![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
So, when you set up your LiveJournal account, you maybe typed up a list of interests. Mine include anonymity, archery, geeks, plato (meant to be the computer system, not the Greek), and world domination.
That world domination might just get me in trouble.
By now, you may have heard of the censorship of some LJ accounts based on these lists -- accounts that were actually set up as part of an RPG or to write fanfic. No more accounts, because they had things like "rape" and "pillage" in their interests section.
Could they just remove the interests and have the accounts reinstated? Well, no, sez the LJ crack legal team, because if the RPG characters are then found to have used LJ as a platform for their raping and pillaging, then LJ could be implicated (see "scienter").
And there are apparently people who are survivors of incest, so they have "incest" in their interest list, and they've been suspended, too, in fine Orwellian fashion. Look for the support of others who have been harmed? Not here, by jiggy. Write fiction where characters do anti-social things? No more account for you.
Fans are fighting this...by identifying themselves as fans, and by including a lovely series of specially-crafted icons to tell LJ how they feel.
I really like that last one quite a bit. I'm sure there will be more.
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LiveJournal censorship based on interests
LJ has apologized, but doesn't seem to understand that having a "zero-tolerance policy" means that overreaction is always preferable to lack of response, thus guaranteeing this sort of thing will happen again. I like the witchhunt one... ;-> Communities don't have activities. People do activities. Communities are tags put on data (postings). Only activities of people can be illegal. Talking and writing about illegal stuff isn't illegal.. There are some other circumstances, too. But I'd like to watch them try to make a case that people discussing two fictional characters doing something (which would be illegal in the real world, or at least this part of it) are engaging in a conspiracy to have those two fictional characters commit a real-world crime. |
