Any chance we can move on to the 21st century here? [Sure!]

Quoting the Fanfic FAQ (this is a direct quote and the emphasis is in the FAQ, not mine) "The JC does not permit slash or same-sex relationships, including fiction of other genres. As they are used in officially released material, allusions and innuendo are permissible so long as they remain ambiguous and are in reference to original characters. If you are unsure, contact a mod."

There is a separate set of rules pertaining to sexual depictions and sexual references under the famous "child-friendly" principle (that I personally find a little bit fuzzy but that's a discussion for another day.)

So strictly speaking, under the rule quoted above, you can have LGBTQ characters as long as 1. they're original characters and 2. they're not in a relationship (i.e. a same-sex relationship) or 3. the relationship is discreetly implied, not directly stated.

On the fanfic level -- I'm working right now on a story that involves a transgender Hutt (don't ask). I challenge anyone, including the owner of this site, to come and tell me with a straight face that the concept of a transgender Hutt is shocking in any possible way, even if xe has an unrequited crush on a Hutt of the same sex.

On the RL level -- other than being blatantly discriminatory, the above rule is simply absurd in a day and age where same-sex relationships are increasingly visible in many societies, where they are depicted in a wide variety of media and where numerous countries or states within countries not only abolished the outdated laws that criminalized homosexuality or otherwise discriminated against homosexuals, but are actually passing legislation to actively protect equal rights for LGBTQ people, up to and including same-sex marriage.

Fanfic also has a number of rules pertaining to inter-species romantic relationships and one of them is that stories involving such relationships should state it in the thread title, implying "if you don't like it, don't click." If the site owners are uneasy with the idea of younger readers (or anyone, really) running into LGBTQ stories that they don't want to read, we could have a similar rule for same-sex relationships. I would still find it exceedingly prudish, but it would be a million times fairer than banning same-sex relationships altogether.

 

We have been discussing this amongst the mods. Hopefully we can move forward on it after Ramza finishes battling Darth Real Life. His time has been limited recently due to issues discussed in his away thread stickied up top here.

 

Those are very good points. I apologise for sort of putting my foot in my mouth; I just have a lot of irritation at this policy that's been stewing for years, like an oyster getting grit in its mouth making a pearl. Except the pearl is rage. And not nearly as good to make necklaces out of.

I'm glad to see the mods are at least willing to discuss this. Last time I asked I was shut down unilaterally with a 'nothing we can do, no point in trying'.

 

We had a former site owner who was very religious. I believe that's where the policy originated. Hopefully once Ramza is back we admins will come up with something we can take to the current site owner. So if you can be patient til May..

 

Believe me, I'm all too aware of that

 

Harpalyce, I totally get the rage.

LAJ_FETT, Yes, the policy originated with Joshua Griffin, who no longer, to my knowledge, has any stake in TF.n. Two things are worth noting:

1) Rebelscum does not have an anti-slash policy
2) When other holdover Josh Griffin policies (with conflicting policies at Rebelscum) have been brought to Phil Wise for reform, we have in the past ended up with a more nonsensical policy rather than a solution. (See: the ban being lifted on "WTF" but remaining in place for all other acronyms. How on earth previous admins managed that is still mystifying to me.)

Like I said above, I really hope the current mods will approach this in a way that will actually get the results desired here - a reasonable and non-homophobic fan fiction policy and a set of fanfic rules that suits the community's wishes while not running afoul of anything Phil Wise actually cares about. Evidence from Rebelscum indicates that he doesn't care about slash, so framing this reform as bringing TFN policies in line with policies Phil Wise had control of when they were created rather than holdovers from previous site owners with weird hangups, is probably going to be more effective than, for example, going to him and asking how he feels about removing a policy that has been in place since internet time immemorial. To be even more frank, please put some thought into how you approach this and try not to hand him reasons to say no on a platter.

 

Whatever we send him will be formulated and discussed by us admins and then presented for comments/changes to the mod staff. So it won't be just one person putting something together.

 

I'm really glad to see that this is getting discussed. I'm happy to wait until May as well, I know how Darth IRL can be sometimes, especially given that May is traditional exam season. If there's anything more I can do let me know - I'm Christian as well and if you need a thorough debunking of anti-homosexuality from that point of view I'm happy to give it. (The Bible has surprisingly little to say about queer folk, and a lot more to say about, oh, divorce, yet we're not screening people at the door to see if they're divorcees, after all.) And I owe you a more thorough apology Boba - I wasn't trying to demean other efforts, and I shouldn't have lashed out at people doing good work in my frustration.

 

No hard feelings at all, we're on the same page.

 

The rule in the fanfic forum is actually no criticism allowed period, including constructive criticism. The only exception is if the author has explicitly requested constructive criticism.

 

And that's another weird thing, as I assume that some people could benefit from it...but yeah.

 

The no critique thing I can actually explain, or at least attempt to illuminate, I think. It's my current policy on my works because right now I'm disabled (chronic pain ftl) and I know I'm writing worse than I used to - to have anyone actually come up and go "did you know your writing's a bit cruddier than it used to be?" is kind of a low blow. There are a lot of artists that hyperfocus on the bad in what they produce, and there are sadly also a lot of people who don't know how to actually critique well. (Many of them on ff.n actually pride themselves about bringing authors to tears with so-called 'honest critique'.) It may seem a silly rule, but "no critique unless specifically asked for" actually makes a lot of sense to me. I didn't really 'get it' until I was disabled, though, so it may be one of those things you have to experience for yourself (I'm hoping you never have to, really). Consider it humoring people with fragile egoes until then.

 

*grumbles* You guys forget to me away from my quiet mostly hanging in the 3SA forms to bring back thi 'old chestnut' of a discussion?

Well since this bear is technically 'awake'...

First, can we kindly drop the 'Slash' moniker? 'Slash fic' has a historically 'pervy' bent and feel, often pairing characters who would normally not be together (IE Harry/Draco, Batman/the Joker, Han/Chewie) and putting them in very explicit sexual situations. Not that I personally have anything against 'fan fic porn' (To save someone from chasing out a supposed 'skeleton' in my closet, yes, I freely admit I've written quite a bit of it) but I find the term detrimental to the discussion.

Secondly, the reference to 'Original Characters Only' comes from an edict from Pappa George himself, who said that "Luke is Not Gay', and it has been extended to include Han, Leia et all.

Finally, Got news for some folks - Same sex characters have been all over TF.N's fan fiction for over 13 years. My own story - which featured 3 characters of varying sexuality - 2 bisexual, 1 decidedly and unequivocally 'gay' actually won a fan fiction award back in the day -( 2002 ) There was absolutely no 'ambiguity' about their sexuality. Indeed, one of them (one of Anakin;s best friends) actively and quite frequently playfully 'hits' on Anakin (don't get your collective panties in a bunch, he's never taken him up on it). Over the years, I've added quite a few characters of varying sexuality (I found it challenging, and it's WAY harder than one would think to create characters who are as far removed from yourself as can
be) but the KEY was always to write a compelling STORY, with interesting characters. Not to push the envelope for 'shock value'..

 

Yeah, It's funny as all get out how the 'world has moved on with out me' here...

 

A LOT of my works got lost in the move to the new boards - 'Knights' still exist over on Fanfiction.net, but I believe it is the uncensored 'R' rated version (back in the day, you had to 'ask' for the "PM' versions from a LOT of authors, not just me). I have to admit, I stopped posting my fan fics here on TFN after the move as the readership declined, and I just didn't have the heart.

Sadly this is true of many of the original 'SSR' fics that were posted (not just my own).

 

I agree we need to drop all of Josh's attempts to win heaven dollars for the afterlife, but I cannot in good conscience support fan fiction. It's up there with Nazism and driving slowly; unpardonably wicked.

 

There's not enough Heaven dollars to buy my way in after some of the stuff I've written, however, I'll be in EPIC company.

 

There's a special corner of hell reserved for furries, bronies, and fanfic writers. It's actually not that bad, they have access to all the forbidden sinful stuff, like porn and beer and heavy metal.

 

I agree that the goal is to write compelling characters and compelling stories. But by specifically disallowing slash fic you're saying to a side of the population "you aren't wanted here, and we don't want you trying to find yourself in these characters". It'd be rather like we came down hard on every Leia cosplayer who happened to be less than lily white. If somebody who's queer wants to find themselves in an interpretation of Luke Skywalker - and I don't just mean gay here, I mean the entire spectrum (trans Luke! asexual Luke!) - is it really our place to shut them down? Even if it's an edict from Uncle George himself (praise be to the beard), fanfiction authors notoriously sacrifice canon in order to explore different things - alternate universes are our bread and butter, after all. What makes an AU where Luke kisses Lando instead of kissing Leia so much worse?

It just baffles me that the rule is even there, especially when it's so convoluted. Surely it would be much easier work to explain and to enforce if we got rid of it.

I realize I may be preaching to the choir here but ah well. Like I said, this issue has been stuck in my craw for years. It's why the majority of Star Wars fans I know shun TF.N as a backwards site full of backwards people, which is deeply unfair to the community here, but I can't really blame them since they see it as a clear sign they aren't welcome.

 

As the one who originally 'lead the charge' to have SSR I am going to reiterate that the term 'Slash fic' is detrimental to the discussion.

That being said, there are actually very few 'restrictions' other than the 'PG-13' limits. George has been remarkably tolerant twords fan fiction (there are some writers who expressly forbid it).but he HAS made his position clear, and it's the least we as writers can do to respect that.

There are quite a few other venues for writers to explore 'AU's' such as that, but personally, I think that such examples start drifting away from the actual 'Core' of the character. You want to write about a TG Jedi? Nothing is stopping you, even writing and posting it here, but as I said before, you'd better make sure you have a compelling STORY to go with it. otherwise, you'll just have a cardboard cutout of a character, all dressed up with no where to go.

 

Maybe I should have specified that in my fanfiction world, AUs are my bread and butter. I don't see what makes these topics inherently stickier to deal with or why they require more justification than your average heterosexual romance or your average cis character.

But apparently with Episode 7 we're getting canonically LGBTAQ+ characters, so it makes a good time imho to look at the question and figure out what's really going on in canon so that we can honor it appropriately.

 

We started this same conversation internally a few weeks ago and decided (unanimously, I think) to send the owner a request to get the rule changed. As LAJ said, we were waiting for Führer Ramza to be back to send this petition. It's good to see the userbase is more or less on the same page.

 

As the Führer?