Turn off anon on your askbox. The harassment will dry up fast.
Enable comment moderation on your fics.
Get over your discomfort around the block button and use it liberally. It will protect you.
Keep an eye out for the warnings signs. Vaguely TERFy arguments, erasure of bisexual characters, referring to the AO3 in a disparaging or insulting way, posts that vaguely refer to Bad People in fandom without elaborating, statements about how Good People ship this specific thing so they’re good, etc. Block them all.
Stay out of the maintags, but follow personal blogs. Expand the network; if you see one of your mutuals reblogging a cool person a lot, go follow that person.
Don’t try to debate an anti. They care more about fictional characters than living, breathing people, and they will use any public show of contention as a rallying cry. Once an anti knows you’ll debate one of them, they’ll sic the whole group on you.
Spread positivity whenever you can. Leave good tags on art and meta you reblog. Comment on every fic you like. Antis foster an atmosphere of fear and hopelessness, in which people stop wanting to participate because what’s the point? The point is that antis are a vocal minority, and we’re greater than them.
Make fandom what you want it to be.
If you start to wonder if you’re the bad guy, if you really are a terrible person, remember these are people who have singled out mostly female and queer creators with no support systems, with no clout. They focus on small creators because they have a better chance to silence you than a mainstream creator that has actual influence on culture.
Because it’s not about you being a bad guy. It’s about how good it feels to be outraged and to win. They don’t give a shit about helping anyone. And you’re better than them.
And in the end, if you absolutely have to engage with antis, I recommend being as fucking vicious as possible. Because I’ve been a passive observer and an active participant in this shit, and I can tell you true that being nice to antis doesn’t matter. They already see you as Dirty and Gross, they have already dehumanized you. So fuck them up.
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