Content, Clarity, and Consent

Hey all! For the past weeks, the moderator team has been in deep discussion about a number of topics regarding recurring issues we’ve encountered through reports, as well as concerns that have been raised over time. Today, I’d like to present an early look at our effort toward refining and clarifying a few of our existing rules, as well as introducing a couple changes to help users better curate their experiences on Wolfery. We’re aiming to implement these rules in the future alongside some updated help files for commonly-asked questions. Rest assured, many of you will not need to make any changes and we’d be moving forward gently with these improvements; we know it takes time for rules updates to disseminate. But before we continue, we want to welcome feedback and discussion!

  1. The first, and perhaps biggest change, is that any content in your character fields that is not permitted in the Town of Sinder must be appropriate for wherever it can be viewed.

Please note, this is not intended to restrict Tags, unless custom tags are overly explicit. So, what does this mean? Basically, fields like your About, LFRP, and status, should be appropriate for the rules in the Town of Sinder. When in Areas that are less restrictive, additional content should be kept to fields only visible in that Area, like the Description. Most characters already satisfy this rule! But, if you move between Areas often, and want spicy details in your Description, consider creating a Sinder-appropriate Character Profile. That way, you can quickly swap to a Realm-acceptable profile and back with just a couple clicks or taps!

  1. The second is equal parts change and clarification. It’s simply that the combination of underage characters and any kind of sexual content or context is not appropriate in the Town of Sinder.

This has already mostly been the case, but has never been spelled out. Now though, combined with the prior rule, this does mean that any kind of adult description or details regarding underage characters must not be accessible outside of Areas which permit the content. Explicit details should be moved to the Description, and only displayed when in Areas which permit Ageplay. This way, players are free to engage in the kind of role play they want, without unintentionally exposing other users to unexpected content who may wish to avoid highly sensitive subjects. It is our hope that more clear guidelines will create consent-based access to content that achieves the expectations we’ve set with the Town of Sinder.

Finally, while this has always fallen under the Be respectful pillar of etiquette, we’d like to enumerate one of the ‘soft rules’.

  1. One should not unexpectedly solicit or engage another player, publicly or privately, with content that is both not allowed in the Area that player is in, and for which that player does not have a tag or details in their profile indicating their interest in.

Does this mean you cannot discuss or ask about things they lack tags for? Not at all! You can always ask permission first to ask about unlisted interests. Players are also free to voluntarily engage in role play interests outside of their profile or tags, and content explicitly allowed in the Area a character visits is fair game, just do be mindful of both the interests and disinterests in a user’s tags.

Please always remember, every interaction on Wolfery requires consent and agreement between the players. Profiles, tags, Area rules… these are all tools to help us align our interests without lengthy discussions. But none of them ever mean you’re required to do anything you don’t want to, aside from abiding the rules and Terms of Service. A quick OOC (out-of-character) message can solve a lot of problems, too. Let’s all work together to make Wolfery a place where we respect and appreciate each other!

Hopefully these updates will help set better expectations for players, and offer more clear guidelines on how to respectfully express and interact with a wide variety of interests. We all share this wonderful space we call Wolfery! We’ve workshopped these rules to a state we feel brings worthwhile value to the community, but now we want to hear from you.

3 Likes

The first one seems… Incredibly silly

This all sounds very reasonable to me, but it may be difficult to get the word out to many players who are only occasionally online.

It might behoove us to see if Acci can create some sort of ‘pre awakening’ consent window queue for messages such as these (in a condensed form possibly with a link to the forum post) that must each be acknowledged to signify that they read them. It would also serve as a rebuttal to ‘But I didn’t know!’ claims.

1 Like

That’s a good suggestion. There is also a recent change that lets us set the realm rules rather than it being hardcoded which will give us some ability to do things like this.

There are a significant number of characters who have somewhat (or worse) objectionable content in their About. It is quite reasonable to say that it should be kept elsewhere so those not in an area where such content is permitted will not have to be concerned about coming across it accidentally.

I’m not following.
What would even be an example of something like this?

Lots of examples have been provided in the past by others in various threads. Suffice it to say that it does indeed happen and causes problems for many individuals who do not wish to see content that is inappropriate for the location they are in.

Im still not seeing how removing content from abouts ahould be a thing. Especially if people like that wont be in the same roomz

I think the plan is mostly reasonable, does not unduly disrupt or shame writers engaging in kink, and will serve to improve the average community member’s comfort.

I have only one concern, and that is that the first rule will prove prohibitively difficult as written for those writers who are affected by it, that it does create a sense of having to closet oneself, and that those writers will simply remove details from their descriptions that would be inappropriate in Sinder. It is not reasonable to ask writers to be constantly on high alert for changes to the rules as they explore the world, and to expect them to repeatedly alter their description.

I believe this fixation on people accidentally stumbling across content they do not like is in excess of reason. We are all adults here, and we are perfectly capable of not looking at things we do not like. If our eyes should glance across a kink that makes us uncomfortable, the correct response is to step back and look at something else, not expect the subject to censor themself.

Looking at a writer’s profile is an explicit choice one has to make, and one can stop looking at it at any time. We should expect readers to be exercising this liberty, and if they do not, it is on them to rectify that.

That said, I believe a reasonable compromise would be to allow otherwise disallowed content in collapsible fields, if they provide adequate specificity about what kind of content exists within. If a reasonable reader can read the heading and think, “Ah, this is not my thing!” then that should be good enough for our purposes.

This addresses the chilling effect I alluded to before, and puts the responsibility on the reader, not the writer, to curate what content they consume; the writer has done their duty by simply providing a content warning. This is not censorship or closeting, this is just good practice in general; writers involved with kink will be the first to tell you so.

Writers generally already use alternate profile images for play scenes as opposed to public scenes if they have them, so I do not think it is unreasonable to ask them to do this as a rule. Images are much more effective at inducing genuine discomfort in others that is not addressed simply by looking away, and there is no way to apply an adequate content warning with our present UI. Further, in some cases, hosting those images poses a legitimate legal risk that Wolfery is not obliged to take, thus it does not seem unfair to restrict them more firmly.

4 Likes

Because people across ALL of Wolfery can see the About section. Not being in the same room has nothing to do with it.

So? Still not seeing the issue.
If this was a rule from the begining then this wouldbe fine, but its a bit shitty to declare this so late

So, rules need to not be vauge and open to interpretation. There is no common sense here, cause what is common sense to one is not common sense to another.

Here’s some examples of things on profiles today I do not know the disposition of:

[CUB]

Is this too much? It potentially references ageplay, which is not allowed.

[Teen]
<link to salacious F-List here>

Is this too much? It happens on a lot of profiles, and would be good to clarify.

Hello all, I'm looking for scenes where <character> gets molested by <potential mates>.

Is this too much? I expect so.

But some clarity would be nice. Obviously a whole ageplay scene is not allowed in a profile, but I haven’t seen anything like that anyway.

Also something to consider is that tags are always public, as is the messages in tags. Are these subject to the same rules?

Some clarity would be nice. Thank you.

1 Like

In order your examples, from our internal discussion would be: Mentioning you’re an underage character okay, the ‘looking for scenes’ example is not okay.

The F-List example is indeed a grey area. I’d prefer a content warning there but let’s keep it open for discussion.

2 Likes

I think restricting tha about, while annoying, could be fine. But restricting the LFRP is just ludicrous to me

I think a lot of what’s covered here could be accomplished with a two-way overlay on profiles.

A player note with list of content.

A button that clears the overlay when a viewer hits agree.

A setting for the viewer that can be toggled to either show these overlays or not.

That way the writer is less burdened and the viewer simply has a choice whether to tempt fate or not.

I can add more thoughts once I am out of the office. This was largely a gut reaction type. :stuck_out_tongue: Quick thoughts.

2 Likes

We are working on putting together a collection of proposed technical tools to make compliance more convenient and automatic- I would love to collect peoples’ outlooks on tools like this, tag checking, and use of profiles.

3 Likes

I feel like letting players activate a content warning setting on their profile would be the best.
In a field bellow where you select it you give a list of content that could be icky to some people.
When someone clicks on your profile they can choose to back out or go forth (and also an option for do not show again for this player)

1 Like

This sounds like, “A person who reads content they do not like gets to domineer others and make them change how they appear.”
It’s awful.
Everyone on this site is an adult.
Lewd content is lewd content. I really don’t see why some particular kink should be singled out.
In what way is this rule change not just, “Those with less thick skin get to harass others for their kinks?”
I’ve never liked Spider characters. Can all spider characters change their profiles while they are at it? I think spiders are creepy.
This rule seems bad and seems to serve no greater principle.

2 Likes

Spider characters are not illegal in any jurisdiction in which Wolfery users reside, are not considered contentious content at the social level, and are not thematically adjacent to any such content. It’s not about individual reactions, it’s about the communal status of the content. The community zeitgeist determines what is socially acceptable in public, and any argument that no such line should be drawn will result in absurdities in short order.

3 Likes

Whatever it sounds like, what this IS would be an attempt to keep from having to ban ageplay and other subjects (but mostly ageplay) entirely. Regardless of how individuals feel, it is causing a LOT of trouble and the few on the moderation team who are trying to be open-minded are having to fight VERY hard to keep from having to ban things entirely. Is it fair? Not really. But this is a lifeline being thrown and the more folks complain about it being unfair, the more difficult it is for those few working in your favor to manage it.

Asking politely for clarification, as was done earlier, is fine. But the more the conversation focuses on how it isn’t fair, or whether someone thinks a rule is stupid, the more nails you’re putting in your own coffin.

2 Likes