Originally posted by moerlin at As of tomorrow, no more subject lines in comments on LJ


To sum up, in my own ( neotoma) words: as of tomorrow, no more subject lines for comment in S1 styles at all, possibly some subject lines in S2 if you know to do it, and no more drop-down menu for icons.

This entry was originally posted at http://neotoma.dreamwidth.org/268075.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

This comes from an article by rachelmanija entitled, Say Yes to Gay YA.
(click the link for the full article)

Our novel Stranger has five viewpoint characters; one, Yuki Nakamura, is
gay and has a boyfriend. Yuki's romance, like the heterosexual ones in
the novel, involves nothing more explicit than kissing.

An agent from a major agency, one which represents a bestselling YA novel in the same genre as ours, called us.

The agent offered to sign us on the condition that we make the gay
character straight, or else remove his viewpoint and all references to
his sexual orientation.

This isn't about that specific agent; we'd gotten other rewrite requests before this one. Previous agents had also offered to take a second look if we did rewrites… including cutting the viewpoint of Yuki, the gay character.

It's time to stand up and demand change. Spread the word everywhere if you are just as angry and outraged by this.

From the flist: 



Spread the word, even you're not a US citizen, it is important for everyone!! It easy to do and it can change everything. More info by clicking on the banner.
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Read this analysis from boing-boing.net

Get on the phone and call your representative. Express your disapproval. Tell him or her exactly how you feel, and that you don't support this. Tell your friends to call their representatives, their Congressperson, and complain. Mention that you are a registered voter that takes your civic responsibility seriously and that you will use that vote to express your feelings about this.

http://www.rollcall.com/issues/57_60/Internet-Companies-Boost-Hill-Lobbying-210345-1.html?pos=olobh

“We support the bill’s stated goals — providing additional enforcement tools to combat foreign ‘rogue’ websites that are dedicated to copyright infringement or counterfeiting,” the Internet companies wrote in Tuesday’s letter. “Unfortunately, the bills as drafted would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new uncertain liabilities, private rights of action and technology mandates that would require monitoring of websites.”  The chamber-led coalition in support of the bill includes Walmart, Eli Lilly & Co. and Netflix.

Google and other opponents of the legislation argue that restricting the Internet in the U.S. sets a bad international precedent and that the language defines infringing too broadly.

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The biggest bully in my life was probably me.

( Considering I'm not even f-locking this I suppose this won't really be a secret anymore, but let me tell it to you anyway: I was a bully. And I was bullied. And I am still not sure which was worse. (Long memoir on bullying experiences is long.) )




( Meta on bullying is not nearly as long but still rather long. Meta being that it is hard to get out of your head and realize just what is and is not bullying, just what is and is not crossing the line, and that as much as we despise bullying, the answer is not to despise the bullies. )




TL;DR

I was a bully, and I was bullied. I was the tough girl of the playground and of the block who managed to bully people without every laying a finger or a word on them. I was also shunned by my peers while barely clinging on to my friends, and eventually even assaulted for something that is such a small part of me and yet such a big part of what people see in me.

To this day, I struggle with trying not to bully others, trying not to be domineering. I try not to turn into a "bad boss", hurting and ignoring others to my ego-stroking benefit and at their expense.

There are a lot of types of bullies and a lot of reasons people bully, and there will be no one, easy solution to depend on to get rid of it, or even make a dent in it. But one type of bully I can say we can help is the ones who don't know that they are bullies.

And yes, they exist. They think their roughhousing is just playing, and don't realize that it's not playing when your friend/opponent is not nearly of your size or skill level. They think their back-and-forth insults are just joking around, without realizing that some of the people around them take these words to heart in a negative way. They believe what they are doing is truly okay, because they are seeing it on TV and in books and in video games that it's okay, and everyone expects someone else to do it so no one is just talking with them about it.

I can't speak for every bully or bullying victim, or even most, but I can speak for the ones who were like me in saying that we need to stop relying on bullshit campaigns and false platitudes, and that we need to start figuring out what bullying is and what it means for kids today, where they are getting the message from. The existing plans and campaigns against bullying are great, and they get a lot done, but they ultimately only reach out to a few kids because they only target a few specific types of bullies - they get a lot done but not enough, because we are placing too high and unrealistic expectations on them. We need to quit the futile efforts against stopping these ideas and instead equip kids with the ability to filter these ideas, learn what is and isn't okay, because if we don't, then no one else will - after all, no one else has so far.

No one did for me until it was too late.






What the hell did I just type 3300 words in an hour?! I spend 3 years ignoring that 'Writer's Block' widget on the LJ homepage and this is what gets me?!