience is not universal, rather than assuming that everyone else is also into the same things as you

[strawberry-cowmilk]

imagine the universe feels so bad for you because you got attached to a character who literally was the first to go (in one of those 90% of the cast dies games) your package arrives a whole week early

[j-esbian]

you know the whole ‘there are no ethical billionaires because to get to that point is dependent on the exploitation of others”

starting to feel like that’s also the case for anyone who achieves a meaningful level of fame.

this is illustrated on a small-scale level by the seemingly endless number of youtubers who appear on my radar only when they are caught in some scandal. it’s not necessarily that youtubers are a uniquely terrible breed; all industries dependent on fame are highly competitive and people willingly step on each other to get ahead. and once you’ve gotten away with that, you feel like you’re untouchable. the rules for other people don’t apply to you because you’ve already proven yourself Better than others, in whatever way that means to you, and maybe you start pushing other boundaries to see what else you can get away with.

talent does not always translate to fame. but, especially in arts industries where it’s nearly impossible to make a living wage without being famous, it seems that way. it’s almost impossible to carve out space to build skill on top of raw talent when you have to work a full time day job, so of course the people who have achieved fame will be able to dedicate more time to their craft. if you’re born without talent, i hope you were at least born rich.

but the guy you’ve heard of isn’t inherently more talented or better at what he does than an indie creator. fame is a combination of merit and marketing

[danothan]

coming to terms w the fact that i might have to be a fake hal fan forever

[quarklynx]

God, if Tumblr goes down for real I don't even know where I'll go. Twitter is an active dumpster fire, Instagram and TikTok are algorithm-riddled nightmares, and it's just plain depressing trying to pick one of the hundreds of alternative sites that are vying for the userbases of these massive social media platforms that have been hyper-monetized into their death throes

[hideyseek]

suddenly gripped by the need to blog about the experience i just had ok. im watching youtube, i get a phone call from an unknown number, i pick up. its some chinese uncle type calling his doctor, and im like, pulling formal phone-answering chinese out of my ASS (like i have not said "请问这是哪位?" in like, the last FIVE YEARS probably, tbh i probably only know this from listening to my mom answer the phone as a kid) and telling him he maybe has the wrong number, and then he hangs up and texts me to apologize and im like (paraphrased and translated:) genuinely nbd my dude ive been there, since im an abc its actually really nice to have a chance to speak to someone in chinese. and then he !!!! texts back asking if i wanna chat some more and i say yes omg and then we just have an extremely pleasant convo in mandarin for like 10min about where our families are from and daylight savings time!!!! he kept saying how fateful (he said and i quote "缘分") it was that the number he mis-saved in his contact happened to be a person's number and not a 空号 (meanwhile im internally like: the more fateful thing to me is that the person on the other line also spoke mandarin) but like wahhhhhhhhhh truly so!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! truly so!!!!!!

[mew317]

"i am so normal about zoh shia"

i say as i trip and 50 different theories fly out of my bag and into the wind

[maaarine]

Why are British teenage girls so unhappy? Here’s the answer (Caitlin Moran, The Times, Sep 13 2024)

"The report, by the Children’s Society, found that British 15-year-old girls are the most unhappy in Europe.

British girls aged 10-15 are “significantly less happy” with their life, appearance, family and school than the average boy — and their happiness is still declining.

Boys’ life satisfaction, meanwhile, remains broadly stable. (…)

But I still didn’t have an “aha!” moment about why this so disproportionately affects girls until… I talked to some teenage girls.

It was at a party, and I went to vape with them on the patio. Because I take my nicotine like children do.

“Duh — it’s the boys,” one said when I brought it up, as all the others agreed.

“The boys?” I asked.

My last book, What About Men?, had been all about how much boys struggle these days: their loneliness; their suicide rates. I’d spent the past year feeling very sympathetic towards boys.

“Yeah, well, who do you think they’re taking out their unhappiness on? It’s us,” another girl said.

“One boy at school used to draw a picture every day of how ugly I was,” a third girl said. “Every day for two years.”

“They’ve all got ‘Rate The Girls’ polls on their WhatsApps,” the first said. “They mark you down for weight gain, haircuts, what you say.”

“But then, if you’re hot, it’s just as bad, in a different way, because they’ll be talking about how they want to f*** you.”

The girls discussed coping techniques. Bad news: none of them worked.

“The only way you can stop them is if you become ‘one of the boys’ and hang out with them. But then,” the second girl said with a sigh, “all the other girls call you a slut. Because you’ve gone over to the boys’ side.”

“Surely it’s not all the boys?” I said. “There must be some nice boys?”

“Oh, yeah,” one girl said. “But they keep their heads down. Because… well, look.”

She showed me the Instagram account of her friend. Under every picture she posted of herself — smiling in a new dress; with her dog — dozens of anonymous accounts had replied with the most rank abuse.

“Fat.” “Slut.” “You gonna try and kill yourself again, for attention?”

“They’re all boys from her school,” she said. “And look, this one boy tried to defend her.”

I saw a series of messages from a brave teenage boy, posting things like, “You’re all big men, leaving these replies under anonymous accounts.”

As I could see, this boy immediately became a target too. Mainly accusations that he was “white knighting” this girl: “You wanna f*** her, bro?”

“So,” I asked, “you don’t think it’s social media pressure to be beautiful, or the economy, that’s making girls so sad?”

“Well, yeah, them too,” the first girl said. “But, Monday-Friday, 9-3, I’m not on social media. I’m not… in the economy. I’m just with these boys. And no one talks about how horrible they are.”

I thought about another recent report, showing a 30 per cent ideological gap between Gen Z men, who are increasingly conservative, and Gen Z women, who are increasingly progressive.

I thought about Andrew Tate, who has nine million mostly young male followers — and faces human trafficking charges, which he denies.

And I thought: maybe these girls are on to something. Maybe more people need to vape with teenage girls and ask them for the school gossip."

[tgithursday]

The way that I suspected I may kin Lottie Matthews for a while, and, so far, every episode of this current season has only affirmed that, and then we got the end of 3×04. Okay.

[ghostsprincess]

I can't stop thinking about Ghost being such a gentleman when your boyfriend is an ass....

warning: domestic abuse, adult language

💀

You were mortified that it happened at work this time...

Your boyfriend was a brute of a man, made worse over the months by drinking alone at night while you bartended to help pay down your student debts from several years ago. He got a little rough with you, but only when he was plastered. And you forgave him, because he was decent the rest of the time.

But suddenly you had to start coming to the pub to pull pints with a little extra makeup on your face. The random patrons out for a casual drink wouldn't have noticed, but your regular boys did. You only knew them by Ghost and Soap. They were military and mean looking, but they laughed together like teenage schoolmates. It was always a good night when they sat at the bar, but you could often feel their eyes on you.

"Y' alright, love?" Ghost asked the first night you wore extra eye makeup and a bright red lipstick.

"Yes," you told him, not meeting his eyes. Your face hurt. Your boyfriend had slapped you two days ago. Your skin was puffy and bruised, and you were embarrassed and afraid to move out, so you stayed. "You boys need another round?"

They left you a sizable tip. They always did.

The next time you saw them, your lip was split open, and you were desperate for a way out of the mess your life had turned into. Trying to hide your face while you mixed drinks was a chore, and as soon as Ghost and Soap arrived, you knew it was useless.

When Soap disappeared toward the washrooms, Ghost leaned across the bar, his hulking shoulders taking up more than their fair of space, making you smile slightly. His voice was deep and soft, but his words made you shiver and freeze with your hand on a pint glass. "Y' know, a pretty little thing like you belongs on a pedestal. A man should touch you with reverence."

You stared at him silently as his eyes tracked the mark on your lip. When Soap returned, you didn't charge them a cent for their drink, but they tipped you well anyway.

When a confrontation happened at the bar, tears stung your eyes, and you wanted to hide. Your boyfriend was drunk and angry, and tonight he beckoned you from behind the bar to a dark corner near the hallway where he could have some privacy while he berated you and roughed you up.

"Please," you begged, running your hands nervously on your shirt. "Just go home. I'll be off work in an hour."

"How many of them have you fucked?"

"What?" you gasped, thinking he'd finally lost it. "What are you talking about? I need to get back to work."

He pushed you up against the wall with his other hand on your jaw. "How many of the men here tonight have you fucked?" His thumb brushed the spot on your lip that was nearly healed, and you flinched. "You have the guiltiest expression. So, tell me how much of a slut you've been. As your boyfriend, I need to keep you in line."

Then he was being hauled away from you as your legs shook. With wide eyes, you watched Ghost's massive bicep wrap around his neck like it was nothing. "Y' alright, love?" he asked you softly, and you nodded without saying a word. Then his face darkened, and his voice was an angry snarl as he told your boyfriend, "Ya' been relieved of your duties."

"The fuck?" he responded from his headlock, gasping for air.

Ghost sighed and rolled his eyes. "Fuckin' prick don't even know military protocol." Then he raised his voice a little louder. "I said, ya' been relieved of your duties. I'll take over from here."

Somehow, you found your voice. "Take over?"

Ghost's face softened again when he looked at you there against the narrow hallway wall. "With the boyfriend duties," he told you while Soap dragged your ex-boyfriend toward the exit. "Sound good, love?"

He was holding out his big paw of a hand, palm facing up, and you knew he'd be incapable of using it to hurt you. The softness in his gaze right now and every time he looked at you was proof enough of that. You didn't respond, but you smiled as you slid your hand into his grasp.

"That'll do for now," he grunted.

That was the night you came to know him as Simon.

💀

Part two