It’s hard for me to say as the story really doesn’t have a sexual component in it; so I’ll basically write it (someday) and leave to you and your editors to tell me if it’s ok. But thanks for responding to my inquiry.
Nobody is being steamrolled. Your opinion is just unpopular. You talk as if you represent a group of people whereas you seem to be only one anonymous person. Underage porn (video, pictures) is bad because it needs real underage people to make it. Nobody is harmed in the making of these stories. I don’t believe in banning or censoring things, especially words. It’s acting as if people can’t make their own minds about what they read. It’s stupid.
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This, of course, is the problem with posting anonymously. There could be a single anonymous poster or a dozen. Nobody knows, although writing style can maybe give a bit of a hint.
As far as the server location goes, I was under the impression that GSS was in Germany, like Martin is, but looking at the WHOIS for GSS, it looks like the server is in Virginia, USA. That makes this a whole different ballgame, since we now have to take into account the law where the server resides being different from the laws in Germany. Virginia is known for have extremely tough laws about this sort of thing.
To be honest, my feelings on this issue are changing the more I look into the laws involved. I personally think applying laws with a hard age limit is stupid, but to do so to completely imaginary people is absolutely asinine. It’s even stupider when you consider that you can write about murder, drug trafficking, or whatever else, without any concerns whatsoever, but when you write porn, the law is different than with virtually any other criminal act you might write about. When it comes to pornography, laws apply to the writing/possession/distribution of the story itself, not just the acts depicted in it. In other words, in most jurisdictions, two sixteen-year-olds can legally have sex, but you cannot legally write porn about two sixteen-year-olds legally having sex in those same jurisdictions. In some jurisdictions, you can’t do so even if you’re sixteen yourself! This all seems to be true in most jurisdictions I’ve looked at, including both the state of Virginia and Martin’s home country of Germany.
My read on this is that the law leaves no room for debate here. Some jurisdictions may allow for a certain level of defence based on actual harm, but many do not. I don’t like setting a hard age, because there are far too many loopholes, as outlined in several other posts, but I think we have to set the minimum age to 18 or we all risk being prosecuted, both by the state of Virginia and whatever might apply in our own jurisdiction. While we can’t take every single law in the world into account, I think we do have to consider the laws in the server’s state, Martin’s home country, and the likely laws of most of our users. All of those say that all written material has to be 18+, regardless of the actual age of consent. Our individual feelings aren’t relevant, and I really don’t think this is a good place for experimentation, as the simple fact is that even being aware that such a story exists here is grounds for prosecution in some places. Reading, contributing to the comments of, and most especially hosting such stories, is grounds for imprisonment in most of the places people are reading this. In some places, like Virginia, even those who objected to it could be charged, in theory.
If we want to add to that minimum to cover prepubescent vampires, that’s probably a good idea, but I really feel that the risk of prosecution far outweighs the benefits of allowing the rare story that has someone under 18 in it.
Hello! I go by the name LongTimeFan when posting comments, but I don’t have an official account, so I apologize for using the “Guest” handle.
Anyhow, as others have said, I would definitely feel uncomfortable reading about fourteen-year-olds being corrupted and used by 30-somethings in these stories. It’s definitely true that someone being seventeen one day and eighteen the next doesn’t magically make them mature, either, so I agree that age distinctions are a tricky topic. However, if someone is CLEARLY a child, immature, or somehow being coerced/coached/groomed into being a partner, it’s not OK.
I also have thoughts about why this topic gets people so riled up as opposed to the hypnotic/mind control aspects of the stories—because unlike magic spells, nanotechnology, hypnosis, and whatever people use to control their victims in these tales, coercion, gaslighting, manipulation, and conditioning actually happen in reality. It’s a lot easier, at least for me, to read Hypnothrill’s stories about high school teenagers slowly being transformed because it’s clearly depicted as fantasy—something otherworldly and terrifying slowly draining their brains and turning them into musclehead jocks. I also remember that Hypnothrill himself stated, at the beginning of “Career Day,” that he imagines the “roles” of the teens in the story being played by twenty-somethings who look like teens. That combination, for me, makes it work. But any story that relies on what feels like they could be real tactics, or have actually happened to people I know? That I can’t handle. I don’t like my erotica to brush up against reality too much, if that makes sense—because then I start thinking about the aspects of the situation, and thinking is rather anathema to erotica. Does that make sense?
Since I’m here, I want to drop my two cents into the discussion about those who are attracted toward minors. I confess that I myself have found myself thinking teenage guys are cute (and post-pubescent teens, mind, not babies!), and I just turned thirty. I’m not proud of those thoughts, but I am proud of the fact that I would NEVER act on them. That, for me, is the distinction, which, at least for me, includes not indulging or pleasuring myself while thinking of them. I don’t think it’s a case of “do it once and you’re doomed forever,” but I do know that indulging in a fantasy can lead to gradually wanting more and more, which is dangerous. It’s like the old story about the frog getting boiled in the water because you turn it up gradually. I don’t believe in slippery slope arguments as a whole for culture, but I do think they have some merit when discussing individual behavior.
And finally, I also want to chime in about why the topics of pedophilia, ephebophila, and attraction to underage people are so under-discussed. I personally think it’s because so often, the only times those topics come up is defensively—that is, when someone is either trying to justify their own actions or justify the actions of another person (usually a celebrity) who they like—actions that have already happened. Much like someone who only defends polyamory when they’ve cheated on their partner or a criminal who’s been caught out, it comes across not as a serious discussion, but someone not wanting to own up to being wrong. It’s like closing the barn door after the horses run out and then discussing why it’s not your fault they were open in the first place. You can’t have a positive discussion like that. If you’re going to talk about a serious topic, it needs to be from a positive place, not a negative one (though of course a personal event often inspires these very conversations).
Those are my thoughts, such as they are. Thank you for reading them!
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Maybe I’m missing something/context for how the current rules came about but I’m wondering just why is admin so adamant about not giving any firmer guidelines on how young characters can be despite the amount of debate in the comments of the story in question. The rules only say
- no kids (nice and clear)
- no pre-pubescent teens (which is… nearly an oxymoron because being prepubescent means you haven’t started puberty and your own reference pins the start of puberty falling between 8 and 13.)
- needs to be depicted as sexually mature (since this links to a scientific article that means latest 13-18, but I believe I remember another controversial story that this might be related to, so I think this can also be taken as “you can’t write a character with the vocabulary/mannerisms of a 9-year-old and then cover for it by saying they’re 18.”)
It’s… a very VERY gray and dangerous area to leave open. Is there really opposition to just making a rule that says you can’t explicitly describe a character as younger than 18, and that implying they’re significantly younger is a no-post? (ie avoid saying “17 years old”, and instead say “high school senior”.)
Also RobinHood has hit on the point that the rules of the site do not protect users/the entire archive in the court of law, at least for the US. It’s 18 when it comes to media meant for erotic consumption, which is what separates this site from a dramatic novel and TV shows. We can get in trouble from a story with a minor being hosted here, even if we aren’t reading it ourselves. The site rules also need to protect the users here and not just try to keep stories from being “censored”.
The site can be moved to another area on the world with practically a couple of mouse clicks.
Even a change of the provider is doable in a day or two, since everything is Dockerized (for us IT savy guys).
That legal talk, for me, is inconsequential. There are really bad things on the net, out in the open, pictures and movies of guys which are in a VERY grey area, not hidden but available with a single search term in Google. And there is an ample amount of all kinds of stories about underage, sometimes just 13, 14 year old guys, which are available openly on gayauthors and many other places with no concern whatsoever.
Officials have simply better things to do than to even look at a site where there is a story involving a high school couple having sex. Believe me. Or at anybody who likes to read such a story.
And also, I don’t know of a single case where somebody has been convicted for writing and publishing a story which contains adolescents in a sexual context on the net. It is simply a non-issue.
People are pursued for owning child porn. There’s enough of them. Nobody cares about some text you have on your computer, really.
My opinion stands. As I see it, there are those people who only think in absolutes, there is a threshold and that must not be crossed, no matter what. There is no grey area, no compromise, you either follow them or you’re their enemy, a bad person, a pedophile. This has become very obvious in this thread and only because they soon realized that their shouting and flaming does not fall on fertile ground here (because this is a closed group with only very small amount of zealots) they actually started to argue in a more civil way - while still not budging in their claim of being absolutely right.
The rules are not going to be changed!
P.S.: Just to make it clear, a person who does not want to read or even be confronted with a certain type of story, is not a zealot in my point of view, this is a very valid choice for everyone. That’s why I’ve added a tag block filter for these people. A zealot is somebody who wants to force his point of view onto everybody else.
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There have been cases of teenagers being arrested for sexting each other in Canada, the US, and the UK. There have also been some for adults sexting older teens. Sexting isn’t the same as story sites like this, but it’s not far off, either. It’s people sharing personal stories with one another. That’s what makes me concerned here, because we’re not just sharing them one-on-one, we’re sharing them one-on-hundreds.
What a can of worms…
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Sexting someone is a form of harassment, so you have to be absolutely sure, that the person you’re texting is fine with that (regardless of his/her age). And if it’s a minor, you also have to make sure his/her parents are ok with that. This is in no way related to GSS.
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Two kids sexting is a matter which should only concern their parents - it’s up to them to teach their children that this is not ok and very dangerous, because of the potential for mobbing and even life threatening consequences.
Overzealous parents and judges who destroy children’s lifes by sending them to prison because of some sexting to each other (not talking about harassment or mobbing, which is much more prevalent!) should be sent to prison themselves.
Again, nothing of this relates to GSS in any way, we’re not addressing anyone directly. This cannot be compared.
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Call me Carus to differtiate from other anons.
I don’t see the benefit to allowing risky content. They are a small number of stories. Can’t we just ban them so people can not be worried. It only takes one authority to get involved and we lose the site for the sake of a few stories. Let alone risks of more severe legal action.
Here is the situation from the UK currently. If one pedophile used this site and it had content the authorities thought was pedophilic it’d get in the system. The site policies not being explicitly against it could be used as evidence. Martin could be arrested under a European arrest warrent as being complicit. The authorities could then try and discover the identities of other people here to try and find other pedophiles. It’d get nasty FAST.
This is a worst case scenario, and quite unlikely, but lax rules make it possible. It also means if let’s say the German authorities decided to crack down we’d all be at risk.
Whatever our personal views on the content itself it’s not worth the risk. Call it censorship if you like but we’re not in the position of power. Let’s not risk the entire archive of stories for that handful.
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The whole site is built on stuff which is highly illegal and amoral.
So, if you continue to write like this, you’re about to convince me to close down the site for good. Right now I’m just in the mood to pull the plug.
I mean it.
I’ve actually just been reading up on the UK law, and in regards to written content, child pornography laws don’t apply. Child pornography laws apply specifically to any kind of drawn/depicted/photographed/filmed image, not written material.
What it does fall under is Obscene publications, however it would be up to a court to decide if any given publication was classed as obscene, and likely to ‘deprave and corrupt’ any individual likely to come in to contact with the material.
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I think it’s a bit pathetic to shut down the site because people happen to not like pedophilia. It’s one rule and it seems obvious that the majority of people are at least uncomfortable with it being on the site.
I for one am not sure why Martin has such a bee in his bonnet over pedophilia, especially when he’s happy to ban vore etc.
Just man up and listen to people. This is obviously more divisive than politics and that is banned.
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What the fuck are you talking about? What seems obvious is that a few guest anonymous users are trolling us. And it led to some doubt by others but nothing like “a majority”.
He doesn’t. He protects things that are not pedophilic from being censored.
That’s cute coming from any anonymous user.
He doesn’t have to. It’s his site which he spent hours to build. You’re welcome to go and build one and make your own rules there.
You’re the one who’s pathetic.
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The vehement defensiveness on display here is… a little disconcerting. It’s an interesting hill to die on, is all I’m saying. That comment about no one being steamrolled hasn’t aged particularly well, either, given the threat to take down the entire site.
Some of you need to go outside and clear your heads.
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Martin created an entire thread to give some sort of credence to your antics. I would not have been so accommodating. I don’t care at all if you feel like you’re being steamrolled. You accuse him of being a pedo-enabler, he’s not. You accuse him of steamrolling when he did his best to hear everybody out.
It seems that it is exactly what Martin did. Just don’t expect the site to be back when he is.
Without people willing to die on hills like this one, we would not have free speech or gay rights. In this case, you talking about censoring stuff that is not pedophilic in nature just because it could appear pedophilic to some idiots. If we don’t take a stand there, then the next question would be: why risk having an entire site about stories that are, in essence, rape? I don’t like those stories, but I care about free speech.
I haven’t accused him of being a pedo-enabler. I actually started out with one of the more reasonable comments and tried to empathise a bit, but antics like yours and like the taking the site down have soured me a bit.
And you know, it’s a bit ironic that vore is banned and yet you’re so far up Martin’s ass it may as well be vore. You also need to rub a couple of brain cells together and realise that it isn’t just one person posting anonymously under this account, even if that would be more convenient for you to dismiss.
I spent at least two years working on this site, spending literally hundreds of hours making it what I thought was great for authors and readers. I made it much more mobile phone friendly, attempted to get a wiki working, added user accounts so that authors could delete their own stories and edit them, and a number of other things.
And then, people kept sending me stories with underage characters. And when I put down a hard rule about it (no characters under 18, and no characters that read like they are under 18), I got email after email and comment after comment about how I was censoring things and being draconian and how could anyone trust me and why was I so arbitrary and what gave me the right to judge authors work?
(Many many many people were reasonable and discussed it rationally and I very much appreciated that).
During this time, I was also involved in some legal proceedings and did always have the fear in the back of my mind that running this site could be problematic. The law is not clear or consistent in this matter. And it frustrates me more because I didn’t want to discuss this openly, because I didn’t want to make it easy for authorities to review even the discussion.
And so I got complaints about my lack of transparency. And questioned about why I wouldn’t open this up to a broader discussion.
I’d told my loving partner some of this. It’s not really his thing and he doesn’t get it but was fine with it as far as it went. But he’d already expressed concerns about underage stories and underage authors and underage readers.
When all of this went down, he asked me “why are you dealing with this? Is it worth the effort? What are you getting out of it and is that worth jeopardizing the legal proceedings we’re in?”
The answer was no, it wasn’t worth it. It wasn’t worth my time, energy and effort to continue managing this site all so that a large number of ignorant, selfish people could stroke their dicks and then complain about what they were getting for free. So I asked someone else to take over.
Martin has done an amazing job on improving this site. He expanded user account functionality, added tag filtering, added this discussion board, discord, and so many other things. He’s spent countless hours on the site, for free.
Deciding he has better things to do with his life than deal with this shit is not an overreaction. It’s a very rational choice. What’s he getting out of this? Theoretical legal risk, an inability to make people happy and having to spend hours discussing his decisions with people that don’t have a clue as to how much work goes into maintaining this site.
GSS is unique in that anonymous people have a voice. This allows for much more feedback to authors, something I very much appreciate. It also allows for anonymous shits to start shit. Maybe the next incarnation of the site will be based on learnings from this one, and anonymous comments will not be allowed.
(Yes, not all anons are evil or have been in this discussion. The problem is that there’s no way to know. Trolls gonna troll.)
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This is true, but for the most part, writing about this stuff is not illegal (and I leave questions of morality to each individual). I think this is the biggest difference that people aren’t getting.
If I write a story about a guy who goes and shoots twenty people in a mass killing spree, that writing is perfectly legal.
If I write about two teenagers having a completely legal relationship with one another, and I make it graphic enough to constitute pornography, that’s illegal and could have me behind bars for possessing, creating, and distributing child pornography.
I support your desire to fight against these asinine rules, because they are asinine by any measure, but it’s not a fight I can be a part of.
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