Vocabulary Issues (Maybe)

[TrulyFictitious]

I'm frustrated, looking for direction, and would be appreciative of any advice I get.

My fourth story submitted was rejected. It started out with the characters, all of whom were clearly stated to be adults aged 18 or over, all of whom had graduated from secondary schools in their homelands, all of whom were attending college, and most of whom were living in a foreign country.

Much of the dialog between characters -- which is what caused the story to be rejected as being "underage" -- is around what constitutes naivete. Students who grew up in material affluence considered those who grew up in a more modest economic environment to lack experience, while those who had few material possessions viewed the affluent as being naive cogs in the system. In the end, they found that they were both half-right and half-wrong.

I have been told I have a vocabulary issue; that the word "girl" means a woman under 18; "child" means a person under 18; "childish" means someone who isn't an adult; and "baby" means an infant under two years of age.

At first I was angry, I could point out dozens of published stories where these words were used, but decided to ask: am I wrong do people in the US not say "she's being a big baby" referring to an adult who is overly emotional about trivial matters? Really? But that isn't the issue, maybe there is a nuance I don't see.

So I thought I would ask the question: What words would you published authors use to refer to people who are over 18 but hold childish beliefs. People who believe that they live in the "best of all possible worlds," that they aren't being lied to by people with ulterior motives, people who do not have their best interests at heart. How does one refer to an emotionally or intellectually immature person who is 18 or over?

Thank You

 

[SimonDoom]

It's hard to answer your question without more information. I don't think vocabulary alone would get your story dinged.

My understanding of the underage rule is stories may be rejected if you nominally designate everyone as of age but they act and talk in a way that makes it appear you are striving for an underage effect in your story. But I don't know enough to know if that's what's going on.

 

[NotWise]

I'm with Simon. It's really hard to give you a good answer from what you've told us. Vocabulary is probably not the problem, as "baby" and "girl" are often used as terms of affection for adults.

Without really knowing, it's possible that the degree of naivete you've given your characters is too much for Laurel to find your characters believably over eighteen.

 

[jaF0]

Sounds like we need a paragraph or two that includes some of the dialog.

There are whole fetishes here involving adults role playing younger, not the least of which is the adult baby thing.

 

[Bramblethorn]

If you are certain that your story doesn't contain under-age content (which includes masturbation, under-age characters fantasising/being fantasised about, and characters who are stated to be over 18 but clearly written as younger) then I'd recommend resubmitting it unchanged, but using the "Notes" field to indicate that there's no under-age sex.

AFAICT, what often happens is something like this:

- Author submits a story
- Laurel (story editor) runs a scan for terms that are often associated with under-age content
- If these terms are found, the story gets bounced to the author with a "was there under-age content?" message.
- Sometimes these are false positives.

By adding a note, you can let Laurel know to look past the word-search results and check the story more closely.

 

[KeithD]

Presume there are no flashbacks to earlier ages than 18 that include any sexual activity then (including voyeur)?

 

[Rustyoznail]

I’ve edited a couple of stories which were pinged for underage contact. Basically the problem was something like “I’d always fanaticised about her, right from high school.” Deleted high school - it passed.

As far as key words go, I’ve used all those you have but it’s all about the context.

If you want someone to read your story, flick me a pm.

 

[TrulyFictitious]

Harry Chapin, an American songwriter and storyteller whom I rather like, wrote the song ‘All My Life's a Circle’. William Shakespeare said much the same thing, well that has just been proven true once again. Sadly, politely framed opinions that disagree with the mainstream are not welcome here. My first attempt at writing and I will freely admit that it was not Ernest Hemingway, before being subsequently taken down, stayed up long enough for me to note that it had a score of 4.33.

PS: I did not write the story that's currently the lone work sitting under my user name in the story catalog here and I don't know who did.

They were three interconnected stand-alone stories. A kind of Alex Haley-ish looks at the settlement of the Andros Islands (Bahamas). In my earlier post, I tried to be coy about my homeland and my family because I literally come from an island that has a mere 1500 residents today and had far fewer when I was growing up. Yes, just like in the story -- if you got to read it -- the census takers always had amazingly even numbers, 130 in Rolle Bay, 30 in Calico, 60 in Judith’s Harbour.

It was intercultural romance, the interracial part being taken care of centuries ago. The ethnic mix of most of the people on Andros is Seminole Indian, with a large amount of African blood -- from slaves who escaped from the Spanish and went to live with the Seminole before Andrew Jackson drove the Seminole out of Florida and direct violation of the treaty that the United States had signed with Spain -- and European from French and Spanish prisoners and from British loyalists like my fictional Miller family who left southern states after losing the revolutionary war in 1783. I'm not making this stuff up, Wikipedia has the CliffsNotes version if you're interested, obviously, I thought my version was better.

I now understand what it is about my writing that sets off alarms, and I understand how saying submitted works are underage is an easy catch-all. Everybody agrees that certain things are inappropriate here. I rewrote that series of three into a single longer story that would go in the erotic pages, striping out the historical flashbacks that explained the place and culture and submitting that story as an “Essay.” My stand-alone essay which has nothing more sexual in it than the fact that Taino Indians do not form nuclear fact families but rather stay gender-defined clans has been rejected for being “underage.”

Now, the last time I checked, the rule about underage sexuality didn't ban characters under 18. It banned sexual knowledge between characters that were under 18. But when I argued this point the response I got was that my story wasn't believable the way I told it. That I had modified the story to make the characters whom academic works say would have engaged in sexual activity before being 18 years of age older “upaging” them which is not permitted.

The problem with that argument is that in all cultures people do become aware of sex before age 18, Health Canada, the US NIH, and Britain's NHS all say that the median boy or girl have their first sexual experience before they are 18 years of age.

This is where the ‘All My Life’s A Circle’ part comes in. When I was going to college in Montreal decades ago I was considered to be the ignorant unworldly little black girl from an impoverished background. But what we lacked in material goods we more than made up for in another arena. For instance, while we didn’t wear shoes to school -- more because it was always quite temperate, 70 F as a low and 90 F as a high year-round, yes we used English measure back then go into the little towns in the Bahamas and they still use English measure today -- we learned the basic skills and how to think critically far better than some who went to much more affluent schools.

“The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.” -- Vince Lombardi

My fourth story, or maybe sixth depending on how you count them, whose rejection caused me to make the OP, featured young college women. I was two years past my high school graduation at the time. The protagonist was discussing how childish it was that people couldn’t see past their own narrow experiences and see that their view wasn’t universally held. She called legal adults “little children,” “babies,” and “childish.”

She was right. But moreover, every single story on this site should be deleted -- except for the Sci-Fi ones, those authors will have to be served with requests for interrogatories -- because every single story takes place in a society in which median people engage in sex -- not in the story mind you, but in the society -- before they are 18. This argument is clearly ridiculous and I am just wasting my time. Sorry to have wasted yours.

 

[KeithD]

You're dancing around the issue, I think--and your argument, if there is one, is with Laurel, the submissions editor, not in hazy references on the discussion board. Arguing whatever case you have here is just spinning wheels. No one here has any decisionmaking power in this and you aren't clearly defining what the issue is.

 

[oggbashan]

Claiming that other classic authors did it has no weight at all.

This is Literotica and the sites' rules are set by the owners.

If they think your words -'Look like a duck, walk like a duck, and sound like a duck' as far as making the characters appear underage they will not accept the story.

Disclaimers such as 'all characters are over 18' don't work if the characters behave as if they are not.

 

[ElectricBlue]

My fourth story, or maybe sixth depending on how you count them, whose rejection caused me to make the OP, featured young college women. I was two years past my high school graduation at the time. The protagonist was discussing how childish it was that people couldn’t see past their own narrow experiences and see that their view wasn’t universally held. She called legal adults “little children,” “babies,” and “childish.”

If your stories repeatedly used words like this, there's your problem. Your content most likely triggers a word search bot and doesn't pass Go. All of the rest of your substantiation, the historical veracity etc. is irrelevant.

This is an erotica writing site with content policies that you must work within to get published here. The rest of us have figured it out, so can you. You seem to be taking a very academic approach - read your content as fiction, read the descriptions of any person under eighteen very closely, and don't repeatedly use language that denotes childlike behaviour.

Your comment that you didn't write the single remaining story under your account is just strange. It's your account, using your password, therefore on face value it's your story. Whose else can it be?

 

[TrulyFictitious]

If they think your words -'Look like a duck, walk like a duck, and sound like a duck' as far as making the characters appear underage they will not accept the story.

Disclaimers such as 'all characters are over 18' don't work if the characters behave as if they are not.

Sir,

I have the greatest respect for you and your work. You are my favorite ostensibly male author here.

But in this, you are mistaken.

Recipe for a DD-LG story published here, there are many.
1. Write a paragraph establishing main characters as being of age -- say a husband and wife sad their youngest moved away to live in a college dorm -- wishing for a "baby" to are for but doing the math, they'll be old when the kid is in high school. So, they got into DD-LG play.
2. Add an otherwise unacceptable sex story about an adult male and a female adolescent.
3. Go back and toss in a few references at slow points that "remind" the reader that it's a "game" -- maybe her cell beeps, an annoying text from a nervous co-worker about the 'Johnson Presentation' at the 'law firm" tomorrow.
4. Add a short "afterglow" paragraph reframing the otherwise unacceptable sex story about an adult male and a female adolescent as a "game."

Recipe for a non-con story published here, there are many.
1. Write a paragraph establishing the main characters as being intimate and sane -- say a husband and wife looking to spice up their sex life. So, they got into rape play.
2. Add an otherwise unacceptable sex story about a rape.
3. Go back and toss in a few references at slow points that "remind" the reader that it's a "game" -- maybe her cell beeps, an annoying text from a nervous co-worker about the 'Johnson Presentation' at the 'law firm" tomorrow.
4. Make her have multiple screaming orgasms.
5. Add a couple of "afterglow" paragraphs reframing the otherwise unacceptable sex story as a "game," have her say something like "I would never want that to happen in real life, but here, with you my love it's safe to explore our fantasies. Because I know you'd never hurt me."

Recipe for an LW story published here, there are many.
1. Write a paragraph establishing the main characters as being of age.
2. Add an otherwise unacceptable sex story about a bunch of misogynistic feces, maybe retell the story of Eve, the Apple, and the Serpent.
3. Go back and toss in a few references at slow points that "remind" the reader that the female MC deserves whatever is coming up.
4. Kill the female MC -- just don't make it a snuff story -- or do something equally nasty to her.

You are totally correct in that it's a Jury of one.

I had initially written because I thought that my message was not being conveyed, that like Bramblethorn suggested a bot was flagging words -- I cannot figure out if BT is a woman who understands men or a man who understands women -- but I now understand that my problem is that it was being conveyed.

The rules say "everything is fiction," and "no characters under eighteen."

But that isn't what they mean.

My story was not an autobiography, IRL I graduated from a small parochial school on a small island and was sent to work in a non-teaching position at a school the religious order ran on one of the Andros Islands in order to determine if I really had what it took to be sent abroad for college. My fourth (or maybe sixth) story was based on this experience. A 19/20-year-old woman talking about things with other 18/22-year-old women including flashbacks to when she was 18/19 and that year of working between high school and college, a lot was about those islands unique culture.

The historical references to the culture were the offending part, not the words used. There are lots of FAP stories here, I thought a nice story about a time and place might be welcome -- because that's what I like to read. Here I have read about growing up in China, on an Australian cattle ranch, in the Midwest USA, or in the West Village of NYC, working as a taxi driver or in advertising.

I thought I could add something, and that it would be fun. Wrong and wrong.

In my story the characters are all 18 or over, I made no references to anyone being underage. But if you read a text-book about the culture I wrote about there were many women "married off" earlier than 18.

NEWSFLASH! It was EXACTLY THE SAME in the US, Canada, and England too, in fact, it was the British who brought the institution of marriage to my home island. A place that is geographically -- and in some ways culturally -- closer to Moa, Cuba, and Cape Haitien than Nassau. The Taino did not marry and so far as slaves went the French and Spanish saw it as a legal complication.

I went to school in Montreal. In Quebec girls of 12 and boys of 14 could marry with parental permission. I've lived in Cuba, you had to be 16 there but didn't need anyone's permission. 16 was also the minimum in many US States. The furor in England over a certain musician who married his 13-year-old cousin was that she lied on the application SAYING SHE WAS 14 because that was the minimum at the time.

I get that saying everyone else speeds doesn't work with the traffic cop. But the situation is clear. Only some of the cars -- like maybe the ones with out of state licence plates -- are being clocked.

 

[TrulyFictitious]

Your comment that you didn't write the single remaining story under your account is just strange. It's your account, using your password, therefore on face value it's your story. Whose else can it be?

https://www.literotica.com/s/primera-first-class

I'm really not trying to make waves here. I'm not saying it's a bad story, but I didn't write it. Someone did, and they aren't getting credit for it unless it's posted here with a different title. A quick google search doesn't show it a second time under this title.

 

[TrulyFictitious]

Read the descriptions of any person under eighteen very closely ...

That's a big part of my point: there intentionally aren't any. The story started with her reflecting on the fact that she got on the boat to Andros three months after her 18th birthday. Then it fast-forwarded to Montreal, stated to be at least a whole year later. "Unlike the teachers, who had summers off, the staff had 365-day contracts." All of the flashbacks took place on Andros. I did that because I specifically don't want to mention the island I grew up on by name, or describe it in detail.

And don't repeatedly use language that denotes childlike behaviour ...

As a speaker of "Australian" what words would you use to describe people who while technically adults are so naive that they believe that the world is just, all poor people are lazy, everybody gets exactly what they deserve in life, bad people don't catch deadly diseases, children don't get cancer if you get raped you had it coming?

I hope that didn't come off as snarky, it wasn't meant to be, it was a serious question.

Thank You

 

[oggbashan]

You are still missing the point. Lit's rules have only one arbiter. She thinks you are breaking them.

It is up to you to convince her, not us, that you aren't.

Your arguments on this thread don't change her view but show you are trying to argue around them. That will get you nowhere.

You have to persuade Laurel. Even if she reads this thread and probably won't, what you say here doesn't convince me and I'm sure it wouldn't convince her either.

 

[ElectricBlue]

As a speaker of "Australian" what words would you use to describe people who while technically adults are so naive that they believe that the world is just, all poor people are lazy, everybody gets exactly what they deserve in life, bad people don't catch deadly diseases, children don't get cancer if you get raped you had it coming?

It comes down to this - if you want your content to get published on Lit, you need to follow the rules, not indulge in long diatribes where you seem to be making some social point (although I don't know what it is).

You need to scrub through your content and consider every sentence with the question - could these words allude to under eighteen sexual activity in any way? If the answer is yes, change it; and if needs be, tell a different story.

You can clearly write, but by fighting City Hall, you're not helping yourself get content published.

 

[SimonDoom]

I get that saying everyone else speeds doesn't work with the traffic cop. But the situation is clear. Only some of the cars -- like maybe the ones with out of state licence plates -- are being clocked.

No. This is very likely not what's going on.

There is something you are not confronting. Nobody here knows what it is, because we haven't seen your story. My guess is if you let others here see your story they would diagnose the problem right away.

I'm not trying to be antagonistic, but this is a common pattern. Somebody new to the site somehow runs afoul of the rules and they believe they are being treated unfairly. It's usually not true.

 

[oggbashan]

...

I'm not trying to be antagonistic, but this is a common pattern. Somebody new to the site somehow runs afoul of the rules and they believe they are being treated unfairly. It's usually not true.

New authors get closer scrutiny than established authors who have been putting stories on the site for years.

The reason is obvious. A newbie is an unknown quantity and might inadvertently breach Lit's rules. An established author is far less likely to but still could so so unintentionally - as I have done.

For me, like most of us, a rejection means that we look at our story again and try to work around the identified problem before resubmitting. If we do not agree that the problem exists, a PM to Laurel might solve the situation. But most times, rejection is for a cause.

That's what you have to do. Arguing about the rule gets you nowhere. You have to demonstrate that you have changed your story to avoid the identified problem.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Let’s roll this back and reset.

Discussions about real-world marriage laws and when people IRL lose their virginity are fine, but not particularly relevant. Literotica is a privately-owned site and has a cast-in-concrete policy which bars any and all mention of pre-18 sexuality.

That rule is certainly unrealistic when held against the real world and, yes, it would bar Willy Shakespeare from submitting Romeo and Juliet. Yup. But it’s a site rule, a hoop we all have to go through. If we don’t like it, we can go somewhere else. Arguing it against the median age for losing one’s virginity in the islands or in Montréal or in Moscow is simply pointless.

Second point. All submitted stories are supposed to be checked by one person, Laurel, the owner, before being posted. Given the number of submissions, it has been speculated that some sort of screening programme is used - back to the ‘false positive’ concept. You can resubmit with an explanation or argument. You’ve been told that. I’ve done that myself.

You’ve had several people take the time to note that it’s hard to comment fully without actually being able to read the story. At least one has been generous enough to offer to beta read it for you. Not doubting your honesty, but it’s hard to believe that an essay of your was rejected simply and solely because it stated, “Taino Indians do not form nuclear fact families but rather stay gender-defined clans.” Nor is it easy to understand why one adult calling another ‘Baby’ has got your story rejected. From the experience of a dozen or so experienced Lit writers, there must be something more. We’d like to help, but absent a chance to see at least some of the rejected material, it’s all conjecture.

Lastly, if there’s a story under your byline which isn’t yours, you can simply ask Laurel to take it down. I’m not sure why that’s germane to your problem with getting a story accepted, but the problem is easily solved. You might consider changing your password, too, if there’s any possibility of it being compromised.

Good luck.

 

[TrulyFictitious]

You need to scrub through your content and consider every sentence with the question - could these words allude to under eighteen sexual activity in any way?

I was told the answer to this is yes ...

Not that I necessarily am, nobody read it ...

But because the WHO says that most women in the Bahamas have sex before they are 18 and that the legal age of majority there is 16.

This is my Social Commentary Part -- BUT ITS THE SAME IN THE US! (GB and Canada too) According to the US Dept of Health and Human Services 37 of 52 "states" have a 16-year-old age of consent, which for this discussion is the same thing -- I'm not sure how reliable that number is because it lists DC and PR as "states" but I digress -- 6 of the remainder are 17 and only 9 have 18 as the AoC -- and 6 of those have exemptions ONE IS 12! for "married persons". In each of the "18" states persons are considered emancipated when married.

tell a different story.

That is the true message.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

... WHO says that most women in the Bahamas have sex before they are 18 and that the legal age of majority there is 16.

This is my Social Commentary Part -- BUT ITS THE SAME IN THE US! (GB and Canada too) According to the US Dept of Health and Human Services 37 of 52 "states" have a 16-year-old age of consent, which for this discussion is the same thing -- I'm not sure how reliable that number is because it lists DC and PR as "states" but I digress -- 6 of the remainder are 17 and only 9 have 18 as the AoC -- and 6 of those have exemptions ONE IS 12! for "married persons". In each of the "18" states persons are considered emancipated when married.

Interesting, but what does it have to do with submitting a work of erotic fiction on a website which - probably to avoid tiresome and expensive legal action in the USA - has a standard barring sex before 18?

 

[TrulyFictitious]

Arguing it against the median age for losing one’s virginity in the islands or in Montréal or in Moscow is simply pointless.

I agree, but I didn't bring it up, a commenter whose complaint caused my story to be removed made the point that my story was "obviously" about high school girls and therefore "underage" rather than about college kids. he pointed out that secondary schools on the outer island go to eighth grade and so a "graduate" could be 14, that person could have worked a year or more n then gone to Uni in Canada at 16.
True, that can be said about many of the stories here

Moscow? I never mentioned the University of Idaho ...

You can resubmit with an explanation or argument. You’ve been told that. I’ve done that myself.

I did. Someone didn't like my story. They complained about it. I don't think the complaint is valid because if universalized it eliminates 90 percent of the library. I am trying hard to be polite. But ...

You’ve had several people take the time to note that it’s hard to comment fully without actually being able to read the story.

It is specifically against the rules here to post over three paragraphs of a story, and any parts of rejected stories or stories that have been taken down (otherwise I would have just posted the entire story here).

I said that in my opinion “Taino Indians do not form nuclear families but rather stay gender-defined clans.” was the closest thing to a statement that might be construed as being sexual. Others did not tell me this.

Nor is it easy to understand why one adult calling another ‘Baby’ has got your story rejected.

As Bramblethorn and Electric Blue suggested a bot counts words and maybe proximity of one listed word to another and an algorithm says "egg" being within twenty words of "separate' "bake" or "whip" flags content as potentially being a recipe.

From the experience of a dozen or so experienced Lit writers, there must be something more. We’d like to help ...

Thanks, it would have been nice to become one of the group.

Lastly, if there’s a story under your byline which isn’t yours, you can simply ask Laurel to take it down. I’m not sure why that’s germane to your problem with getting a story accepted, but the problem is easily solved.

No offense meant to the author, but I don't care about that story. It merely illustrates that bots make errors and sometimes human intervention is needed.

You might consider changing your password, too, if there’s any possibility of it being compromised.

Statistics show close to 100% of security breaches occur at the server or in the communication from the vendor to the server. But businesses always tell consumers to change their passwords. It's like a medical doctor who knows that 95% of all antibiotics are used in factory farming telling you he wants to be conservative because he is worried about antimicrobial resistance. Or the government telling you electric cars don't pollute.

Good luck.

 

[KeithD]

Tuning this out now.

 

[TrulyFictitious]

Interesting, but what does it have to do with submitting a work of erotic fiction on a website which - probably to avoid tiresome and expensive legal action in the USA - has a standard barring sex before 18?

If I wasn't clear I apologize. Three stories I wrote were posted here. A reader complained that they had underage content. The stories were taken down. Age of first sexual experience and age of consent was presumably a point made by the complaintant. I argued that the stories didn't have any under 18 sexual content. I'm sure no human being actually read the stories they made decisions about. I argued that the complaint if universalized -- and I believe that something that cannot be universalized cannot be valid -- eliminates close to the whole catalog.

Now I'm sure I've been flagged as a writer of underage content, so my stories are considered in the light of what I feel is an untrue commentary and must pass a much higher standard. Like my traffic cop analogy, the chief told his officer I'm a "speed demon" cars whizz by at 100, and I'm stopped for doing 24 in a 25 zone because the radar gun is accurate to plus or minus three.

People say write about a 30-year-old not a 20-year-old to avoid being gigged for a flashback to when she was 18 or 19. Why stop there? How about 50. The printed rule is 18 the story was written to comply and it does comply.

Sorry, I'm getting upset.

 

[SimonDoom]

Don't get upset. Just move forward. Adapt. Keep writing. It will do you no good to nurse grievances. Others have figured out how to navigate this Site's rules, and you can too. If you want to.