I'm a victim of cancel culture · 6:05am May 13th
I've entered a writing competition with my story:
The story follows all the rules of the contest, yet it has just been disqualified simply because it was written by me. To be more precise, because I've published foalcon in the past.
https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/924269/
I've just been denied up to $150 simply for being who I am.
Hello, cancel culture, my old nemesis.
What peeves me the most is that I explicitly informed the organizer of my enrolment in the contest beforeclaw.
https://www.fimfiction.net/group/215801/hall-of-contests-sfw/thread/536051/open-science-fiction-contest-iii-2024-mar-25-may-12#comment/7956034
Yet, instead of informing me that I'd be automatically disqualified simply for being Bad Dragon, I was left pouring enormous amounts of time into the story, and only after I published it was I informed that I was being set to fail from the very start.
Sorry to hear that. Life sucks.
5780365 There is a saying:
If you would read the rules, you would've seen how you were disqualified from the start:
What are the rules?
And if you click on the DNI (do not interact) link, you get this:
In other words: Foalcon.
This isn't cancel culture, this is breaking the rule set up by the judge. You can discuss these rules all you want, but Bike is the one who set up the rules, and this rule applies to all Bike's contests.
(Yes, you linked the link I copy pasted. But it's weird how you didn't make the connection. Like, don't people read all the rules fully to get what is allowed and what not to not accidentally disqualify?)
5780370 Tell me something. Let's say a bakery opened up near you and you wanted to buy a loaf of bread. But in the bakery you came across a note:
, would that make sense to you? You understand it's illegal for a business to have such rules, right? It's weird how you can't seem to make the connection.
5780371
There is a difference in not serving someone because of race, religion or sexuality and in not interacting with someone who wrote pornography with underage characters (which is not who you are, but what you did).
Besides, the $150 is not a gurantee, which you wrote like it was.
5780372 I see no difference.
I cannot change the past, just like I can't change the color of my scales.
I literally said:
, which means from $0 to $150, which isn't just a guarantee but a fact. I would have gained from this contest $0, $150 or some amount in between.
5780373
In that case, why not go all out? Make petitions, forum threads, gather support that this rule shall be removed. Fight for your right to write pornography with minors and still enter contests that have this DNI rule, and if not, call it discrimination for "who you are". (Make sure you specify how being black/woman is the same like writing foalcon.)
Or realise that this contest is organised by a private person volunteering to spend money for pony words, and it's in their right to give that money to who they want and not want to—the same way it is in your right to enter or not enter this contest (when you qualify for it. After all, the New Blood Contest for example had specific rules for authors to enter.)
5780374 When denial of service is harmful, it's a criminal offense.
While you may tolerate and even endorse criminal behavior, I do not condone it.
I may not win this battle for justice, but I shall continue to hope for a world without hateful people who discriminate against others based on criteria that are out of the victim's control.
5780376
eh
he can go fuck himself anyway,
its only $150 bucks
gonna go work 8 hours today and make a bare minimum of $225 a day,
i mean it is on you for not reading his rules he posted in 2020
but i wouldn’t join any of that Fags contests anymore then,
im sure you wrote just fine,
some people just like to jew you out of $ don’t worry about it
5780380 Yeah, you're right. Some people are just discriminatory. Can't change the facts.
5780382
well i take that back about making that $ today cause work got canceled for crazy thunderstorms
but alas, tomorrow is a new day
5780389 You're a diver, why do you care about the weather? There are no clouds underwater.
I have a question that no one else seems to have asked, as far as I can see.
Why does it matter?
Why would your other stories have anything to do with the one you're submitting for the contest. Chick-Fil-A will no longer be serving you because at one point in history, you had Taco Bell.
Why would it matter that I wrote a surprisingly wholesome story about an underage gryphon marrying an adult donkey, if the whole point of the competition is to quickly write a time-travel mishap? (I'm guessing, here.) Why would other stories you wrote have any impact on this one?
I'm halfway in your favour, that you should be allowed to participate in this contest, because realistically, no one can know for certain why you wrote the stories you did. Maybe there was a foalcon contest four months ago that you wrote for with a prize of $200 for the winner. Why should that disbar you from this contest? On the other hand, I also support their ruling, as a posted set of rules seems to have been provided. Have you considered making an alt account to bypass their prudishness?
5780400
That's a great summary of what's happening here. You understand the situation perfectly.
It makes absolutely no sense, yet here we are.
I could create another account to circumvent the rule, but to me, that would be akin to sitting at the back of a bus simply for being black. Sure, it allows you to ride a bus, but at the same time, you give more power to racist pricks.
Bicyclette's discriminatory stuff that basically tries to enact policy via the judging scene shunning authors since they can't get the actual rules changed, isn't new, though in some years past they claimed it was some kind of requirement for their job, and with later wordings of it, I suspect that was just an excuse and they were afraid to make clear that they were just plain trying to soft-cancel foalcon stuff.
What concerns me here particularly really is whether they apply this by account or by person; it's absurd to disallow for off-site or alt stuff, and they really shouldn't be in so many judging positions doing this. Do you actually have any published foalcon on your account?
5780463 I've yet to see a job that requires that a person is racist or discriminatory. It sure sounds like a handy excuse, though.
The way I see it, a writing competition is an arena for stories where they battle it out. Who wrote the story or what other stories exist in the Universe outside of the arena shouldn't matter in the slightest.
5780390
lightning strikes will instantly kill anyone in the water
5780468 How can lightning penetrate the isolating bodysuit?
5780470
it doesn’t protect at all, i been electrocuted manny times
not fun
5780471 I guess there is weather underwater after all.
5780464
I'm going to disagree with you, here, but not entirely. I still think you had every right to be entered into the contest, and it should be story against story to determine which one is written best, but there are reasons to exclude one from competitions. This just happens to be a petty and poorly-thought-out reason. If you had a history of plagiarism and attacking other participants emotionally, that's a good reason to ban someone from participation. But that's not what happened.
I don't agree with you in this, but I certainly see your point. If they don't want to see foalcon, that's fine for them, but they could just as easily take another bus if it bothers them that much. It's not like you're forcing them to read it, after all.
5780478 I'm all for punishment, but I still believe in second chances after the punishment as well.
If you deny one opportunity to be better, her only option is to pick a dark side.
What's happening now is akin to a person riding a bus while not being willing to buy a bus ticket just because the driver once let a black person into the bus.
Bicyclette still used me to write the story, which he knew beforehoof that I was going to write, but the story wasn't given fair judgment in return.
It's basically like ordering a whore and then not paying her after you get your way with her. That's how I feel right now, like a whore who got pissed on but didn't get paid.
5780480
Hold on, what involvement, if any, did Bicyclette have prior to refusing the story? You make it sound like they gave the okay or even encouraged you to write it.
5780702 Over a month prior to me publishing the story, I explicitly replied to Bicyclette. And it wasn't just his thread I replied on, but he also got a notification about my reply, making it impossible for him to miss. This is what I said:
Source: https://www.fimfiction.net/group/215801/hall-of-contests-sfw/thread/536051/open-science-fiction-contest-iii-2024-mar-25-may-12#comment/7956034
Bicyclette knew exactly that I was going to write a story over a month prior to me publishing it. That's akin to silently holding the elevator door open for your neighbor while knowing full well that the elevator is broken and that your neighbor is going to die if she rides it. Not cool!
5780711
I think that's expecting a bit much of them, particularly if they hadn't looked into your other stories yet.
5780714 I'm pretty sure they have, given that I was both blocked by Bicyclette and banned from the group.