A very relevant meme!
Aug. 7th, 2007 07:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
essayelI've been reading posts and watching the LJ users divide into fandom, fandom supporters, those who couldn't give a toss about fandom but are dead against censorship, those who are having a great time fanning the flames and other who are just carrying on blithely as normal.
Out of all the responses I've seen, that of LJ shocks and surprises me the most. 'Artistic merit' eh? And how do you work out what that is?
I saw a copy of one of the banned pictures and I didn't like it - but that's MY taste. I don't much care for very graphic depictions of sex and Snape makes me shudder, not in a good way. That said I didn't find it nearly as disturbing as the Happyhappytoytoy.com advert that's staring at me as I type. I clicked on the picture, looked at it for the amount of time I felt I should to be good mannered and to make a balanced judgement of it [and yeah, so I judged it, it's the way I work out whether I like something or not] then I clicked off it again.
As a drawing it had considerable technical expertise, it was carefully planned and posed and executed and there were a number of very telling narrative pointers in it. I could admire and appreciate all that - I just don't like it. I can't HELP not liking it, and I defend my right not to have liked it just as I'm prepared to defend the right of other people to like it and look at it in a forum where one has to go deliberately and with forethought in order to see it.
For LJ to delete without fair warning was wrong. To delete ALL associated journals was sheer idiocy. It's a bit like confiscating my entire library because I own a copy of Fanny Hill! To then fall into petulant silence while fandom flails around them is - baffling.
Unless, of course, this is all a carefully orchestrated plot to get fandom to leave LJ taking it's smut and attitude with it?
If it is that - I should hate to think it might work.