![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
30 Days of Fan Fiction Meme, Day 15
Jul. 13th, 2011 06:16 pm15 – Warnings – What do you feel it most important to warn for, and what's the strangest thing you've warned for in a fic?
Probably in this particular moment in fandom, it's most important to warn for potential Fail, which is close to the same thing as warning for common triggers. I'm defining "important" as limiting potential reader distress and the chances of becoming the object of a flame war. Thus, I try to remember to warn for things that touch on various kinds of abuse, disability, racism, homophobia, etc., not least because I'm not entirely confident that it will be clear what bits of discourse the story is tacitly endorsing and what bits are simply the most realistic POV for a given character/time/place.
However, this varies by fandom. For example, in Mirage of Blaze it's such common knowledge (and generally not a trigger for most fans) that [character I'm omitting for possible spoilers for the uninitiated] is a rape victim that I probably wouldn't be very rigorous about warning for mentions of this in an explicit way. I might simply rate high for "themes," for example. In other words, it depends a little on the population I'm serving.
The strangest things I've warned for: "much religiosity," as in Naoe in church, and "reincarnation interpretation." This is a warning for my Please Save My Earth epic and a decent example of tailoring warnings to population. This is very important to warn for because it expresses where my fic diverges from canon and (implicitly) critiques the manga that is the standard for most fans.
( Rest of the Questions )
Probably in this particular moment in fandom, it's most important to warn for potential Fail, which is close to the same thing as warning for common triggers. I'm defining "important" as limiting potential reader distress and the chances of becoming the object of a flame war. Thus, I try to remember to warn for things that touch on various kinds of abuse, disability, racism, homophobia, etc., not least because I'm not entirely confident that it will be clear what bits of discourse the story is tacitly endorsing and what bits are simply the most realistic POV for a given character/time/place.
However, this varies by fandom. For example, in Mirage of Blaze it's such common knowledge (and generally not a trigger for most fans) that [character I'm omitting for possible spoilers for the uninitiated] is a rape victim that I probably wouldn't be very rigorous about warning for mentions of this in an explicit way. I might simply rate high for "themes," for example. In other words, it depends a little on the population I'm serving.
The strangest things I've warned for: "much religiosity," as in Naoe in church, and "reincarnation interpretation." This is a warning for my Please Save My Earth epic and a decent example of tailoring warnings to population. This is very important to warn for because it expresses where my fic diverges from canon and (implicitly) critiques the manga that is the standard for most fans.
( Rest of the Questions )
