Mod Post: So let's talk about this ableism thing.

[iambickilometer.livejournal.com]

Disclaimer: After writing this, I sent it to the other mods and some friends of mine to check to make sure it didn't say anything problematic, but if they or I missed something important or said something wrong, please don't hesitate to let me know. I'm still learning.

Something's been brought to our attention in regards to language people have been using re: disability, and problematic depictions thereof. It's great that we have a character in this fandom who is disabled, and it's great that there is a lot of interest in writing about him! But there are people on this meme who are also disabled, and insensitive or simply ignorant words can really hurt them. As our goal with this meme is to maintain a space where everyone present can feel comfortable participating, we'd like to keep this from happening, and we hope you feel the same way.

You may have noticed that "ableism" has been added to the list of triggers to warn for. If you're not familiar with the word, it refers to any speech, action, or treatment that hurts, oppresses, or discriminates against disabled people. Words like "cripple" and "gimp" fall into this category. Prompts using these words (with a few exceptions, noted below) will be deleted. So do stories that depict Charles' disability as disgusting or unacceptable, or erase it completely. Language like “the crippled man”, “the disabled man”, and “the handicapped man” focuses on his disability, perpetuating the common mindset that disabled people are only disabled, and never have any other defining traits.

Now, we're not going to ask you to stop writing these stories, because this is a kink meme and it is not our business what you choose to ask for or write about. But we do ask that you warn for it, if you think your prompt or fill contains it. Wanting stories about Charles and Erik having acrobatic post-movie sex does not make you a bad person, but that doesn't really matter to someone with a disability who reads it and is hurt by that erasure. Taking the time to consider if your content could hurt someone is just the considerate thing to do.

Likewise, it’s entirely possible to write about ableism without taking part in it yourself -- for instance, depicting Charles dealing with being visibly different for the first time and showing the ways people treat him. Unless they are part of the prompt (“someone calls Charles a “cripple”, cue him defending himself/the team defending him”), ableist slurs are unnecessary; comments in which the prompter casually uses them to refer to a character are unacceptable. But no matter how you write about it, any ableist content needs a warning.

The mods will treat this as any other warning issue: if we see ableist language or actions in your fill or prompt (or it's called to our attention by someone else) and there is no warning, we will ask you to post it again with that warning and delete the offending prompt or fill. We'd rather not do this, so please just be aware of what you're writing so that we can all enjoy this meme.

Please also be aware that we are not perfect; if you find unwarned-for ableist content that we haven’t caught, please feel free to contact the poster or us about it.

So to clarify: I am asking you to either change your wordings or warn for your content. Not because of politics or what bothers you, but because this is a space for everyone to enjoy their kinks and it's courteous to let people know that you've written content that might upset them.

And appended: took "crazy" out of the post because it's not that relevant to the discussion and I was informed that lumping mental and physical disabilities together was a bit insensitive, which, yes, I see now. I am leaving the computer for a while; if I don't get to replying to you in a timely fashion, that's why.

One more edit. Someone suggested having a "choose not to warn" option. Is this something people can agree on/ are interested in? It's not ideal but it seems like a good compromise so that we can all get back to the meme. 

Comments

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this clarification. *makes a note*

[hoosierbitch.livejournal.com]

Ditto!

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you for this!

(Um, you have some wonky HTML, though!)

[iambickilometer.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what's going on with the html. It's perfectly fine in the draft and then Livejournal eats it and spits it out.

[sandoz-iscariot.livejournal.com]

thanks for this.

[cleo-eurydike.livejournal.com]

thank you so much! I really appreciate this

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you so much for this. The sheer amount of prompts/responses I've seen where Charles's disability is erased ("the bullet didn't paralyze him/gave him a limp/etc") have really bothered me. I think a lot of people just don't understand paralysis (I've seen a lot of "can a paralyzed person even have sex? Wouldn't they not feel anything?)s, and so they avoid having to do research by erasing Charles's disability, but that doesn't make it right.

[(Anonymous)]

It's bothered me as well. It's not just one fic, it's a lot of fics. I don't mind AU but it bothers me that so many people take something that's a huge moment in the movie and a huge part of Professor X's life and character and act like it simply didn't happen.

[(Anonymous)]

What if you don't consider "crippled" an ableist descriptor?

[(Anonymous)]

And "crazy"? Seriously? :/ That's hardly an agreed-upon "slur" in the academic world of ableist thought, let alone among us crazy people ourselves.

[shesayslove.livejournal.com]

Oh my friend, gifs will not bring you peace. :[

(<3)

[(Anonymous)]

THANK YOU FOR ADDRESSING THIS. thank you, thank you.

[(Anonymous)]

This has been a very distressing issue that seems to be plaguing both kink memes and I'm very glad to see it being addressed. Thank you to our awesome mods for commenting on this matter, and for reinforcing that this meme is meant to be a fun and tolerant space for all.

So let's not fight about this and let's all go back to reading/writing porn and being groovy and stuff together again, yeah? ♥

[(Anonymous)]

I approve of the idea, in general, but I do have one question (and I apologise if it has been explained already, and I didn't pick up on it) .
What's the rules regarding a prompt of an AU ending in which Charles' injury doesn't occur due to completely changed circumstances that are the focus of the plot. As in, if I wrote a prompt that said 'I'd like to see an AU ending of the movie where Charles convinced Erik not to kill Shaw', would I need to warn for ableism because it implies that Charles doesn't get hit by the bullet, or is it unnecessary because the rewriting of that scene is simply a side-effect of a different part of the movie plot that I want to see revised?

(I have a feeling I've worded that question terribly. If it makes no sense, let me know and I'll try to explain what I mean without twisting myself into tangles.)

[(Anonymous)]

"So do stories that depict Charles' disability as disgusting or unacceptable, or erase it completely." (...) "Now, we're not going to ask you to stop writing these stories..."

Either it's forbidden or it's not. You can NOT have it both ways and decide on a whim what's okay and what's not. Give us clear rules, not something that will allow you to do whatever you want, whenever you want. That's bad mod'ing. Either stand for the one or the other, no grey middle ground.

And why can't I write an AU fic where Charles does NOT get shot in the spine? So, it's okay to have Charles as a woman. To have him pregnant. To have him lose his telepathy. But it's NOT okay to have him walk?

Wow. No, really, just wow. What will be next? Charles can't be an intersex because it might hurt intersex people? Charles can't be a woman because it's misogynist towards the women who already exist in the movie? Erik can't have a happy childhood because it's hurtful towards Holocaust victims?

Newsflash, it's called ALTERNATE UNIVERSE. Wow, and I thought that the other comm's "no sex till 18" was nuts. This tops it.

[(Anonymous)]

Settle down, Angry McAngerson.

"This is a kink meme. You can request whatever you want and I will not police that. What I am asking is that you think about if the wording your prompt could hurt someone."

http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/2029.html?thread=752109#t752109

"I'm not here to say what people can and cannot request or write. All I can do is ask that people use warnings so that readers who don't want to read stories like that can skip over them."

http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/2029.html?thread=756461#t756461

"what I'm asking is that you make the best call you can and then be open to add warnings at the request of others. Asking people to be right all the time would actually be ridiculous, and I'm sorry if I made it seem like that was what was going on. "

http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/2029.html?thread=795629#t795629

"This kink meme is not a safe space. I am merely asking people to be courteous"

http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/2029.html?thread=757997#t757997

No one is forbidding anything.

I repeat, NO ONE IS FORBIDDING ANYTHING.

You are being asked to make an attempt to leave a warning if your prompt contains content that you think might be hurtful. Further, you're not being asked to warn for every possible piece of hurtful content. If you don't feel like warning, be prepared to deal with the possibility of people who were triggered or otherwise hurt confronting you about it. This is all that the mod is asking.

Now let's return to our regularly scheduled porngramming.

RE:Mod Post

[(Anonymous)]

Hi,
So I've just read this post and the ensuing comments and I was wondering if we can just get some clarification? It just seems like the mods are saying they will delete post that don't warn about "ableism" yet ableism has not been clearly defined and understood (at least objectively) by the mods. Its confusing because, as the mod have stated, people don't recognize when their being offensive and simply having someone say its offensive is obviously not enough as this is a kink meme and virtually everything can be offensive. My deal is just that if my fic does not have Charles in a wheelchair I think it can be assumed that its alternate universe or takes place before the Divorce, or at very least my labeling it as AU is a sufficient enough warning. I mean this is kind of like if I as a women were offended by Charles/Erik shippers because he needs to be with Moira or if someone made Angel a white male instead of a black female. I think seeing slash, AU, or male!Angel are sufficient warnings in all cases (even if AU is the only warning I get for male!Angel). While I do understand your point in that ableism is something people should be made aware of, I think a kink meme is not the place because fiction is meant to be controversial and kink fiction even moreso. The word "crippled" is still used by prominent authors today to describe the disabled and seeing as X-men: First Class takes place in 1960s where P.C. wasn't even an idea I would not be surprised to see it used casually in a fic. Of course fics where there is blatant hatred/mistreatment towards a disabled person should have warnings, but if they don't I would simply exit out of them and not read them.

Re: Mod Post

[(Anonymous)]

I got a little off-track above. My point was that I would appreciate the mods clearly stating what they want and who will be policing because I would really not want a post of mines deleted. I also think the whole post should be rewritten simply because it is very confusing as is and sounds like the mods want to delete all the fics they deem offensive (even with the add-ons and edits). Yes, I do see that they have edited to an extent but its only really caused confusion and it would be better if they just re-wrote it clearly so people understand what exactly is not allowed and so forth.

Also, I think not allowing unlabeled fics that have Charles walking is clearly censorship because a part of writing and reading anything is taking note of what the author thinks is normal, what he/she thinks is a good plot line, and what he/she thinks her/his audience she be warned of. I think that people who are offended should feel free to comment on it (in a polite manner) or exit out. I don't think it is the author's responsibility to warn for it because the action of warning is in a way censoring, i.e. you really can't warn for offensive descriptions of ableism and not think twice about including it at all, or about the fact that by labeling they are making a point (i.e. by labeling my use of the word "cripple" as offensive I am sending the message that I find all use of the word offensive even if I really don't). This might be the point, to get people thinking about ableism, but that is still placing limitations on people and even coercing them to a point of view. That point of view may or may not be the right one but the thing about free will/speech/thought is that it can go either way.

[(Anonymous)]

I have to say, thank you for the clarification, and kudos to you guys for taking note of this issue! It's nice to see how smoothly you guys are running this community and dealing with issues head-on. :D

Also, off topic, but a query (I totally understand if you delete this post, by the way)in regards to wip's.

There is an inceptionwip account on twitter, keeping track of all wip's, and it's done a marvelous job. Would anyone be interested in something similar for first class? I know it's hard sometimes keeping track of prompts that are wip's on the kink meme, and there's some pretty darn good stuff here.

[(Anonymous)]

I understand the thing about not wanting to use language like "cripple" etc to define the character, and why that may be seen as offensive to some people who are paralyzed.

However.

You're talking about how some people are taking offense to seeing Charles out of the wheelchair, which is blowing my mind. First off, it's a contradiction -- if he's not defined by his paralysis (which appears to be a point you're trying to make, that the language of "cripple" and other words shouldn't define the person), then it shouldn't be a huge deal to have an AU where he can walk.

Second -- you do realize that in the comics right now, Charles is out of the wheelchair and can walk? So telling people to -warn- for that sort of thing is pretty ridiculous when it occurs in the actual Marvel story lines.

[(Anonymous)]

It's Marvel. Give it some time and he'll be back in the wheelchair again.

Okay, but talking about this seriously, you should consider that this is a kinkmeme surrounding the movie and a number of people are going to come in expecting stories about the movie or post-movie or pre-movie. The comics aren't the canon here.

As to your first point, I believe the problem is erasure of a disability. He's not defined by his paralysis, but it's still part of who he is. It's not a big deal if someone wants an AU, but just label it as such; that it's an AU where he can walk. Tbh, this subject isn't a touchy one to me, but I do find it irritating because I go into a fic expecting something and I get something else altogether. I've been thrown a few times by fics written for post-movie prompts or with a post-movie setting, that don't mention anything about it being an AU, but suddenly he was never paralyzed.

MOD NOTE

[firstclass-anon.livejournal.com]

Hey everyone.

Just wanted to leave a quick comment to let the people who are still following the discussion know that we've been talking about this further and an update will follow soon.

[(Anonymous)]

FINALLY THANK YOU MOD.

[svilleficrecs.livejournal.com]

I vote in favor of the choose not to warn option, even though I generally like to warn.

[kestrelct.livejournal.com]

Something that works for me is seeing a warning like "this fic is dark. more specific warnings would be spoilers -- email me if you want the details." That gives me a general heads-up so I can skip it if I'm in a fluff mood, or if I don't want to take the gamble that the content is something that really bothers me. Seeing "the author chose not to use warnings for this fic" would tell me much the same -- that there's warn-able content. This lets readers make a slightly more informed decision to read without giving too much away ahead of time. Sure, if I skip all fics with that warning to make sure I don't read any torture, which bothers me, it means I might be missing out on great fics that contain other violence, which doesn't, but that's a tradeoff I'm willing to make.

So my vote is for a nonspecific warning/notice that warnings would have been applicable had the author chosen to use them.

[gogothgirl.livejournal.com]

noted, thank you :)

[(Anonymous)]

I would really love a choose not to warn option. When warnings requirements are this nebulous (which- I'm not saying it's your fault, because ableism etc *are* hard things to define) I get so caught up in whether I should warn or what I should warn for that I never even finish the story. If there's a caveat lector option for stories that aren't clear-cut, it relieves a lot of anxiety.

[(Anonymous)]

For the people who want a chose not to warn option: what other meme has this?

[(Anonymous)]

Don't know about memes, but Ao3 have options for "No Archive Warnings Apply", specific content warnings (Character death, non-con etc) and "Author Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings" which I tend to assume means miscellaneous/spoilery warning (though I may be hugely off base).

[(Anonymous)]

Late to the game, but is it established movie canon that Charles is permanently paralyzed? Or are we all just assuming based on the comics? Because the film is not the same universe as the comics ...

[yeomanrand.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that XMFC is intended to be a prequel to X-Men and X-2 (What X-3?), and presuming that is correct, yes: Charles' paralysis is canon.

Also, from things James McAvoy has said, he believes it to be canon. Whether that has any meaning, I don't know, but.

[adrian-chan.livejournal.com]

Hi.

Um, I'm not really commenting on the content of this ableism thing, as I think both sides have commented this thing to death, and I don't feel like getting into an argument with anyone.

I'm just wondering how many people who visit the meme are really going to know about this.

Like, I know you put this post up and all, but personally, it's only a fluke that I saw it, as I usually only visit the prompt posts, whether I'm posting a prompt or filling one. I don't normally look at a lot of the other posts that get put up on the community as a whole (on any kink meme I visit--I check the rules page at most, and then never really follow anything but the prompt posts). I feel like a lot of people might not know about this new rule, and it would be kind of unfair to delete their posts when they don't necessarily know they're doing something wrong.

Also, what exactly is this "choose not to warn" option?