#puritanism

[craycraybluejay]

You know how a pretty obvious majority of kinksters are submissives? You want to know a big part of the reason why it's hard to find a dom that's into the same hard kink you are?

Ask a hardcore masochist what they think of being whipped.

Then ask a hard sadist what they think of whipping someone.

Do you notice that the sadist/dom will often either dance around an answer or try to use soothing language/euphemism not unlike the way how in many places people are still expected to discuss sex if at all. Gentle, calculated language.

The issue is, especially with a new surge of purity culture overtaking so-called "leftist" online circles, is that fantasy becomes a moral judgement.

Sub with a noncon kink: "I want to be raped" (cnc but like. People can talk ab it how they want don't cancel me fr.)

Response from Normies: "well that's weird and kinda dark but ok"

Dom with a noncon kink: "I want to rape"

Response from Normies: "I'm calling the police and you should kys and you're also a sexual abuser and even though you haven't said anything about kids you're also also a pedophile :)"

Not only does the attitude of murderous hatred against doms/tops with hard kinks/fetishes/paraphilias make it difficult for them to practice those kinks (safely and ethically) out of fear of social backlash if it's ever found out even if both they and their partner[s] had a great time and are fine-- but, it actively puts innocent people in danger by equating thoughts and attractions of ANY KIND to the act of hurting others against their will. It equates fantasy, which can oftentimes be played out safely if in a modified way with real harmful actions.

Also, kink is still illegal in many places, so don't "its illegal" me about harder kinks. Law is not morality, none of us are free until all of us are free, etc. You get the gist.

You want to see more doms? Meet someone who can indulge your "scary badwrong" sexy feelings? Then maybe don't actively promote a culture where you put ANY kind of attraction or kink under fire. It doesn't matter if it'd be unethical to act out in real life. Some of the most common kinks worldwide are unethical as fuck to act out irl, including rape. That's why we have cnc, come on, guys.

You know what? In fact, you SHOULD actively shun people who shame others for their sexual feelings. EVEN if you think it's gross. EVEN if it wouldn't be ethical to act on irl. Let these types know that their puritan ideals are NOT accepted here. Let them know that if they want to go to church they can do that but not in your space, not forcing other (non consenting!) people to listen to their hateful and repressive ideology.

Like, hey, I'm not into ABDL, for example. But I will defend to the death other people's right to be into that. To think and feel whatever they think and feel. You think diapers are sexy? Great! I don't personally see the appeal, but you do you boo. There is no Correct Way to be sex/kink negative. Either you believe in thought crime or you don't.

And yes, this post includes "harmful" paraphilias (I put it in quotes because they're only harmful if acted on), sadomasochism, mutilation fetishism, etc etc. Every "gross" or "evil" kink, fetish, para you can possibly imagine. The stuff that makes you horny is just stuff that makes you horny, and being horny is normal. Being "weird horny" is also normal. No one deserves to experience shame, let alone public harassment or hate over feelings they most of the time don't Choose to have. Be mindful of puritan rhetoric and strike it down when you see it.

[mywitchcultblr]

If you are an American artist/fan, change your pixiv account region! Because there's new censorship

Number 5. If your drawing has no 'educational/scientific/artistic value' it won't be allowed to exist. These new censorship are absolute nonsense pushed by credit card company and conservative politicians. Fucking bonkers

It's the same thing when Tumblr banned NSFW and they promised that 'artistic nudity' will still be 'allowed'. I hope every purist on the internet realized that when they whine over anime fan art they are repeating what conservative billionaires and politician are pushing:

The death of art...

[imptwins]

You are not a bad person for having 'immoral thoughts'. Guilt helps nobody. You cannot do harm if nobody is hurt. Shed the notion of 'mental sin.'

Do well by people. Act with compassion and kindness. Improve lives. That is how you be a good person, not by 'purity of soul.'

[theweeklydiscourse]

Why is nuance dieing?

The younger generation seems to be so much more obsessed with moral puritanism in fiction and irdk why. Could it be because kids these days don't interact with real people and are just chronically online so they repeat what they see on the internet?

Actually saw someone saying people who like fictional bad boys are the reason why men get away with sa & rape irl and countries are criminalizing abortion...

It's just so depressing to see that. This line of thinking is scary actually.

I don't remember people going this mad over morals when shows and movies like Vampire Diaries and Twilight saga were huge. It's like people have regressed.

The media we consume is becoming more and more didactic as we enter an age where it seems like every piece of popular media is obsessed with delivering their messages and themes like an after school PSAs. Media is becoming increasingly more sanitized and “family friendly” to appeal to the broadest possible audience to create more and more profits for corporations. This obsession with sanitized fiction has become commonplace with many younger people who parrot what they see online and on the media they consume and proceed to deliver underdeveloped takes on subjects they don’t fully understand yet.

It becomes even more interesting when people point to fictional narratives as the cause for societal problems when there are already larger institutions that have historically been responsible for what they claim fiction causes. They displace the blame for societal ills like SA, abuse, patriarchal violence and misogynistic legislation onto fiction, fan fiction and media that explores taboo subject matter. While I don’t deny that fiction has power, 90% of the time these people have no idea of the ways literary works influence our culture and default to a 1:1 “monkey see, monkey do” explanation for why people must consume the “correct media”.

Another factor is the way that people have become accustomed to moralizing their content consumption. They have convinced themselves that they need a concrete and righteous justification for their likes and dislikes and this has ruined the way fandom interacts with literature, film and other art forms. With this in mind, they can no longer dislike or even hate something without creating some moral justifications for why “hating this thing is actually progressive and righteous!” and in the process, conflate consumerism with activism.

The comparison to Puritanism is quite fitting in this case. After all, the principles of that religion were based in purity, obedience and censorious beliefs for self-indulgences and we can draw comparisons with the way people online discuss certain subjects. There’s a phenomenon where people will say something along the lines of: “It’s alright to like (insert problematic character here)! But you need to acknowledge that they are a bad person.” To them, it seems like a gesture at fairness and magnanimity when in reality, it is an attempt at exerting unearned moral authority over the tastes of others. It is a demand that a person proves their moral innocence to them in a performative manner that validates their need to feel superior. But it’s all performative purity because even if a person did explain/justify their fictional tastes, these people wouldn’t care and would continue to demand purity from others.

People can’t even discuss certain characters anymore without running into people accusing them of being terrible people who would approve of real-life violence and abuse. And I can’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t always like this, when did it change?

[coulsonlives]

"That's got to be the most depressing shit I've ever seen. Like, just go read a geography textbook. I'd have more fun reading that than trying to find fanfiction to read that I didn't derive any pleasure from; that was in complete moral alignment with.. not even who I am as a person, but how I would treat everybody."

Well said!

[misscromwellsmonocle]

Art in the Age of Digital Puritanism (2022) by Iness Rychlik The artist reposted it in 2024 "because it feels relevant in social media today".

[girlcalledwhatsername]

People pretending to be against censorship of dark materials but still unwilling to actually leave fiction that makes them uncomfortable alone will really enter discussions of censorship to say "noo I totally understand the difference between dark stuff being depicted (Actual Highbrow Art That Deserves To Be Saved) and icky pornographic romanticisation of bad things that people get off to (Morally Corrupt Non-Art That Should Be Destroyed Or At Least Harassed Off The Platforms) and obviously I'm a progressive person who doesn't want to censor the former!!"

like clearly you've first missed the whole point that exploring dark themes doesn't have to be a moral lesson for it to be "allowed" and fantasies ≠ reality, secondly you have decided to become the arbitrator of what depiction is good and what is pornographic ie what depiction is pleasing in a righteous way (tragic) vs in a corrupt way (sexual - which is always corrupt no of course this has nothing to do with my religious upbringing why do you ask) which has an understanding of "harm" not really grounded in reality because it sees fantasies when they are sexual as being harmful for real (so I already know these are people who are progressive only in name but will hate me for my lived reality of being 1. Kinky and 2. Mentally ill with intrusive thoughts), thirdly you've missed the whole point of anti censorship which is that it doesn't matter whether you find something uncomfortable it still has the right to exist, and fourthly this attitude somehow only comes out with sexual stuff bc none of these people are going after dark romanticism when it has cannibalism and the cannibals have a twisted sexual romance with each other or when it's a murderer or a vampire who also has a love story no no this is reserved for "dark sexual themes" because how dare anyone wish to explore that in any way that's not purely clinical, doesn't matter if you're a victim exploring this stuff to cope you're a victim in the wrong way go be sad and submissive instead.

Tldr: "I'm not like the other conservatives I actually know that art shouldn't be destroyed except when it's sexual because then it's meaningless and not art" actually you're exactly like the other conservatives

[decolonize-the-left]

If y'all don't like astrology you can just say that. And if you don't like me then you can just say that too. You don't have to make everything a moral question or call my integrity to question because I made a post about where the planets were when I was born lol

I just shared a post, too, about the boomerification of gen z and how a lot of them are turning into puritans and not even the right wing ones. The liberal ones are turning into puritans.

That last anon was a stunning exhibit of what that post meant.

[tempoaryblogformightyjensblog]

Philip grew up hating Catholics like any other good Puritan boy, but also knew their aesthetic was way fucking cooler. So when he became emperor he just stole it.

[dukeofankh]

The discourse about whether romance novel fans are porn addicts is dumb and hilarious. Like, are the books deeply pandering escapist fantasies that usually veer into deeply horny fuck scenes? Yes. Are they PORN though? Oh, absolutely also yes.

The issue isn't whether it's porn. It's that porn addiction isn't real, and getting mad at women for reading porn makes even less sense than being mad at men for watching it, considering at this point the people aren't even real so it's not even like there's a risk of exploitation.

Does it make someone an addict to consistently read books that make them feel good? No. Might not be the most challenging or enriching thing ever, but who gives a shit. People don't have an obligatory quota of deep existential thought that they're shirking by reading thinly veiled Reylo fanfic. Reading words isn't something you can be addicted to. That's not what addiction means. Just straight up. Even when it's compulsive or self-soothing behaviour, that's still not the same as an addiction and you need to stop acting like your youth pastor and/or favourite sex-negative tumblrista knows better than a field full of people with PHDs in neurochemistry, who consistently maintain both the conclusion that the only aspect of porn consumption that is bad for you is the shame some people feel for consuming it, and also that since people can develop compulsive relationships to anything including eating hair, laser focusing on that happening with porn specifically is pretty clearly just a basicass moral panic.

If I could watch movies about a cool awesome guy that everyone thinks is the coolest, and all the dudes are like "oh no here comes the coolest dude ever, I lose and you win" and the girls are all like "but you only have one penis and me and my gorgeous frenemy each have several holes how are we going to figure this out?"...I...would? And I do? Its not hypothetical. I am a dude. That's what a lot of media aimed at dudes has, historically, been. Wish fulfillment. Ladies should also get wish fulfillment.

Like, is it cringe to see people geeking out about their porn in public? Yeah. I don't tend to do that, personally. I think that since people tend to see women's desire in a toothless and objectified way, there's a tendency for some people to overlook how broadcasting it can put people off in public spaces. But that's more of an issue of social media cramming everyone into the same space and destroying the barriers between niche hobby spaces and adult spaces and people's public news feeds. The women reading the porn is fine. The women liking the porn is fine. The women talking to other women about how they like the porn is fine. Something annoying you or disgusting you is fine, but then that's kind of all that can or should be said. There isn't a step two. There isn't a step where you should shame and smear people until they never annoy or disgust you.

At this point society's morals are pretty broadly varied. Theres only a few things left you can call someone that are received with the scorn and shame you meant them with in any consistent way. And that's why everyone spends all of their time calling people they don't like either pedophiles or addicts. It's getting tiring.

[craycraybluejay]

apparently it is morally wrong to have a crush/sexual feelings for anyone in general. Like. the whole 'dont sexualize literal people ewwww.' i really really wish less teens were on the internet because of this kind of stuff. we are mass-producing mental illness and i am not kidding.

like imagine being 15, having a crush on someone in your class, going on the internet, and being bombarded with all sorts of people saying its wrong to experience sexual thoughts towards people in your peer group. its wrong for adults to have sexual thoughts about other adults. its even more wrong for you, a teen, to have sexual thoughts about your classmates.

you are 16 now and very lucky to be in therapy with a well off enough family. you confess to your therapist how evil you are for wanting to touch or look at that one girl in your class. she looks at you with confusion, like how your mother looks at you when you ask her why you have a computer and your friend doesn't. why is it fair. everyone's confused about you and you are confused too. you're evil, you must be, because you have dirty disgusting feelings. you deserve to be mocked online, says dogluvr15089. you're an evil monster, says @Official Priest of West California. you're a pervert and sexual predator, says fandom_m0m321. they have stupid names and no faces-- but if all of them are saying it then it must have some truth to it, right? your therapist is saying something but you don't hear her, you're in your head wondering if you should punish yourself, how you should punish yourself. when you're back in the room with her you ask her what's wrong with you. she writes you a diagnosis for ocd and anxiety. you take the drugs, like the good, righteous, pure teenager you want to be. they make you feel weirdly empty, and not very hungry, and kinda sleepy. they might give you dementia in your 50s but who cares. you deserve it for being gross. you look through the comments even on other people's stuff, the comments telling them the same thing you were told. you're still punishing yourself for natural feelings-- seeking out the same degrading bullying when you don't get enough of it. you don't tell your therapist you are doing this; because you know she would tell you to stop and you don't want to stop. it's a compulsion. you talked about those last Tuesday.

you're 17. you haven't asked anyone out. by some miracle, a girl who likes you takes the initiative. you stumble through the date awkwardly and anxiously, trying not to touch her, flinching away when your fingers brush over a cheap burger. she asks if you're okay, and then asks, "don't you like me?" She asks, "why do you look like you're scared of me or something?" You stay silent. But then when it happens again, she gets up to leave and the rejection causes the dam to break. You try not to cry, because that's Emotional Manipulation. You choose your words carefully, because you don't want to accidentally Gaslight her like the evil thing you are. You stumble through it but you tell her you're sorry, you tell her you've never had the chance to date. You tell her, shaking like a leaf, like a dumb idiot, that you really really like her and she's very pretty and you're scared to say Hot or Sexy so you don't. And you tell her you're scared. You're really scared she'll see you're a bad person and leave you for someone more pure and good. You try really hard to phrase it like a PR team would. She tells you that's ridiculous, laughing like sunshine and kisses and god, sex. But most of all you've never heard someone so flippantly tell you how ridiculous of a notion that is. She makes you feel brave. You tell her what people have been telling you, scared that you're Trauma Bonding her but pushing through. She, with more surprise, again tells you it's ridiculous. She's not laughing anymore, but you want to make her laugh. You ask with a voice too small for your age if its okay you think her laugh is really sexy. She smiles so brightly its blinding, and says she thinks you're sexy too. You hold hands when you leave together. You go on more dates later, and the two of you talk about your problems and your dreams. And she shows you how to yell at "internet dumbasses." And you still go to therapy except this time you think it's working, because this time you Get It. You get it's ridiculous, and you're happy enough to try to heal.

And you know what? You're one of the lucky few that got that chance. Many teens struggle with mental health problems due to the internet. Not all of them are caused by this purity bullshit. Some of it is body image-- accounts that encourage eating disorders and low self-esteem. Some of it is trends and feeling lonely and unlikeable. Social media doesn't just excaberate mental illness. Sometimes it really and truly produces it and this fact needs more awareness.

[mywitchcultblr]

🚨 A harasser calling the Police on a trans artist over Warhammer 40k BDSM porn art and genshin impact 🚨

The harasser seems to be on Tumblr as well so be careful. Situation is very new and currently still ongoing and people is talking about this

TW and CW for the contents below:

Okay so someone on Twitter is harassing, stalking and doxxing, making false bigotry accusations and calling the cops on an artist over Warhammer 40k art and stuff about genshin impact that person seems to be very upset that the artist is drawing bdsm porn gore Warhammer 40k and they don't like art about Childe x Xiao?...

And they don't like art about Childe getting fucked by the tentacle monster or tortured or shipped with "the wrong person and not their fave"

This is the harasser Twitter account and Tumblr sock puppet account btw. I have no idea if the harasser might have a main Tumblr blog but could be hence why I'm posting this here because the harasser can be anywhere on Tumblr especially on Genshin

Edit: *sighing roll my eyes. Of course it's the people like this always. I had to update the tag now to include pro vs antis stuff... lord...*

As you can see the harasser is making these unhinged accusations about the artist and calling them racist slave owner Nazi (yeah probably the harasser is one of those people who believes that if you like Warhammer 40k then you are a Nazi)

I haven't seen any evidence of the artist doxxing a poc so far while the harasser literally calling the cops on other people over shipping and fan art

MissingOldRose has been harassing the artist for MONTHS both on Tumblr and Twitter, made concerning and threatening comments about the artist pets and also countless false accusations.

Also you noticed that the harasser is HARASSING THE ARTIST SIMPLY BECAUSE THEY ACTUALLY FELL SQUICK?! WHY DID YOU SWAT/CALLING COPS ON SOMEONE JUST BECAUSE YOU FELL SQUICKENED OVER FREAKING GENSHIN IMPACT AND WARHAMMER 40K FAN ART?!

Also accused an SA survivor (the artist) as a rapist over personal vent and fan art. I can't do it anymore with modern fandom. Especially with the fact that cops was called to arrest a TRANS PERSON over fan art. LGBTQA+ people are often the target of police brutality and unfair treatment both from the legal system and that's happening in the western world that supposed to be progressive countries.

In my country LGBT people have no protection

Another important detail

Yeah fyi for some people who wanting to call the cops or swatting other people over ship/art/ stupid ass shipping discourse, as quoted:

"Anyone has free artistic expression and they (the cops) don't find anything wrong at all with my art"

If you possessing and distributing CSEM yeah you can go to jail. BUT YOU ACTUALLY CAN'T REPORT SOMEONE OVER THE ART OF CHILDE GETTING HIS ASS RAMMED BY TENTACLES OR 40k ART.

Thats a false report and you won't go to jail over Genshin Impact shipping and art.

The situation today still ongoing

Remember the harasser is on Tumblr, last time i check the soc account is still exists and they MIGHT have main blog on Tumblr as well especially on Tumblr Genshin (but who knows just careful)

If you know MissingOldRose on Tumblr and Twitter or you know if they have main Tumblr account please be careful. @abusiveartistsfuckoff account as listed above is used for harassing and stalking on people Tumblr. Even if this situation doesn't impact you directly. What if that person (especially if you are on Genshin Impact fandom) doesn't like your ship or you art then threaten to do the same to you?

Also have some compassion for the artist please

Sorry for tagging this with genshin, doesn't mean to polluted the fandom but it's just an awareness since the harasser is on Tumblr and also a part of the Genshin community. It's really sucks because the game itself is really fun but by god some people in the Genshin fandom often went too far...

[genuinely-bad-posts]

This Post is Genuinely Bad!

[melodiesofmidnight]

One of the most unfortunate notions to have emerged from the afterbirth of the very odd resurgency of Puritanical morality (in regards specifically to literature as well as to fictive works of film and/or television) is the idea that characters must be inhuman in their goodness.

Not in that they must be angels, or that they must be without moral quandary, but that they must, in the end, transmute these struggles into redemption, or, at the very least, into qualities which render them more sympathetic than condemnable.

That, however, renders a disservice unto readers. As poetry, if one were to align one's views with Wordsworth, the purpose of a literary work is to contain "the spontaneous overflow of feelings," and thus to evoke such in those who consume it.

There must be catharsis. A good character is not so necessarily because he is morally good, or because he is an embodiment of our most noble and admirable traits (though well-written and well-rounded characters certainly can be so), or because he serves to bolster a work whose exigesis would extoll the virtues of a parable, but because he is deeply human; because he is multi-faceted; because he is flawed.

Humans are not paragons of virtue. To hold a character to the standards of perfection expected of martyrs is to divest the character of his humanity, and, thus, of his use to us. Characters do not need to be role models, or motivational, or inspirational, they simply must speak to our humanity.

It is dishonest to claim that humans (at least, those worthy of respecting, according to those braying the loudest within communal spaces that they have never experienced an incorrect thought, nor held a questionable belief, nor behaved in a way they would wish to keep from being broadcasted across the Internet) do not possess traits which are reflected in well-crafted, realistic characters: in Byronic heroes, in Romantic heroes, in Picaresque heroes, in anti-heroes, in the wicked, in the cruel, in the sadistic, in the mad.

It is necessary to recognise these traits within ourselves and to endeavour to become truly, intimately familiar with them. You must know the darkness of yourself as well as the light, if you truly wish to grow into a functional, kind, and well-balanced individual: you must learn to deal with your shadow. Those who pretend it does not exist within themselves often struggle the most with its existence, and often are the most easily consumed by it.

Characters who are darkly relatable to us, in their quickness to anger or in their sardonic, mean-spirited wit, or in their selfishness, or in their impulsiveness, or in their stubbornness, or in their wrath, are the most instructive in conveying the importance of goodness.

There must be catharsis. There must be purgation. We must see the darkness behind our eyes reflected in the faces of these characters, and we must see them fail because of it. We must see them hurt those they love because of it. We must see them lose everything because of it. We must see them destroy themselves because of it.

We must be allowed to explore the darkness of humanity within fiction, because it is that acknowledgement of darkness that allows us to wrestle with it, to know it, and to best it. No monster in the closet has ever been defeated by refusing to look it in the face and to name it. You cannot heal if you do not identify and treat the wound.

It is through the morally upright and the morally contemptible characters that we find traces of ourselves, and that we are allowed to proceed forward on the path to becoming the well-rounded, mature, and critical-thinking individuals we aspire to be. To continue to strike down 'problematic' content and characters is to sit beside the book burners of Fahrenheit 451, to worship Big Brother in 1984.

The good and the bad aspects of oneself must be explored in equal measure to grasp reality by the shoulders and to sit upon the throne of your identity, confident in the knowledge that your mastery of yourself and your answer to who am I? can never be shaken by outside forces.

The best and safest way to explore these aspects is within the sheltering confines of literature, of music, of film, of television, to see ourselves in the faces of others and to know what that means. To know what it means in others. To grow empathy and compassion and acknowledgement that all are human, all are imperfect, all are light, and all are dark -- and to not only acknowledge these facts, but to accept them as being inescapable, as being inherent, and as being okay.

[cemitadepollo]

The fact that the Warrior Cats fandom has a puritanism problem is so ironic considering how much do its fans criticize Starclan. There's a thin line between what Starclan does to its medicine cats and what entitled antis from the fandom believe everyone should do.

Adult warriors content? Can't show that in a christian manga, I guess.

[imptwins]

Why making any concessions to puritan rhetoric is a bad idea

(note for the uninitiated: 'anti' is short for 'anti-shipper', 'anti-ship', or 'anti-fan'; in this context it refers to people who get very vocally militant about opposing dark kinks/problematic ships in media, especially creative fandom spaces. Proship is simply the opposite, people who vocally believe people should be free to make/indulge in whatever as long as a line is drawn between fiction and reality.)

(note 2: this was written for cohost, i cbf rewording it lol)

I very often see people - both websites and individuals - making a concession to the people who come up to them yelling about problematic kinks and guilt by association and 'why didn't you block this person' blah blah blah. It's happened with a few BNFs (big-name fans) in the UTDR scene lately, I've seen it from artists I respect, from friends, hell I used to be in this camp myself. And, of course, it happened to this website about a year back, and the conversation has come up again recently due yet another tumblr exodus.

It makes sense. The most common stuff that antis go after is stuff very few people are into: lolisho/cub, ferals, heavy gore, heavy noncon. It's niche, the real-world applications are unquestionably vile, it's very easy to just say 'I also find this icky regardless of whether I really believe that all people into it are secret criminals, so, I'll just block the people who they say are bad and move on.' I can't tell you the amount of times I've seen someone respond to proship/antiship discourse with "I'm an adult with a job." Going to bat for this content is high risk, low reward. You're not going to make friends, you're going to lose them. YOU WILL LOSE SUBSCRIBER, etc. As a result of all this it's very easy to assume that anyone defending it must be into it.

But I'm not. I'm a writer who often deals with darker subjects, but most of the first-on-the-list anti stuff, I'm not into at all. I'm not into ferals or gore period, noncon I like purely as character exploration, lolisho I can enjoy from the perspective of what I call 'trauma repair.' There's probably a proper term for it. But the tl;dr is I've never been actively aroused by any of these things, not in fantasy and especially not otherwise. Whenever I write them, it's just fascination or character analysis. Whenever I have a 'this character can be any age you want' fic, in my head, they're 18+. Writing noncon is a weird challenge for me because I'm constantly battling with the alternate ending in my head where the victim breaks free, beats the shit out of their captor, etc. This isn't me trying to claim virtue through this, just stating my position.

So… Why do I go to bat for these things? Why do I get annoyed when websites block lolisho, when artists have 'proship DNI' in their bio, etc? It's lost me a couple friends, it's certainly cost me followers and general reach, it's gotten me blocked by countless people I respected the work of. It's earned me a few callout posts, multiple with 1k+ followers, and one particular obsessed stalker who tells anyone who will listen that I actually groomed a child (despite all evidence otherwise). It's caused me a really significant amount of trouble. Why die on this hill?

The answer's kind of simple, when you boil it down: fictional fantasies either affect reality, or they don't. This is why I go to bat for things I'm not into, but it's also why whenever you see someone making concessions to antis, it's never enough. Cohost banned lolisho last year (I believe it's still banned?? Unclear), but the antis still make constant callout posts about this site and its owners. Some of the team have even gone out of their way to state very firmly that they're against these things, they've gone above and beyond just 'ban the bad thing' and broadcast their views about the morality of it. You'll frequently see artists write some huge apology or clarification when a callout post hits, usually involving some variation of 'I do not condone x y z and think it's disgusting.'

It's never enough.

But it makes sense, when you think about it. By drawing a line, you have essentially agreed with the core angle of the people screaming at you: that a fictional fantasy affects reality. That it's dangerous. You will, by necessity, now have people start to work down the list. Incest, ferals, gore, noncon, sure. Any relationship with any kind of skewed power dynamic. Sibling-coded, minor-coded, postminor nonsense. All of these things are less easily agreed to than lolisho, I've seen countless porn artists concede with the core idea that lolisho is immoral, then they act like it's unreasonable that people just keep going until they're being told that a knot on a furry is bestiality, or a 23 year old dating an autistic 21 year old is pedophilia. These are genuine examples of things I've seen people dogpiled for. Seriously look up "postminor" if you want to see how bad this can get, on top of being absurd it's one-for-one the kind of gross ableist shit that Autism Speaks gets into.

But YOU AGREED TO THEM. You agreed with the core concept, that the fantasy must reflect reality. Of course they're going to keep demanding more; by the logic you used to agree with them, you are doing immoral things. If fictional lolisho is immoral, so are the rest of them. It's way easier to look at your average pic on baraag or inkbunny and go 'oh, eugh, vile,' but at the end of the day the cutesy played-for-laughs sleeping kiss, the dubcon bondage that you don't call dubcon, or the meet-cute where they're a bit too drunk, they're all immoral fantasies.

That's not even to get into non-sexual stuff. If the lolisho fantasy is wrong, so is running down civilians in GTA. Suddenly your notifs are full of 16 year-old Jack Thompsons with rainbow flags in their bios.

This really is an all-or-nothing debate. If fictional fantasies affect reality, then even the immoral fantasies that you're personally comfortable with, the cutesy coy playful ones, must be immoral. If fictional fantasies don't affect reality, then even the ones that make you uncomfortable, the ones that have you scrambling to close your browser in case the feds are looking, must be fine.

It should have become very obvious over the last decade that you cannot fence-sit on this. There's a huge internal disagreement going on among progressive/queer/compassion-minded people, on whether these kind of things affect reality, or whether they don't. You can learn to apathetically dismiss stuff that squicks you, or you can learn to sanitize everything you ever make so there's not a trace of contentious theming left. Immoral fantasies are immoral, or only immoral actions are immoral.

You're going to have to pick one.