Two + or Not Two +, THAT is the Question

[KassX]

Hey fam, hope your weekend has been LIT [/cringe]

I spent some time going over the guidelines for story ratings and I have one of mine on Adult++ for the longest time now, but that’s because I always think I’m so hardcore until you guys come in like ‘lol, nah’. I’m erring towards rating it back down to Adult+ but I don’t want our awesome mods to have to ban me into the next life, so I wanna know: how do you guys know when your story has crossed the line into ‘most extreme’ and ‘darkest’ territory? I think the worst thing I have planned for mine is a forced late-term abortion (semi-graphic), but even ‘worst’ is subjective! 

[BronxWench]

As one of the mods, I’d say it’s a fairly subjective thing. Clearly some stories, especially those that list every tag and mean them, do require a ++ rating, without doubt. But I would say some of the stories tagged ++ here haven’t really hit that territory. I tag ++ for things like rape, extreme brutality, and other things which might trigger a reader. I’d actually use the ++ for a forced late-term abortion, honestly, even if only semi-graphic. It’s definitely a trigger issue for readers.

 

[KassX]

@BronxWench I was hoping you’d show up! Okay, I had a feeling that one scene was going to do me in which is why I mentioned it lol. I’m actually surprised to hear you say that rape is an auto ++ because I thought that was kind of par for the course around here, unless like, someone dies or something. But once you combine trigger issues, that makes more sense… I just posted one with rape that is only +, I might have to change that then.

[pippychick]

It’s weird to answer. My darker stories I tend to go for ++ because my darker stories involve a lot of psychological cruelties, and I can’t in conscience say that they are easy to read in any sense. So I tag for that rather than the content, though the content alone would require it. My others… I do tend to get fairly descriptive. I see so many stories proudly proclaiming a sex scene, so I settle in, and there’s like three or four paragraphs, and I think I kind of go for more. And when I tag for something, I really often mean it.

I’m sure there are some stories of mine that only need the one +, and there are even some that are SFW. I’ve probably overrated them all to be on the safe side. I’m not interested in triggering anyone. I want people to have fun/be entertained reading my stories. Sometimes I want them to be horrified, but then I want that to happen for the reasons they should be, not because they encountered something they didn’t expect.

[KassX]

Just now, pippychick said:

It’s weird to answer. My darker stories I tend to go for ++ because my darker stories involve a lot of psychological cruelties, and I can’t in conscience say that they are easy to read in any sense. So I tag for that rather than the content, though the content alone would require it.

 

Yeah, that one’s harder to quantify for sure but it sounds like you know what you’re doing. I agree with erring on the side of caution; it really didn’t even occur to me that I could be triggering someone inadvertently but oh welp, I guess it’s a good thing I had it at ++ in the first place! My tagging is a bit ad hoc – I typically have an idea of what kind of scenes are going to be in the story, and I try to tag in advance for them because I want everyone to be cool with that going in. I’ve had to delete some when I cancel plans for scenes (and sometimes I just outright forget why I added that tag in the first place!).

[CloverReef]

I kinda had the same issue, not knowing how much was too much. I think I’ve only rated ++ on one fic, and that’s just because that fic had a few really violent sex scenes and human trafficking was a recurring theme in detail. So I pretty much agree with the others – the subject matter plays the biggest part in my decisions. Like if a fic had a lot of really graphic sex but was a standard erotic romance, I wouldn’t tack on that extra +. Unless that romantic erotica involved like… scat. Or super graphic vore. Okay I gotta stop thinking of things I’d go ++ for. My depraved imagination is having a little too much fun with priests and tentacles now. 

[KassX]

Just now, CloverReef said:

I kinda had the same issue, not knowing how much was too much. I think I’ve only rated ++ on one fic, and that’s just because that fic had a few really violent sex scenes and human trafficking was a recurring theme in detail. So I pretty much agree with the others – the subject matter plays the biggest part in my decisions. Like if a fic had a lot of really graphic sex but was a standard erotic romance, I wouldn’t tack on that extra +. Unless that romantic erotica involved like… scat. Or super graphic vore. Okay I gotta stop thinking of things I’d go ++ for. My depraved imagination is having a little too much fun with priests and tentacles now. 

Just goes to show you everyone’s threshold of ‘intense’ varies! I think maybe you made the right decision on your story to be on the safe side. When something really bad happens in my fic, it’s usually for a plot reason, lol. Hey, I see you giving me the side eye over there! 

That one episode of Supernatural was enough vore for me for a lifetime...

[CloverReef]

2 minutes ago, KassX said:

Just goes to show you everyone’s threshold of ‘intense’ varies! I think maybe you made the right decision on your story to be on the safe side. When something really bad happens in my fic, it’s usually for a plot reason, lol. Hey, I see you giving me the side eye over there! 

That one episode of Supernatural was enough vore for me for a lifetime...

Of course! The horrible stuff is only fun if its got a purpose! Okay, that’s a lie. Sometimes its fun to write horrible shit just to write horrible shit. But it’s more fun to read when it’s got a point! … Okay that’s a lie too. Stories I like best are the crazy, pointless, horrific shit I wandered onto via pure, unadulterated morbid curiosity. 

I forget what I was trying to say...

[KassX]

Just now, CloverReef said:

Of course! The horrible stuff is only fun if its got a purpose! Okay, that’s a lie. Sometimes its fun to write horrible shit just to write horrible shit. But it’s more fun to read when it’s got a point! … Okay that’s a lie too. Stories I like best are the crazy, pointless, horrific shit I wandered onto via pure, unadulterated morbid curiosity. 

I forget what I was trying to say...

That moment when you stumble through the looking glass and discover gore hentai… *shudder* Can we reset the internet now? 

[CloverReef]

Just now, KassX said:

That moment when you stumble through the looking glass and discover gore hentai… *shudder* Can we reset the internet now? 

Noooo! Not until I’ve backed up all that messed up pervy stuff so they can continue to entertain me while I simultaneously weep for humanity for many years to come.

[KassX]

11 minutes ago, CloverReef said:

Noooo! Not until I’ve backed up all that messed up pervy stuff so they can continue to entertain me while I simultaneously weep for humanity for many years to come.

You will be weeping forever, my friend. 

[Desiderius Price]

I tend to play it safe, rate mine adult++ and not worry about it….  hopefully it’s not scaring too many readers away.  I tend not to pay attention to it on that occasion when I go reading.

[KassX]

@Desiderius Price Oh yeah, when I’m reading I don’t even look at it; I just read the tags. 

[Arian-Sinclair]

12 hours ago, KassX said:

That moment when you stumble through the looking glass and discover gore hentai… *shudder* Can we reset the internet now? 

Thanks for unintentionally setting an image of Offenderman stuck in my deprived mind.  Actually, that  gives me a fun little idea to play with for a one-shot. 

  8 hours ago, Desiderius Price said:

I tend to play it safe, rate mine adult++ and not worry about it….  hopefully it’s not scaring too many readers away.  I tend not to pay attention to it on that occasion when I go reading.

You're only scaring away the weak-stomached. I'm all for more maturely rated stories. ;3 I'm all for gore mostly. Fuu~

Edited February 26, 2018 by Arian-Sinclair

[KassX]

38 minutes ago, Arian-Sinclair said:

Thanks for unintentionally setting an image of Offenderman stuck in my deprived mind.  Actually, that  gives me a fun little idea to play with for a one-shot. 

2

Something tells me that’s going to need a ++ for sure 

[Arian-Sinclair]

6 hours ago, KassX said:

Something tells me that’s going to need a ++ for sure 

Most likely. 

[Desiderius Price]

8 hours ago, Arian-Sinclair said:

Thanks for unintentionally setting an image of Offenderman stuck in my deprived mind.  Actually, that  gives me a fun little idea to play with for a one-shot. 

  8 hours ago, Desiderius Price said:

I tend to play it safe, rate mine adult++ and not worry about it….  hopefully it’s not scaring too many readers away.  I tend not to pay attention to it on that occasion when I go reading.

You're only scaring away the weak-stomached. I'm all for more maturely rated stories. ;3 I'm all for gore mostly. Fuu~

It’s more if the weak-stomached complain, then an adult++ with a butt load of tags generally means they ignored the warnings.

[KassX]

4 hours ago, Anon said:

All my stories are Adult++, because that’s just where they naturally fell given their subject matter.  If you’re concerned about limiting your readership by having that Adult++ tag on your story then maybe you’d have to consult specifics with moderators, but I don’t think that’s something to be afraid of.  I didn’t think anyone was going to actually make it through my stories whatsoever, but pleasantly there have been plenty of people who not only made it through but left positive messages and reviews.  I think you’d be surprised how dark and miserable you can turn your fanfiction on any show/anime/book/movie/cartoon/etc and still have avid readers follow you down to that dark place.

The reason my stories are on this site is because of the Adult++ tag allowing artists to fully craft stories in complete creative freedom.  This seems to be the one site that understands that fiction is fiction and art is art, none of the characters or events depicted in the stories are real, and so they don’t content police you as long as you label your work accordingly.  I wouldn’t worry much about straying up into that Adult++ category because I think at most it’s only going to turn away the “casual reader” who stumbles by the site when looking for some fapfics, but a LOT of people who come to this site genuinely like reading stories no matter how macabre as long as they’re engaging.

That’s a really good point! I was worried that things got a little too dark or extreme in my story at times, but I’ve had readers read it and stick around, surprising even myself. I guess I’m just chained to the guidelines of other forums/communities where my more mature stories would get censored and deleted, lol. I love the freedom we have here; I feel like there’s nowhere else for this stuff. 

[CloverReef]

2 hours ago, KassX said:

That’s a really good point! I was worried that things got a little too dark or extreme in my story at times, but I’ve had readers read it and stick around, surprising even myself. I guess I’m just chained to the guidelines of other forums/communities where my more mature stories would get censored and deleted, lol. I love the freedom we have here; I feel like there’s nowhere else for this stuff. 

I spent my whole adult life on this site. Over the… 13? years, a lot of the stuff I posted, I never bothered to post anywhere else. So when I recently started looking at other ‘mature’ fiction sites, the rules they have blew me the hell away! Wtf, no necrophilia? What about zombies? Don’t they get any sweet loving?! I think I saw a no ‘non-con’ rule out there somewhere and I was like welp, that excludes about 90% of my stuff, and I don’t even write rape porn. I mean, don’t people get bored on those sites with no morbid, dark rabbit holes to fall down? 

[KassX]

8 minutes ago, CloverReef said:

I spent my whole adult life on this site. Over the… 13? years, a lot of the stuff I posted, I never bothered to post anywhere else. So when I recently started looking at other ‘mature’ fiction sites, the rules they have blew me the hell away! Wtf, no necrophilia? What about zombies? Don’t they get any sweet loving?! I think I saw a no ‘non-con’ rule out there somewhere and I was like welp, that excludes about 90% of my stuff, and I don’t even write rape porn. I mean, don’t people get bored on those sites with no morbid, dark rabbit holes to fall down? 

No non-con? Lmao, that’s 100% of my stuff down the drain (trying not to imagine what that says about me as a person...). Why even HAVE a mature fiction site if you’re gonna moderate it like fucking Disney? 

[CloverReef]

I think the one that puzzles me the most is the no incest rule I see on a lot of them. I mean no pedophilia covers the statutory rape issues that could arise so what you have left are the situations with two consenting adults. I mean it's fiction so you don't have to worry about them breeding. 

[Desiderius Price]

33 minutes ago, CloverReef said:

I think the one that puzzles me the most is the no incest rule I see on a lot of them. I mean no pedophilia covers the statutory rape issues that could arise so what you have left are the situations with two consenting adults. I mean it's fiction so you don't have to worry about them breeding. 

Plot bunnies breed, they’re always breeding. 

2 hours ago, KassX said:

No non-con? Lmao, that’s 100% of my stuff down the drain (trying not to imagine what that says about me as a person...). Why even HAVE a mature fiction site if you’re gonna moderate it like fucking Disney? 

It may be legal issues.  AFF is hosted in the US which has the first amendment, other countries aren’t so lucky.  Even in the US, you’ve got busibodies sticking their noses into other people’s websites and try to censor via court/legal-threats when they see it (ie, why bother with parental oversight when you can try to Disney-fy the entire internet instead?).  IIRC, AFF has had to fend off threats to its existence, a mod/admin with good memory could fill us in here. 

[KassX]

11 hours ago, CloverReef said:

I think the one that puzzles me the most is the no incest rule I see on a lot of them. I mean no pedophilia covers the statutory rape issues that could arise so what you have left are the situations with two consenting adults. I mean it's fiction so you don't have to worry about them breeding. 

It really sounds to me like selective outrage based on the mods of the site picking and choosing what they personally find reprehensible, unless it’s for legal reasons like Desiderius mentioned. Like, I personally find Minor1 pretty bad but I wouldn’t want writers to be censored on that basis. It’s just fiction after all, and no one is actually getting hurt.

10 hours ago, Desiderius Price said:

It may be legal issues.  AFF is hosted in the US which has the first amendment, other countries aren’t so lucky.  Even in the US, you’ve got busibodies sticking their noses into other people’s websites and try to censor via court/legal-threats when they see it (ie, why bother with parental oversight when you can try to Disney-fy the entire internet instead?).  IIRC, AFF has had to fend off threats to its existence, a mod/admin with good memory could fill us in here. 

3

Ah, that makes sense. Lol, at least we can protect our smut to some extent. I was just thinking I’d love to read a dramatic retelling of AFF’s history with the law told like a prohibition era crime drama. You guys be the smut peddlers and we’ll be the degenerates stumbling into the speakeasy 

[pittwitch]

Here fact is far, far stranger than fiction.  Always has been.