RUMOR: LJ’s strike three, or beginnings of an exodus?
Some naughty Ouran High School Host Club communities have been deleted, leading fans to fear that LJ has moved out of the Harry Potter fandom to target anime communities. It looks like at least two of them were deleted by their owners, but the status of two others’ is unclear: ouran_papas and ootoricest both offer “this journal has been deleted and purged” messages, NOT “this journal has been suspended” messages.
However, given that in their last attempt to rid themselves of “kiddy porn” LJ changed from using their many-years-old tradition of striking through the deleted account names and bolded them instead, it’s not hard for me to fathom that they might change the message on the deleted account to prevent yet another uprising. Sorry if that sounds a little conspiracy theory-ish. By the way, the communities’ names are bolded, not struck through. But again, with LJ changing little things like that now, it’s unclear whether that means the journals were deleted by LJ or by their owners.
After hearing about this, a number of Weiß Kreuz communities moved to Insane Journal.
After the jump, a quick catch-up on what’s been going on at LJ, for those unaware:
Alrighty, so, in May we have the “Strikethrough ‘07″ event, in which 500 journals were deleted with no warning– many needlessly –for any relation to child pornography. Many of these journals (which included a Spanish-language discussion group for the novel Lolita and communities for rape victims) were reinstated after LJ members made a big fuss and LJ realized that blanket-deleting people with certain interests like “rape” was not a good idea. They then promised that nothing like it would happen again.
Then a few weeks ago they permanently suspended two more accounts without any sort of notice whatsoever for more kiddy porn potentially obscene works involving minors. This became known as “Boldthrough ‘07″ because instead of striking through the username as is normal with a I saw a copy of one of the pictures in question, a Snape/Harry shot posted pre-book 7, in which Harry could as easily have been an adult as been a minor. Fans again rose in protest. Five days later– after one LJ staffer had apparently joined a snarking community for the express purpose of mocking fans –LJ finally spoke.
They clarified that even if the material was not decidedly illegal they didn’t want to host it, which is of course their right, but it was noted that the artwork had to be reported, had to involve a minor in a sexual situation (e.g. with actual genitalia contact) and had to have no artistic merit, as decided by the LJ abuse team– which, of course, consists of world-famous art critics, I’m sure. I didn’t see any response to people’s suggestions that the posts be deleted and the account owners contacted on the first offense (especially if said offense is questionable) rather than an immediate and permanent deletion of the user’s account.
After all the hubbub, LJ reinstated one of the two users.
Tags: censorship, harry-potter, livejournal, ouran-high-school-host-club, Weiß-Kreuz
August 17th, 2007 at 10:05 am
lol what? im not sure i understand
August 17th, 2007 at 11:48 am
Oh, how wonderful. I wonder where they’re getting pressure from this time?
August 17th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
Hard to say. I’d be inclined to place the blame on Honey, who is actually the oldest-aged character (and probably the only one who you could reasonably argue might be legal), but he still LOOKS like a 10-year-old.
…Except that the ouran_papas community is presumably dedicated to the fathers we’ve met in the anime/manga so far, which are Haruhi’s, Tamaki’s, Kyouya’s, and the twins’– not Honey’s. Any pairing of Honey and an Ouran dad we’ve seen would just be plain crack and if there is any of it on LJ, there wouldn’t be much.
And of course, Honey wouldn’t be part of any Ootoricest art.
Unfortunately, it looks like the community has closed itself to new members and taken the entry that was my original source and turned it members-only, so I’m not sure if there’ve been any updates on this atm :/
August 17th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Whatever am I going to do without my shotacon fanfic and fanart? :P
I’m definitely not throwing a fit, singing protest songs and creating dumbass cat macros. :P
August 17th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Well, it’s worth noting that it’s pretty much only fanART that’s being targeted– text has always been held to a much lower standard for artistic merit.
That said, what if they started targeting lolicon as well as shotacon? ;)
August 17th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
It wouldn’t bother me much. Lolicon and shotacon are both not really that appealing to me. :P
August 17th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
But wouldn’t it bother you for the sake of any friends you might have who are?
And if not that, then maybe the fact that the law currently on the books that is scaring these companies flies in the face of past supreme court rulings? That part certainly bugs me.
August 17th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
The legislature can create laws that contradict supreme court rulings forcing the court to revisit past rulings. This is how it is supposed to work, the court is not king, it is an equal partner in the three branch system and not superior to any other.
It may “bug” me, but it also carries the hope that bad rulings can be reconsidered.
I try not to let my emotions get in the way of politics. :)
(Of course, I’m also of the mind that this country is fucked due to having poor taste in who we elect to the legislature.)
August 17th, 2007 at 2:12 pm
Fair enough. I happen to agree with previous interpretations of the Supreme Court on this matter– they’ve said repeatedly that the reason child porn is illegal is because its creation by definition involves the abuse of children, NOT because of the effects it THEORETICALLY could have on the watcher (by which logic depictions of violence, drugs, etc. should be illegal as well).
If one takes that concept as a given, then cartoon pornography involving minors should clearly not be made illegal, because its creation does not mandate the sexual abuse of any real children.
August 17th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Oh, I certainly agree that the creation of art should be protected, but I don’t see the reason for making the sort of OMGENDOFTHEWORLDPANIC that is going on over at LJ. LJ’s my home on the web and I still find them to be… childish and completely batshit insane… in their “counterefforts”.
I love me a good lolcat, but honestly, its not protesting. :P
And seriously, the amazing amount of tubman’s and godwin’s lawbreaking is amazing. Then again, its Livejournal, they know drama. :P
August 17th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
Hey, I’ve been with LJ for seven years– since it was still a small local (to Portland) company. I think it’s fair for people to annoyed when they see a service that used to cater to them somewhat altering their stances, especially if it’s a service they’re paying for ;)
Though I’ve issued my own complaints about fans who take it too far, who think they have some “right” to LJ as opposed to realizing that it’s a privilege, etc.
August 17th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
LOL! The Nickelodeon ’shippers are next.
August 17th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
Oh please god yes. They should be strung up for Hey! Arnold fics. :P
August 17th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
they better leave my loli alone
August 17th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
I can’t deal with the Drake and Josh crap, Avatar, or the Spongebob stuff…but then again, I never understood ’slash’ with real actors–I must be outa touch.
August 19th, 2007 at 8:33 am
Hi, can you tell me which WK groups have moved and where you heard about it? I’m a member of several over there and haven’t heard a word, but I’d like to know in case they’re some that I read on occasion so I know where to go.
August 19th, 2007 at 11:01 am
Hey, Kyaa, is there any particular reason you’re constantly deleting any mention of the suspensions on Wikipedia? Just curious.
August 19th, 2007 at 4:19 pm
Shelly, I heard it from a friend who linked me to Weiss Report.