#AO3 IS THE PROSHIP SITE

[myfandomrealitea]

"Proshippers harass everyone!"

My brother in christ antis will comb through tags looking for a proship post to scream about and harass the OP over the way a mother of three rakes through her middle child's head looking for nits after a school outbreak.

[diedbydeth]

rant about proshipping because it's 1 am and i can't sleep and i can't find a good fucking fanfiction website and i'm just so fucking sick of everything.

just to preface this i'm not an "anti". just anti-leaning. i'm shipcourse unaligned because i find this type of discourse really pointless and anger inducing. like why the fuck do i have to tell grown ass adults (i'm literally not joking there are people in their fucking forties believing this shit) that shipping a child and their dad is not ok. like what.

ok preface done. now the rant.

i find all of proshitters' takes on stuff really weird. like what do you mean fiction doesn't affect reality? if fiction doesn't affect really, then how the fuck did the january 6 riots happen? i can assure you that the reason they were there was not because there was actual election fraud. if fiction doesn't affect reality, then queer and racial representation in fiction doesn't matter. like people realize that, right? or am i just out of my mind? clearly you can understand how pedophilia and incest in fiction can affect people if you can understand how representation of minorities in fiction can affect people. there can't possibly be people that dense, right? even aside from children and minors reading that shit, pedophiles reading it can make them consider not getting help for their paraphilia and just jacking off to the porn you oh-so-graciously have given them. like does that not make you uncomfortable beyond words?

or their other argument saying that people shouldn't care what others ship? like am i overreacting to be incredibly uncomfortable around people who actively ship minors and adults? why do people even do that in the first place? don't give me that coping mechanism crap, there are *much* more better and efficient coping mechanisms than writing about pedophilia, like writing about the feelings you felt or talking about it with someone. i went through something very similar, but i didn't have to write pedophilic shit and post it on ao3, so why would you have to?

like you are harming people with this crap. you are giving predators something to hide behind. you are giving people who draw problematic things, not even related to weird ships (like people who draw racist and other bigoted things), something to hide behind. you are giving creeps a platform and ultimately helping them in getting their behavior normalized. do you not see the problem with this?

do i, a teenager, need to tell an adult, a person in their mid-forties, that condoning pedophilia and incest, even fictional, is problematic?

rant over. feel free to send death threats or try to tell me to support creeps in the replies or even my askbox. or don't. your choice.

[shivasdarknight]

Putting this over here to isolate this point: the OTW Volunteers did a lot of work to get AO3 back up and running after the DDoS. The OTW Board didn't do shit.

Your donations to AO3 go into OTW's financial reserve, and an estimate of how much they have is around $2.5 million (thread that breaks this down). They can maintain the platform for five years with what they have stored, and that number may be a low estimate.

OTW doesn't need your money. OTW's volunteers deserve financial compensation for all they've been subjected to, but none will see a penny from your donations.

Support the volunteers all you like, but know that your donations do nothing for them nor improve their working conditions.

Also stop being islamophobic assholes, the people who did this called themselves Sudanese just to get this kind of response. Grow up, learn to spot a troll, and go educate yourselves instead of constantly spewing racist shit.

[xx-lun4c3st-xx]

people in the comments reminding me how easy antis are, literallyall we’d have to do is spread the word about the creator of ao3 being profic and proship and then theyll be like “i cant support a problematic site” and then theyd spread the word to other antis and eventually theyd leave, or some antis will go pro and we’ll flourish as fandom once again

Need proshippers to reclaim Ao3 frfr cuz- ??? why antis on a profic site….complaining that its profic

[thexnightmarexgarden]

Uh, AO3 is a plague on society and I think it should burn, actually .3.

[sparkling-pink-lemonade]

Saw a post of an anti saying that they are leaving AO3, as they are too uncomfortable to post their fics there now. The reason? They found out one of their long time readers was a proshipper, despite their fics having proship dni. And how "that includes silent readers too, I don't want you all looking at my content."

My brother in christ, you are posting on the fiction freedom site. The proshipping site. Dnis aren't god damn restraining orders. They are one tool in helping you display your boundaries. It's still on you to enforce your boundaries. You post something publicly, you forfeit your ability to regulate who can view your work. If you're obsessive enough, you can regulate who actually interacts with your work by stalking each person in the kudos list, comments, or bookmarks and then blocking snyone you don't like, but you do not get a say on who may silently read your posts. Not unless you private your work and only show it to specific people.

And if you don’t want proshippers to interact, get off the profic site.

[themurdochmemesteries]

seeing antis on ao3 is so funny because babe what are you doing on the proship site complaining about seeing proship shit on there

[fight-nights-at-freddys]

@maknaasfalti

first of all, being this condescending and mean isn't gonna change anyone's minds. you're being an ass.

just because the content gets taken down, doesn't mean it violates copyright law. you know that as well as i do. that's why so many sites take down things that are falsely DMCA'd, and they get put back up later. they act first, ask questions later. that's how most sites operate.

that's not how boundaries work. you set boundaries FOR YOURSELF. once you start telling other people what to do and how to do it, you start making RULES.

this has nothing to do with being proship, really, but it has everything to do with keath falsely copyright striking people due to their personal distaste or disgust for what other people do.

also saying "kill yourself" over pinecest (re: fiction) isn't cute! nor is your blatant xenophobia of rural americans!

NOW let me outline why it would be a false copyright strike!

(i'll also @silly-lil-bimbo for this section)

once again, we go back to THE ACTUAL LAW (17 U.S. Code § 107) which clearly states it that the factors considered when referring to copyright and fair use are as follows:

the purpose and character of the use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes,

the nature of the copyrighted work,

the amount of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole, and

the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

also note the fact the work is unpublished does not bar itself from a finding of fair use.

the fact is, it's entirely on a case-by-case basis, as a lot of this is subjective and completely depends on the judge presiding over the case. HOWEVER, fanfiction is very likely to count as "transformative", due to the nature OF fanfiction. there's a reason AO3 is still up and the entire site hasn't been removed for copyright infringement.

in the case of yaelokre, specifically the nsfw works, they're only taking the characters and some elements of the story, but they're not appropriating the entirety of the work, making profit off of it, detracting from the potential market value of the original work, or claiming it as their own, which is NECESSARY to prove it is an infringement of copyright.

regardless of all that, the fact remains it is shitty to try and strike down what fanfiction writers/fanartists do just because YOU PERSONALLY do not like what fans do with your characters. keath made their characters public, now they have to deal with the consequences of that, or remove their characters from public eye. very simple.

at this point, i hope people DON'T make fanfic/fanart for yaelokre lest they get a cease and desist, because who knows what keath/the people working with them will determine as "inappropriate, offensive, or misinfo".

[frownyalfred]

sorry this may be a dumb question, but what do you mean when you say proshipping?

Just cause I see people say a lot of different definitions and they all kind of confuse me. I've always been in the ship and let ship space and I don't really get the discourse I guess? Like, we're talking about fake little people, why do we care what other people ship?

Exactly what you wrote above. Ship and let ship. Don’t like, don’t read. I won’t tell you what you can and can’t ship and I certainly won’t try to ban you or restrict you from writing on sites like ao3. Even if the content is “immoral” or I don’t personally agree with it/enjoy reading it.

[arsynnotarson]

im still baffled how people with "proshippers dni" in their ao3 fanfic desc / tags exist.

like, i thought it was a myth. ( /j because of course antis would do something like that )

its ao3. AO3!!!

it's an archive for the stuff wattpad and ff.net kicked off.

any by their definition, that stuff was "proship content" made by "proshippers".

you can't kick the freaks off the freak website made for freaks.

you're fighting an uphill battle, antis. if you hate proshippers so much, get off their site.

[belladonnabedlam]

👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

"Why can't the freaks on AO3 just go and make a site for all the gross stuff and leave AO3 alone."

Because AO3 is that site. Because AO3 was that site long before you decided AO3 was better than the sites you bullied us off of before, and I can promise you if someone somehow comes up with a fanfic site you like better specifically for the 'gross stuff' you'll try to bully us off that too so you can benefit from it.

AO3's specific core purpose is to preserve fanfiction, yes, but it was also instigated as a host site for the fanfiction that kept getting yeeted off other platforms like Wattpad. Its designed to preserve all fanfiction, not just the fanfiction you, personally, think is 'allowed' to be written.

AO3 is the site for all the gross stuff the freaks make. We've been there just as long as you. We've been funding it just as long as you have. AO3 has specifically said you have a place here. The timeline was literally:

Wattpad/FF.net/LiveJournal purge fanfics > AO3 is born > The people who's fics got purged moved over to AO3 > AO3 gains popularity as the best functioning site > The people who pushed for the fics to be purged off Wattpad move to AO3 > The same people try to push for AO3 to purge fics.

AO3's source coding is open-access. You go make a polished, strict, rigid site where nothing 'icky' is allowed. You go make a site where you can control what is hosted. We already have our space.

[thatsthewrongwallcraig]

Seeing Anti's recommending and advising to report "problematic fanfics" on Ao3 to Ao3 is sending me.

My rather distant sibling in fandom, I'm going to hold your hand when I say this, but Ao3 is the "Ship And Let Ship" site.

Ao3 was built on proship mentality after other fanfic platforms like ff.net got purged. Ao3 is anti-censorship central.

It is so very okay if you don't like something, but if you are so adamant about your fandom POV, at least commit to the bit and invest some time into research before you just end up saying things.

[spacebeyonce]

on today's episode of 'praying on ao3's downfall', racism has to stay on the site to prevent censorship, but if you put 'proship dni' in the tags that's harassment and we're wiping your fic.

[olderthannetfic]

Re: discourse about using outliers / the worst examples of a group to justify generalizations-- this is also a problem with the femslash wank asks

I'm one of those filthy f/f folks who actually does want to see more femslash relative to mascslash, but I'm not anti-fujo or a terf or telling ppl to change their own tastes. I'm proship / SALS and kinkmato and I think fujoshi are great; I appreciate their massive contribution to fandom culture including AO3's existence itself

But some ppl seem like they just hate f/f fandoms generally and want a reason to bitch about us? and I've felt super demoralized by it whenever I read your blog lately

Like the complaints about f/f being too wholesome and fluffy and that this is somehow bad?? tumblr is C O V E R E D with cutesey fluffy bubbly m/m art using That Artstyle we all know and nobody complains about it. But when sapphic art is like this suddenly its cause we're boring sexless puritans who dont know what pussy should look like? The huge amount of kinky weird depraved f/f thats out there gets totally erased and the wholesome stuff gets scapegoated as a symbol of regressiveness.

Or the constant lecturing to "JuSt CrEaTe It YoUrSeLf" as if nobody who says they want more f/f would actually be making it??? How do you KNOW they're not making it? Are you stalking the tumblr of every ao3 f/f author to make sure they never expressed the opinion you hate , and vice versa??

Yeah a few awful ppl have been super obnoxious, terfy, or puritanical bullies with how they talk about this topic. But when you constantly bring those people up to demonize talking about it at all it feels like you're creating a taboo around it because you want those annoying lesbian feminists to shut the fuck up. Cause how dare we, right? How dare we express desire for something in a way that reminds you patriarchy exists.

You won't even let us express that we're bitter or sad about feeling like a minority even amongst other queer women. You won't let us express simple jealousy without interpreting that jealousy in the most terfy antiship bad faith way possible!

I won't defend those who actually harass ppl or moralize over ships. I won't defend anti-fujos. But when you constantly lump me in with those people just because I looked at AO3 stats and went "Hmmm, it would be cool if this was more balanced :/" or whatever it feels like you just don't want me to say anything at all

--

Is this about me personally? Yes, I agree that topics that are repetitive start to feel like an attack.

But with regards to AO3 stats, this is my pet peeve, as you probably know if you read here often, and I'm unlikely to stop being angry about it.

AO3 is extremely unusual in the history of fandom for being a very big, very multifandom site that is not m/m-specific but where m/m outnumbers other things. There have been large-ish slash archives before. There have been and still are other large, multifandom archives, from FFN and Wattpad, which are in AO3's weight class, to medium size ones like MediaMiner. The spaces that aren't m/m-specific generally have f/m vastly outnumbering m/m. They also make it harder to get stats than AO3 does.

I don't have an issue with people looking at overall fandom stats and complaining that f/f has the short end of the stick when it comes to fanfic broadly. I do object to people pulling only AO3 stats and going "The one anomalous clubhouse that looks like this is the problem" and pointing at m/m.

It's the same problem you point out, just in another direction. After being told "Okay, but the amount of m/m..." constantly for years, people are fed up and never want to hear it again. Even if it's phrased nicely. Even if the person saying it is also hurting.

[hostilecandle]

Okay fellow fic writers, we need to have a little chat. I really need yall to understand that Ao3 is not a social media site, it is an archive. And because of that there are 2 big things I am begging you to grasp

1) You do NOT control who reads your fics. It is getting increasingly often I'm seeing "minors dni" and "proship dni" on fics on the archive. Yall... that is not. how. archives. work. You don't get to choose that. The second you consent to your fic being posted in an archive you have consented to anyone reading it. That is how an archive functions. If that is a problem or sticking point for you or makes you uncomfortable, don't post there. It's simple. There are basic and common sense rules that apply when using an archive, and the ability for anyone to read what's posted to archival site is one of them. Imagine if you went through a physical archive in a library or at a college or wherever and they had signs saying "X do not read/interact" yall would recognize that as wrong and stupid. Recognize it in yourself as well

2) I need yall to understand what tags are actually for. They're not for triggers, contrary to popular belief and discourse. Though can be used as a very helpful tool for it. They're there, and im sure I'm beating a dead horse saying this again, BECAUSE ITS A FUCKING ARCHIVE. Do yall not understand how those work? Tags are for filtering so people can find. what. they're. looking. for. This is why it's important to tag things like blood, gore, mcd, fluff, cheating, marriage, whump, happy endings etc. It's why its a bullshit argument to say "I don't want to spoil it" (apart for the massive ethics problem that is you weirdos) that's not what an archive is for. Post it here, or wattpad, fanfic or live journal (if theyre still functioning) or in a long af threadfic on twitter. Hell, post it on fb or insta for all I give a shit. But if you want to play by social media rules, post it on a social media not an archival site.

And I've seen the argument that "published works aren't held to this standard" and 1) you're work isn't a published book and 2) YES THEY ARE. When a published work is added to an archive, they also have to be properly labeled. Why the fuck do yall think they dont??? Sure if your fic was on a Barnes and noble shelf, you wouldn't have to say or "spoil" it. You don't even have to do it here on Tumblr, though I frankly think it's an absolute dickhead move. But anything in an archive is labeled or "tagged". Otherwise it's just a mess of words that no one can seperate from each other. You'd be creating a library of babel without it.

So tldr: learn what an archive actually is, stop putting '___ dni' on your ao3 fics, and tag. your. fics. and stop complaining about it in said tags for fucks sake 😭😭😭

[just-antithings]

Just saw a "how to navigate Ao3" guide that said "don't bring up antiship/proship discourse, nobody there cares and they will all just point and laugh and block you. But they're not proshippers! Remember that dark fic and profic are two different things! The people on Ao3 just Don't Know About fandom discourse and have absolutely no opinions on it!"

I lost so many braincells in that moment. At least they mentioned "and nobody cares about DNIs there, don't put them in the tags" so maybe that annoying trend will stop.

Btw in the comments they were saying "that's not true" to every person who said "no everyone on ao3 is just proship bc the founder shipped the Supernatural Brothers, it just became a site for all fics as a result of allowing all fics"

Like not with evidence or anything. Just "no that did not happen" and deleting any links people posted. Truly, effervescent.