Age Disclaimers

[IrateQuaker]

I was wondering how many of you have had to revise a submission or feel like you've had to make a disclaimer on the age of your characters so they'd fit the rule over being over eighteen.

I recently made the dubious mistake of calling one of my characters a teenager and had the submission rejected on grounds of age. Not that I want to quibble about eighteen and nineteen falling under teenager. There was no references to anything underage, nothing underhanded that you could point to and say "Ah-ha, underage, get him".

So since I was new to submitting stories, how do you go about handling teenage characters?

 

[TheeGoatPig]

One of my first submissions was written with 18 and 20 year olds in mind, though I never said anything out loud. It got rejected because one of them mentioned "She knew them from school." So... I had to go back, rewrite a few lines, and include people's actual ages. Bleh...

 

[PennLady]

I don't have this issue myself, but I've seen a number of stories where the author puts a note at the top stating that all characters are over 18, or all that are involved in sexual situations are over 18 or something like that.

 

[Tyro999]

You are quibbling, and your mistake wasn't "dubious." 13 y.o. through 17 y.o. constitute 5/7ths of the "teenage" ages, with 18/19 only 2/7ths.

Be explicit, either by bringing up the specific age within the story, or adding the "All characters are over 18 years old" disclaimer at the top of a story where necessary.

 

[estragon]

We've been down this road many a time and oft. Under 18 is totally "no-fly". I strongly suggest the disclaimer should be mandatory if there's any doubt. I had one story bounced for under-18, even though the under-18s were twenty miles away from any sexual activity and totally unaware of it.

And Irate, I thought your story "Ah, The Life of a Geek" was a real winner. I meant to put it on my Embarras de Richesse thread, and apologize for the omission.

 

[sr71plt]

I think all disclaimers are lame and invited further scrutiny. If you think your story might have a false age rejection, put a note disclaiming underage in the notes box of the story when you submit it. That way it will go to the human editor to check it. If it is rejected by surprise when there's no underage problem in it (as happened to me last week), just resubmit it with a note in the notes box and, again, the human editor will review it and pass it through if there's no underage violation (which is what happened to my last week's story). The story is just delayed in posting for three more days, but you don't have to either rewrite or lead with the chin by including a disclaimer.

 

[3113]

As sr7 points out, you have to understand that Lit gets a ton of stories submitted daily, and they can't post any of them till they're sifted through for questionable content. There is no way they could get them up as fast as they do (I know it seems slow to you) if they didn't use a 'bot for that.

So it's a computer program that hits on that word "teenager" or "high school" and goes "ding!ding!ding! rejected!" That program is after words that might suggest underage sex, and if it sees any of them, it spits the story back at you. Once you put a note in, a real human being scans it and says, "Ah, the 18-year old is going to high school and is having sex with another 18-year old. Acceptable."

Do what sr7 said. Get a person to look at it and you should be fine. However, in regards to the question itself, given that a computer program is always scanning these new stories for those key words, if you continue to have characters in high school or who are described as "teenagers" then you will probably continue to get flagged. It's like in a game of sports. If you play near the boundaries, then you risk being flagged by the referees for going over those boundaries even if you did not and the game will have to be paused while they take a closer look.

 

[IrateQuaker]

Thanks Estragon! I appreciate that.

And it's not that I'm quibbling. Perhaps because I'm not at submitting I have the "Thou Shalt Not" of not putting under 18 in my stories so when it gets rejected when I don't have any in the story then I begin to wonder, but as 3113 points out, if they're using computer scans because of the traffic it becomes understandable. They do have it set up to have a human look it over, which is a way around it and there is the disclaimer.

To clarify, I also mention in the story about school, though she'd down with school and that could have hit a filter. Completely understandable if they're using bots to help out.

I just agree with sr71plit, disclaimers as a matter of necessity are lame.

I just can't blame them for using computers either and thanks to you guys, I know there are ways around it.

Thanks for the help.

 

[sr71plt]

Thanks Estragon! I appreciate that.

And it's not that I'm quibbling. Perhaps because I'm not at submitting I have the "Thou Shalt Not" of not putting under 18 in my stories so when it gets rejected when I don't have any in the story then I begin to wonder, but as 3113 points out, if they're using computer scans because of the traffic it becomes understandable. They do have it set up to have a human look it over, which is a way around it and there is the disclaimer.

To clarify, I also mention in the story about school, though she'd down with school and that could have hit a filter. Completely understandable if they're using bots to help out.

I just agree with sr71plit, disclaimers as a matter of necessity are lame.

I just can't blame them for using computers either and thanks to you guys, I know there are ways around it.

Thanks for the help.

I would think the comment would need to go in the notes box rather than at the top of the text to get past the mechanical selection bot.

 

[lovecraft68]

An easy out is somewhere early in the story mention the characters 18th birthday. I started one of my last stories with the Girl sitting in class and had her looking out the window looking at the Toyota her father had given her two months ago for her 18th birthday.

Or something like "At nineteen, John was a year older than me."

If you state it early on there can be no qiestion on questionable age.

 

[sr71plt]

An easy out is somewhere early in the story mention the characters 18th birthday. I started one of my last stories with the Girl sitting in class and had her looking out the window looking at the Toyota her father had given her two months ago for her 18th birthday.

Or something like "At nineteen, John was a year older than me."

If you state it early on there can be no qiestion on questionable age.

I don't think this is a guarantee that the bot won't rejected it. I think anything in the text could trigger the bot.

I think it's possible, though, that if you use words rather than figures (which you should do for ages anyway), it might get past the bot.

 

[lovecraft68]

I don't think this is a guarantee that the bot won't rejected it. I think anything in the text could trigger the bot.

I think it's possible, though, that if you use words rather than figures (which you should do for ages anyway), it might get past the bot.

So far I have had good luck with this (so far anyway). I do it all the time and never add a disclaimer in the notes or the story.

I have even sometimes played the "age game" and after stating the B-day was two months ago later say she was having sex with her boyfriend "last year" That's as far as I have pushed as I have no desire to get under the "high teens" in my writing.

 

[sr71plt]

So far I have had good luck with this (so far anyway).

I didn't have luck with it just this last week. My first paragraph explicitly laid out his age--and the story was rejected by the bot--and later passed through as written by the human editor.

(And "doing it all the time" doesn't mean much when you don't have all that many stories posted.)

 

[IrateQuaker]

I have no problem naming an age if it fits the story but if I did that formula for every story then it becomes a disclaimer.

Can't we just tar and feather Pedophiles?

Bring a dish, have a potluck and then stomp them into grape jelly for making life difficult for the rest of humanity.

 

[lovecraft68]

I didn't have luck with it just this last week. My first paragraph explicitly laid out his age--and the story was rejected by the bot--and later passed through as written by the human editor.

(And "doing it all the time" doesn't mean much when you don't have all that many stories posted.)

So if you were explicit what set off the bot? Just good old fashioned inconsistency?

And as for your other remark here we were having a nice conversation and you had to go and be a smartass.

I have used this several times within the long running series as well as a couple of standalones I have not had a problem with it. I only had one problem when I used 16 and it was the #16.

 

[lovecraft68]

I have no problem naming an age if it fits the story but if I did that formula for every story then it becomes a disclaimer.

Can't we just tar and feather Pedophiles?

Bring a dish, have a potluck and then stomp them into grape jelly for making life difficult for the rest of humanity.

No a disclaimer is a specific warning my style is simply CYA.

As for pedophiles thing about them is that what people forget is that even thirteen is to old for them. Most peds target children who are not even sexually developed in anyway.

So even if lit decided to "go younger" it still wouldn;t do anything for true pedophiles, just people with a bit of an age kink. And for the record what pedophiles do has a lot more serious consequences then you having to be careful with age in a story so lets not be so dramatic here

As others have told me if you get hung up on it there are sites that allow underage.

 

[sr71plt]

So if you were explicit what set off the bot? Just good old fashioned inconsistency?

And as for your other remark here we were having a nice conversation and you had to go and be a smartass.

I have used this several times within the long running series as well as a couple of standalones I have not had a problem with it. I only had one problem when I used 16 and it was the #16.

Anyone who wants to know either how I set up the age issue in the opening or what might get stopped by the bot can just go and review my last-posted story, "The GED." It's verbatim what the bot rejected with a "anything underage" question--and then the human editor passed when I disclaimed underage in a note in the submissions form.

As for disrupting the thread, I had posted a couple of times to the question without any contention until you dropped into the thread. So perhaps I'm not the problem here.

Even after you posted, I was attempting to post directly to what could cause rejection. I've only had this one problem on the underage issue in 475 stories posted here myself--with a whole lot of them skimming at the edge of the age eighteen cutoff. So, I'd say I had sufficient experience to be responding on the issue.

 

[lovecraft68]

Anyone who wants to know either how I set up the age issue in the opening or what might get stopped by the bot can just go and review my last-posted story, "The GED." It's verbatim what the bot rejected with a "anything underage" question--and then the human editor passed when I disclaimed underage in a note in the submissions form.

As for disrupting the thread, I had posted a couple of times to the question without any contention until you dropped into the thread. So perhaps I'm not the problem here.

Even after you posted, I was attempting to post directly to what could cause rejection. I've only had this one problem on the underage issue in 475 stories posted here myself--with a whole lot of them skimming at the edge of the age eighteen cutoff. So, I'd say I had sufficient experience to be responding on the issue.

And you are the only person who can respond? It's a free forum.

Okay I just looked at the first paragraph of your story. "he waited until I'd turned eighteen" Okay just a bad bot day. But that is exactly what i was saying to do is to get it out there early.

I'll have to say for the most part I let crap roll off of me here and take nothing to heart but as for your comments of what little I have done I have put up 47 stories since last May when I joined. No where near as prolific as some but certainly more prolific than many from what I have seen here especially some of the bigger mouths around here (Welcome to scouries world 3 stories in like 6 months)

That is not bad considering it's around a full time job, volunteering at a boys club, helping my wife with her personal business and keeping track of not only my two daughters but we currently have a young girl from the shelter my wife volunteers at staying with us (Rape victim BTW a walking plot bunny for my friends over at non consent and the reason I would just assume hit the authors as speak to them) and she is a handful due to her issues. What is here is also not all of my writing I have quite a bit of other stuff written that does not fit Literotica because most is not erotica.

Maybe if I were retired like some other people and my time my own I could crank stories out faster but until then I do what I can.

 

[lovecraft68]

Anyone who wants to know either how I set up the age issue in the opening or what might get stopped by the bot can just go and review my last-posted story, "The GED." It's verbatim what the bot rejected with a "anything underage" question--and then the human editor passed when I disclaimed underage in a note in the submissions form.

As for disrupting the thread, I had posted a couple of times to the question without any contention until you dropped into the thread. So perhaps I'm not the problem here.

Even after you posted, I was attempting to post directly to what could cause rejection. I've only had this one problem on the underage issue in 475 stories posted here myself--with a whole lot of them skimming at the edge of the age eighteen cutoff. So, I'd say I had sufficient experience to be responding on the issue.

Now totally unrelated to you but to the actual topic at hand as I looked over your story this was in the "similar" stories section wonder if this got the boot once for title alone

http://www.literotica.com/s/being-a-gay-teenager

 

[sr71plt]

Okay just a bad bot day. But that is exactly what i was saying to do is to get it out there early.

Well, yes. Except . . . You were trying assert that getting it out early would keep the bot off your back, and my entire point in commenting on that was that this wasn't true. I'd done it last week and the bot rejected the story anyway.

Beyond that, you don't know what I do with my time other than write. But we certainly know what you do with yours--because you describe your life to us ad nauseum. All of which makes your ragging on me about talking about myself on the forum really, really hilarious.

 

[sr71plt]

Now totally unrelated to you but to the actual topic at hand as I looked over your story this was in the "similar" stories section wonder if this got the boot once for title alone

http://www.literotica.com/s/being-a-gay-teenager

My thought was that it was probably the blurb that did it--indicating that this was before the protagonist got his diploma. But, as I noted to Laurel on the refile, a GED is something you get because you didn't manage to get your diploma on time--which indicates it's after eighteen right there. Perhaps too subtle for the bot.

 

[lovecraft68]

My thought was that it was probably the blurb that did it--indicating that this was before the protagonist got his diploma. But, as I noted to Laurel on the refile, a GED is something you get because you didn't manage to get your diploma on time--which indicates it's after eighteen right there. Perhaps too subtle for the bot.

Yeah got mine at 20. As for subtle probably right I've heard that the mention of "school" or "high school" can be enough sometimes for the boot from the bot. Still wondering how the hell the damn thing works.

Smashwords has their "meat grinder" which I suppose is similar but I have not had problems yet with that.

 

[lovecraft68]

Well, yes. Except . . . You were trying assert that getting it out early would keep the bot off your back, and my entire point in commenting on that was that this wasn't true. I'd done it last week and the bot rejected the story anyway.

Beyond that, you don't know what I do with my time other than write. But we certainly know what you do with yours--because you describe your life to us ad nauseum. All of which makes your ragging on me about talking about myself on the forum really, really hilarious.

Sure I do you gave me the rundown the other night including cooking twp meals. And some other domestic stuff.

Sides on the details of my life? All a game there friend, but not one that involves you. I'm baiting a blast from the past that just happens to be a Lit member. Just waiting for them to put everything together.