this post was submitted on 18 Jun 2025
1069 points (97.9% liked)
196
3633 readers
2213 users here now
Community Rules
You must post before you leave
Be nice. Assume others have good intent (within reason).
Block or ignore posts, comments, and users that irritate you in some way rather than engaging. Report if they are actually breaking community rules.
Use content warnings and/or mark as NSFW when appropriate. Most posts with content warnings likely need to be marked NSFW.
Most 196 posts are memes, shitposts, cute images, or even just recent things that happened, etc. There is no real theme, but try to avoid posts that are very inflammatory, offensive, very low quality, or very "off topic".
Bigotry is not allowed, this includes (but is not limited to): Homophobia, Transphobia, Racism, Sexism, Abelism, Classism, or discrimination based on things like Ethnicity, Nationality, Language, or Religion.
Avoid shilling for corporations, posting advertisements, or promoting exploitation of workers.
Proselytization, support, or defense of authoritarianism is not welcome. This includes but is not limited to: imperialism, nationalism, genocide denial, ethnic or racial supremacy, fascism, Nazism, Marxism-Leninism, Maoism, etc.
Avoid AI generated content.
Avoid misinformation.
Avoid incomprehensible posts.
No threats or personal attacks.
No spam.
Moderator Guidelines
Moderator Guidelines
- Don’t be mean to users. Be gentle or neutral.
- Most moderator actions which have a modlog message should include your username.
- When in doubt about whether or not a user is problematic, send them a DM.
- Don’t waste time debating/arguing with problematic users.
- Assume the best, but don’t tolerate sealioning/just asking questions/concern trolling.
- Ask another mod to take over cases you struggle with, if you get tired, or when things get personal.
- Ask the other mods for advice when things get complicated.
- Share everything you do in the mod matrix, both so several mods aren't unknowingly handling the same issues, but also so you can receive feedback on what you intend to do.
- Don't rush mod actions. If a case doesn't need to be handled right away, consider taking a short break before getting to it. This is to say, cool down and make room for feedback.
- Don’t perform too much moderation in the comments, except if you want a verdict to be public or to ask people to dial a convo down/stop. Single comment warnings are okay.
- Send users concise DMs about verdicts about them, such as bans etc, except in cases where it is clear we don’t want them at all, such as obvious transphobes. No need to notify someone they haven’t been banned of course.
- Explain to a user why their behavior is problematic and how it is distressing others rather than engage with whatever they are saying. Ask them to avoid this in the future and send them packing if they do not comply.
- First warn users, then temp ban them, then finally perma ban them when they break the rules or act inappropriately. Skip steps if necessary.
- Use neutral statements like “this statement can be considered transphobic” rather than “you are being transphobic”.
- No large decisions or actions without community input (polls or meta posts f.ex.).
- Large internal decisions (such as ousting a mod) might require a vote, needing more than 50% of the votes to pass. Also consider asking the community for feedback.
- Remember you are a voluntary moderator. You don’t get paid. Take a break when you need one. Perhaps ask another moderator to step in if necessary.
founded 5 months ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
If anyone is looking for some ~~good~~ fucking amazing books by an awesome and genuinely fun and good natured dude, check out Jason Pargin, he is awesome and not problematic and his books are all bangers, and he also enabled and actively supports the careers of many other super awesome and creative people. Also, listen to Bigfeets.
I've been wanting to read his books for a while. I have quite a few that I own and still need to read, though. Any particular book recommendations from him? John Dies at the End? Zoey Ashe series?
There really are no wrong answers. The JDATE books are cosmic reality bending lovecraftian horror, and the Zoey books are a Bladerunner-esque sci-fi about a future you can see from here. The first thing i read of his was John Dies At The End, and I think that is a really good place to start.
The tiktok guy?
The very same
If we're recommending authors, my favorite is Jasper Fforde. He wrote this book called Shades of Grey (which unfortunately came out around the same time as that book) that's about people who can only see one color (sorry, colour), and the hue that they can see determines their social standing. I have been waiting over a decade for the sequel and he just released it (Red Side Story) last year. My brain has been bad at letting me read books, so it sits on the shelf but I loved the first one.
I really hope there's no problematicism around him (as that's the subject of the thread), but reading his books it's hard to imagine there could be.
I also love Jasper Fforde, and it is because he was guest of honour at a Jodi Taylor event that I also got into her books. She writes a series about time-travelling historians which I would recommend.
She also writes at a much faster pace than Fforde does these days, so that's a plus. I was never half as annoyed waiting for GRR Martin to write A Dance With Dragons as I was waiting for Red Side Story!
ooo, thank you for the recommendation. I look forward to it. i was recently gifted Grady Hendrix's The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires. I know they say don't judge a book by its cover, but i judged this one by its title and d(-_☆).
The last three books that weren't technical manuals i tried to read, i got 100 pages in and realized i hadn't retained anything. working on it, but i'm not exactly excited about reading so much. goddamn grad school broke my brain.
I love the guy but I'm sure you could find an instance of him being problematic. Like his pen name, David Wong, is questionable given he's not asian.
Stephen King is Scots-Irish and he used the pen name Richard Bachman despite not being German.
there is a long and respected history of mocking germans.
He stopped using it for that very reason, and took accountability. People are allowed to self correct, if he understands the problem with what he did and course corrected without being called out for it what would throwing more stones accomplish?
Edit: Also, not a big enough deal to say you shouldn't read his books. Especially considering the narrative reason as to why he was using it.
I'm not throwing any stones, yo. I'm just pointing out you can't exactly say he's not problematic. I have a tolerance for problematicity so it's of no bother to me.
The word problematic is kind of weasely used this way. The pen name had an in-universe rationale that made sense and was funny because of the incongruity. Merely alluding to the existence of ethnicity isn't "problematic" in itself.
I'm not the on who brought the word problematic into this conversation. But I bet you if I put a poll on, say, tumblr, asking about different potentially problematic things, "pretending to be asian" would score highly on the problematic scale.
He wasn't pretending to be asian, though, the book John Dies at The End makes that very clear and gives a silly in universe reason for the now dead pseudonym. It really was not problematic, even at the time of it being used.
If he was still using the pseudonym and making excuses to keep using it, sure, but I’m of the opinion that once someone understands what they have done wrong and took the opportunity to learn from it and do better there is no more wrong doing. There are, of course, exceptions to this, but a pseudonym that someone came up with in their 20’s and had the wherewithal later to say, “That’s not ok, I need to stop doing that” and stopped doing that for the right reasons is pretty far from a reason to call them problematic, especially when it wasn’t a decision made under any form of duress and he has made no attempt at defending his choice to have used that pseudonym and stated it was not ok for him to have used that pseudonym.
Why is that questionable?
Stolen Valor
?
How does being or not being Asian plays into this?
"Stolen valor" can be used in a humorous way beyond its original meaning as someone pretending to be a veteran. For example, there's a funny Youtube video about a tradesperson encountering a hipster wearing Carhartt workwear and using the phrase "stolen valor" to describe him.
Ok, so it was a joke?
English is not my first language so I'm asking for clarification not trying to be snarky.
I like to think my comment qualifies as clarification. I'm not trying to be snarky either.
OK, maybe a little snarky.
What? :D
I'm asking if you are implying that the person replying "stolen valor" to my question was making a joke or if I don't understand something obvious.
Why is it stolen valor to have an Asian pen name? As I see it, you don't want people to know that it is you, so it is another layer of obfuscation. Which is good if your goal is to be undercover.
Being asian is awesome so pretending to be asian is stolen valor. Also the idea that you're awesome just because you're asian is ridiculous so the joke works on many levels.
Oh John dies at the end is in my top ten all time favorites possibly even #1 and I don't even like horror.
That whole series is as good as it gets for me, hands down. John, Dave, and Amy are the mother fuckin’ GOATS.
Edit: The Zoey Ashe and The Suits series is every bit as good if you’re into sci-fi, and Black Box of Doom is a fantastic stand alone story set in the modern world. Neither are connected to the reality or events of [UNDISCLOSED]. He’s also currently working on the next book in the JDATE series which will release next year.