And I realized that I have zero desire to read their work specifically because of that opinion.

I read non-tagged stuff, especially in the older archive content because porting stuff from external archives often left it without even pairings. I will delve right into non-tagged stuff and use my own discretion; I am an adult who has a great many opinions and doesn’t need my hand held. The attitude that tags are somehow detrimental, however, struck me as first off: cutting themselves off at the knees (okay, but what if I’m searching a trope? just...just let me find your fic). More so, however, was that the way this was presented it was as much as declaring that this author knows better about what I need to be reading than I do, because they wrote it and their work is somehow inviolable. 

Now. 

I have an instinctive, gut-deep reaction to people implying they know what’s best for me and that is “fuck you.” I’m a million times less willing to trust an author that, up front, says ‘I am deliberately not going to tell you literally anything about this story, but you gotta trust me.’ I do not need to trust you. If you’re telling me that you’re deliberately not tagging, then I’m immediately suspicious. What are you hiding that you think I’m not going to like? I absolutely get that tagging in particular ways creates a different reader relationship with a work of fiction. Sure, I get that. Stories are experiences that depend a great deal on what the reader brings in with them, the information in the tags included. 

I’ve yet to encounter a tag, however, that changed my reading experience for the worse. If something was tagged for that I knew I didn’t want to read, I usually noped out of the fic anyways when I hit that element even when I tried to take a stab at reading. If you tag something ‘temporary character death,’ I’m gonna to read to the end of the story. I’m ‘spoiled’ that it’s temporary, but you know what? I wouldn’t have read to the end of the story if it I didn’t know that upfront. My relationship with the element was fundamentally changed in a way that allowed me to engage with at all. 

Tag your shit. Don’t tag your shit. You’re the author, I don’t care, I’ll just leave your fic if I hit something I don’t like. Just don’t imply you know what’s best for me and that you’re doing something reactionary for my benefit. 

Como eu passei boa parte da minha existência sem saber que podia baixar todos os artigos da Contrariwise, traduzi-los  e lê-los? E depois usar como recurso no tribunal moralista brasileiro que chama Lewis Carroll de estuprador? Para ser chamada de apedeuta e dizerem que estou defendendo um pedófilo porque nesse tribunal só tem gente ignorante que ama odiar e condenar?E então experimentar com um público mais intelectualizado porém carente de informações a respeito de Carroll na língua portuguesa (até a própria Sociedade Lewis Carroll do Brasil admitiu ser mais artística do que teórica) expor essas ideias e então as pessoas enxergarem que Lewis Carroll vai muito além da “tal polêmica”? E então, como boa advogada cumpridora do seu papei de difusão da imagem  carrolliana que o século XXI respeita, me tornar aos olhos de uma outra Isabela uma carrolliana revi a ser ludibriada, e ao perceber tal ocultação, fingir que não percebi nada e dizer “na escola que você estuda, eu dei aula para os seus professores”, e finalmente descobrir que tudo na vida é um ciclo sem fim, e quando ninguém tiver olhando, eu me vestir com minhas roupas de senhora, ir no batizado do oitavo filho da Charlotte com Alec, mas sem que ninguém saiba desse compromisso, publicar uma tese explicando o quanto Lewis Carroll era inocente dessas acusações (porque não, acredito que esse mito nunca morrerá, e a questão é simples, as pessoas amam odiar e condenar, não só no Brasil, é muito cômodo você apontar os erros de uma pessoa que fez mais coisas do que você para você não se sentir tão inferiorizado) e então uma dessa novas Isabelas lerá e cansada de ler no facebook (ou rede social do futuro) sobre Carroll ser um Jack safado, apesar de..., prosseguirá com a sina.

I also got some writing done about Maeglin. (I think my headcanon for him is worse than what Tolkien wrote.)