Petition: Right to Dictate Your Own Species

[Autumn Rain]

You can't seem to answer my questions, Chomp. Please do so, or your arguments will appear to have no foundation.

In all seriousness, can someone in support of this petition please explain the need to exclude sexual orientations from characters that will ultimately not belong to you?

If I understand correctly, Chomp, it isn't that you oppose the LGBTQ community, it's the principle of controlling what you create. But why will it affect you at all?

[abel.]

But I DO not what it means to be oppressed, and homosexuality isn't the only thing in the world being oppressed right now. Little children are dying for my beliefs in parts of the world, mothers and fathers are being tortured in the worst ways possible, people are being kidnapped, and this is all going on right now. And there are a number of situations arising in the US. You can't tell me that I don't know what oppression feels like because that's absolutely wrong.

Yeah, that sucks, but that is not institutionalized/systematic oppression, that is extremist groups doing extremist things. The government isn't oppressing catholics in the united states, the Government does however oppress LGBTQ+ members. You can also walk around the streets freely expressing yourself, especially in America. You will not get beaten for wearing a cross, I will get beat up for holding a girls hand. Acknowledge your privilege and appreciate it.

And being vegetarian is something that is deeply ingrained in a lot of people. They CAN eat meat, and that sense it's a choice, just as much as LBTQ+ people CAN technically date someone of a sexual orientation that they don't prefer.

This is ridiculous. Can you date someone of the same sex, even if you don't prefer them? Probably not.

"more disputes like this over the rule itself being unfair and enabling prejudice"

Except the rule doesn't enable prejudice. If it were directly opposed to users of different communities that's one thing, but it's applied to private species, where the artist already has choices over so much else. It simply gives them the extra control that they should have from the beginning.

Take a minute to think what it would be like to have a prejudice person have this kind of power. They would be able to make a species where no dark-skinned coloration is allowed, or that they would have to believe in a certain god, or they would be able to deny a certain god within the species. This rule would allow bigoted people inflict their bigoted ideologies on others

"also, small tangent, heterophobia is not a thing."

Oppression isn't the meaning of homophobia. It literally means fear of homosexuality and homosexuals. So if you want to be technical, that's not a thing either (or at least there are very few people who are actually diagnosed to be phobic of homosexuals). But people are oppressing straight people more often all the time, and while I still don't have time to pull up sources, it's happening, and there are heterosexuals being oppressed. Right now there is a mentality that exists in the world, especially the US, that says, "if you're white, male, straight, then shut up" basically - and if you happen to fall under any of these categories, your opinions are snuffed out, your concerns left unacknowledged no matter how reasonable, and overall people are becoming far more aggressive towards those who they believe are not oppressed, causing them in actuality to become oppressed. Basically if you DON'T fit into the "oppressed" category, people are claiming rights to be flat out awful to those who fall under anything else. You can't justify hate like that.

You do not get to decide what his homophobic. Again.
If have yet to hear, there is something called straight privilege, white privilege, male privilege, and cis privilege.
They all allow the people you described to live a perfectly normal life without fear of being themselves. They, the people you are talking about, are the ones who try to dictate the lives of minorities, and America is finally getting fed up with it. Nearly every important position of power in this country is taken by a non-minority person. I'd also call crap on the hetersexual oppression, there are no laws against people for being straight, thats just true. Heterosexuals aren't being kicked out of their homes or shot in the street for holding their partners hand.

[muteani]

You can't seem to answer my questions, Chomp. Please do so, or your arguments will appear to have no foundation.



In all seriousness, can someone in support of this petition please explain the need to exclude sexual orientations from characters that will ultimately not belong to you?

If I understand correctly, Chomp, it isn't that you oppose the LGBTQ community, it's the principle of controlling what you create. But why will it affect you at all?



I also have some points that have not been addressed, that I believe should be, such as the issues of actual enforcement, and the workload it would put on the mods

[mr.kingrichard]

Actually, in nature, most (if not all) animal species display some sort of "other" sexuality (aka, something other than heterosexual). There are over 400 documented mammalian species that display homosexual behavior. Realistically speaking, saying that your species must be heterosexual is silly and unrealistic.

[mawsoleum]

I have more errands to run before I can focus on this but this isn't intolerance of a person, this is intolerance of peoples intolerance towards my species being the way that makes me happy and makes me comfortable.

Well, there you go. It doesn't make you comfortable to include queer people. Ask yourself, though, why is this? Why do you have to exclude us, why do we make you unhappy and uncomfortable? That's exactly why people oppose this idea, artists will get away with blatant homophobia and we will be able to do nothing about it.
As for your definition of homophobia, that's not what it means now. Sure, it may have started with a literal definition like that, but it's now become a term to describe those who are intolerant of queer people or uncomfortable with their existence. Please don't try to red herring this, we aren't here to talk about the evolution of a word.

Anyway, moving on to the oppression bit. The reason people don't like to listen to white, straight, cis men is because they are the oppressors. They should have little voice in most social justice issues, because literally nothing affects them. They're told to shut up because their voice always rings the loudest, no matter what it's about, even if it shouldn't. White people aren't hunted down and killed for their skin, straight people aren't sneered at and bullied relentlessly for being straight, cis people aren't constantly misgendered or killed for being cis. When people on the internet say things like "all white people need to shut up" white people are not harmed. When people on the internet say "no one cares" in response to a man, it's because they're angry that men get all say. But, again, no harm is done to the man. In the real world, no one cares if you're cis, a man, white, or straight. No one will bully you for that, and therefore you are not being oppressed.

And being vegetarian is something that is deeply ingrained in a lot of people. They CAN eat meat, and that sense it's a choice, just as much as LBTQ+ people CAN technically date someone of a sexual orientation that they don't prefer.

Also, please just stop with this argument, I'm sick of seeing it. Queer people are not like vegetarians. End of story. Being a vegetarian is a choice, being queer is not. I don't get the second half of that statement, though. What does vegetarianism being a choice have to do with someone queer dating someone of a gender they aren't attracted to?

[plum]

Now you're turning to the literal definition of homophobia to try and make an argument - really?
And yeah, oppression may not be the actual definition of homophobia (google's definition; wiki's), but queer people ARE oppressed EVERYWHERE. Some of us have to deal with it every day - others have to hide their sexuality for their own safety or acceptance within their communities. This is going off topic, though- back to the rules-

The thing is, this rule can and likely would enable prejudice, and even more bad feelings than there already are on CS. If you are allowed to exclude queer people, then what's stopping another person from making a species that doesn't allow PoC adopts to be made? Would the rule stop at the oekaki or would I be able to make a club that excludes everyone except cisgender heterosexual people?

Aaand to add on to the listen of questions for you - are there any other examples of moderators "controlling" someone's adoptables in the sense of rules or traits?

[DoctorDraca]

I think both sides have expressed all their concerns already. I'm locking this topic to prevent further fights. We will take everything into consideration.

[Tess]

Thanks everyone for all the feedback

The team has discussed this issue and decided that it is fair and reasonable for artists to decide on the sexuality of their created adoptables/characters even if this means being restrictive.

We feel that the majority of rules defining sexuality of adoptables are not created because of homophobia, but rather to set up a certain realism for the species and to support certain breeding pairs/possibilities.

There was an issue of an ongoing "unspoken rule" against these kinds of restrictions, caused because of a precedent set by one particular topic which caused problems. This rule is being wiped.

Members who find an adoptable artist's rules to be unreasonable or too restrictive/controlling are encouraged to seek other artists to adopt from instead, rather than put the artist out of their comfort zone. Artists retain the right to choose who can use their designs and under what conditions, within reason.

However if a topic seems to be intentionally inflammatory/offensive please feel free to report it so a moderator can check it out. Members who set out to intentionally upset others or cause trouble with their actions will not be protected by this rule.