Explanations · 10:31am Apr 25th, 2022
It is said that “Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it.” I apologize for the rather lengthy text that follows, but feel that to properly explain the current situation i need to give a brief overview of how we got here, also giving you the information required so you can make the most appropriate choices to bring about your own desired future.
When i posted the last chapter of the first arc of “In which Spike ...” i had already long finished the first chapter of the second arc - i generally try to make sure i am one chapter ahead before posting, since i think that having to go back and edit already posted chapters is not good. It breaks internal consistency and a number of readers will not go back and read the changed chapter, so minimal changes to improve the style or decrease the number of word repetitions are fine, but it would be best to ensure that no actual content changes are necessary.
My frustration back then had also reached toxic levels. None of the people that i contacted who had promised on a forum or to me personally that they would help as editors stuck to their word. The only partial exception to this was one reader who offered to help, but given their still rather developing grasp of the English language i couldn't see this becoming a fruitful endeavour, so i thanked them but never actually tried if they would finally be the first person on FimFiction to actually fulfil the promises they made.
But the first chapter of the 2nd arc was written, and those that did get to see it told me they liked it, and some suggested i post it as is. But it would have been highly incomplete either way, and it would have completely failed in one of the core goals that were set up when developing “In which Spike ...”: Back when this story was conceived, there was some disagreement on this site since several members were disgruntled by the disproportionally high attention and traffic that stories containing sex got. Many argued that stories containing sex were inherently of lower quality, since they at the very best sacrifice space that could be used to develop characters and plot to instead incorporate gratuitous sex scenes.
One of the goals of “In which Spike ...” was to be an example of how sex scenes could be integral to character development. Each of the main characters has a vastly different view on what sexuality is – strongly simplified:
• for Applejack it's something natural - all animals do it, and its where foals come from;
• for Rainbow Dash it's a physical challenge, great sport and an intense experience;
• for Rarity it is the penultimate consummation of a romantic relationship;
• for Fluttershy it is something very scary yet darkly alluring;
• for Twilight it is an act of great trust, fascinating but also quite unnerving since you need to confront your own physicality;
• for Pinkie Pie it is fun, and a great way to build connections with people.
And each of them is right, in their own way. Sex can be all of these things and much more. With every one of them seeing sexuality from such a vastly different perspective, one would expect that experiencing sex will be vastly different each time as well, leading to better insight into the character. Thus it was intended that Spike's role in this story would be the same as it was in the original show: functionally that of a mirror for the other characters to be reflected in.
With just one chapter of the second arc posted, it would be impossible to determine that: you can only spot differences once there are at least two different things to look at. So i decided to write out probably two more chapters once my frustration had simmered down a bit - i already had fairly detailed plans jotted down for the next chapters, and a lot of ideas for the romantic date between Rarity and Spike that i liked.
While stuck on a scene between Rainbow Dash and Spike, i came across a writing contest from a fairly well known artist – Pia Gabriela, also known as “Pia-Chan” or “Pia-Sama”. I figured writing a piece for that might very well help me get my creative juices flowing again, and hopefully give me a chance to positively interact with the FimFiction community.
Some might say i should have known what would happen.
After posting the little piece – it holds little relevant content, but is merely a nice little romantic comfort story – ALL my stories got a downvote in less than 24 hours, including a story that hadn't even been opened for reading that day. Noticing this rather obvious abuse of the vote feature, i contacted an administrator, informing them of the situation. Their reply was that while this looked peculiar, it was believable to them that someone might have downloaded the stories prior, read through each of them in turn, finding each and every one so lacking in quality that they felt it was worth a downvote but continued to read more of my stories – for whatever reason i cannot fathom.
Talking about it with other members on the site the general consensus was that i “shouldn't let it bother me” and “just ignore it”. That essentially means the voting feature is worse than useless. If i am not bothered by negative criticism, if that does not cause me to reflect on what i have been doing and how i can improve, then it is a waste of time at best: when the general advice is to just ignore the voting results, the system has been abused beyond its breaking point. But it is clear that the intent of these people goes further than that: they target specific types of stories – based on character pairing, content or because they personally dislike the author – and try to systematically downvote them to reduce traffic to them and frustrate the authors into leaving the site. This isn't a new phenomenon. A number of people have been complaining about it, but the admins are unwilling to take action, since doing so might scare those "paranoid about heavy handed moderation" away from voting. So their proposed alternative is to maintain a system where the general advice is to just ignore the results of the votes, yet that still incorporates those votes into the mechanism that selects which stories are displayed on the front page.
As far as the contest previously mentioned goes, Ms. Gabriela was “not really online”, so couldn't post the results for more than six months (“online enough” to post on Twitter, Deviantart, Patreon and play a lot of League of Legends, but not quite “online enough” to leave a reply to the several requests for information from different participants as to what was going on, even though she repeatedly logged on to FimFiction). Eventually, after more than half a year of silence, she posted the results: i did “win” 2nd prize, which to me would have been mostly cause for celebration because it meant that someone i thought i should respect considered my writing above average. But when i found out that this person is actually a cheat who tried to weasel out of delivering the prize promised, the last of the respect i had for this person vanished.
She will be successful with that. I have no longer any interest in obtaining art from this person, having recognized she has no sense of honour.
I was initially rather surprised when i saw how very few people participated in this contest, given that it was started by the rather well-known artist Pia Gabriela. Guess they already knew some things about her that i didn't.
And as i was finishing this up, all my stories except the contest submission once again got a downvote on a single day, and again some of them weren't even opened for reading. I think i can take a rather educated guess as to which account those downvotes came from.
My disdain for the MLP-community has managed to reach a new level.
Out of sheer stubbornness i have finished the 2nd chapter of the 2nd arc of “In which Spike ...”, and have now posted it here as i originally planned. But this community is poisoned – by a small minority, no doubt, but the real problem is the silent majority that is willing to let that happen. I don't have enough attachment to this place that to me it'd be worth fighting to fix it. I'll just do what i have seen many other actually good authors do whose last journal entries read somewhat like mine, concluding with “I'll head elsewhere.”
Hey there. I'm still new to the community, so I don't have first-hand experience with said toxicity. But I've heard of it. And sadly, every fandom has such people, and even though there are people who try to make it right, their efforts get swept away.
I actually just came across this blog randomly, I've never heard of you nor read your stories.
But, anyway, whether you leave this site and head to a different site, just keep on doing what you do. Works of art make rules; rules don't make works of art.
God bless, Jesus loves you
5653230
Greetings Isuvyw,
firstoff, thank you for your comment. I value your input.
Please indulge my curiosity: if it was not my stories that piqued your interest, what led you here?
I used to be active in the Neon Genesis Evangelion fandom and to a lesser degree in other anime fandoms, and while there certainly were a few problematic individuals out there, i can assure you that never have i seen the level of vitriolic hostility that i witnessed here. You are certainly right that ultimately you'll always run into some trolls, but that you have already heard cautionary tales before joining seems like a significant warning sign to me. If those who are more than willing to push boundaries and incite hate are not reigned in, they will invariably radicalize and poison the community, those who find themselves targets of such attacks in turn becoming less adverse to resorting to unsightly means if they feel that they are not being defended against those who would bend the rules to the breaking point. If a community is to remain orderly and overall peaceful, it needs those who will defend that peace. To be tolerant towards intolerance is to let hatred breed.
I do think this can be fixed. I do think that if those who don't want a group to become a playground for spiteful trolls band together and put enough pressure on the moderators to enact some necessary reforms and properly enforce the necessary rulings the situation can be reigned in and a return to peaceful and polite interaction is possible, potentially even sparking the return of some of the many authors who left because they didn't want to deal with this hostility any more. But it would take a significant amount of time and energy, and i personally do not have the attachments to this place to be willing to take up this fight. But one of the if not the main point of my blog post was not to whine and bitch, but rather to hopefully jostle some other people who aren't already disgusted enough with the entire fandom that they want nothing more to do with it to finally take some action. Unfortunately, not long before i joined apparently there already were some efforts towards a reform which were ultimately shut down by the moderators, leading to many really good authors leaving, so it's possible that the FimFiction site might be beyond salvaging, but i would expect that the fandom itself need not be if enough people decide they've had enough and if necessary start their own site where such vitriolic behaviour will not be tolerated.
So again – the most interesting question is probably what you want in your future. Are you willing to accept that trolls will keep poisoning the community you are in and be a silent bystander to their behaviour? Are you going to be the one to take up the fight, try and galvanize those who are discontent with the situation into taking action together so that the MLP community will no longer be renown for the internal hostility beyond its borders? Or will you decide that this is not a struggle you are willing to invest energy and time in and ultimately leave?
I think it would be for the best if others have this information and think about this question before they, like me, spend months trying to look for decent people only to find that most of those have already left, unwilling to be part of a community that tolerates such hateful behaviour.
Regards
00_02
Will you be writing on a different site or are u done for good. I respect either decision u make I'm just curious if I should look for your stories elsewhere.
5653816
I will probably post some stories on Literotica.com, but naturally those will mostly be original stories with a strong erotic focus.
(The title of "In which Spike ..." was
blatantly copiedstrongly inspired by the story "In which an Elven Servant ..." which you can find there. While for me personally the sexual themes weren't quite to my liking, i found the internal monologues hilariously witty and quite enjoyed that piece of work.)As far as non-erotic fiction goes, if inspiration for a science fiction story strikes me, i might post something on Sufficient Velocity, since that is a place that was recommended to me for having an amicable user base.
Regards
00_02
5653712
I was just scrolling through the blog post feed and found yours. I decided to read the whole thing after skimming through the first paragraph.
To be honest, it was the "My disdain for the MLP community..." line that grabbed my attention and prompted me to say whatever I said.
I know you prob have heard it before and I may be a little late to this comment section, but that’s been a one reason I haven’t been able to post any stories, is out of fear they won’t be good enough which isn’t really a good excuse. I do though love this story and hope that regardless if it’s somewhere lese that you can finish it or add more to it eventually. I wish this community didn’t have lots of people running away.
5657115
Greetings;
i apologize for the somewhat belated reply; as mentioned, i do not log on to FimFiction often any more.
Exemplary authors like Terry Pratchett were haunted by self-doubt whether their stories were any good, so it seems only natural that beginners like us, who cannot point to a long list of successful published books, will be reasonably wary about the quality of their work. Pretty much no one started out as an awesome writer, and like so many other skills the best way to improve is to do it - write, publish, face the criticism and work on your weak points. My goal is not to be better than any specific known author, instead i aim to become a better writer than i was when i finished my last work. And facing constructive criticism is extremely helpful if not crucial to achieve that. Path_of_Cloud pointed out to me that the physical descriptions in my stories were rather lacking, something i started focusing on more in the last two posted chapters, and the person who did most of the editing for the story cautioned me that i need to be wary of starting too many paragraphs with the same word or phrasing, and convinced me to trash a 1600 word interlude that i had already completely written out, because it just wasn't particularily good nor added enough to the story to make it worth posting. For the roughly 13000 words of the 6th chapter of "In which Spike ..." i had 71 notes where i would have preferred to improve the text in the final draft - mostly word repetitions and passages where a more elegant phrasing or transition would have been called for. Given that i am not a native English speaker i still need to put noticeable effort in to keep my active vocabulary at any acceptable level.
I've seen the opposite - people who insist that their stories are amazing, regardless of any arguments to the contrary, and who blatantly refuse to accept any criticism, and that is most definitely worse.
But if people just down-vote spree everything an author has published without reading it, that is not constructive criticism, and i can in no way use it to improve as an author, with the goal of hopefully eventually being able to give people actually good stories. Heck, i preferred the guy who posted a comment on "In which Spike ..." calling it "zoophilia garbage" - at least i could figure out what his issue with the story was, and while i don't rightly know what he expected clicking on a MLP-story featuring sex that explicitly states in the description that the characters are only somewhat anthrophied, knowing what irked him allowed me to properly gauge what reaction to take.
While in general writing and posting stories to get criticism is the best way to improve as an author, i cannot with good conscience urge you to post something on FimFiction: constructive criticism is rare, finding an editor who'll actually do some work nigh impossible and almost certainly you'll face unwarranted hate attacks by users who have an issue with some specific topic you are writing about, rather than any reasonable, factual complaint about a shortfalling in your story. That's how bad the community here is, that i actually cannot encourage you to post anything here. No wonder then, that most decent authors choose to leave. I had some slight hope that my posts would encourage someone to try and combat the most egregious problems with this community, but i think we can fairly say that i utterly failed in this regard.
I myself don't want anything to do any more with the MLP-fandom in general. I'm no longer reading any MLP stories or looking at fanwork, and while there were some concepts in the next chapter planned for "In which Spike ..." that i liked - a closer look at what makes Rarity Rarity, more interaction with the townspeople showing that those who condemn Spike are actually just a small but loud minority, snappy one-liners from our favourite fashionista ("Darling, life is too short to waste a day wearing anything bland.", "Style is about saying who you are without having to speak.", and similar quips), and many, many romantic scenes with the couple - i just really don't want to deal with this any more. Rather than having fun with writing, just thinking about anything MLP related makes me grumpy. I wanted to come here to become a better author, but also to draw some strength for the real life horrors like female genital mutilation that i am campaigning against. When a hobby becomes an energy drain rather than a resource, it's time to quit.
So, sorry, but there almost certainly won't be any more MLP content forthcoming from me. I'm writing some original stories, and will likely start looking for a place to post them once i have polished them to where i feel somewhat comfortable - probably will look for an editor again before posting there. Fair warning, most of them are very NSFW. The current most likely candidates for sites i might post on are sufficient velocity and literotica.
Unfortunately i can also only suggest you find a better place to improve as an author. FimFiction seems to have been properly abandoned to trolls, and no one appears to be willing to invest the effort to fix it.
Regards
00_02