maybe i’m swinging a bat at a hornet’s nest here but i honestly think that people are right to be critical of ao3. like, obviously they can’t moderate everything posted on the site perfectly all the time, but it’s pretty hard to look at the amount of seriously fucked up and even illegal content on there and argue that there are no flaws in the current system in place.

allowing people to self-regulate the content they view is one thing, and i respect that decision, because freedom of choice comes with a responsibility we as individuals have to ensure our own safety and wellbeing when making those choices. but the fact that there are basically no additional checks in place to ensure content being posted is at least dubiously morally and legally correct is, to me, significantly more problematic, as it is at this point that the effect of the content moves beyond the individual and branches out to those who access the content.

and it’s all well and fine saying “well, people have to read the tags and make informed decisions about what they view”, but that’s part of the problem. there are no compulsory tags one has to use on ao3, and no penalties for incorrect tagging unless the issue is flagged up, and even then the processing of complaints and applying a solution is slow at best, or simply ignored by the site’s mods at worst. and i’m not trying to blame the mods, who are mostly volunteers and have a very tough job keeping the site in order, but the fact remains that ao3 as a whole has some significant issues it needs to address, and if it wants to keep asking for hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations several times a year, then it needs to do something to prove it cares about its client base and acknowledges their concerns. and it won’t, unless that client base is critical of it.

so by all means donate to ao3 if you wish, and carry on enjoying reading the fanworks published on there. but also try to think critically about what exactly you’re supporting, and listen to those who have concerns about how the site operates rather than just dismissing them for threatening your personal enjoyment of it. but, like, that’s just my opinion man ¯\_(ツ)_/¯