Ed. note: If you've come here from an outside website, please be aware that while we strive for these pages to be an accurate and well-documented accounting of events, this is an unofficial and internal wiki for the use of the nonnies at fail_fandomanon. Links marked in red go to posts outside of FFA, and the footnotes are archived versions of these pages.
On April 14, 2015, a nonny asked:
I know it was alluded to, but I want the juicy deets. Something about a panel on noncon fic and how everyone who presented it are all rape apologists? I know graceebooks has been wanking about it, anyone know what happened?
221b Con, a convention for all sorts of Sherlock Holmes–related fandoms and other activities, was held in Atlanta, Georgia the weekend of April 10-12, 2015. On the Saturday evening, a clique of The Johnlock Conspiracy (TJLC) fans, led by Graceebooks, crashed the 18+ panel titled “The Gender Politics of Fandom” and derailed the topic from “the revolutionary implications of fan works created by women for women” to noncon fanworks and how “problematic” their creators are. One panelist, who had just talked about her status as a survivor of sexual violence and her enjoyment of noncon fanworks, broke down crying.
During the panel, one of the group took video without the consent of anyone else in the room. It was eventually posted to YouTube and embedded on Tumblr. (YouTube has since removed the video.) Two of the group created a blog calling the panel moderator, a former friend of theirs, a pedophile. That group and their followers have continued to wank on Tumblr and elsewhere, calling the moderator, the other panelist, and their supporters “pedophiles” and “rape apologists” —including those who are themselves survivors of sexual violence. More information on post-con wank can be found in the sequel: Sherlock 221b Con Wank 2: The Chafening.
As discussed here and here, TJLCers like Grace and loudest-subtext-in-television have been accusing “Toplockers” (fans who headcanon Sherlock as topping John) of being “rape apologists” and “pedophiles” for a while now, especially when they attain BNF status. One fanartist in particular, Archia, caught flak because she draws youthful-looking characters; at least some Sherlock fans have claimed that her John looks about 12 years old. (It is not clear if Archia is the fanartist being referred to in this comment as having been attacked for drawing John and Sherlock without wrinkles, making them look “weirdly young.”)
Archia is dating Michi (“Traumachu” on Tumblr), whose shota kink is “pretty well known in the fandom… since they're easily the two biggest proponents of the toplock portion of the fandom, some members of the bottomlock portion of the fandom latched on to them as representational of all the toplock fans.” Archia, Traumachu, and another fan called pretty_arbitrary run a bottom!John blog together, and Archia has also created a fanart book titled //Toplock//.
The TJLCers initially didn’t object to Toplock itself but to the “Dark Fuck Prince” meme: “Basically, people running away with Sherlock's claim that he's a ‘high-functioning sociopath’ and making him into this cold, dark, rapacious top who hits poor vanilla John's arse like a Category 5 sex hurricane.” However, “the vast majority of TJLCers now have their heads shoved so far up their asses that they think all toplock is DFP.” (Another nonny picturesquely described them as “all joined mouth-to-ass so it's one long chain of spewing their shit into each other's mouths.”)
The 221b Con wank was foreshadowed in the wank around Sherlock Seattle 2015, held in January. Per this nonny, who links to several relevant posts on Kinklock, (so many!), Gracee's crowd was buttdevastated that Archia, Michi, BNF Emma Grant, and fanartist Rutobuka hosted a panel they'd wanted to host themselves. Their response was to throw around accusations of “rape apologism,” call their nemeses “crusty old has-beens,” and wring their hands about “rape kinksters shaping the minds of the young.” Another nonny later informs meme that this panel was the genesis of The JohnLock Possibility (TJLP), to which TJLCers took offense.
More foreshadowing came in March 2015, when one TJLCer posted photos of the doujin they had just burnt 1) after realizing it contained dubcon. Nonnies discussed this, pointing out that the artist benefited from this act because of the money spent on the book, and that even though physical books are overvalued and the fan had every right to burn the copy they owned,
That doesn't make book burning a value neutral act, or one that doesn't have specific symbolic weight… It's one thing to disagree with art, and another thing to publicly deface or destroy it to make your point. That's making very specific statements about censorship and moral guardianship that people rightly find very uncomfortable and worrying.
Back on FFA, another nonny linked to a post by //Sherlock// fan Roane72, who was not at the GP panel but said,
I’ve experienced this sort of harassment firsthand from the exact same group of people, and I’ve watched them do it others. They’ve formed a pattern, and their behavior is escalating. … Several people overheard a group of artists and some well-known Sherlock fandom trolls and troublemakers literally plan to go into [the Gender Politics and the Mary Morstan] panels for the sole purpose of trying to fuck them up. They were targeting one person in particular for the GP panel.2)
That person was Michi/Traumachu, who was moderating the panel. After she replied to an ask3) warning her to be careful (FFA discussion) — “These people are considering going on some crusade to start reporting people THEY deem rapists or pedophiles to the police now” — she followed up with her account of what happened at the GP panel4)
[R]ather than being able to give [her fellow panelists] the credit they deserve for their amazing work and perspectives, I am instead forced to preserve their anonymity to save them from harassment. There was talk of blogs calling for the doxxing of the 221B Con organizers.
Michi called out Graceebooks, Ivorylungs, Vellium, Katzensprotte, Taikova, Joolabee, and Kumbricwitch (see Gracee's Minions for more) as the troublemakers who had attended the panel just to “watch it crash and burn.” As proof, she put up a series of social media screencaps demonstrating their glee in disrupting the panel.
(Here, also, is a screencap of Grace claiming she attended the con “specifically with the intention of subtly intimidating people with my mere presence and not allowing bullshit to go un-pointed out.” Additionally, here is a screencap of Taikova declaring on Twitter, “the reason any of us went onto that panel w/ the aim to be confrontational was bc we knew exactly the kind of panel it wanted to become. we knew exactly why we were there and it was for a really fucking good reason. wake the f up.” Meme discussion.)
The names of these fans, Michi said, “have popped up in fandom wank again and again, especially in the harassment of other members of Sherlock fandom … where fandom issues are broken down into extremes of black and white morality.”
About half an hour into the panel, one audience member asked about survivors of sexual violence writing noncon and dubcon for therapeutic purposes. Michi, a rape survivor, feels very strongly in the therapeutic value thereof and in speaking about it whenever possible to diminish shame and stigma. Before the discussion began, she announced a trigger warning so that those who felt uncomfortable/unsafe with the topic could leave first. (Kumbricwitch, among others, left the room.)
The ensuing discussion was protracted and hostile: “[T]here were members of that group that would not let the subject drop. It was very difficult to move on, unlike previous panels I have been on. Every single point made became a debate, like they were demanding some sort of concession. Like there was a ‘winning’ point. … The previous open and sharing atmosphere started to feel tense. Contentious, even. … It became more like an interrogation than a sharing of ideas and fun discussion.”
One panelist who had outed herself as a survivor who enjoys noncon began to cry a few questions later, due to the tension in the room. “This shows me that this is not about support for survivors, even though that is the line that is often spouted by those attacking fans and calling them ‘rape apologists.’ This is not about protecting the children (of which there were none at the panel). There was no real consideration or kindness for the feelings of survivors shown by this group.”
The panel ran half an hour over. Because no one individual’s behavior could be identified as harassing, neither Michi nor the con staff could shut things down. She points out that one has to look at the larger context of their behavior, including past wanks they’d been involved in, to understand their motives. “After this tense panel and painful experience, I was later informed that they were celebrating their ‘victory.’”
Later, Michi discovered that “Vellium had recorded the panel on her iPad without any of the panelists’ or the audience’s knowledge or consent.” As other Tumblr bloggers and some nonnies would later point out, this is against both Georgia law and the con’s harassment policy.
The next morning, Michi discovered that Ivorylungs (Manna) and Katzensprotte (Falka) — former close friends of hers — had repurposed an old blog she used to share with them. They retitled it “traumachuisapedophile” and posted her real name and her photo on it. “There were no posts on it, and they didn’t publicize it anywhere, but they knew that I would see it. I can see no motivation for this other than the fact that they wanted to hurt me.”
The panelist who broke down and cried is a fan who cosplays Irene Adler in a green dress. To protect her privacy, she created a separate Tumblr account named "TheGreenIrene"5) to discuss the events at the GP panel from her perspective. (Nonnies discussed her post here, here, and here.)
Irene applied to be on the panel “because I am passionate about feminism, about queer theory, about fandom.” Quoting her panelist application, she notes it does not mention noncon fanworks “because [that] wasn’t supposed to be the topic of the panel.” Once it came up, “a group of people sitting at the front of the room derailed the discussion and kept it on the topic of rape/non-con in erotic fanworks for probably forty-fifty minutes of a panel that was only supposed to be an hour’s duration (we went over time).”
She says there is value in debating these topics in good faith. “But what happened at that panel was not about debating non-con, or about making fandom a safer space for survivors, or protecting young fans. What happened was that a group of people came in intending to intimidate and kinkshame the panelists.” And she rebuts their claim* that “there wasn’t enough diversity of opinion on the topic among the panelists. … [O]nly two of five panelists were defending the legitimacy of of depicting rape/non-con as a form of self expression.”
Various people in Grace's crowd have claimed that their comments at the panel were “not that bad. They were polite, they say. They were respectful. Even one of the panelists said they were civil.” In actuality, one panelist out of the five “said that the discussion was civil before any of us knew about the bullying going on in the background. I have spoken with my fellow panelists about the events since, and not one of us condones these individuals’ behavior.” Irene urges people to stop debating the semantics of what was said and pay attention to the larger context of harassment.
The tension and hostility in the panel room were such that Irene “felt attacked” and began to weep. (Some of Grace's friends have claimed that either she did not cry at all or was crying in response to something other than them.) During the noncon discussion, Irene “outed myself as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. I shared my story and my feelings with them in an attempt to get them to relate to me as a human being. They responded by violating my privacy and my trust.”
My feelings were confirmed when I left that panel, and people began to come out of the woodwork and tell me what they’d heard about these people going to the panel with the intention of “watching it burn.” Person after person came up to me and told me that they had been bullied, or worse, that they knew someone who had been bullied out of fandom, and it wasn’t all about non-con. People were attacked for speaking about TJLC, for shipping Sherlolly, for being pro-Mary, for writing or drawing top!lock.
…When a friend sent me a link to that video, I was triggered, and I don’t use that word lightly. It was bad enough to be brought to tears in a panel by people who admitted they came to kinkshame and intimidate. It got worse when I realized that I had fallen into a trap set by a pack of bullies willing to doxx people. I was so afraid that I spent almost all of Sunday in friends’ hotel rooms, or off hotel property, for fear of encountering these people. I felt unsafe to participate in the events hosted by a convention I’d paid for. I felt I couldn’t even squee about the good things that had happened, the wonderful and supportive people I’d met and the fun I’d had before that panel. I asked my friends not to tag me in photos for fear these people would target me. And then to cap it off, after I came home, I discovered that video of me in a vulnerable moment had been posted online.
Grace's crowd, Irene says, have claimed that “no one was calling for all-out censorship, or saying that every place in fandom has to be safe for minors.” However, the video covers only 24 minutes of a panel that ran for 90 minutes and a noncon discussion that ran for nearly a hour. “All I can say is; they professed more extreme viewpoints earlier in the panel than are shown in the bit of footage they released.”
If they actually cared about survivors, they would not have snuck a camera into a venue where survivors were sharing their stories. If they actually cared about protecting children, they would not have taken footage of an event that the con said was 18+, and at which attendees were required to show ID to get in, and put that video up where minors could see it. Additionally, they posted a video of a discussion of rape/non-con fanworks without tagging it as such or warning for content.
A nonny who attended the GP panel at 221b said that Irene
broke down crying after a … dude essentially questioned the responsibility of non-con/dub-con fanwork creators in perpetuating rape culture by writing these stories, coping mechanism or no, especially with how easy it is for minors to access. He'd done a term paper, you see, on marketing media targeted towards minors, so he had thinky thoughts on this (even though this kind of fic is IN NO WAY TARGETED TOWARDS MINORS). He mentioned how easy it was for him to find that kind of erotic fic when he was a minor, how normal it seemed to him, and how he looks back on it now and how what was a turn-on for him back then scares the shit out of him now, and what do you think of THAT.
It was essentially a mansplainy THINK OF THE CHILDREN AND DON'T WRITE YOUR RAPE APOLOGIST FILTH lecture with no solution offered except, presumably, for never writing works like it again. The panelist broke down into tears because it was such a personal issue for her.
(Note that although the above nonny mistakenly identified said “dude” as white, due to having only seen his hair, he is in fact not white.)
Either this nonny or another who attended the con reported that they left not long after he asked his question. ”[G]lad I did as I heard someone ask why they call it non-con and not rapefic and someone sneered TO KEEP IT SEXY before the door shut behind me.” Judging by this6) exchange7), that snide comment probably came from Gracee.
Finally, a nonny who watched the video while it was still up said,
[T]he crying panelist was at the very start of the video, apparently predicated by whatever happened before filming started. Later on, an audience member also mentioned being a CSA survivor during a question, while the camera panned around to show as much as every speaker's face as it could. These people need barred from as many cons as possible, and I say that as another CSA survivor who A. avoids noncon and underage stuff B. doesn't talk about it C. wouldn't want it filmed if I did and D. certainly don't want to bring it up to be considered a valid contribution to fandom discourse, which is how half this shit seems to be going.
Gracee's initial post8) about 2221b Con was described thus on meme: “There is not a single apology in that long ass post. A list of excuses. A refusal to acknowledge the widespread hurt she and her sycophants cause. Trying to make her victims respond to her (an implying that if they don't, THEY are being the unreasonable ones). I hope none of them respond, she's being completely disingenuous.”
Another nonny wrote, “As one of her victims (who wasn't acknowledged in that post) I am literally sick to my stomach. That is the most classic example of gaslighting I have ever seen in my life. I do not believe for one second that she's acting in good faith. She's not sorry. She's sorry she's getting shit now for what she's been doing all along.”
Grace's response to Michi/Traumachu was to accuse her of accusing Gracee of things9) that Michi had not, in fact, accused Gracee of. (FFA discussion.) It is worth noting that Gracee has used this strategy more than once. Here10), alluding to how she had not-at-all creepily used Leelah Alcorn's suicide as an excuse to invite trans* teenagers to stay at her place (see Gracee's Minions), she implies that people criticizing her for this have hinted that she molests minors. Nobody on FFA, at least, has ever made such a claim; the criticism is that this is one way to put kids in her debt and make them easier to manipulate as pawns in her fandom wars. A nonny points out the massive amount of projection in that post as well, as Grace and her crowd have been accusing others of victimizing children.
And her response to Irene11) was a marvel of passive-aggressive outrage and “How could you do this to me” high dudgeon that attacks Irene's character and attempts to “rebut” facts with outright lies:
This is one of the most egregious hatchet jobs I have ever read in my entire life. How can you possibly ask others to vouch for your character, to agree that you are a conscientious person of all things, when you have created a post - strike that, created a blog - specifically for the purpose of demonizing me as a person, assigning the absolute most egregious possible motivation and characterization to every choice I and anyone who has ever expressed affection or support of me has ever made with regard to 221B Con? How can you think you are posting something meaningful and credible at all when you are explicitly justifying my banning from the convention by citing a list of things I did not not do? How can you expect people to see this anonymous, newly-created-for-this-specific-purpose blog and give you the benefit of the doubt as to the reasons for that choice when you are so unbelievably unwilling to give the benefit of the doubt to any of our choices or intentions whatsoever? This is unbelievably hard and unfeeling. ….I truly hope that you all are able to access enough healing and self esteem someday to realize that you don’t have to eradicate people and viewpoints you don’t agree with off the fucking planet in order to feel secure in yourself and your own perspective. Cheers.
Nonnies discussed Gracee’s reply to Irene in detail. At least one considers Gracee's last paragraph to be “a dig at thegreenirene for being a survivor of child sex abuse.” This comment provides a long, blunt, point-by-point rebuttal, for those who want one, ending with “I think her response actually reveals how hard she's trying to twist events to paint herself in a better light.” This nonny specifically rebuts Grace's claim that the video was perfectly legal. But this one probably sums it up best:
Grace's reply is more of the usual “But what about ME? I'm the victim! I have done nothing!”
In a later post, Grace writes12), “how the fuck can we have this conversation when these people have no qualms whatsoever about telling and “confirming” blatant, utter, complete, wholesale-invented lies?” Nonny: “It's a conspiracy, clearly!”
See Gracee's Minions for receipts of their hypocrisy.
On Thursday, April 16, Gracee posted a screenshot13) of an email from 221b Con's organizers: “Due to a number of complaints about your behavior at 221B Con 2015, the Board of Directors has decided that you will not be allowed to register for our future events.” Nonnies discussed it here. It is likely to be true:
My friend and I went to the con, and this has been playing on her anxiety enough that she e-mailed the directors about graceebooks et al. earlier (whereas I've just been keeping my head down). So I'd assume that others have done the same, and therefore that this is genuine, since the con runners are pretty proactive about feedback. Last year one panel in particular drew a lot of complaints (the trans issues one, iirc?), but seems to have done much better this year.
In her disingenuous response to TheGreenIrene (discussed above under “Grace's responses”), Gracee claimed that her banning was because
people hate me so much more intensely and violently than is even remotely justified that my very existence itself is enough to make them angry. You say: “You can, as the excerpted blog says, intimidate with your mere presence.” ARE YOU KIDDING ME? You are openly advocating the idea that it is intimidating and inappropriate FOR ME TO EXIST AND ATTEND FANDOM EVENTS.
Nonny: “Her newest tack: Being barred from a con means they literally want her to not exist!”
Grace emailed the BoD back, asking them “earnestly” what she might have done to get banned from the con. As of April 21 they have not answered her14), and "She is **pressed**." She has apparently “self-reblogged that same post at least 4 times since she posted it.” (She also “reblogged her banning email like 40 some times in two minutes.”)
On April 19, Joolabee posted15), “what if we just turned it around and did everything in our power to ban roane from the con”. This refers to Roane72, for whom Gracee & Co have a serious hateboner. (Meme discussion.) They got a reply from a user named Pyrotope: “That's my plan”. (They got another reply from abundantlyqueer*16): “why don’t you get her to film people at a con without their knowledge or permission, while they discuss really sensitive, intimate stuff, and then get her to put it on the internet. surely that would be enough to get anyone banned.”)
The sequence of events seems to be that the iPad which was used to record the video of the panel belonged to Vellium, who lent it to Ivorylungs and then left the room. Ivorylungs admits to having recorded the panel*17):
I guess i need to say this again? I am the one who recorded the video… on a giant ass ipad that was not ‘snuck’ in…. there were plenty of people around me and i know one of the con staff members sitting near the door had a VERY clear shot and did nothing about it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
(On a side note, Katzensprotte/Falka claims in her tags18) to her reblog of that post, “#also no one had intentions of uploading it until people tried to drag us through the mud by lying about what happened #and i know no one in that room or on that panel would have tried to set the record straight for us lol”)
When Vellium got the iPad back from Ivorylungs, they asked Gracee, ”Do you want me to upload the video [to YouTube]?”19) Gracee responded with an enthusiastic “YES,” then posted the video once it was uploaded — ensuring that it would reach a much wider viewership — with the comment “horrifying.”20) (Ed. note: because the video was removed from YT, all that's left is the comment. From Gracee's archive page, you can tell it's a video post.)
(Plexippa posted a screenshot of the YouTube removal notice, linked at the top of this page under “In a nutshell.”)
In her response to Irene, Gracee had stated that she neither took nor uploaded the video. Keyz-Padlock retorted,
You did, however, request the video be put up by those who had taken it and were the one who posted and promoted the video to Tumblr under the sarcastic title “horrifying”. “I didn’t take the video. I didn’t upload the video. Oh but I did tell Vellium to upload it and I did promote the video on my blog but it wasn’t ME you guys omg!” I have no idea why you think this type of response is helping you. It just isn’t. It’s just getting really sad at this point that you respond in such ways. Your arrogance and flippant attitude is disgusting. You continue to make jokes about this. You continue to reblog others’ jokes about this. If you can’t see how you’re digging a bigger hole for yourself, how you are ruining your own credibility, than I don’t know what to tell you.21)
Gracee’s response to Keyz-Padlock22) was a marvel of baffled faux-earnestness, asking for “receipts” because “i literally do not know what behavior at the con [the Board of Directors] could be referring to … there seem to be countless people who DO know and just are just keeping the specifics secret. if i knew what i had done, i would better be able to react to what is going on here. thanks!! xx”
Nonnies have criticized the wankers in this wank for promoting ideas that ultimately will do more harm to victims of sexual abuse:
In response to Gracee's fetishization of queer men (see the “Grace's SJ fails” section of her wiki page for more information), a nonny who is a trans man writes that he is on sugirdaddy's list of "pedophiles" (see “Hypocrisy” on the Sherlock 221b Con Wank page for more details) — and is also a CSA survivor “who uses writing as an outlet to deal with the shame and disgust I feel about what happened to me when I was a little boy.” He continues:
This is just… Icing on the cake, in my opinion. Grace's fetishization of people like me feels like another way for them to silence me. My abuse doesn't matter. The fact they are literally accusing me of being the same as the man who molested doesn't matter. My gender doesn't matter.
I'm a straw man argument to them. I'm an effigy to be burned.
And apparently to Grace I'm also some sort of mythical perfect boyfriend and human being because I'm trans.
Can you see the disconnect here? To her I'm a monstrous pedophile and rapist. To her I'm perfect.
This whole debacle disgusts me.
Gracee’s trolling of FFA (see her wiki page for more details) produced a couple of succinct comments from nonnies about where she and her friends can shove their Helen Lovejoy-esque ideas about fandom.
...did you join fandom in your twenties or something?
Things have been age-locked since the dawn of the internet. And teens have been lying about their ages to get at it for exactly as long. It has been factually shown to be about as effective as the condom-less PIV method of birth control.
Why the fuck should adult fans spend their time moderating their activites so that kids don't see it? If it freaks the kids out, well fuck–it was labelled and rated. Maybe they should have fucking read the tags. How is it the author's fault unless they've specifically hunted down the little bastards so they could link them to their porn?
Like, thirty seconds with google and I can get a live action video of a woman being fucked by a chimpanzee, no questions about my age even asked. Give me ten minutes, and I can find you a video of a legit serial killer dismembering a corpse. These flailings about 'won't someone think of the children!' have forgotten that kids have access to way worse, and they always have the choice to not participate in fandom if it makes them uncomfortable.
Fandom isn't obligated to be kid friendly. (because fuck 'em)
And:
It does not go over well to inform a woman-heavy fandom that they must think of the poor babbies. We have been told since the dawn of time to think of the babbies. We no longer care about babbies. We want our OWN safe spaces. We are not babbie machines. Do you fucking get that? I don't give a shit about kids, yours or anyone else's. I lock my fics and I warn so survivors can choose to read or not. Beyond that, you don't get a say in what I write. PERIOD.
A nonnie asks, “Is there a fucking TJLC Wanker Bingo Card yet? Because I'm sure I have bingo.” A brilliant nonnie provides one, which now has its own wiki page.
More wank: Sherlock 221b Con Wank 2: The Chafening
* denotes posts that have since been deleted. wiki nonnie is attempting to find copies of these in reblogs and will update if possible.