Some of you are just now joining fandom culture, some of you have been in fandom culture for a while, but no matter how long you've been in a fandom community, this is important information

Some of you out there are just now discovering things like fanfiction, or fan art accounts, and roleplay, and I'm happy that you're able to enjoy some of the wonderful creative outlets that have been created for you to have a creative outlet for your fandoms!

But it's important that you stay in a "designated area" for these creative outlets. I put that in quotation marks because there's usually very little vetting or gatekeeping for these areas. But let me explain

If you're a minor, you shouldn't be reading M or E rated fanfiction. You shouldn't be looking up pornography of the characters. And for the love of all things holy

You shouldn't be role playing with adults

When I was young and still new to fandom culture, I absorbed every bit of media that I could get my hands on. I read a lot of adult oriented fanfiction, and I role played with anyone that would give me the time of day. This ended up getting me into a lot of trouble, and I don't mean with my parents

Introducing yourself to mature themes, such as sex, at a young age desensitizes you to it. I was 12 or 13 when I first started reading fanfiction with those themes. When I got into roleplay, some of the role plays had those themes as well. A 13 year old should not be roleplaying sex or sexual themes. That's not a healthy outlet for someone that's just becoming a teen and going through puberty. It's harmful, and it causes issues later in life.

But even going further than that, some of the people I came in contact with were also pretty bad as well. Including, but not limited to

A Homestuck group that was never ending drama, especially with a 19 year old that was trying to date a 13 year old that was also in the group

A Black Butler group that was full of shota fangirls

A MLP roleplayer that would only RP adult content, and would harass you if you refused, and had backup kik accounts if you ever blocked him

Another MLP RPer that lied about his entire existence, convinced me he was a girl by sending me pictures of a girl he went to high school with, lied to me about his age (told me that we were in the same age group of 13-14 year olds, but he was actually 4 years older than me), coerced me into sending lewd photos of myself, tried to guilt me into dating him (I'm a lesbian, and he kept up the facade of being a woman for a year and a half, and then tried to tell me that if I could love him as a woman then I should be able to love him as his true self. Keep in mind, he's a cis man that was just pretending to be a woman to get me to have feelings for the fake persona before he sprung that on me, and then for years after that he would randomly message me and try to guilt me by saying "I'm in love with you but I know you could never love me back because I'm a man".)

These communities can be very dangerous to your mental state, your physical state, and your emotional state. If you know someone is an adult

DO NOT INTERACT WITH THEM

Especially if you know that they create adult content.

Please, if you are a child, don't try to befriend adults, or have deep interactions with them, or consume their adult oriented media. When I was young, I had the mindset of "if anything happens, then it'll be a learning experience", and that's so damaging to have.

And if you're an adult in these spaces

Don't interact with the minors

14 year olds shouldnt be friends with 23 year olds. 23 year olds shouldnt be creating adult content for 14 year olds, or including 14 year olds in their adult content.

This is something that I'm very passionate about, and I'll fight tooth and nail about

Please separate minors and adults, and please separate yourself from the other side if you find yourself included in an area that you shouldn't be in.

salt-and-rust

shedding-my-velvet-deactivated2

friendly psa from a library assistant!

do not write on our books!!!!

your selfishness not only wastes an employees time (we have to spend 2-4 hours checking every page and erasing) but also the poor book will never look clean ever again, there’s no good way to permanently remove pencil marks (god forbid pen) and the eraser shavings get everywhere too.

sticky notes exist for a reason!! DO NOT WRITE IN BOOKS YOU DONT OWN!!!

thanks for coming to my Ted talk