It's always coalest before the dawn

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Posting deadline: 18th December at 9am UTC - may be the 17th in your time zone
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Author reveal: 1st January

Yuletide Discord for Hippos. Google Group for PHs.

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Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

No. There needs to be a line of decency so some asshole doesn’t request something that’s completely out of bounds, like Nazi RPF or [whatever the latest US mass shooting] RPF. It’s not a matter of “moral policing,” it’s not letting some dickhead do whatever they want just to be an edge lord. Nazis shouldn’t be allowed in Yuletide, and if you’re so desperate to stroke yourself off to the idea of millions of innocent people being gassed to death in concentration camps, make your own Nazi RPF holiday exchange instead of whining about how unfair it is that’s it’s not allowed in Yuletide.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

But who decides what's completely out of bounds? Like, sure, we find Nazi RPF really distasteful. What about serial killer RPF - is it okay when they were active long ago (and what's long ago? Ted Bunny or Jack the Ripper)? Some people find noncon fic distasteful. Some people think underage fic is a gateway to pedophilia. Some people find RPF about living people distasteful in general. You have to draw a line somewhere, and it's always kinda arbitrary.

I think RL Nazis should be punched in public, at best (I actually favour more radical approaches, but whatever), but I don't think people who ask for Nazis RPF shouldn't be allowed into Yuletide.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

But who decides what's completely out of bounds?

The mods. As they have done and should continue to. Do you think, like, a roving calvacade of antis is going to show up and take over Yuletide because Nazi RPF wasn’t allowed as a category?

As for what’s distasteful, I believe it has been in the past, when requesting murderers or major disasters or similar, deciding if the event is recent and still has surviving victims or a surviving legacy. And I’m sorry you feel that the actual Holocaust is “an arbitrary line,” but I’m sure survivors and descendants of survivors and people who have to deal with Neo-Nazis now don’t feel that way.

It’s not a matter of “Some people find underage distasteful, what if they take underage away?” (Never mind that we’re talking about Nazi RPF as category for Yuletide, not some general request like underage, and no one even has write underage even if they get that request because ODAO.) It’s a matter of “Millions of RL people died in the name of ethnic cleansing, so we’re not going to let their murderers into a holiday exchange started by a Jewish mod team.” Your idea that it’s a slippery slope from not allowing Nazis to not allowing underage is fucking moronic concern-trolling.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

What about all the movies about Nazis? It's an entire post-war genre, both serious, dramatic, and comedic over the years.

Should those not be allowed to be created, or is it only "non-professional" works?

I don't think Nazi RPF should be in Yuletide -- someone can write it on their own time -- but I also wonder about what counts as okay.

/earnest coalie

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

This whole discussion has hinged on Nazi RPF. That’s what got AR their reputation, that’s what has brought the concern trolls like yourself and others who are pearl-clutching about “But when will the discrimination against Nazis end?”

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I just said I don't think there should be Nazi RPF in Yuletide -- especially in the case of ars_belli

I'm just asking what makes it different than Downfall, for instance (which is basically Nazi RPF).

Like, is Downfall only okay because the creators aren't all "ovaries go boom"? Is it okay only because the producer is German/Italian?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Is it okay only because the producer is German/Italian?

LOL, if anything, that should make it less ok.

(But I'm also confused about the 'we mustn't write about it but it's okay when professional writers and movie makers do'. I've had the same discussion about RPF (non-Nazi RPF, just regular fic about living celebrities) recently and I don't understand why there would be a difference between writing fic about it and writing books about it.)

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

LOL, if anything, that should make it less ok.

Why the fuck would it make it less okay?

If anything, it would make it more okay.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

People can write whatever they want. That doesn't mean it needs to be allowed in Yuletide.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Context. Context is why Downfall is okay and ars_belli's Nazi fetish is not. She's not asking for thoughtful, brutally honest examinations of why Nazism occurred and what lessons we can take from our ancestors' mistakes to do better next time -- you know, the stuff actual Germans often produce when they make media about Nazis. She's asking for things that trivialize a historical tragedy because some of the people involved were sharp dressers.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

+1

And even if she was into the costumes or hurhurhur edgelord most awful dudes make me wet, there's plenty of fictional canons where that itch can be scratched. No, she wants to go for the real deal for the exact same reasons Neo-Nazi's do. The context is the whole thing for her, not the individual aspects that can be found elsewhere.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Never mind that we’re talking about Nazi RPF as category for Yuletide, not some general request like underage, and no one even has write underage even if they get that request because ODAO.

What kind of an argument is that even? No, no one has to write underage. No one has to write Nazi RPF either UNLESS THEY OFFERED IT. It's not like you're offering Bambi and suddenly you're somehow forced to write fic about Nazis. And even if you're offering a canon with Nazis, you're not forced to write fic portraying them in a positive light.

I'm not saying underage and Nazi RPF are comparable, but "... because ODAO" is a really dumb reason why they're not.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Blame AIRT. They were were the one brought up underage fic and acted like banning Nazi RPF was the sign that banning underage was eminent.

I mentioned the issue of Nazi RPF being a category because this whole debate started years ago when that one asshole tried to nominate it as a category. The mods accepting it would mean that they thought Nazi RPF was an acceptable fandom for Yuletide. Meanwhile, unless there’s some general Underage RPF category that I don’t know about, a request for underage would have to be in the actual fandom request itself that involves the characters, with which the writer has the option of going ODAO. Therefore, the mods banning Nazi RPF a category means absolutely nothing in regards to the future of requests for underage, so this idea that underage will be next to go is really damn stupid.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

That still makes no sense. It doesn't matter if there's a separate category. If the mods didn't want underage, they would ban it, so whether there's a category for it or if the writer can go ODAO is irrelevant. The mods not banning it still means its acceptable, so I don't know what your point is at all. (And no, of course, it doesn't mean that underage will go next. But I don't see where AYRT even said that.)

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

You're being indigenous. When I said it was "an arbitrary line", I wasn't in any way belittling the horrors the Nazis are responsible for and you know it (unless you didn't read the rest of my comment). What I mean is that making choices what's out of bounds and what's not, we have to make a moral value judgement on what's distasteful enough to warrant being not allowed. If we do that, I'm not suggesting that Nazis should in any way fall in the "that's okay" category - I'm just against judging allowed fandoms/characters/requests on a moral basis altogether. There have been mod choices to rule out nominations that were "in poor taste" before that I found ridiculous, so yes, it clearly IS a slippery slope. Just because it doesn't affect underage (which I personally DGAF about but would still hate to see banned) doesn't mean that the slippery slope doesn't exist.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Oh my God, dude. Not allowing RPF for mass genocide or Hurricane Maria or school shooters isn’t a slippery slope. It’s having basic respect for the RL victims of specific RL events who are still hurting. Fucking deal.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

... which is exactly the same argument people make about noncon and underage. Is it really different when it's a specific event and someone writes about Hurricane Maria instead of a fictional hurricane? What if we nominate a celebrity who's recently been implicated in sexual abuse for actor RPF?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Is it really different when it's a specific event and someone writes about Hurricane Maria instead of a fictional hurricane?

Yes. Because real people died there. Real people had their lives destroyed. Real people lost loved ones. Real people had to live for months without clean water and go hungry because they didn’t have any food. Same thing with the Holocaust. Millions of people died there. Real people? Died. Thanks to the Nazis and their supporters.

And no, it’s no the same argument against underage or noncon. This isn’t a case of banning a hypothetical that does and could happen in RL from happening in fic with fictional characters. This is a case of not wanting to have national tragedies and atrocities against humanity that happened in living memory as RPF categories. It is taking a very specific tragedy that affected particular people IRL and making them into fanfic fodder. And for the Nazi request, it was making the Holocaust victims into fanfic fodder so the person could jerk off to the idea of them dying horribly. That is the problem. I give zero fucks about your noncon Thunderbirds request or underage Baby-Sitters Club fic.

As for your hypothetical about a celebrity implicated in sexual abuse, I don’t know, but I can’t see a nomination for Rose McGowan/Harvey Weinstein RPF going to well, though.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Sorry, they're being what?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I'm pretty sure they meant to say AYRT was being ingenuous.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

Disingenuous, sorry. Half-asleep ESL typing on a phone and accepting autocorrect suggestions without thinking. But I think they got my point.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

There have been mod choices to rule out nominations that were "in poor taste" before that I found ridiculous

Which ones?

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

The anthropomorfic one with the hurricanes, for instance.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I nommed The Interview a few years back because I wanted slash of Seth Rogen and James Franco's characters and it got rejected. This was after the drama about serial killer RPF and nazi RPF so I assume it was rejected for being in bad taste, but I never bothered to contest it.

Re: ars_belli

[(Anonymous)]

I doubt it was even bad taste they probably thought it was trolling with that other stuff in the tagset. If you had contested with your sign up they probably would have played it off as “whoops! It’s back in now. Sorry, don’t know how that happened!”