New/Foreign authors, please ease up on the disclaimers

[KeithD]

Also, and let me get annoyed for a moment, since when is it a bad thing for authors to write stroke stories?

Surely you aren't addressing that to me.

 

[Agent0069]

That gave me an idea to write a story where a disclaimer is three pages long and describes great detail every possible thing a disclaimer should warn about, a few of personal anecdotes, and every sexual encounter author ever had (both of them), before finally arriving to the story, which is a paragraph long or so. Should be a fun challenge for the next Aprils fools…

 

[lovecraft68]

It's a free site and people are free to do as they please. Don't like it, don't read their story.

For those who think its "Amateurish"? Let's get back to it being a free site that allows slobs, and obviously snobs, alike.

 

[RetroFan]

I can understand newer writers being cautious about how people take their content. I was at first, for example one of my earlier stories was set in the 1950s, in which the main male character had an intellectually disabled younger brother whom everyone refers to as 'The Spastic' and also a scene in which homosexuals are described as sick and perverted. I was conveying attitudes that were common around this era, but concerned that people might think that these were my own views, added in the disclaimer that they were not. Nowadays I wouldn't bother, although I do put in the disclaimer about the characters and events being fictional, and that those in any sexual situations are 18 and older. I will warn of content too, such as female characters having their periods after getting much flack on some stories for not mentioning this detail.

As I've said before though, it's amazing what offends some people in stories, even the more minor things. For example, in one of my stories set at a camping ground in the New Jersey Pine Barrens an older man, referred to as 'The Christian Man' keeps seeing and hearing things with the younger characters that un-nerve him as he thinks them immoral and sinful, this all played for laughs, sort of like a 1990s comedy movie. I got an angry comment years after the story was published about how offensive they found me mocking the man and his faith.

Another was my story 'My Nephew Got Into My Knickers' set in Melbourne Australia, which mocks political correctness, left-wing politics, social justice warriors and woke culture. People got so upset about the premise, which was that the nephew Cody who doesn't share the left-wing views of his woke mother Rhonda, his father and younger sister gets kicked out of home and sent to stay with his Aunt Emily. Emily, the narrator of the story like her nephew has more conservative views. A major part of the story is that Emily and Rhonda don't get along all that well, Rhonda plain in looks and overweight being one of those kids who had no discernable talents growing up, while pretty younger sister Emily was a talented singer and dancer who was a child/teenage actress and performer who was on a TV variety show back in the late 80s and early 90s. This, along with the fact the women have a younger brother who was a sports star growing up led to much resentment on Rhonda's part which still lingers years later even though the siblings are now middle aged and all have teenage and young adult children of their own. Boy oh boy, did this story premise offend some people.

My story 'Leanne the Lusty Lifeguard' was set in Sydney, Australia in 1980, and includes a non-erotic character named 'Uncle Merv', who is the most politically incorrect person one could ever imagine and who fully earns his nickname of 'Merv the Perv'. Perhaps showing how times change I got no negative reaction to Uncle Merv when I published the story in 2017, but more recently I've had negative comments from readers about the character. Not to fear though, Uncle Merv was born in the mid 1920s and given that he is overweight, smokes incessantly, guzzles beer and disparages things like healthy eating and sunscreen as being for 'poofters' he would be long dead by now.

Sometimes things that offend people are really strange. Negative feedback on Loving Wives stories are of course nothing unusual, but one on my most recent story in this category 'Bad Things Happen on April 15' about the Titanic disaster of 1912 was odd. In the story, the narrating character and his wife write a message in a bottle and throw it overboard from Titanic's upper decks. This seemingly minor part of the story plays a major part in the epilogue (now in third person) 112 years later, when the long-lost bottle is found floating in the Mersey River Channel in Devonport, Tasmania by a family who are watching a car ferry depart for an overnight sailing to the Australian mainland. In the epilogue, the husband and wife despair about the antics of their 18-year-old daughter Poppy, a shallow girl who lives her life online and recently after a pedicure sent a picture of her bare feet to a guy who claims to be gay and his transgender partner who now identifies as non-binary and uses them/they pronouns. While the concern of the parents is that their daughter's online 'friends' are straight male perverts using this ruse to obtain pictures of unsuspecting girls' bare feet, one reader was most upset about me apparently being transphobic. Go figure.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

For those who think its "Amateurish"? Let's get back to it being a free site that allows slobs, and obviously snobs, alike.

Well, to me any disclaimer that effectively says "only the right people should read this, and even then should read my story the right way, since it deserves to be read properly," is snobby as fuck.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

This thread has all the hallmarks of a successful AH thread. Needs more pictures though.

 

[Blind_Justice]

I've been blasted several times quite viciously by thin-skinned readers who didn't expect my adult fantasy stories with sex in them, posted on an adult website no less, to turn dark and/or grim. Therefore, to save those poor snowflakes some time and myself some serious headaches, I'm including a discclaimer that, yes, my adult stories with sex in them might contain things people might object to, maybe my kinks aren't their kinks and if they can't handle that, they should please fuck off and let the rest enjoy their entertainment.

I'm just covering my ass, so to speak. If about a hundred words are enough to turn you off my story, then the remaining 20k (on average) might not be for you anyway.

 

[lovecraft68]

Well, to me any disclaimer that effectively says "only the right people should read this, and even then should read my story the right way, since it deserves to be read properly," is snobby as fuck.

Then don't read it.

People learn as they go here and I've seen some of these types of disclaimers in someone's first stories. Over time they may gain confidence and stop feeling they need to do this, or maybe they'll always do it. Either way, its their story, not ours, so who cares?

 

[pink_silk_glove]

People learn as they go here and I've seen some of these types of disclaimers in someone's first stories. Over time they may gain confidence and stop feeling they need to do this, or maybe they'll always do it. Either way, its their story, not ours, so who cares?

Like I said already in this thread, often I don't read it. And as I also already said in this thread, I don't bring it up, I only answer when someone asks about disclaimers. I say my piece. Just as I shouldn't read the disclaimers, perhaps they shouldn't ask for opinions on them.

 

[KeithD]

I'm surprised nobody has pointed out the near-complete futility of this topic. The proportion of people publishing these (ostensibly objectionable) disclaimers who aren't AH visitors is pretty near 100%.

Really? From the AHers who had advocated using disclaimers in the past, I assumed a lot of them do so.

 

[KeithD]

I'm intrigued. Could this be an example of "simple erotica??????" Will you let us know here when it's published.

Could your concept of "simple erotica" be stories with little or no plot or character development, almost entirely the seduction and carry through of sex?

 

[Britva415]

My point was that the author's note can be seen as part of the framing

Yep. I'm not talking about author's notes, I was trying to talk about disclaimers, and mistakenly thought you were equating narrative with disclaimers when you reacted to someone's strawman about a big-ass non-narrative disclaimer at the beginning of Dune.

 

[Britva415]

Really? From the AHers who had advocated using disclaimers in the past, I assumed a lot of them do so.

I'm still surprised nobody has mentioned it. Maybe OP can show us a list of authors whose disclaimered stories they're reacting to, and we can see whether the stories are just selected from the many dozens of authors published daily who haven't ever hit the forum in general or AH in particular, or, if there are AH people being called out.

 

[KeithD]

I'm still surprised nobody has mentioned it. Maybe OP can show us a list of authors whose disclaimered stories they're reacting to, and we can see whether the stories are just selected from the many dozens of authors published daily who haven't ever hit the forum in general or AH in particular, or, if there are AH people being called out.

It's an issue here on which all are dug in, with all opinions well represented by AHers (which, as Pink notes, is no reason, of course, not to state one's opinion when the subject comes up). We just go around and around on this.

 

[Britva415]

Surely, the scrolling text in Stars Wars is not experienced by the characters?

Sure, they don't see the yellow letters in the sky. But the events described in that text were experienced by people in the story.

Maybe breaking the fourth wall is a gray area. When someone does it, is that the actor or the character? Take Ferris Beuller for example. When he does it, it's being experienced by Ferris as well as by the audience.

As well as by Matthew Broderick, but that's an example where I feel good about saying Ferris did that.

 

[Britva415]

Anyway, if it is addressed at AH authors and not just to the far greater proportion of authors who don't visit AH, it's still futile for a whole different reason.

 

[mrs_mackenzie]

I also use all 10 tags. Some authors think that tags reveal something about the story, and that they are therefore a negative aspect to the website. Others find it extremely helpful that they can use the tags as a tool to warn potential readers of disturbing elements, and also highlight fetishes that may either appeal or disgust someone. If you use tags but not disclaimers; what makes one better than the other?

The tags are used by the site's search function, so if I don't put in any tags (to avoid spoilers) then the story won't appear in searches either. I take the view that if the reader is avoiding spoilers, then they should avoid looking at tags, generally. But I'm not sure they're a substitute for a disclaimer if there's a particular content warning that the author wants to draw attention to, as not everyone does look at them as a matter of routine.

On the other hand, I've never personally experienced a reader responding by saying that something wasn't in a disclaimer or tags and therefore they were shocked by it. Ultimately, the site categories handle a lot of expectation, but I also don't write stories with particularly unusual content or a very wide range of content either.

 

[KeithD]

The tags are used by the site's search function,

Not obligatory, I don't think. The search function provides the option of a title and text search or just a title search.

 

[Erozetta]

The only disclaimers I recall having on my stories were ones that involved domestic violence, a history of child abuse, suicide or suicidal ideation, self-harm, abuse or sexual assault.

I might've mentioned an author challenge or thanked an editor/proofreader before. But mostly I only warned people of content that might trigger negative physical or emotional reactions in people. Wasn't to protect scores, but was to protect readers who maybe know what they can and can't handle around their PTSD.

I for one appreciate those warnings and would love if more would include things like animal or child death in the warnings.

 

[Voboy]

I for one appreciate those warnings and would love if more would include things like animal or child death in the warnings.

I do brief forewords, but I don't remember doing more than one or two actual disclaimers. I think if I killed an animal or a kid in one of my stories, I'd do one.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

I do brief forewords, but I don't remember doing more than one or two actual disclaimers. I think if I killed an animal or a kid in one of my stories, I'd do one.

Hope that they wouldn't be the only kid or animal in the story otherwise you'd be spoiling the plot. As soon as we meet kid/animal, we know that his days are numbered.

 

[AlexBailey]

The tags are used by the site's search function, so if I don't put in any tags (to avoid spoilers) then the story won't appear in searches either. I take the view that if the reader is avoiding spoilers, then they should avoid looking at tags, generally. But I'm not sure they're a substitute for a disclaimer if there's a particular content warning that the author wants to draw attention to, as not everyone does look at them as a matter of routine.

On the other hand, I've never personally experienced a reader responding by saying that something wasn't in a disclaimer or tags and therefore they were shocked by it. Ultimately, the site categories handle a lot of expectation, but I also don't write stories with particularly unusual content or a very wide range of content either.

Google searches for “(choose your tag) stories” can include results from literotica. That’s how I first found the site - and one of my favorite authors.

 

[Voboy]

Hope that they wouldn't be the only kid or animal in the story otherwise you'd be spoiling the plot. As soon as we meet kid/animal, we know that his days are numbered.

Thank you, Captain Obvious.

I don't know how I ever make it without your help.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Thank you, Captain Obvious.

I don't know how I ever make it without your help.

You're welcome.

 

[Erozetta]

Hope that they wouldn't be the only kid or animal in the story otherwise you'd be spoiling the plot. As soon as we meet kid/animal, we know that his days are numbered.

Spoilers have never bothered me. I'd rather not throw up after getting to that point of a story because I wasn't warned about it and know my limits on what I can and can't handle reading.

Does anyone know if there's a way to mark opening warnings like that to be a spoiler tag within the story? Because that would be a huge boon to readers who *want* to know what to prepare for within a story as well as the ones who *don't* want to know what happens before they read it.