Hello there.

[TopHatAndTea]

Greetings, my fellow authours. I have joined exceedingly recently and have a question concerning the submission policy of this Website. Now, obviously the stories published cannot have explicit sexual conduct with underage characters for... obvious reasons. HOWEVER! Can the stories have underage characters used exclusively for the plot?

Please help. I have genuinely debated this for... a lot :3

 

[BeechLeaf]

You can have children in stories. No problem. You can't have them anywhere near sexual content, though. Not explicit content, not watching, not thinking about it, not hinting or suggesting anything. Don't try to sneak underage characters into the sexual parts of the story. This is a very strict policy.

 

[TopHatAndTea]

Awesome! Thank you so much, BeechLeaf. Much appreciated!

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Good question and welcome to the AH!

 

[RejectReality]

It's best if you get any underage character well out of range before the naughty bits start to remove any hint of ambiguity. If the kids live in the house where the sex is going to happen, drop something in there about them going to school, or grandmas, or something of that nature. Or take it to a hotel. Things like that.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

An often debated subject.

There are a lot of opinions based solely on someone's perception of the underage rule, or why they believe that their own submission didn't pass, but few of these are useful as definitive advice on the subject.

The reality is that you can have underage characters in a story, but they cannot be "engaged" in any sexual activity. The dilemma for many writers is understanding what "engaged" means where their own story is concerned.

I think most agree that anything beyond underage outside-the-clothes petting would likely get rejected. Viewing, hearing, or otherwise being aware of the sexual activity of others also crosses the line.

Underage characters can "know" about sex. They can think about it and talk about it, but only in obscure and generalized fashion with nothing graphic or too detailed being described.

Some examples from stories published on this site include: High school boys making jokes abut the bra size of a girl. Boyfriend and girlfriend kiss and hug. A teenage son or daughter learn of one parent's infidelity. There is a reference about an underage character losing their virginity at some point. Depending upon the context in which the content is presented, you should be okay.

The benchmark I have used successfully is to ensure that the activities of underage characters cannot be viewed as arousing, titillating, or sexually exciting by the average person.

 

[nice90sguy]

Greetings, my fellow authours. I have joined exceedingly recently and have a question concerning the submission policy of this Website. Now, obviously the stories published cannot have explicit sexual conduct with underage characters for... obvious reasons. HOWEVER! Can the stories have underage characters used exclusively for the plot?

Please help. I have genuinely debated this for... a lot :3

Obviously a lot of adult characters in these stories will have kids, or interact with them. They're a major part of life, and including them in the story is fine -- similarly, making a character a pet-owner will not trigger a bestiality alert!