Writing Resources from Fifteen Minutes of Fiction

Banned!

I love this little community of writers. I say little, but in reality we have almost eight hundred members on this site...not such a little group after all. Many of these members use the site as a private storage place for their writing, many write two or three pieces, then forget about us, but a few keep coming back week after week, month after month, to share their creativity with us all.

I love it.

Most of our members understand that this is an educational website, designed to be used by school children and their teachers, and as such, we have very strict guidelines for what we will permit people to post. Vulgar language, sexual content, and violent, gory content will not be permitted.

Once in awhile someone will post something that doesn't match those guidelines. They discover their mistake very quickly, because their writing gets flagged as inappropriate, and remains hidden from the public. It's happened to a few of you, and most of you have been very gracious about it. You read the terms and conditions of the site, then send me a courteous email that says, "I didn't realize I was breaking the rules of the site; if I edit this and take out the offensive content, will it be okay to publish it?"

That's not my pet peeve. In fact, I love getting emails like that. It shows that the writer who broke the rules sincerely wants to make use of the site.

No, here's my pet peeve. It's the writers who join the site and, without bothering to read any of the terms and conditions of the site, try to publicly post a piece of writing filled with scatological invectives and f-bombs. Then, when they discover that their account has been disabled, even then they do not bother to read the terms and conditions of the site. Oh, no. That would be far too much work! Instead they send me nasty emails demanding that I tell them why their account has been disabled.

When I receive emails like that, I'm tempted to reply back with something like this:

Dear sir,

When you joined this site, you checked a checkbox that says you agreed to the site's terms and conditions. Apparently you checked that box without looking at what you were agreeing to.

After you joined the site you were sent to a page that had, in TWO places, links to help you understand the kinds of content you may post on this site. Apparently you didn't read those, either.

When your account was suspended, you were sent to a page which instructed you to read the site's terms and conditions:

Unable to login. This user account has been suspended. Please read the site's Membership Agreement, and then contact the site administrator by Postal Mail explaining why you should have your account reinstated. When you write, be sure to include the following information in your letter: User ID: ###

I'm guessing you didn't read that, either.

The fact that you are sending me an email at all suggests to me that maybe, just maybe, you are completely incapable of reading.

If you can't read, you can't be much of a writer, either, so what is the point in being a member on this site?

Practice up on your reading skills for a year or two, and then maybe you can come back.

Hmm...that's not very nice. I guess I just won't reply at all.

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